The Story of the Stone: a Chinese Novel: Vol 1, The Golden Days (Penguin Classics)

Product Information

Another reason the novel is admired as much as it is, is that all is not rosy in the portrait of China that this novel conveys. Okay? This novel is famous for being extremely candid, extremely honest at looking at the, um, aspects of Chinese society that Chinese people at the time would have been troubled by. Library Journal stated that "This sequel to Bridge of Birds ( Del Rey, 1985) reaffirms Hughart's gift for comic fantasy as well as his talent for ingenious storytelling." [2]

Morson, Gary Saul, and Caryl Emerson. 1990. Mikhail Bakhtin: Creation of a Prosaics. Stanford: Stanford University Press. [ Google Scholar] Zachary Davis: This is Ronald Egan, a professor of East Asian languages and cultures at Stanford University.In 2014, three researchers using data analysis of writing styles announced that "Applying our method to the Cheng–Gao version of Dream of the Red Chamber has led to convincing if not irrefutable evidence that the first 80 chapters and the last 40 chapters of the book were written by two different authors." [14]

The main protagonist is about 12 or 13 years old when introduced in the novel. [21] The adolescent son of Jia Zheng and his wife, Lady Wang, and born with a piece of luminescent jade in his mouth (the Stone), Baoyu is the heir apparent to the Rongguo House. Frowned on by his strict Confucian father, Baoyu reads Zhuangzi and Romance of the Western Chamber on the sly, rather than the Four Books of classic Chinese education. Baoyu is highly intelligent, but dislikes the fawning bureaucrats who frequent his father's house. A sensitive and compassionate individual, he has a special relationship with many of the women in the house. Yumemakura, Baku. 2005. Shamen Konghai Zhi Tang Guo Guiyan. Taipei: Yuan-Liou Publishing. [ Google Scholar] Only its length might scare off readers -- otherwise there is nary a fault to find with this incredible work. Preferring the company of girls and women, Bao-yu seeks out the company of Dai-yu, Bao-chai, or others when possible.

Data Availability Statement

Dream of the Red Chamber contains an extraordinarily large number of characters: nearly 40 are considered major characters, and there are over 400 additional ones. [17] The novel is also known for the complex portraits of its many women characters. [18] According to Lu Xun in the appendix to A Brief History of Chinese Fiction, Dream of the Red Chamber broke every conceivable thought and technique in traditional Chinese fiction; its realistic characterization presents thoroughly human characters who are neither "wholly good nor wholly bad", but who seem to inhabit part of the real world. [19] Ronald Egan: There are admirable characters in the novel. They aren't shallow in the respect that they lead very, very simple, happy lives. There are admirable characters who struggle with the problems of the society that the author goes out of his way to depict. And yet they struggle with these problems without allowing themselves to become corrupted by them. For example, the father of Baoyu. Baoyu is the, the young man protagonist. His father is a respectable man. He is completely out of touch with his son and out of tune with his son. But you don't finish the novel thinking that he's a bad man. You, you finish the a novel with a keen sense of here's a good man who is struggling to retain his ethics and morality in a society in which it is challenged almost every day. Yu, Anthony C. 1997. Rereading the Stone: Desire and the Making of Fiction in Dream of the Red Chamber. Princeton: Princeton University Press. [ Google Scholar] The autopsy of Brother Squint-Eyes reveals a normal corpse that died of fright. It also reveals that he had feasted during a recent trip to Ch'ang-an. They visit the devastated Princes' Path, a flowered path whose upkeep is paid for by the Laughing Prince's fortune. The abbot tells them that the prince's descendant Liu Pao wishes to meet them. The peasants also wish them to be certain that the Laughing Prince is still in his tomb. Zürcher, Erik. 2007. Buddhist Conquest of China: The Spread and Adaption of Buddhism in Early Medieval China. Leiden: Brill. First published 1959. [ Google Scholar]

So if you ask why Chinese readers have for 300 years so loved this novel, um, they respect it for its honesty. Because to face these problems, which are really endemic problems in traditional Chinese society, to face them as candidly and as openly as this author does takes a lot of courage, actually. Takes a lot of courage. Later, they walk through the part of Peking known as Heaven's Bridge, a crime filled area. Master Li spots a robbery in progress and makes a detour to Fire Horse Park, specifically to the Eye of Tranquility, a small lake surrounded by old sinners hoping for salvation, following the tradition of Chiang Taikung, a Taoist who fished without worms. Li Kao wrings a confession about the mushrooms from a toadish fellow named Hsiang. He identifies the manuscript fragment as a Ssu-ma Ch'ien, but an obvious forgery. It has also been traced recently. Flower-maidens combine for nocturnal birthday revels; And a grass widow copes with funeral arrangments single-handedLee, Haiyan. 2010. Enemy under My Skin: Eileen Chang’s Lust, Caution and the Politics of Transcendence. PMLA 125: 640–56. [ Google Scholar] [ CrossRef]

Grief of Dawn's odd manners and knowledge, part peasant, part courtier are remarked on by Master Li. The samples show no traces of anything beyond natural decay. They make a visit to Serpentine Park, where Master Li cleverly obtains rubbings of the Confucian Stones. He later alters them to appear to be forgeries (changing the old form of the character 且 to its newer form) and trades them at the Pavilion of the Blessings of Heaven, a library, for the tracings sold by Brother Squint-Eyes. Lady Wang authorizes a raid on Prospect Garden; And Jia Xi-chun breaks off relations with Ning-guo HouseIn the other world the two were meant for each other, and their relationship in the real world drives much of the dramatic, romantic, and tragic tension of the book. In 2020, Zhang Qingshan, the president of the academic organization Society of the Dream of the Red Chamber, stated that although the authorship of the novel's last 40 chapters remains uncertain, it is unlikely Gao E was the one who wrote them. [15] Plot summary [ edit ] A piece from a series of brush paintings by the Qing dynasty artist Sun Wen (1818–1904), depicting a scene from the novel.