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About author:Yang Guitang, graduated from the Department of Chinese of Nanjing Normal University, is currently an employee of a subsidiary of Sinopec.
author
Yang Guitang
The novel, like anything else, seems to be very clear; when it is taken seriously, it is confused.
In detail, there are two questions: What does the novel look like? What kind of novel is Cao Xueqin writing?
Wang Xizhi has this to say:
The future looks at the present, and the present looks at the past.
When future generations read books, it is difficult to understand the situation and state of mind of their predecessors, and they often regard themselves as their own people, take their current situation as the former people's former situation, and take the knowledge of posterity to solve the unknown of their predecessors.
The novels we are accustomed to reading are generally derived from modern Western novels. Modern print media, such as Dickens's time, had newspapers and periodicals, and the rise of the civic class had published columns. Modern China has also introduced this model, there are newspapers and periodicals, there are distribution channels, and when novels are written, there is food to eat and money to earn.
At this point, the novel has a basic concept, a basic follow-up, a communication channel, a feedback mechanism, and even an evaluation award. Writing a novel is not too humiliating. Writing novels has become a family, and there is a certain social status. In foreign countries, you can mix with a royal academician, and in China, you can mix with a provincial and ministerial level or something.
But in Cao Xueqin's time, this was not the case at all.
Mr. Lu Xun wrote a "Historical Outline of chinese Novels", which should be said to have clearly explained the general context of Chinese novels, from "decorating novels with Dry County Orders" to the naming of novels, followed by miscellaneous records of historians, essays of hundreds of families, myths of ancestors, preaching of Buddhists, legends of the Tang dynasty, words of the Song people, and lectures of Yuan Ming. After the Ming Dynasty, novels were gradually enriched, such as telling history, gods and demons, public cases, chivalry, irony, condemnation, and human feelings.
Rao is like this, the novel is not very highly regarded, not as good as poets, historians, etc., and even can not belong to the ranks of literati and inkers, even Liu Yongliu, who is instructed to fill in the words, is not as good as liu yongliu. This situation had not changed much by the time of Cao Xueqin.
Although, people like novels, like "Dream of the Red Chamber", even the royal family is no exception - there are barnyard history records, the Qing Dynasty royal family ordered people to copy all of the "Dream of the Red Chamber", thirteen lines per page, three crosses, and there are fine characters on each page, Zhu Pi, from the hand of Empress Dowager Cixi. Legend has it that Empress Dowager Cixi liked to read "Dream of the Red Chamber" the most, and often compared herself to Shi Taijun. Of course, this is also the novelist's statement, and even if it is taken seriously, it will not change the novelist's despicable status.
If we say that Cao Xueqin is a novelist, and his old man wakes up, will he scare us so much: you are only a novelist, your whole family is a novelist!
We probably know that Cao Xueqin is a flag person, the Cao family was once wide, the ancestors were once red and purple, rich and oily, but the family road declined. Cao Xueqin herself, who also had a generous life, was soon interrupted, just like the one written in "Dream of the Red Chamber":
Suddenly the horn is like a building falling, and the darkness is as if the lights are about to run out.
Mr. Lu Xun has a saying:
Who has fallen from a well-off family into a difficult situation, I think that in this way, I can probably see the true face of the world.
Before falling into the trap, the Zhou family was well-off, which was as rich and noble as the Cao family. Otherwise, Mr. Lu Xun could also write such a work with aristocratic temperament as "Dream of the Red Chamber".
Yu Pingbo, in the preface to the "Eighty Returns to the Schoolbook of the Dream of the Red Chamber", described Cao Xueqin in this way——
We only know that he and Duncheng read books, and worked on poetry, good at painting, good at drinking, good at talking, and tireless in telling people all day long. Later, he lived near Xishan in Beijing and was quite poor. Only one youngest son also died, so Xueqin became emotionally ill, and within a few months he also died and was buried in the western suburbs of Beijing. All that was left was his widow, who was depressed behind him. The second half of the manuscript of "Dream of the Red Chamber" was quickly lost, which is not necessarily a reason.
Cao Xueqin was an uneven "generous and tragic man", which can be seen from the poems given by his friends such as Dun Min, Dun Cheng, and Zhang Yiquan. He wrote the word "Dream Nguyen", and his friends also used Nguyen books in their poems to compare him. And "drunk and thirsty", friends will be Chun Yu compared to him, and after death, they will use Liu Ling to compare him.
He excelled at poetry and painting. He painted landscapes and also stones. He drank wine and painted, drew money and went to sell wine. From here, we can also see Cao Xueqin's personality. The style of his poems is close to That of Li Changji. His life is a novelty of poetry, and there are still broken sentences such as "Bai Fu ShiLing should be very happy, and he will teach the barbarian ghosts to be pompous", and the style is more or less the same.
Some people think that "Dream of the Red Chamber" has the meaning of poetry, which is incorrect. We can clearly see that the poems of the characters in "Dream of the Red Chamber" are one of the organic components of the novel. Such poems are also subordinate to the character of the author's characters. This is a point worth noting.
In addition, he may play the piano and sing songs. He was a versatile talent—naturally his greatest achievement was in fiction.
So the question is, why did Cao Xueqin write a novel? You can write poetry, you are good at painting, you can play the piano and sing songs, you can be a poet and a painter, can't you?
In fact, everyone has their own wanderings. Wang Guowei wrote two "Thirty Self-Prologues", each saying:
Weak voxels, melancholy sex, and life's problems go back and forth day after day.
To be a poet, the nature of the remainder is to be bitter for the philosopher, and to be a widow, and to be a poet is to be bitter and feelings and to be rational. Poetry? Philosophical? What will he die in the day, I don't dare to know, or is it in between?
In the end, Wang Guowei still did not understand, and committed suicide at the age of fifty on the sinking Kunming Lake.
Cao Xueqin didn't know what to rely on, and didn't know what to do with herself. As I understand it, he cannot be satisfied with being a poet, being a painter. His sky is incomparably far away, his mind is incomparably wide, his pain is incomparably heavy, and his compassion is incomparably deep. Neither poetry nor painting can carry his profundity or express his richness.
Falling from wealth to hardship, Cao Xueqin embraces the talent of making up for heaven, and he will create a world for a long time, just like Sima Qian:
Sincerely writing this book, hiding the famous mountain, passing it on to others, and passing it on to others, then the servants pay for the responsibility of the previous humiliation, although they are killed, how can they repent?
Among the many readers of "Dream of the Red Chamber", zhang Ailing feels that the closest to Cao Xueqin is Zhang Ailing, but her "Nightmare of the Red Chamber" is too difficult to read. According to Zhang Ailing, "Dream of the Red Chamber" was not written in one go, nor was it completed. From "Treasure Book of the Wind and Moon" to "Twelve Nobles of Jinling" and "Record of Love Monks", after decades of gestation, writing, deletion, and copying, it later took on the form of "Stone Record" and "Dream of the Red Chamber", from the initial memories of unwillingness, guilt and repentance, resentment and depression, satire and persuasion, to the final creation of novels based on life experience. Ge Fei has to say:
The novel's only advantage in winning over the reader is that it relies on words to stimulate the reader's imagination, and pays attention to those existences that are ignored by the reality of social subjects through the unique thinking of the individual on the existence itself.
"Dream of the Red Chamber" is exactly the existence that Cao Xueqin pays attention to that is ignored by social subjects, and it is the dream world created by experience rumination and ideological fantasy after the collapse of Cao Xueqin's personal and family real world, but this construction has not been fully completed.
Today we know that "Dream of the Red Chamber" created a dualistic world where people and gods are connected.
In the world of God, there are great desolate mountains and green peaks, there are too illusory realms, there are vast masters, and there are vague real people. The Westerner Nabokov said:
A good novel is a good myth.
"Dream of the Red Chamber" has a clear mythological model:
Shi Youling - self-exercise, spirituality has been understood;
Stone has resentment - there is no material to make up for the heavens, self-hatred and self-pity, day and night sorrow;
Stone has desire - want to enter the red dust, rich and noble field, gentle township to enjoy;
Shi Youyu - into the red dust, nineteen years, to see the fact of the rise and fall of the Twelve Chao and Jia Province;
Shi Youwu - see through the red dust and lead to the other shore, but it is just coming and going.
One of the monks, communicating with man and god, has always assumed the role of director, played the function of guide and savior, conveyed the will of the gods, and promoted the process of the world.
In the world of people, there are the second house of Rongning, there is the Grand View Garden, and there are the daughters headed by the Twelve Nobles of Jinling. Even Baoyu exclaimed:
"Oh my God, how many essences do you have, giving birth to these people on the top, you know that I am a frog at the bottom of the well, the Cheng Ri family only said that these few people now are unique, who knows whether they don't have to look far away, it is the local scenery, one race is like one, and now I have grown a layer of learning." In addition to these few, are there still a few that cannot be achieved? ”
Therefore, in October of the thirteenth year of the advent of this stone, the first heavy snow in winter, all the women of that day, including Daiyu, Baochao, Xiangyun, Tanchun, Li Feng, Xiangling, Li Wen, Li Qi, Xing Xianyan, Xue Baoqin, Jian Fengjie, Ping'er, plus Yi Hongyuan Turbid Jade, Roast Meat and Wine, that is, Jing Lian poems, the meaning is still unfinished, and a number of red plum blossoms are given.
At this time, Dai Yu Baochao released his previous suspicions, and yingchun was in the garden, and Miao Yu lived in seclusion in Li Cui'an and gave everyone a red plum. In the Grand View Garden, the scenery is picturesque, the female masters are gathered, and the poetry is full of poetry - the unique Yuan Chun is still in that unseemly place.
In addition to Lu Xue Guanglian poems, Jia Baoyu Qingmei, there are also Daiyu funeral flowers, Baochao fluttering butterflies, Xiangyun drunken sleep, Mandarin duck Xuan, Lingguan painting roses, Qingwen tearing fans... The beautiful characters and countless classic scenes have always remained in this world and in people's hearts.
Cao Xueqin wants to express his understanding of the world and spread his values through "Dream of the Red Chamber". Cao Xueqin made it clear that "Dream of the Red Chamber" "talks about love in a big way".
This statement is exclusive, that is to say, all the current political situations, career economies, family rises and downs, etc. involved in the book are by no means "big purposes" . The main purpose of intercourse is to love the daughter first.
The Grand View Garden is the daughter country, which is a too illusory realm built in the human world. Cao Xueqin more than once, borrowing zhen Jia Baoyu's mouth, emphasized the supremacy of her daughter, saying:
"It turns out that the innate man is the spirit of all things, the essence of the sun and the moon in the mountains and rivers, only the daughter, and the man with the eyebrows is just some scum and turbid foam." "Daughters are flesh and bones made of water, and men are flesh and bones made of mud." When I saw my daughter, I was refreshed, and when I saw a man, I felt foul and smelly. ”
A "Dream of the Red Chamber", with the Grand View Garden as the world, the daughters as the protagonists, and the romance as the main purpose. There is truth, goodness and beauty in the boudoir, the daughter is respectable and lovely, the emotion is valuable, and it can carry the life of the universe.
Open up Hongmeng, who is the love species?
Undoubtedly, "Dream of the Red Chamber" has opened up the world of love and established new values.
The general purpose of love also involves the love of children. There is a wooden stone frontier between Bao Dai, a golden stone marriage between Bao Yu, a hazy affection between Bao Yu and Qingwen, and Bao Yu and Raider have tried to do what the police have taught. On a larger scale, it also includes the private affairs of Xiaohong and Jia Yun, Siqi and Pan You'an, and even the love between Jiaoxing and Jia Yucun. The love between men and women no longer needs to be avoided, nor is it as vulgar as the popular erotic novels of the time.
The purpose of the conversation is extended to the human world. As Qi Liaosheng says in the preface:
Writing boudoir is extremely solemn, while Yanye is already full of paper; the shape of the valve reading is extremely plump, and the decline has been full of eyelashes.
There is also the author's creation of "Good Song", lamenting the sadness of the world. The pure love of the daughter, the true love of men and women, the sorrow of the world. Cao Xueqin vividly depicts the love and sex of the human world. It has experienced the major events of family destruction and death, and the trees have fallen and scattered, showing the big ending of "a thousand reds and one cry" and "all the colors and sorrows".
Cao Xueqin's compassion is deep and broad, covering the most human feelings, extending to ancient and modern China and foreign countries, comparable to The Buddha and Jesus.
Holding up a rafters and creating such a world, Cao Xueqin can be described as painstaking. For the first time, there is a passage summarizing the "secret methods in the book":
The facts are facts, but there are also gaps, twists and turns, smooth and contradictory, reflection belts, hidden views, positive and leap, so that the grass snake gray line, the sound of the empty valley, one blow and two sounds, the Ming Xiu Zhan Dao, the darkness of Chen Cang, the cloud dragon fog and rain, the confrontation between the two mountains, the moon and the moon, the powder on the back, the thousands of dyes, the secret methods in the strange book are no less.
Other specific writing techniques mentioned in the fat batch include: Fu Pulse Qianli, Spring and Autumn Character Method, Hengyun Broken Ridge Method, Cloud Cover Peak Tip Method, Word Splitting Method, Three-Five Gathering and Dispersion Method, Smuggling Golden Needle Method, Writing Without Writing, Un-Yang First Suppression Method, Inverted Curtain, and so on.
Expressing the world with words and depicting the world, the great challenges faced by writers can only be solved with painstaking thoughts and wisdom.
Cao Xueqin has created her own world, not only family stories, wonderful characters, but also myths and fantasies, dream sayings, as well as poetry and song, Andying Order, of which the delicacy of etiquette is particularly worth learning...
The unique world created by Cao Xueqin integrates the writing method of ancient novels and the concept of Western novels, with profound thoughts, exquisite structure, bright characters, moving plots, and gorgeous language.
As we know today, Cao Xueqin's creation of "Dream of the Red Chamber" was a creative act, concentrating on the great achievements of Chinese culture and creating a miracle of world literature. Wang Guowei said that "Dream of the Red Chamber" can be called "a great work", "a tragedy within a tragedy", "a great work in the universe", and "the only major work in mainland art". But on that day, did Cao Gong have this kind of self-consciousness and self-confidence? Wang Bo wrote:
The mountain is difficult to cross, who is sad about the person who has lost the road? Pingshui meets, all are guests of other places.
Cao Xueqin solemnly declares:
Full of absurd words, a handful of bitter tears. All cloud authors are stupid, who understand the taste.
The family was ruined, the people were scattered, and Cao Xueqin was desperate. He inevitably regretted the day's stumbling, deeply believed in the value of compassion, lamented the misunderstanding of the world, doubted the meaning of his writing, and finally died in helplessness, leaving his world to future generations.
Therefore, I would rather call this "Dream of the Red Chamber" the world of the Red Chamber, the self-sufficient world built by Cao Xueqin.
Disclaimer: This article only represents the personal views of the author and has nothing to do with the position of this public account. Some of the illustrations come from the Internet, if there is infringement, please contact to delete.