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Oct. 31 (NBD) - Journalism tycoon and the most widely read martial arts novelist, Jin Yong, has died at age 94 on Tuesday in a Hong Kong hospital, according to Ming Pao Daily News.

The news has sent shock across the Chinese-speaking world, where the literary giant's tales of swords and warriors have become shared cultural memories for generations of readers.

Jin Yong, pen name of Louis Cha Leung-yung, serialized his first novel The Book and the Sword in 1955, which became an instant success. By 1972, when the last installment of The Deer and the Cauldron was published, Jin Yong had created 15 martial arts novels. 

Over 100 million copies were sold worldwide, according to South China Morning Post.

His novels were translated into different languages, including three in English and eight in Japanese.

Jin Yong's magnum opus, The Legend of the Condor Heroes, is being translated into English. The volume 1 titled A Hero Born, was published in February this year and received critical acclaim.

Besides, his works had been adapted into countless TV series, movies, radio dramas, comics and video games, penetrating almost every aspect of popular culture. It is likely that every Chinese speaker is influenced by Jin Yong, a BBC article said.

Jin Yong's martial sagas are often set against the backdrop of China's political history, in which heroes and villains operate in an underground world called "Jianghu". Jianghu is a space parallel to the conventional society, with its own laws and code of ethics, according to Professor Petrus Liu in a Quartz interview.

The universe constructed by Jin Yong's oeuvre is often compared to those created by J.K. Rowling in the Harry Porter series, or J.R.R. Tolkien in Lord of the Rings and The Hobbits.

Jin Yong is not just a genius novelist. In 1959, he co-founded a newspaper called Ming Pao in Hong Kong. Not only did he serialize new martial arts novels on the publication, but he also wrote editorials that had huge impact among intellectuals.

It is reported that Jin Yong had written for Ming Pao 2,000 words of editorials under Cha Leung-Yung in day time, and 5,000 words of novels in the evening under pen name for over 20 years. 

His prolific writings made him a rare example of literary man getting rich. Started as a tabloid with small circulation, Ming Pao grew into a media giant and went public in 1991 in Hong Kong Exchanges and Clearing Limited. Jin Yong's 60 percent of holdings in the company sent him to the 64th richest Chinese in Hong Kong that year.

Apart from stocks and book royalties, Jin Yong also rolled in money from various forms of adaptations. For example, His novels had been repeatedly transformed into TV series and films, amounting to 89 adaptations for 14 novels, according to incomplete statistics. 

Moreover, online game developer Perfect World bought the right to adapt four novels into games in 2011. Another game developer Changyou.com spent 20 million yuan (2.9 million U.S. dollars) for the adaptation rights of Jin Yong's 11 works in 2013.

Jin Yong was born in Haining, Zhejiang in 1924, and graduated from Law School of Soochow University in 1948. He began work as a translator for the newspaper Ta Kung Pao in Shanghai in 1947, and was assigned to the paper's Hong Kong office in 1948. 

He was awarded the Order of the British Empire in 1981, and earned Doctor of Philosophy in oriental studies from the University of Cambridge in 2010, after submitting a thesis on early Tang Dynasty. 

Email: limenglin@nbd.com.cn