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A Dream of Red Mansion, by Cao Xueqin
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The classic tale of the Ning and Rong families, Chinese aristocrats on the wrong side of the wheel of fate. Starring Baoyu, a character unique in literature, the young man who finds his own kind filthy, and seeks only the company of women. With characters high and low, corrupt and chaste, human and supernatural. Illustrated.
- Sales Rank: #94432 in eBooks
- Published on: 2012-12-10
- Released on: 2012-12-10
- Format: Kindle eBook
- Number of items: 1
Most helpful customer reviews
24 of 26 people found the following review helpful.
Long but timeless story
By Laszlo Hopp
Review of Dreams of the Red Mansion
The copy I read was a downloadable Kindle version. I could not figure out the translator. The total location number was 36403. If I use a recommended page-equivalent converter number of 16.69, the page number comes to a little over 2100, which is close to the printed full version page number.
At first, I couldn't understand how this book became one of the four pinnacles of classical Chinese literature. - The other three are: The Romance of the Three Kingdoms, Journey to the West, and Outlaws of the Marsh; all may have various different titles depending on the translation. - It starts out like a rather dull, uneventful, linear diary spiced with an occasional mystical dream of the main protégé, Bayou, an early teenage boy growing into young adulthood during the story. The details of his days and the days of a host of other main characters, mostly his relatives, are given in obsessive, almost painful details.
But dear Reader, don't be fooled by this slow start! Perhaps the following statement will demonstrate how the book grew on me: completing the first 20 % of the book took me more time than the rest of the 80%. The reason I hung on during these critical early pages was a fascinating look into a long-gone culture; a culture that until this day has been reflected in the life and mentality of nearly a third of the World's population - East and South-East Asia, to be exact -. If one has my kind of enthrallment with various cultures, the "boring" details throughout the book actually provide an exquisite opportunity to observe and learn.
In sharp contrast to the first part, around 50% into the reading the story accelerated and I had hard time putting down my Kindle. From here on, the life events of a few dozen main characters and countless minor participants became compelling. The story branched out into several exciting subplots only to be masterfully reunited in the final chapters.
The Jia is an old, noble family in the middle period of the Qing-Dynasty China. One of their greatest social achievements came when the Emperor chose their oldest daughter as a favorite concubine. When the family learned that their daughter had gotten permission from the Court to visit her parents, for her welcome they built a magnificent garden with several living quarters. The rest of the story took place mostly in this garden and the surrounding two mansions belonging to two branches of the Jias.
The main storyline focuses on the slow decline of this huge, influential family. However, there is an equally important second storyline running parallel with the first one as an organic component of it: Bayou's somewhat mystical spiritual awakening.
Most characters have multidimensional flesh-and-blood personalities without a hint of dogmatic profiling. The good, bad, and the ambiguous features are distributed among them with good sense, letting their vivid individualities shine through.
Poetry is an important part of the characters' lives. The book presents a good number of poems written by a few gifted family members. Although intellectually these poems gave me very little to hang on to, their moods nonetheless helped me understand the state of mind of those who wrote the poems and even the times they lived in.
Not unlike James Joyce's with his "stream of consciousness," the author gives the reader free access to the most inner thoughts of several major characters, most notably to Bayou's. This extra dimension of their personalities makes these characters even more intimate and accessible to the reader.
One thing I especially enjoyed in the book was learning about the multiple elements of the Qing Dynasty China interwoven in the story: the arranged marriages; concubines; the "dowager" cult - incidentally this latter largely contributed to the fall of China during Emperor Dowager Cixi's regency -; the bizarre look at suicide as an accepted and in fact frequently expected solution to life's problems; Chinese Medicine with its reliance on pulse evaluation; the system of feudalistic servants whose status was not much different from slaves but who could become highly valued members of the families - in the book represented by Xiren and Pinger -; the influence of Buddhism, Taoism, and Confucianism on every day life; the role of Chinese Opera in Chinese culture; the importance of jade in Chinese spirituality; etc.
One peculiarity that stood out for me in the book is the physical and psychological fragility of the Jia clan members. Frequent crying, mental derangement, suicide, and consumption - i.e. tuberculosis - abounded in this wealthy family. I could not find any historical information regarding the incidence of mental disease and tuberculosis in 18th century China but based on the story it surely seemed high. Or, was this family struck by an unusual genetic burden due to intermarriage? As an example, Bayou, who himself acted at times as a schizophrenic, other times as a depressed or autistic youngsters, married his first cousin.
In summary, this is a remarkable book for its documentation of an obscure historical time hardly accessible for most Westerners. It has a rich character set, the theme is timeless, and the intriguing subplots make it a persuasive reading. The book's length is due to exquisite details. On one side, these seemingly unnecessary details don't help much with the modern concept of story development yet, I would submit that they have other literary values. I can see that many potential readers will get discouraged to start or continue reading the book even after overcoming their reluctance due to the formidable page number. To such potential readers I would recommend reading one of the abridged versions readily available in popular bookstores.
16 of 16 people found the following review helpful.
..This novel is a world classic.
By J K DPS
I first became acquainted with this 18th century novel years ago as the David Hawkes translation. I still consider that the gold standard. Despite its length, I've read it three times. This is not just a classic Chinese novel; it's a classic world novel that ranks with the very best literature of any culture or age. This particular translation, though I personally don't think it's as good as the David Hawkes translation, is certainly passable. I highly recommend this book to everyone!
3 of 3 people found the following review helpful.
A grand, immersive reading experience, one of the greatest novels
By a Seattle reader
Probably the longest novel I've ever read, something like 2,500 pages. I read it at a slow pace, one chapter at a time, over a year-and-a-half. I picked up the book whenever the mood suited, in between several other books.
The author Cao Xueqin died before finishing the book, so another writer completed it for him. The book has 120 chapters, and I think the first 80 are written by Cao. Those are much better written than the latter chapters.
Despite the slow pace at which I read it, I absolutely LOVE this book. It's loaded with mystery, romance, family drama, comedy, poetry, and details of life in a large, affluent family in 18th Century China. It's a novel of manners, so you'll learn more about how the Chinese lived in middle Qing dynasty than any history book.
There are many versions available, so why this one? It was one volume, the English translation seemed OK, and it was inexpensive. I'm not even sure who the translator is. I compared it to a library copy of the David Hawkes/John Minford translation, and it was clear that Hawkes/Minford did a better job. When I read the book a second time (and I will) I'll go with Hawkes and Minford.
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