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基本信息
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出版社：Penguin Classics
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页码：400 页
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出版日期：1982年
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ISBN：0140443711
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条形码：9780140443714
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版本：1982-09-01
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装帧：平装
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开本：32开
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外文书名：The Debt of Tears (The Story of the Stone,
or The Dream of the Red Chamber, Volume 4) (Paperback)
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内容简介
在线阅读本书
'The Story of the Stone' (c. 1760), also known by the title of 'The
Dream of the Red Chamber', is the great novel of manners in Chinese
literature. Divided into five volumes, of which 'The Debt of Tears'
is the fourth, it charts the glory and decline of the illustrious
Jia family (a story which closely accords with the fortunes of the
author's own family). The two main characters, Bao-yu and Dai-yu,
are set against a rich tapestry of humour, realistic detail and
delicate poetry, which accurately reflects the ritualized
hurly-burly of Chinese family life. But over and above the novel
hangs the constant reminder that there is another plane of
existence a theme, which affirms the Buddhist belief in a
supernatural scheme of things.
作者简介
CAO XUEQIN (171 5?-63) was born into a family which for three
generations held the office of Commissioner of Imperial Textiles in
Nanking, a family so wealthy that they were able to entertain the
Emperor Kangxi four times. But calamity overtook them and their
property was confiscated. Cao Xuegin was living in poverty near
Peking when he wrote his famous novel The Story of the Stone (also
known as The Dream of the Red Chamber), of which this is the second
volume. The four other volumes, The Golden Days, The Warning Voice,
The Debt of Tears and The Dreamer Wakes, are also published in the
Penguin Classics.
JOHN MINFORD was born in 1946. He studied Chinese at Oxford and
at the Australian National University, and has taught in China,
Hong Kong and New Zealand.
媒体推荐
Reviews
Reviewer: Melvin Pena (Evanston, IL United States)
I spend a lot of time wandering through bookstores. One particular
book has caught my eye over the years, and the other day I bought
it - Volume 1 of Cao Xueqin's eighteenth century epic, 'The Story
of the Stone: The Golden Days'. As a developing eighteenth century
scholar, I was doubly attracted to it. 'The Golden Days' absolutely
blew me away - used as I am to eighteenth century novels (British,
French, American), this is wholly unlike anything I've read from
the era. It bears structural similarities to the Laurence Sterne's
'Tristram Shandy' and 'Sentimental Journey,' but aside from that
bears more in common with ancient Greek novels like Longus's
'Daphnis and Chloe' or Heliodorus's 'Eithopian Romance,' as well as
the mysticism of the ancient Egyptian 'Story of the Shipwrecked
Sailor.' And yet, Cao's attention to actual life experiences, and
the detail he conveys about tradition and ceremony, along with
frank dealings with human relationships and sexuality makes 'The
Golden Days' much more than any quick summary of style or content
can relate.
'The Golden Days' begins in amusing, but sympathetic fashion: the
goddess Nü-wa is repairing the sky with 36,501 stones.
When she finishes, one remains, which is cast off. Having been
touched by a goddess, this stone has magical properties, able to
move, change size, and even talk. One day, a Buddhist monk and a
Taoist come upon the stone, and promise to let the stone have an
adventure - to become human. As the stone waits by a pond, it falls
desperately in love with a Crimson Pearl Flower, which is also
selected for incarnation by the Fairy Disenchantment. The stone and
the flower are incarnated as the novel begins in earnest, as a
young minor nobleman named Jia Bao-yu, and a commoner related to
the family, a girl named Lin Dai-yu - both unaware of their
heavenly origins. 'The Golden Days' centers around the daily events
and occurrences in the lives of these two teenagers, as they come
to grips, as we all must, with human life.
The Rong and Ning branches of the Jia family, on opposite sides of
Two Dukes Street, are the centerpieces of the novel's action. Like
the 'big house' fiction of the English eighteenth century, these
ancestral manses provide a locus of activity, as the nobles, their
extended families, friends, and servants mingle and interact
constantly. Cao marks himself as a remarkable author by the way he
handles a massive cast of characters, letting us into the private
lives and concerns of all ranks of society, as well as the forms of
etiquette that determine their relationships. Another terrific
facet of the novel's construction is the almost stream of
consciousness style Cao employs - as characters pass in and out of
the immediate action of the novel, the narrative seems to choose
the person it's most interested in and follow them for pages at a
time, before seamlessly passing to the next character. It's really
quite amazing, how, in this way, we come to understand the
motivations, fears, and hopes of so many individuals. Time,
distance, culture, Cao levels distinctions, making historical China
accessible to even 21st century readers - he reduces people to
their human concerns.
Cao Xueqin's novel is also remarkable for what I can only call it's
pro(to)-feminist tone. While we are reminded by certain characters
that male lineage is of major importance to the structure of the
society, the narrative consistently shows the power, ability, and
influence of women. At the novel's beginning, a Taoist named
Vanitas finds the stone, and is asked to transcribe its story, but
complains initially that it is about a 'number of females'. The
stone obviously insists that the story be written out. Later,
Bao-yu, the major male character, says he is more comfortable
around women - that they are like water, while men are like mud,
castoffs, unclean. One of the main characters of this volume is
Wang Xi-feng, a young woman in her early twenties, who for an
extended period, manages the affairs of both the Ning and Rong
mansions. Cao's respect and admiration for the strong women in
Bao-yu's life: Xi-feng, Dai-yu, and two particular servants, Aroma
and Caltrop, is quite obvious and important to the novel.
If you are like me, and know tragically little about Chinese
literature and culture, Cao takes care of that too - there is a
heavy emphasis throughout the novel on the cultural productions of
China. The book integrates a wide range of poetry, drama, fiction,
folk wisdom, and mythology as a central part of Bao-yu and Dai-yu's
upbringing. One can sense Cao's insistence in the novel that
education and cultural production is of vital importance,
particularly to children. While the Fairy Disenchantment seems to
be the guiding spirit of the novel, hinting at the diappointments
inevitable in the course of life, this is a novel about youth, and
hope for the future, even in the midst of concern about how long
prosperity can last. Taken altogether, 'The Golden Days' cannot be
recommended enough. David Hawkes's translation is first rate, and
his introduction, pronunciation notes, and appendices are thorough
and very helpful.
Reviewer: Matthew M. Yau 'Voracious reader' (San Francisco,
CA)
The Dream of the Red Chamber (The Story of the Stone) starts off as
an immensely long inscription on a miraculous stone which was
copied out by a visiting man and taken down into the world for
publication. Volume 1 gives the account of the magic stone's
origin, renders the discourse redolent of a supernatural, mystical
overtone. Once upon a time a piece of stone that was unworthy to be
used for repairing the sky possessed magic power and ended up in
the mortal world. The unhappy stone incarnated and lived out the
life of a man before finally attaining nirvana and returning to
what Buddhist refers as the 'other shore.'
Jai Baoyu is the incarnation of the stone. The name 'bao-yu' means
'treasured jewel' and was named after the wonderful incident that
the only surviving son of the Jia household was born with a piece
of spotless jade in his mouth. Lin Daiyu, Baoyu's teary cousin with
a superior intelligence, is the incarnation of the Crimson Pearl
Flower, which the unhappy stone once conceived a fancy that he took
to watering everyday so the flower was able to shed the form of a
plant and became a girl. The consciousness that she owed the stone
ensued her to repay him with the tears shed during the whole of a
mortal lifetime if they were ever to be reborn as humans in the
world beneath. It was no wonder when Daiyu first saw her cousin,
who had tyrannized the household, hated studies, and spent most of
his time in women's quarters, it was as though she had seen him
somewhere before, like a déjà vu.
Aside from the ethereal origin, the first volume of The Dream of
the Red Chamber depicts a fairly eventual record of a great Manchu
household (Qing Dynasty) under the tutelage of the Imperial family
in early 18th century China. It's the picture of daily routines in
the life that emerge most vividly from its discourse. The Jia
household is genuinely disguised as some highborn aristocrats whose
ancestors were ennobled for their military powers. This first
installment of five parts, titled Golden Days, captures the Jias at
the hi-time in which members of the Rong-guo mansion and t
