Sunday, September 21, 2008

Ni Kuang

Ni Kuang is a prolific novelist and scriptwriter, with more than 300 published martial arts and science fiction novels and more than 400 movie scripts.

Born as Ni Chong , he grew up in Shanghai. He worked as a official in the 1950s in Inner Mongolia before moving to Hong Kong in 1957.

His science fiction stories, which have been enjoyed by generations of juvenile readers in Hong Kong, usually take the form of - at the end the unexplainable is often explained by pointing to the doings of extraterrestrial life. The most famous heroes in his science fiction stories, which have been adapted into TV dramas and films, are Wai See-lei and Yuen Tsang-hop . In their adventures, critics of communism are common. Wai See-lei was born in a wealthy and traditional big family, somewhere in the south-eastern region of Yangtze River. Here he was trained with many kinds of martial arts. He became an orphan early, but he has no financial concerns. After he had grown up, he moved to Hong Kong, got married with the daughter of the head of underground society, and his adventures became international, sometimes even intersolar. Wai's stories take first person narrative.

Ni wrote many scripts for Shaw Brothers Studio, and often co-wrote scripts with Chang Cheh, including hits such as ''One-Armed Swordsman'', ''The Assassin'' and ''Crippled Avengers''.

Ni helped Jin Yong to write episodes of his martial arts novels when Cha was busying himself with other business; and, according to the late Wong Jim, that was the reason why Cha, dissatisfied with Ni's often wild extemporisations, had to revise his novels. It is known that Ni had written at least an extended episode in ''Demi-Gods and Semi-Devils'', when Cha was out on holidays abroad, although much of it was excised in Cha's first revision. Ni, while helping Cha write a chapter while he was busy, made A Zi, a character from ''Demi-Gods and Semi-Devils'', blind in the story. Cha has since re-edited his swordfighting works but still left this part, written by Ni, in his work.

Ni Kuang later migrated to the United States in the 1990s and has continued his writing career there. In 2006, Ni and his wife moved back to Hong Kong after he sold his home in the United States.

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