The eighteenth-century "Hongloumeng," known in English as "Dream
of the Red Chamber" or "The Story of the Stone," is generally
considered to be the greatest of Chinese novels--one that
masterfully blends realism and romance, psychological motivation
and fate, daily life and mythical occurrences, as it narrates the
decline of a powerful Chinese family. In this path-breaking study,
Anthony Yu goes beyond the customary view of "Hongloumeng" as a
vivid reflection of late imperial Chinese culture by examining the
novel as a story about fictive representation. Through a maze of
literary devices, the novel challenges the authority of history as
well as referential biases in reading. At the heart of "
Hongloumeng," Yu argues, is the narration of desire. Desire appears
in this tale as the defining trait and problem of human beings and
at the same time shapes the novel's literary invention and effect.
According to Yu, this focalizing treatment of desire may well be
"Hongloumeng"'s most distinctive accomplishment.
Through close readings of selected episodes, Yu analyzes
principal motifs of the narrative, such as dream, mirror,
literature, religious enlightenment, and rhetorical reflexivity in
relation to fictive representation. He contextualizes his
discussions with a comprehensive genealogy of "qing"--desire,
disposition, sentiment, feeling--a concept of fundamental
importance in historical Chinese culture, and shows how the text
ingeniously exploits its multiple meanings. Spanning a wide range
of comparative literary sources, Yu creates a new conceptual
framework in which to reevaluate this masterpiece.
General
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