There are no exact figures on sales in Four Great Classical Novels, but there are still many versions of Four Great Classical Novels sold in large quantities every year. The most widely recognized version is People's Literature Publishing House.
The Romance of the Three Kingdoms is a long historical novel, which can be said to be the pioneering work of China's ancient novels, and it is also one of the four classical novels in China, which are equally famous with The Journey to the West, The Water Margin and A Dream of Red Mansions. The author is Luo Guanzhong of the Ming Dynasty (there is no conclusion yet, and there are many controversies. Some people think that it was written by Shi Naian). The story began with the yellow turban insurrectionary and was finally unified in the Western Jin Dynasty. Is a century-old book, all-encompassing, seven points true, three points fiction. The Three Kingdoms refer to Wei, Shu and Wu. This novel is beautifully narrated throughout, and is regarded as China's strategic encyclopedia.
Romance of the Three Kingdoms is very popular among ancient people in China. Song and Yuan dynasties came to the stage, and Jin and Yuan dynasties performed more than 30 kinds of Three Kingdoms operas. From Yuan Dynasty to Zhinian, the Pinghua of the Three Kingdoms published by Yu's family in Xin 'an came out. At the end of Yuan Dynasty and the beginning of Ming Dynasty, Luo Guanzhong synthesized folklore, drama and scripts, combined with historical materials such as the History of the Three Kingdoms by Chen Shou and Notes by Pei Songzhi, and based on his personal understanding of social life, he created the well-known Romance of the Three Kingdoms. The earliest existing edition was published in Jiajing period of Ming Dynasty, commonly known as "Jiajing Edition", with a total of 24 volumes. During the reign of Emperor Kangxi in the Qing Dynasty, Mao Zonggang, the father and son of Maureen, collated historical events, added or deleted words, and revised them into the current 120 Romance of the Three Kingdoms.
There are many versions of Romance of the Three Kingdoms, mainly including: Ming Hongzhi version of Romance of the Three Kingdoms, with simple words and simple content; Romance of the Three Kingdoms, a commentary added or deleted by Mao Zonggang in Qing Dynasty, was written in the early years of Kangxi, and it is the most widely circulated book in the society.
Author: Luo Guanzhong (1330- 1400), a famous novel, was a popular novelist in Ming dynasty. His native place is Taiyuan (now Shanxi) and Qiantang (now Hangzhou, Zhejiang), so he is not sure. According to legend, Luo Guanzhong was the guest of Zhang Shicheng, a peasant uprising army at the end of Yuan Dynasty. Besides Romance of the Three Kingdoms, he also wrote popular novels such as Romance of Sui and Tang Dynasties and dramas such as Dragon and Tiger Club of Zhao Taizu. In addition, quite a few people think that the last thirty chapters of Water Margin are also his works.
The Romance of the Three Kingdoms describes the history of nearly a hundred years from the end of the Eastern Han Dynasty to the beginning of the Western Jin Dynasty, reflecting the political and military struggles and the infiltration and transformation of various social contradictions during the Three Kingdoms period. In the attitude towards the Three Kingdoms, it is the mainstream tendency of the people to respect Liu and oppose Cao, but it also shows an obvious tendency to support Liu and oppose Cao. Taking Liu Bei Group as the description center, it implies the people's hope for the revival of the Han nationality and the orthodoxy of imperial power. In the Qing Dynasty, when Shi Mao and his son collated The Romance of the Three Kingdoms, they deleted the falsehood in the Ming version and the confusion in Machamp, but the Romance of the Three Kingdoms erased the unfavorable descriptions of Cao Cao, Sun Jian and his son, Wang Yun, Kong Rong and Ma Chao in history. Cao Cao, Zhou Yu, Lu Bu, Sun Ce, Guo Jia, Sima Yi, Zhuge Liang, Yu Xun, Zhao Yun, Pound, Xia Houdun, Guan Yu and Si Mazhao made further contributions. The performances of Huang Fusong, He Jin, Lu Zhi, Liu Bei, Sun Jian, Yuan Shao, Cheng Yu, Chen Deng, Zhang Zhao, Lu Su and Cao Zhen were all discounted.
The Romance of the Three Kingdoms has created nearly 200 characters, among which Zhuge Liang, Cao Cao, Guan Yu, Liu Bei and others are the most successful. Zhuge Liang is the incarnation of the "saint" in the author's mind. He has the lofty spirit of "devoting all his efforts to death" and the ambition to help the people and rebuild a peaceful and prosperous world. The author endowed him with the peculiar ability to give orders and calculate skillfully. Cao Cao was portrayed as a treacherous man who "would rather teach me to be negative to the world than to teach the world to be negative to me". He is a political careerist and schemer, both clever and treacherous. Guan Yu is "brave and resolute" and "righteous as Mount Tai", but it is mainly based on personal grievances. Liu Bei was molded into a kind-hearted and caring person, a corporal with courtesy, righteousness and shame, and a typical benevolent gentleman who knows how to be kind and do his duty.
The Romance of the Three Kingdoms describes wars in various ways, and readers often feel the war scenes with swords and shadows. Among them, the description of the battle of Guandu and Battle of Red Cliffs is considered to be ups and downs, ups and downs, which is soul-stirring.
Romance of the Three Kingdoms is a pro-Liu work. He wrote 565,438+0 times from Taoyuan to Zhuge Liang's death in Wuzhangyuan, which took 65,438+003 times, and only 65,438+06 times in the following 46 years.
The Romance of the Three Kingdoms and the stories and legends of the Three Kingdoms period had a far-reaching impact on East Asian culture. In ancient China, there were countless poems and songs about the Three Kingdoms, and oral literature works such as storytelling and drama with the story of the Three Kingdoms as the content also emerged one after another. Moreover, these works and The Romance of the Three Kingdoms learn from each other and inherit from each other, forming a unique quasi-cultural group. Until today, various dramas, cartoons and books about the Three Kingdoms are still enduring. The influence of Romance of the Three Kingdoms and Tales of the Three Kingdoms on China culture can still be seen everywhere. In the competitive environment or struggle stage, people may consider the scene of the Three Kingdoms and the relationship between people. The debate on praise and criticism has never stopped, but no matter what the conclusion of praise and criticism is, people's recognition of the humanistic spirit of the Three Kingdoms has been deeply rooted, and it is hard to say that it will be greatly improved.
Individually, in some areas or nationalities related to the romance of the Three Kingdoms, the brand of the culture of the Three Kingdoms is more obvious, such as Zhuge surname, Sichuan and Shaanxi areas.
China has a saying since ancient times: "Young people don't read the Water Margin, while the elderly don't read the Three Kingdoms", which means that young people don't read the Water Margin, otherwise they will easily want to fight all day and their thoughts will deteriorate; Old people should not study the Three Kingdoms, because the characters are good at intrigue and intrigue. As an old man who should know his destiny, he should spend his old age peacefully, instead of thinking about calculating others all day, which is not good for his body and mind.
The Romance of the Three Kingdoms also left many idioms, such as making friends in Taoyuan, talking about heroes in childhood, caring about the thatched cottage, borrowing arrows from straw boats, being happy without thinking about Shu, being separated from one another, having no generals in Shu, and sharing the world for three points, and so on.
Romance of the Three Kingdoms also left some slang words, such as three heads are better than one Zhuge Liang, speaking of the devil, and so on.
In addition, the books "The Model of Teacher" and "The Model of Teacher" written by Zhuge Liang, the prime minister of Shu, have also been handed down through the ages.
Since The Romance of the Three Kingdoms spread abroad, the Japanese people like this theme very much, and it has been adapted into cartoons or animations for dozens of times. For example, Yokoyama Mitsuteru's work "The Glorious History of the Three Kingdoms in Hengshan", there are also many computer games and video games with the background of the Three Kingdoms on the market. More famous is the "History of the Three Kingdoms" series of Japan Glory Company.
The Journey to the West is a classic novel of China and one of the "Four Classical Novels" of China. The book tells the story of the Tang Dynasty mage learning from the West and shows the ancient theme of punishing evil and promoting good. The Journey to the West's book was written in the middle of the Ming Dynasty in the16th century. Since its publication, it has been widely circulated in China and around the world, and has been translated into many languages. The Journey to the West is a household name in China and even parts of Asia, among which the Monkey King, Tang Priest, Pig Bajie, Friar Sand and other characters and stories such as "Nayong Tiangong", "Monkey King Thrice Defeats the Skeleton Demon" and "The Flame Mountain" are particularly familiar. For hundreds of years, The Journey to the West has been adapted into various local operas, as well as various versions of movies, TV series, cartoons and cartoons. In Japan and other Asian countries, there are also literary and artistic works with the Monkey King as the theme, with many styles and an amazing number. The author of The Journey to the West is generally regarded as Wu Cheng'en of the Ming Dynasty.
All the published editions of The Journey to the West are signed by Wu Cheng'en, but since the advent of The Journey to the West, there has been controversy about its author.
The Journey to the West, which was circulated in the Ming Dynasty, has no signature in various versions. In The Journey to the West, the king of Qing Dynasty suggested that The Journey to the West was written by Qiu Chuji in Southern Song Dynasty. After this view was put forward, most scholars in Qing Dynasty agreed with it. Ji Yun and others in the Qianlong Dynasty began to doubt this theory, thinking that The Journey to the West described the customs and habits of the Ming Dynasty in many places, and Qiu Chuji was a person at the end of the Southern Song Dynasty (a dynasty before the Ming Dynasty); In addition, Huai 'an dialect is used in many places in The Journey to the West, while Qiu Chuji has lived in North China all his life and never lived in Huai 'an. There are also Taoist priests and literati in Ming and Qing Dynasties who think that The Journey to the West is the book of Taoist alchemy.
During the period of the Republic of China, Lu Xun, Hu Shi and others presumed that the author of The Journey to the West was Huai 'an Chengen according to the records of Huai 'an House in the Apocalypse of the Ming Dynasty and the theories of predecessors. In the late Republic of China, since the founding of the People's Republic of China, especially after 1980, the research on The Journey to the West's authors has gradually become a hot spot. Some scholars still question Wu Cheng'en's authorship. The reason is that writing Journey to the West has never been mentioned in Wu Cheng'en's poems or friends' words. Secondly, Wu Cheng'en wrote down the fact of The Journey to the West in the Records of Huai 'an Prefecture, which did not indicate that it was romance or official history, but in general, romance and official history were not recorded in local chronicles; Thirdly, The Journey to the West in Wu Cheng'en was classified as a geographical category in the Bibliography of Qianqingtang written by Huang Yuji, a bibliophile in Qing Dynasty. So some people suggest that The Journey to the West was written by Qiu Chuji, or by his disciples.
There are also a few scholars who believe that The Journey to the West was written by Li Chunfang, the "Prime Minister of Qing Ci" in the Ming Dynasty. However, due to the scarcity and far-fetched arguments, most scholars do not agree with this statement. On the other hand, the argument that Wu Cheng'en is the author of The Journey to the West seems to be more and more convincing. Mainly: First, Wu Cheng'en's personal situation fully conforms to the characteristics of the creators of Journey to the West. Second, it gives a more reasonable and practical explanation to all kinds of questions. Thirdly, the most convincing is the dialect study in The Journey to the West's text. After 1980, there was a breakthrough in this field, which almost irrefutably proved that Wu Cheng'en was the author of The Journey to the West. (For related research, please refer to Liu Xiuye's works and Yan Jingchang's Poetic Rhyme and Journey to the West. )
Therefore, it is generally believed that religion prevailed in the Ming Dynasty, and biographies, legends, other religious legends and folk stories of Master Xuanzang's voyages to the West in the Tang Dynasty were widely circulated in the society. It is in this social and cultural background that Wu Cheng'en created the novel The Journey to the West based on the above biographies, legends and stories.
After Wu Cheng'en's re-conception, organization and compilation, compared with previous biographies, legends, stories and comments, the novel The Journey to the West is not only richer in content, more complete and rigorous in plot, vivid and full in characters, more colorful in imagination and simple in language. More importantly, the novel The Journey to the West has reached an unprecedented height in ideological realm and artistic realm. Can be described as a master.
In 629 AD, Xuanzang, a monk in the Tang Dynasty, went to India to study Buddhist teachings in violation of the imperial court's regulations prohibiting people from traveling westward without authorization. 16 years later, he returned to China in 644 and wrote a report to Emperor Taizong. Emperor Taizong wrote a letter asking him to dictate what he had seen and heard in the western regions. The disciples argued and wrote "The Story of the Western Regions of Datang". After Xuanzang's death, his other two disciples, Hui Hui and Yan Xun, compiled Xuanzang's life and Journey to the West into a book The biography of Master Sanzang. In order to carry forward the master's achievements, they made some deified descriptions of Xuanzang in the book, thinking that this was the beginning of the fairy tale of Journey to the West. Since then, the story of learning from the scriptures has spread in the society, and the color of immortals is getting stronger and stronger.
In many records of the late Tang and Five Dynasties, there were stories of going west to learn from the scriptures. The existing murals of Xuanzang in Dunhuang Grottoes were made in the early years of Xixia, and the image of a staff-bearer has appeared. In the Southern Song Dynasty, some walkers had already turned into Untitled Scholar, calling themselves "84,000 bronze-headed monkey king" and "God of sand". There are four apprentices in the Southern Opera of the Song and Yuan Dynasties, The Monk on the Chen Guangrui River, and Wu Changling's zaju, Tang Sanzang's Journey to the West. The zaju "Erlang God Locked the Great Sage in the Sky" and Journey to the West at the end of Yuan Dynasty and the beginning of Ming Dynasty describe the origin of the Monkey King. "Journey to the West and Pinghua" was mentioned in the Korean language textbook "An Interpretation of Proverbs about Park at the Same Time" in the early Ming Dynasty, which summarized and repeated a passage "The car was late against the country", which was very similar to The Journey to the West's forty-sixth chapter. The Yongle Dadian in Ming Dynasty (volume 13 139) contains Dreaming of Dragons, which is basically the same as The Journey to the West's volume 10.
Many images in The Journey to the West, such as the Monkey King and Pig Bajie, are almost household names in China. The Journey to the West systematically reflected China's thought system of integrating Buddhism, Taoism and Confucianism, combined the Taoist immortal system of heaven, earth and sea with the Buddhist western heaven, and at the same time carried out the Confucian thought that "there are no unfaithful and unfilial immortals in the world". Journey to the West put forward the bold statement that "the emperor will take turns to go to court next year and come to my home". At the same time, the description of the immortal system in this book is the epitome of the political society of the Ming Dynasty in which the author lived.
Feng Menglong called Water Margin, Romance of the Three Kingdoms, The Journey to the West and Jin Ping Mei "the Four Musts". Along with Romance of the Three Kingdoms, The Journey to the West and A Dream of Red Mansions, it is listed as "the four classical novels of China".
The main purpose of Lu Xun's evaluation of The Journey to the West in A Brief History of Chinese Novels is to describe and reflect a person's life. When he was young, he was active in thinking, daring to think and do, omnipotent and daring to despise any authority. "The soil was in Wan Huhou that year"; Once you hit a nail and fall down, you will overcome the difficulties, obstacles and temptations in life step by step (81 difficulties), and finally you will get a "positive result".
Outlaws of the Marsh is the first Zhang Hui novel written in the vernacular in the history of China, which describes bandits who run amok. Also known as "The Water Margin of Loyalty and Righteousness" and "The Biography of the Hawks in Jianghu", generally referred to as "The Water Margin", was written in the late Yuan and early Ming Dynasties. The author has been controversial [1]. It is generally believed that Shi Naian did it, and Luo Guanzhong did some sorting work. Most of the robbers in the book were driven into outlaws by the government. Many of them were originally officials, but they were once classified as peasant uprising novels in Chinese mainland.
There are always different opinions about the author of Water Margin. Besides Shi Naian, there are several other viewpoints in history, including Luo Guanzhong's theory, Shi Hui's theory, Guo Xun's nickname theory and Song Dynasty's theory.
Some people think that the whole book was written by Luo Guanzhong. Wang Daokun, the foreign minister during the Jiajing period of the Ming Dynasty, pointed out for the first time in the Water Margin that "the Vietnamese Roche ... is this book, which has been read a hundred times". Later, many people in Ming and Qing Dynasties pointed out that Luo Guanzhong was the author of Water Margin. Until the Ming Dynasty, Lu Xun and Yu Pingbo thought Water Margin was a simple work, and a vast number of books were made up. Even some people who hold this view think that Shi Naian is a fictional character and does not exist in reality.
But this view is generally not recognized now. Opponents believe that [1], Luo Guanzhong's Romance of the Three Kingdoms and Water Margin are obviously different, and they were not written by one person at all. Wellcome Yecuo said in "Knowledge": "Two books are clumsy and vast, and each has its own principles?" Moreover, most of the evidence about Luo Guanzhong's Water Margin can't stand textual research.
Another view is that Water Margin belongs to cumulative mass creation. Undoubtedly, Shi Naian referred to, used for reference and absorbed a lot of materials in the process of creation, including historical records, notes, some complete novels, opera works or some fragments of them, but Shi Naian's creation cannot be denied.
The story of Water Margin originated in Xuanhe period of the Northern Song Dynasty, and has become the main theme of folk oral literature since the Southern Song Dynasty. At present, according to storytellers, there are scripts such as Green-faced Beast, Flower Monk and Warrior. In the early years of the Yuan Dynasty, the story book The Legacy of Xuanhe in the Great Song Dynasty appeared, which described the stories of 36 people, including Chao Gai and Wu Jialiang (Wu Yong), and initially had the story outline of Water Margin. In the Yuan Dynasty, some water margin story scripts [source requests] appeared in Yuan Zaju.
The Water Margin was written in the early Ming Dynasty on the basis of the records of 36 people, including Song Jiang, who was involved in the Song Uprising, in historical books, such as The Legacy of Xuanhe in the Great Song Dynasty and A Brief Account of the East Capital. The story describes the different stories of Liangshan 108 generals, from being caught up with Liangshan one by one, gradually expanding, rebelling, and finally accepting the whole process of enlisting. The legend of General Baidan in Water Margin is the reincarnation of 36 highest solar stars and 72 terrestrial stars. They pay attention to loyalty, love to fight injustice, rob the rich and help the poor, resent corrupt officials, and finally gather in Liangshan to fight against the corrupt court. The novel successfully created the images of Song Jiang, Lin Chong, Lu, Lu and so on, and showed the readers the political and social situation in the Song Dynasty.
The Water Margin literally means the water's edge, which means the story takes place in Liangshan Park, Shandong Province. In addition, there is a saying in the Book of Songs, "Ancient Qi Huangong and his father came to fetch horses from the DPRK and led them to the water margin in the west, as for the gorge", which recorded the migration of tribes led by Zhou. Some people think that the title of Water Margin is an analogy between Song Jiang Juyi and the rise of the Zhou Dynasty, which proves that the original author affirmed the spirit of the uprising hero's resistance to rule. Song Jiang, the leader of the Shuihu Rebel Army, was originally a small official, but was later driven to Liangshan. Together with other Liangshan heroes, he rebelled against tyranny, "doing justice for heaven" and gradually developed and expanded. The story of Water Margin is bold and rough. In the book, the characters express their contradictory inner world through their words and deeds, and the characters have their own characteristics. The heroes who were caught up with Liangshan have different growth experiences. The plot is tortuous and the language is vivid, which has high artistic value.
As the first vernacular novel in the history of China, Water Margin has a great influence on later generations.
In the era of lack of knowledge and popular entertainment activities, other popular novels such as Water Margin and Romance of the Three Kingdoms often become the only cultural activities of ordinary people through folk artists in the form of opera and folk art, in which fictional characters or fictional stories become historical facts in the eyes of ordinary people. Many such stories, such as Lu pulling out weeping willows and shooting tigers, have always been talked about by men, women and children. The moral values revealed between the lines in the book, as well as the characteristics of valuing friends, ignoring life and death and valuing chivalry embodied in the characters in the book, have become the standards used by the public to judge right and wrong, good and evil.
Compared with Romance of the Three Kingdoms, the strength of Water Margin lies not in the description of political and war scenes, but in the description of the main characters and citizens' lives. Among them are Song Jiang, Lin Chong, Lu, and so on. The main figure in Liangshan has a distinct personality and has his own language.
The Water Margin has been adapted into various folk arts. In A Dream of Red Mansions, Lu's Wutai Mountain Song was mentioned. There are many classic programs in storytelling, such as Suzhou Pingtan and Shandong Kuaishu, which are all based on Water Margin.
There is an ancient saying: "Teenagers should not read the outlaws of the Marsh, let alone the Three Kingdoms", which means teenagers should not read the outlaws of the Marsh, otherwise they will easily want to fight all day and their spirits will deteriorate; Old people should not study the Three Kingdoms, because the characters are good at intrigue and intrigue. As an old man who should know his destiny, he should spend his old age peacefully, instead of thinking about calculating others all day, which is not good for his body and mind.
The Water Margin is also one of the four classical novels in ancient China, and its literary achievements have been praised by many literary critics in later generations:
Jin Shengtan called Shuihu, Lisao, Zhuangzi, Shiji, Du Fu's poems and The West Chamber "the book of six talents". Feng Menglong called Water Margin, Romance of the Three Kingdoms, The Journey to the West and Jin Ping Mei "the Four Musts". Along with Romance of the Three Kingdoms, The Journey to the West and A Dream of Red Mansions, it is listed as "the four classical novels of China".
In the 20th century, in addition to commenting on the literary achievements of Water Margin, literary critics began to take an interest in the social situation and values reflected in Water Margin.
At the beginning of 1930, Lu Xun once commented on the Water Margin in The Change of Thieves: "The word' chivalry' gradually disappeared, and robbers appeared, but they were also chivalrous, and their banner was' for heaven'. They opposed traitors, not emperors, and robbed civilians, not generals. Li Kui jy took the lead in chopping with an axe when grabbing the gift ceremony, but it was the spectators. A movie "Water Margin" makes it very clear: because it is not against the Emperor, as soon as the army arrives, it is called up to fight other robbers for the country-there is no robber who "acts for heaven". Finally became a slave. "
There have always been different views on the ideological tendency of Water Margin [2]. One view is that the Water Margin shows the idea of loyalty. The main representative is Li Zhi of Ming Dynasty. There is also a view that this is a book for robbers, a book to teach people to be robbers. It was mainly put forward by Zuo in Ming Dynasty. He thinks that the water margin has taught the people badly, and robbers learn from Song Jiang. And think that if the Water Margin is not banned, the impact on the world is unimaginable. At that time, the court accepted his suggestion and confiscated the water margin nationwide. Another person who holds this view is Jin Shengtan. This is one of the reasons why he cut off 70.
1950 s, the view held at that time was that "Water Margin" celebrated the peasant uprising. This view was a mainstream view held by various textbooks, literary history and novel history at that time.
In the1970s and at the end of the Cultural Revolution, Mao Zedong also commented on the values of Water Margin: "Water Margin only opposes corrupt officials, not emperors, 108 is beyond people whip's reach. Song Jiang surrendered, engaged in revisionism, and changed Chao's Juyi Hall into Loyalty Hall, which made people find peace. The struggle between Song Jiang and Gao Qiu is a struggle between one faction and another within the landlord class. Song Jiang surrendered and went to fight Fang La. " He also said: "The Water Margin is good at persuading surrender. Make a negative textbook and let the people know the capitulators. " His remarks once set off a "Comment on the Water Margin Movement" in China. At this time, the official view is [2], "Water Margin" is a book to promote capitulationism; Song Jiang carried out the capitulationist line and denied the revolutionary line of Classical. Classical and Song Jiang are two routes of struggle. Song Jiang rejected Classical after going up the mountain. 108 people have no classical name and status.
A Dream of Red Mansions is a classical novel in China, and its completion time remains to be verified. So far, the earliest copy appeared in the Xu Jianian period in the middle of the Qing Dynasty (1754). The titles mentioned in A Dream of Red Mansions include The Story of the Stone, The Record of Love Monks, The Mirror of the Moon, Twelve Women in Jinling and so on. In the forty-ninth year of Qing Qianlong (1784), The Preface to Dreams was officially named A Dream of Red Mansions. Before this, this book was generally called "The Story of the Stone". Since then, A Dream of Red Mansions has replaced A Dream of Red Mansions as a popular title. Who is the author of A Dream of Red Mansions has long been controversial. Most people think that Cao Xueqin is the author of the first eighty chapters, while Gao E and Cheng Weiyuan are the authors of the last forty chapters.
A Dream of Red Mansions is rated as the most accomplished classical novel in China and the pinnacle of Zhang Hui's novel, and it is the first of the "Four Classical Novels of China Classical Literature". In modern times, a subject with the theme of "Dream of Red Mansions" appeared-"Dream of Red Mansions".
A Dream of Red Mansions is a novel with chapters. Although each chapter is independent, it is interrelated. Some scholars have pointed out that the structure of A Dream of Red Mansions is completely different from that of western novels. The author adopts a "wave-like" structure in which many small events are superimposed into a big event and many small stories are interspersed with several main axes. So there is no unified view on the theme of A Dream of Red Mansions, but the most important ones are Jia Baoyu, Lin Daiyu and Xue. There are many descriptions and scripts about Buddhism, Taoism and Confucianism in the book, which are full of myths, reflecting the political ethics, social life, economic system and cultural development at that time, as well as clothing, food, pavilions, boats and cars.
The names of many characters in the book are homophonic, with special meanings, satire or exclamation, which is one of the arts of A Dream of Red Mansions. The recognition of Zhi Yanzhai indicates some obscure meaning.
Zhen Yinshi-the truth is hidden (go)
Zhen Lian won-what a pity.
Su Feng-Customs
Hodge-a disaster
Jia Yucun surnamed Jia Minghua: a lie; When words fly: this is not true; Nickname Yucun: False language [1]
Beautiful apricots-Lucky
Feng Yuan-Every grievance
Qin Keqing-Love can be light.
Qin Zhong-Love Species
Zhan Guang-Zhan Guang
Bo Gu Show-Regardless of Shame
Bo Shiren is not alone.
Hire people alone-good at deceiving others
Stone idiot.-a real idiot
Welcome to Spring, Welcome to Spring —— Yuan, Ying, Tan and Xi are homonyms of "original sigh".
At the beginning of the 20th century, the question "Who is the author of A Dream of Red Mansions" once caused a controversy in China academic circles, and it continues to this day. First of all, Hu Shi proposed that the authors of the last forty chapters and the first eighty chapters of A Dream of Red Mansions are not the same person. Therefore, after repeated textual research by many people, it is generally believed that Cao Xueqin is the author of the first eighty chapters, while Gao E and Cheng Weiyuan are the authors of the last forty chapters. Later, the author of the first eighty chapters was controversial, but there was no sufficient evidence.
In the first text of A Dream of Red Mansions, the author is called "Stone", which is naturally said by the novelist. Then he mentioned that "Cao Xueqin spent ten years for Hongxuan, adding and deleting five times, cataloguing and dividing chapters". However, a large number of fat reviews in early manuscripts pointed out that Cao Xueqin was the author. For example, there was a comment in the JOE edition for the first time: "If Yun Xueqin reads it and adds or deletes it, who wrote it after opening the book?" It shows that the author's pen is very cunning. "Zhifu has also said many times that many stories in A Dream of Red Mansions are based on the historical facts of the Cao family and can also be used as circumstantial evidence. The Fat Review reveals that the author is closely related to Cao Xueqin and his family, and is familiar with and even partially involved in the creation of A Dream of Red Mansions, so the Fat Review can be said to be the most direct evidence that Cao Xueqin is the author of A Dream of Red Mansions.
Ming Yi, a poet in the Qing Dynasty, said in the preface to tihongloumeng: "A Dream of Red Mansions was written by Cao Zixue Qin to record the prosperity of romantic life, and its ancestor was the magistrate of Jiangning. Its so-called Grand View Garden is the former site of today's garden. I am sorry that his book has not been passed down, and little-known people in the world will see his banknotes. " Yong Zhong, another imperial poet of the Qing Dynasty, wrote a poem called A Dream of Red Mansions in the thirty-third year of Qianlong, saying, "Looking at the novel A Dream of Red Mansions from the ink fragrance, there are three quatrains of Xueqin (surnamed Cao)". This is probably the earliest record that Cao Xueqin is the author of A Dream of Red Mansions besides A Dream of Red Mansions itself and Zhi Pi. Ming Yi and Yong Zhong are both Cao Xueqin's contemporaries. Although there is no evidence that they know Cao Xueqin, they have close contacts with Cao Xueqin's friends Duncheng and Dunmin, so their statements are considered highly reliable. But so far, in the works of Duncheng and Dunmin brothers, there is no record that Cao Xueqin is the author of A Dream of Red Mansions.
In addition, in the notes of Yuan Mei, Yu Rui and others who were contemporaries or later than Cao Xueqin, there are also records that Cao Xueqin was the author of A Dream of Red Mansions. 192 1 year, Hu Shi published Textual Research on A Dream of Red Mansions. According to the notes of Qing Dynasty and the textual research of Cao Xueqin's family background, Cao Xueqin was identified as the author of A Dream of Red Mansions, and since then he has become an authoritative theory. Later, the discovery of fat-based fat batches more strongly supported this conclusion. In recent years, although it has been suggested that the author of A Dream of Red Mansions is another person, the evidence is insufficient.
Cheng Weiyuan said in the preface to A Dream of Red Mansions 120 that he found more than 20 of the last 40 volumes from "book collectors and even old paper piles", and the rest 10 volumes were due to "drum burden", and he and Gao E only "carefully added points to make up for each other's shortcomings". However, most people think that the last 40 chapters were actually written in elevation. In recent years, it has also been suggested that someone updated the last 40 chapters of this book, and the elevation really just edited it. Some people think that there are some old manuscripts of Cao Xueqin in the last forty chapters.
198 1 year, through the mathematical statistics of A Dream of Red Mansions, Chen Bingzao came to the conclusion that 120 chapters are all Cao Xueqin's original works. However, there is still no general understanding in academic circles.