Yue and Chang’e
Yue (月-yue- moon) is visually based on Chang’e, but their stories differ.
Chang’e 嫦娥 is the Chinese goddess of the Moon. Unlike many lunar deities in other cultures who personify the Moon, Chang’e only lives on the Moon. As the “woman on the Moon”, Chang’e could be considered the Chinese complement to the Western notion of a man in the Moon.
One version of Chang-e’s story: Chang’e and her husband Houyi were immortals living in ‘heaven’. One day, the ten sons of the Jade Emperor transformed into suns, causing the earth to scorch. The Jade Emperor summoned Houyi for help. Houyi, using his legendary archery skills, shot down nine of the sons, but spared one son to be the sun. The Jade Emperor was obviously not pleased with Houyi’s solution : nine of his sons were dead.
As punishment, the Jade Emperor banished Houyi and Chang’e to live as mere mortals on earth.
Chang’e felt miserable over her loss of immortality and Houyi decided to find the pill of immortality so that they could be immortals again. Houyi brought the pill home and stored it in a case. He warned Chang’e not to open the case. Chang’e became too curious. She opened the case and found the pill just as Houyi was returning home. Nervous that Houyi would catch her discovering the contents of the case, she accidentally swallowed
the entire pill and started to float into the sky/heaven because of the overdose.
Although Houyi wanted to shoot her in order to prevent her from floating further, he could not bear to aim the arrow at her.
Chang’e kept on floating until she landed on the Moon.
