Top Five Most Interesting Things about the Third Wave

5. Seven Sages of the Bamboo Grove
The Seven Sages of the Bamboo Grove, or SSBG, was a group of Chinese scholars, writers, and musicians that came together to drink wine and write poetry. They were a very unique group of people, really similar to the hippies of the 1960s. Both what they wrote and the Sages themselves are very interesting. I found the story of the SSBG’s drinking game involving writing poetry and passing wine down a river to be almost too peculiar to be real. A story about how the different sages came to be and how they met each other would be really appealing. However, I found their work to be a tad boring, so I’d like to focus on the characters themselves rather than what they wrote.

4. Buddhism
I’m much more interested in the spread of Buddhism to China than the actual beginnings of the religion. I found the legend on how Buddhism was first started to be very confusing, so I’d like to write a story that is about a different part of the religion. I was fascinated by the fact that loads of different religions such as Christianity were found in the capital of Chang’An. It’s quite impressive how open the Chinese were at the time. I think a story about a Indian or Tibetan Buddhists traveling to China could be both informative and interesting. It would also be a perfect example to show the similarities and differences between Theravada and Mahayana Buddhism.

3. Martial Arts
This is a topic that most guys will find interesting. Everyone has seen or heard about the intense meditating that monks do that allow them to accomplish near inhuman feats, such as breaking bricks with their heads or even lowering their body temperature  . The fact that a type of fighting could be considered an art shows a lot about the Chinese. Like calligraphy, the Chinese take much more thought into things that most Westerners think nothing about. Also, there are so many movies that explore almost every aspect of the art that it would be hard not to find one part that is not interesting.


2. Chang’An
Chang’An was the capital of Ancient China during the Tang Dynasty, and was the capital of more than ten dynasties. Chang’An still exists to this day, though it is known as Xi’an. Chang’an was one of the biggest cities of its time, supposedly having a million inhabitants in 750AD. What is great about Chang’An is that we can learn so much about Chinese culture at the time, as metropolitan areas are usually the home of culture. There are records on fashion, art, religion, sport; so much can be discovered about the Chinese by learning about Chang’An. I would really like to write a fictional story that would show some part of the culture. Like for example, write a story about an athlete struggling to survive in the city that would show how sport affected the people of China at the time. I actually just visited Xi’an over break, and feel like actually being there could make writing a screenplay much easier and realistic.


1. The Three Kingdoms
The Three Kingdoms was caused when three different Han generals, sent to 3 different parts of China to subdue the Yellow Turban extremists, each believed that the current emperor had lost the Mandate of Heaven and believed that they were the most fit to become the new emperor. China split up into the empires of Wu, Shu, and Wei. This period, lasting from 220AD to 280AD, is one of the bloodiest periods in Chinese history. I'm really interested in this topic as it is really relevant to my project goal of a screenplay. There have been hundreds of operas, folk stories, novels, films, television series, and even video games about the Three Kingdoms, meaning I have a lot of different sources that I could base my screenplay off. In fact, one of China’s biggest blockbusters, Red Cliff, was based off the Battle of Red Cliff in 208AD. A screenplay was based off one battle alone during an 80 year period, so there is definitely enough material to write a good, informative, screenplay.