Chapter 4 The status of the book

Hungry grandson Jia Mu pities orphans This section can only discuss three issues: (1) the author, (2) the unfinished book and its continuation, and (3) the relationship between the author and the characters in the book. Everyone said that Cao Xueqin did it, but did he do it?This problem came up first.Reading this book does not say anything bad about Xueqin's book, but only hints at it.According to the first round of the passbook: Kongkong Taoist sees color in emptiness, from color to emotion, through emotion into color, from color to Wukong, so he changed his name to Love Monk and changed it to "Love Monk Record".Donglu Kongmeixi titled "Fengyue Baojian".Later, Cao Xueqin read it for ten years in Mourning Hongxuan, added and deleted it five times, compiled it into a catalog, and divided it into chapters.

According to this, Taoist Kongkong, Kong Meixi, and Cao Xueqin (some Zhiyanzhai books have more names), what did these people do?These names really belong to people, and are they under the pretense of Xueqin?It is not easy to get a decisive answer.Now it seems that Cao Xueqin’s name is recognized as real, and the others are his own pseudonyms. Let’s admit it, even so, Cao Xueqin didn’t say anything, I did it.In the first chapter of Zhiyanzhai's review, there were two articles that were said to be done by Cao Xueqin.Look at the first article first: If Yun Xueqin reads, adds and deletes, but who wrote this article so far after the opening of the book, it shows that the author's pen is very cunning.

This is so obvious that there is no need to say more.Look at the second article: Xueqin used to have the book "Fengyue Baojian", which is the preface of his younger brother Tangcun.Jintang Village has passed away, but I still feel nostalgic for it when I see the new. Here it is said that Cao Xueqin wrote "Fengyue Baojian", and his younger brother Tangcun wrote the preface.New refers to "Jinling Twelve Hairpins"; old refers to "Fengyue Baojian".It was put together from about two manuscripts, all of which were written by Cao Xueqin.According to the "fat review", there should be no problem.However, the prefaces of the old manuscripts and printed editions all say that no one did it [3], which shows that the copyright of this book has not yet been determined after the author's death.

This fact is worth noting.According to my guess, Cao Xueqin sometimes said he did it, and sometimes refused to say it clearly.Even though he has made a peerless article, in terms of human feelings, he is unwilling to bury his hard work; at the same time, there are always reasons why he does not want to admit it.There are too many obstacles, such as bold pornographic performances, weird thoughts and discussions, and profoundly depicting the dark side of the big family. From our current point of view, this is nothing, but it was not the case at the time, and it could arouse social suspicion. blame and criticism.Moreover, there is inevitably some basis for the deeds of the characters in the book. There are living people, and there are too many grievances and grievances.All of these can make him unwilling to admit it directly, and only vaguely stated at the beginning of the book, saying that "it has been read for ten years, added and deleted five times", and sometimes he uses the tone of a critic to explain it.These are of course my conjectures.Another point is that although so many names were written in the first book, there are many contradictions and disconnections in this book. I always think that it was written by one person.Although the eighty chapters of text are slightly short and long, they are generally consistent.Since only one person did it, who is this person if not Xueqin?So the copyright of this has to belong to Cao Xueqin.In Zhiping and other records, there are other proofs, so I won’t say more.

The author question is so decided.We know very little about his life.The name Cao Xueqin was born in Zhengbai Banner of the Han Army.They have been weaving in Jiangning for three generations. Their father is Cao. Xueqin was born in Nanjing, went to Yangzhou, and later lived in the western suburbs of Beijing. Their lives were very poor.Born in 1723, died in 1763, at the age of forty [4].He planned to write more than one hundred chapters, and the first paragraph of his writing was about 1743 to 1752 [5].It is impossible to test how much this book can be completed in ten years.By 1759 at the latest, there were eighty manuscripts, with two missing in between.In addition, there were five or six paragraphs in the manuscript after the eighty chapters, all of which were lost later.After another three years without finishing the book, he died.There are wives and no children behind him, and the situation is very depressed.That's about all we know, in a nutshell.It was recently discovered that his portrait is similar to the "fat body and broad head" mentioned in "Zao Chuang Xianbi", which may be somewhat true.

Cao Xueqin was a precocious genius. He was only about twenty years old when he wrote the first draft.But in the second decade from then to 1763, it seems that there was not much writing, so that the book was never finished.This has something to do with his poverty in his later years.If the missing manuscripts are included, the book is about 80% to 90% complete.The situation of the incomplete manuscript is roughly like this: Jia's mansion is completely dilapidated, Baoyu lives in poverty, and only Baochai and Sheyue follow him.Daiyu died first, and Baoyu became a monk later.At the end, there is a Jingfan "Love List" that lists the names of the twelve beauties as "Zheng", "Deputy", "Youfu", "Third Deputy" and "Fourth Deputy", with a total of 60 names, and there are comments under the list. , with Baoyu at the top.These materials are scattered in Zhiyanzhai commentary.

Once the book was copied, it became very popular. It is a pity that it is not finished.Not long after Xueqin's death, Gao E came to make up the book.He said that there were originally a catalog of 120 chapters, but the last 40 chapters were lost, and he successively dubbed them all on Guerdan.In fact, the last forty chapters and this article were all written by Gao Shi. He refused to admit it, but was exposed by his relative Zhang Wentao.The copyright of the last forty chapters Gao E is also pushing back and forth, which shows that people's views on novels at that time were very different from ours now.Gao E's continuation, combined with the first 80 chapters, Cheng Weiyuan typeprinted twice in 1791 and 1792, both called Cheng's version.From then on, only the hundred and twenty chapters circulated in the society, and it was not printed until after 1912. Later, many old manuscripts with comments were found, some were incomplete, some were complete, but they did not exceed Eighty times.These manuscripts are relatively close to the author's original manuscripts, but there are many confusions. If they are not sorted out, they will not be as good as the printed version in some places.Because Cheng and Gao, apart from the continuation of the book, have also done some sorting work on the first eighty chapters, but it doesn't have to be consistent with the original according to their intentions.The supplementary book is different from the original in terms of ideology, story development and structure, and character description, and it is not as good as the original.This kind of book has been in circulation for more than a hundred years. Although it is barely complete, it is unfortunate.

In addition, there is another kind of bad luck, which is all kinds of subjective guessing "requests".In recent years, the textual research has changed from the objective aspects of the author's life and family background, etc., which is much more realistic than the so-called "red studies" before, but I have made a little too rigid a problem, which I have committed before.They merged the fake Jia family with the real Cao family, and merged the protagonist Baoyu and the author into one person; in this way, Jia's lineage is equal to Cao's family tree, and Xueqin's autobiography.It is obvious that there are three kinds of inappropriateness: first, the meaning of novels as novels is lost.Second, it is difficult to write a novel, let alone such a good one, if real people and real events are glued together like this.Third, the author clearly stated that the truth is concealed. If it is true everywhere, then there is no such thing as "concealing the truth", but the truth has been moved and the real person has been replaced with a name.Therefore, I think to read, we must first determine the relationship between the author and the characters in the book, especially the relationship between Xueqin himself and "Baoyu".And divided into two layers:

(1) How realistic are the characters in the book?Reading the first chapter of this book and Zhi Yanzhai's commentary, there were indeed some real people; there were a few outstanding people, such as Lin Daiyu and Wang Xifeng, who were more authentic.But although there are real people as models, the original appearance has been greatly changed after being modified by the author's literary skills.If you compare recent events, it is easy to understand.For example, in Mr. Lu Xun's "The True Story of Ah Q", it is said that Shaoxing did have an Agui.Although Ah Q in Lu Xun's novels regards the real Ah Gui as his "model", he does not really write his biography for Ah Q, such as Ah Q's happy reunion and Ah Gui's not being killed.Inference from this, even if Cao Xueqin has a lover named "Ah Yan", the book reviewer would still want to paint a portrait of her, but the beauty of the real person will never be as beautiful as the "Concubine Xiaoxiang" in the book.She is anxious and sick, or has it.In this way, the reality of the characters in the book is limited, and the author's creative management and artistic decoration play an important role.

(2) Why these characters?That is, the problem of the function of the characters in the book.These people, big or small, men and women, born, young, clean, ugly, and ugly have different roles, but they all come to perform the whole show.So they can all represent a part of the author in a certain situation, but no one can, and no one has ever represented his whole.Since the book contains its own life, Jia Baoyu is of course the most representative author.But Jia Baoyu is not equal to Cao Xueqin, and Cao Xueqin is not equal to Jia Baoyu. As far as Cao Xueqin is not equal to Jia Baoyu, the scope of the author is much wider than that of the protagonist in the book as usual. ; Daiyu talks about poetry with Xiangling, which may be regarded as a "poetry talk" about mourning Hongxuan.For example, Baoyu's "Hibiscus" and Daiyu's "Buying Flowers" are also eligible to be included in Cao Xueqin's anthology.As far as Jia Baoyu is not equal to Cao Xueqin, Baoyu's words and actions in the book may not be in line with Cao Xueqin's diary.The relationship between Baoyu and his family may not all be in line with Cao's pedigree.For example, the Cao family once had a concubine, Cao Xueqin's aunt, but in the book Yuanchun is Baoyu's older sister.For example, Cao Yin has only one biological son Cao, and the second son Cao is adopted; but the book says that Jia's mother has two sons, and she likes the second son Jia Zheng more than the eldest son Jia She, which just reverses the difference between biological and adoptive.If it is attached everywhere, it will cause all kinds of penetration.Xueqin lives with Baoyu, that's all.That is to say, it is said in the book that Baoyu had an affair with the Qin family[6], if this account is directly written under the name of Cao Xueqin, it may not be in line with the facts, let alone close to reason.Why did he scold himself.If the characters in the book represent the author, any one can represent him, but if they do not represent the author, even Jia Baoyu cannot represent him.Let me make another analogy, these are like chess pieces in chess, Baoyu is like a veteran, twelve beauties are like chariots, horses and cannons, and Jia Amnesty and Jia Zheng's disciples are just soldiers.Those chess pieces all support the handsome flag, and the victory or defeat of this game of chess is also determined by the safety of the veteran; but the actions of the veteran, chariots, cannons, and even small soldiers all show the minds of the chess players, but no one can It doesn't mean chess players, their status was originally equal.Wouldn't it be a joke to say that only veterans represent chess players.

From a glimpse here, you can imagine that there are many troublesome questions in it.Not only that, but there are also many self-contradictions and inconsistencies in the preface and the postscript. I have called it peerless in the above. If readers find some shortcomings, I am afraid they will be suspicious.I think it is necessary to explain at the end that these doubts and shortcomings are related to the regrets of this book. The misfortune of this book, the misfortune of the author, first, is that the book was not finished; secondly, the continuation book is mediocre; A birth defect that cannot be remedied.If the writing is finished, I think some questions can be solved naturally, and some outliers and contradictions can also be corrected after the author's final approval, but these are still small points. Where is the biggest regret for not finishing writing?Just because there is no end to the chapter, the symbolic "Treasure of Wind and Moon" is still hanging, and it cannot be completely turned over as expected.The impact is probably too great.The fault of looking in the mirror cannot be entirely blamed on the readers of the past two hundred years, and the work itself must bear at least half of the responsibility.However, it is more likely to cause misunderstandings.Those who opposed this book regarded it as an obscene pornographic book and wanted to burn it; those who were in favor of this book became "red fans" and read it every day in bed.The attitudes towards them seem to be absolutely opposite, but the nature of the mistakes is exactly the same. They are all reading this book, and this book, the author repeatedly said, must be read in reverse.He will turn it over in a later reply, but unfortunately this wish has never been fulfilled.Today, who can use the stubborn stones of the Great Barren Mountain to make up for this incomplete sky? We cherish this unfinished work even more, and we must be extra careful when reading it to be worthy of such a good book.We should restore its true face from a historical point of view, further analyze and criticize it with progressive literary theory, make it easier for the people to accept, and at the same time reduce the occurrence of its abuses. The work of textual research is in line with this general purpose Come to the event.We must be responsible to our great literary geniuses, and we must be responsible to the broad masses of the people.