On April 23, 2022, China Post issued a set of 4 special stamps and 1 miniature sheet of "Masterpieces of Chinese Classical Literature - (5)". The names of the stamp designs are: Dai Yu Burning Manuscript, Jinyu Marriage, TanChun Yuan Marriage, Bao Yu But Dust, and the name of the miniature zhang pattern is: Hantang Crane Shadow. The full set of stamps has a face value of $11.10. The number of stamps planned to be issued is 8.6 million sets, and the number of miniature sheetlets is planned to be 5.98 million.
"Dream of the Red Chamber", also known as "Stone Record", "Jinling Twelve Chao", "Love Monk Record", "Wind and Moon Treasure Book", is one of the most outstanding works in the history of Chinese novels. The book is one hundred and twenty times, the first eighty times were written by Cao Xueqin in the Qing Dynasty, and the last forty times are generally considered to be compiled by Cheng Weiyuan and Gao Yan in the Qing Dynasty.
The whole book takes the rise and fall of the four major families of Jia, Shi, Wang and Xue as the background, and takes the tragedy of Jia Baoyu's love marriage with Lin Daiyu and Xue Baochao as the central clues, and reflects the politics, economy, thought, culture and life of the patriarchal society in a panoramic way. The book has created many artistic images with distinct personalities, grand scale, strict structure, beautiful language, high degree of ideological and outstanding artistic achievements, and is the encyclopedia of China's feudal society and the aggregator of traditional culture.
This set of stamps is the fifth set of stamps in the "Masterpieces of Classical Chinese Literature" series issued by China Post since 2014, depicting five story scenes from the 76th to the 120th time of the novel.
The small zhang "Hantang Crane Shadow" shows the scene of Daiyu and Xiangyun Mid-Autumn Festival's joint poem Yongyue, and the picture creates a poignant and quiet literary and quiet poetic situation with cool tones; the first picture, "Dai Yu Burning Draft", shows the scene of Dai Yu burning the poem manuscript lying in bed and cutting off the infatuation, through the delicate portrayal of the character's action demeanor, showing the situation in which Dai Yu is still in tears and has made up his mind; the second picture, "Golden Jade Marriage", shows the scene of Bao Yu and Bao Chao becoming relatives, through Bao Yu's stunned expression and Bao Chao's helpless look, The atmosphere of the novel's tragedy is implied; the third figure, "Exploring Spring and Marrying Far Away", shows the scene of a single shadow of Tanchun taking a boat to get married, hiding his face and crying, and expresses the reluctance and sorrow of the characters' hearts through the rendering of the broken kite, the vast sea and other environments; the fourth figure, "Baoyu but Dust", shows the scene of Baoyu stepping barefoot on the snow and drifting away, highlighting Baoyu's determination to cut off the dust edge and abandon the monk.
This set of stamps was created by Xiao Yutian, a famous painter and national first-class artist. The painter uses the traditional Chinese painter's method of heavy color creation, the picture composition is full, the colors are simple and delicate, the characters are vividly portrayed, and the story scene of the original novel is brilliantly depicted, showing the novel ending of "sorrowful gold mourning jade" and "wind and clouds", and drawing a satisfactory end to the series of stamps of "Masterpieces of Classical Chinese Literature".
The set of stamps is printed by Beijing Stamp Factory Co., Ltd. using photocopying technology, and is sold at designated postal outlets, philatelic network halls, China Post mobile phone clients, China Post WeChat Mall of China Post WePufea Bureau and WeChat Mini Program of China Post Mall for a period of 6 months from the date of issuance. In order to display the stamp content more abundantly, China Post will release digital content through the "China Philatelic Stamp Encyclopedia" WeChat Mini Program, and stamp collectors can use the AR function to watch.
Source: People's Daily client
Guangzhou Daily New Flower City Editor: Chen Tingting