The book on "Dream of the Red Chamber" is now recognized by the academic community as being composed during the Qianlong period in the middle of the Qing Dynasty, and is believed to have been composed by Cao Xueqin, the grandson of Cao Yin, who served as a weaver in Jiangnan during the Kangxi Dynasty.
Many people also rely on this article to describe the Qianlong period in the middle of the Qing Dynasty as the peak of Chinese culture.
In fact, such a statement is very problematic, for the simple reason:
First, it is impossible for a classical novel writer to sign a real name, so the "Cao Xueqin" that appears in the book can only be a pseudonym;
The second is to go through the family tree of Cao Yin's family, and I can't find this Cao Xueqin.
The author believes that these two reasons are still small problems, the real big problem, that is, after the "baptism" of banning books, burning books, and the prison of words, the whole world is silent, "avoiding the prison of words", which was the photo of the whole world at that time, and the land of China at this time did not have the conditions for "Dream of the Red Chamber" to be written.
The author believes that "Dream of the Red Chamber" can never be written in the middle of the Qing Dynasty, but can only be written in the Kangxi Dynasty of the early Qing Dynasty, which is not so strict on the literary network.
Why?
First of all, the middle and late Ming Dynasty was a climax in the development of Chinese culture, and even after the ming dynasty, the aftermath continued for a long time.
During this time, there were "Journey to the West" and "Golden Plum" in the "Four Strange Books";
There was the great opera legend "Peony Pavilion" (one of the four classical famous operas in China) and "Jingzhongqi";
There appeared the classical vernacular short story of the collection of "three words and two beats" ("Yu Shi Ming yan", "cautionary world communique", "awakening the world Heng Yan", "shooting surprise", "two moment shooting surprise")
There were also great thinkers and scientists, as well as many famous poets, such as Feng Menglong, Wu Meicun and others.
After the death of the Ming Dynasty, the aftermath continued for decades.
In the early years of the Qing Dynasty, there were still many great works, such as the opera works "Peach Blossom Fan" and "The Hall of Eternal Life" (all selected as the four famous chinese classical dramas), and the "Liaozhai Zhiyi" of the great collection of literary short stories...
(Works such as "Liaozhai Zhiyi" in the early Qing Dynasty are the aftermath of the peak of Chinese culture in the late Ming Dynasty)
It can be seen that only in this era can such a great work as "Dream of the Red Chamber" appear.
Secondly, in the middle of the Qing Dynasty, the prison of writing prevailed, and the conditions for producing great works no longer existed.
A very important reason why great works still appear in the early Qing Dynasty is that the Qing court at this time has not yet established a foothold, and their main task is to eliminate the Southern Ming regime and consolidate their rule, and they have not thought of anything else for the time being.
In addition, in order to buy people's hearts, they will not kill the thoughtful and wind-boned scholars for the time being, but mainly buy them, even if these people have anti-Qing ideas, they will not do anything to them.
However, by the middle and late Kangxi period to the Qianlong period, the Qing court's jiangshan had been stabilized, so they began to raise a bloody butcher's knife to the scholars, engaged in a literary prison, and killed all the people of insight in the world.
In such a situation, the whole world can be said to be silent, and the readers are also rigid in their thinking, and dare not cross the thunder pool for half a step.
(The Bloody Literal Prison of the Qing Dynasty reached the peak of the Qianlong Dynasty.
I would like to ask, under such a circumstance, how can a great work like "Dream of the Red Chamber" be produced?
Third, the era background of "Dream of the Red Chamber" is an "end times" with "white bones like mountains", which obviously indicates the end of the world.
The "end times" appear many times in the book, and this is also a "last days" that are so "white as mountains" that many people "forget their surnames".
Obviously, only the era of the end of the Ming Dynasty was in line with the collapse of the earth, and the middle of the Qing Dynasty was the "prosperous world" that some people who praised the stinky feet of the Qing court, and there were no large-scale wars and natural disasters and man-made disasters at this time, which did not conform to the fixed phrase of "white bones like mountains".
(The massacre of the people of the whole country by the Qing court was only in line with the "end of the world" of "white bones like mountains and forgotten surnames" in the late Ming and early Qing dynasties.)
Moreover, in the first criticism, the commentator used the word "Nanzhi Summoning Disaster", which actually explained the background of the times clearly.
Because "Nanzhi" is a historical term that only existed in the Ming Dynasty, the Ming Taizu Zhu Yuanzhang fixed the capital nanjing, and its surroundings were called "direct subordinate"; in the ming Dynasty Zhu Di period, the capital was moved to Beijing, and Nanjing became the capital, so there were two "direct subordinates", called "North Zhi" and "Nan Zhi".
The Qing Dynasty only had one "direct subordinate", and there was no distinction between "north straight" and "south straight".
The author of "Dream of the Red Chamber" entered the Qing Dynasty from the Ming Dynasty, out of habit, he would still call the surrounding area of Nanjing "Nanzhi"; and by the middle of the Qing Dynasty, the Ming Dynasty had been destroyed for more than a hundred years, and it was impossible for anyone to mention "Nanzhi" anymore.
(Only the Ming Dynasty had "Southern Zhili")
(Just as our current people don't mention chahar province, Xikang province or anything, in fact, these place names disappeared less than a hundred years ago.) ）
Fourth, the author believes that the most important thing is that "Dream of the Red Chamber" has a strong anti-Qing ideology, which is also a fundamental reason why "Dream of the Red Chamber" can only be popular in fragments.
Such a situation can also be found in the book, the most obvious is the sentence "The surname Jin, you are something"!
This sentence can be said to be "the poor dagger present", which tells the true intention of the author's heart.
We know that when Nurhaci was founded, its national name was "Jin" (historically known as "Houjin") rather than "Qing", qing was the name of the country changed by Emperor Taiji of the Qing Dynasty, and its intention was also obvious, because the Ming Dynasty belonged to the fire (the fire of the sun and moon rotation), and the Emperor Taiji hoped to use "water" to extinguish the "fire" of the Ming Dynasty.
(Nurhaci's founding name was "Jin", which was later changed to "Qing" by Emperor Taiji)
The surname of the Qing royal family, "Ai Xin Jue Luo", means "gold" in Manchu.
Therefore, the "Jin" here cannot be more explicit, that is, it refers to the regime of "Hou Jin" (that is, the Qing court), and also refers to the surname of the Qing royal family Ai Xinjueluo.
In addition, the author was afraid that the reader would not understand, so he explained the background of the times in the book through the mouth of the true girl of the true country, "Last night Zhu Lou dreamed, tonight the water country yin."
"Zhu Lou Meng", this is also too clear, the emperor of the Ming Dynasty is not surnamed Zhu?
"Water country yin", "Qing" is not water?
In addition, the surname of the first heroine in the book, Lin Daiyu, "Lin", also has a deep meaning, "Lin" is a double wood, and the rule of the Ming imperial family's name is five elements, and at the end of the Ming Dynasty, it happens that the "wood" characters are popular (for example, the last two emperors of the Ming Dynasty, Zhu Youxiao and Zhu Youjian, and the Yongli Emperor Zhu Youruo are all "wooden" characters), and the origin of "wood" and "Zhu" is also very deep, according to the "Commentary", "Zhu" is "Red Heart Wood".
(Lin Daiyu's surname "Lin" is not casual, at the end of the Ming Dynasty, most of the Ming royal family was "wood" generation, Zhu is "red heart wood")
In the first time, the Gourd Temple (i.e., Hu Yu) caught fire, causing a row of wooden structure houses to be burned down, which actually heralded the entry of the Qing court and the entire Chinese land.
As for the author's use of Baoyu's mouth to scold "Yelü Xiongnu" and so on, all the people in the book who are surnamed Jin (Jin Rong), those with jin (Xia Jingui), those with the surname Hu (Hu Yong doctor), those with "North" and "Water" (Northern Jing Wang Shui Rong), and so on are not good people, and these are also intentional by the author, and they are definitely not written casually.
From all this, it can be seen that "Dream of the Red Chamber" can only be written in the early Qing Dynasty, and this novel, which represents the highest achievement of China's classical novels, is the aftermath of the highest peak of Chinese civilization in the late Ming Dynasty.
Because the book had extremely strong national feelings, it denounced the sins of the Qing rulers, and naturally became a banned book, which could only be circulated in fragments.
The next dozens of times of writing must be a poor dagger, which will inevitably indict the tyranny of the Qing rulers and send mourning for the homeland, in other words, "Dream of the Red Chamber" is a work of "anti-Qing mourning".
It is precisely because of the lack of dozens of texts that many people have misread the book, and even some people have misunderstood the background of the book, which is really a ridiculous and generous thing!