Judge Dee at Work

Robert van Gulik's book Judge Dee at Work details the fictional exploits of a real-life Chinese official from the seventh century. Judge Dee was Magistrate of Peng-lai, a remote region on China's northeastern coast. Dee had many responsibilities, but in this incarnation, his specialty was solving crimes. This paper will examine Judge Dee, his strengths and weaknesses, both in a modern context and according to the standards of his time and culture.

Judge Dee had many admirable traits, from benevolence to empathy to wisdom. His most admirable characteristic, though, was his sense of justice. Judge Dee wielded immense power as the magistrate, overseeing the entire area. To that role he brought an overpowering desire to achieve righteousness, without self-aggrandizement or self-righteousness.

Judge Dee's desire to do what was right runs through all of the stories. In "Five Auspicious Clouds," Judge Dee was investigating the murder of Mrs. Ho. At first, the death appeared to be a suicide, but Judge Dee quickly ascertained that Mrs. Ho was murdered (6). The killer, Mr. Ho, tried to make it appear that Mrs. Ho died at 4:30 p.m., thus giving him an airtight alibi he was meeting with Judge Dee at that time. Moreover, that allowed the killer to frame another man, a painter named Fung who loved Mrs. Ho but did not marry her because he suffered from an illness (10).

At first, Judge Dee fell for the murderer's elaborate trap and arrested Fung (14). Soon after, though, the ki

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had nothing to gain by interceding in military matters, yet he went to the trouble. In the first instance, Colonel Meng Kwo-Tai faced beheading for killing a colleague at a local army fort (22). The military had a strong case. The victim was a killed by an arrow in his upstairs room. The wall outside his window could not be scaled and no one passed the guards in the hallway, so the arrow seemingly must have come through the window from a distance, fired by an expert marksman such as Meng (27). Dee's initial investigation did not turn up anything new, but he pressed forward, even after Meng, the accused, told him to drop the matter (33). Something nagged at Judge Dee, and he finally got the break he needed while delving into some missing forms with the fort commander (33). That led Dee to the truth, which never would have been achieved without his overriding desire to see justice done. Later Judge Dee was transferred to a northern province, one that was facing attack from the Tartars. He was ill with a cough, yet he listens patiently while a woman tells him about her husband, who was to be executed. The accused was Captain Woo, and the military has convicted him of having an affair with Captain Pan's wife. That offense a

Category: Foreign - J