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Have you ever experienced teenage angst?

I think that most of us have. There are times when you feel utterly incapable of controlling your emotions during your teen years. There are times when the pent-up rage and frustration simply have to come out.

That’s what happened to Jia Baoyu. He’s sitting alone in his room, with only a candle, a pot of tea, and an old philosophy book to accompany him. He’s had two cups of wine after dinner. The girls who usually fill the room with laughter aren’t speaking to him.

So he picks up his brush and rewrites the book. In his version, the four girls closest to him are the trouble with the world. The cure is to burn them, scatter them, wreck their beauty and turn their minds to ash.

Then he goes to bed.

Is that a joke? Or did a little wine let Jia Baoyu say what he really feels?

What he did

If you missed yesterday’s post, Two Cups of Wine and Zhuangzi, here’s the short version. Baoyu’s maids, led by Xiren, have given him the silent treatment. (See The Silent Treatment.) Alone and a little tipsy, he reads a chapter of the Zhuangzi called “Prying Open Trunks.” It’s the one that says the world would be better off if we burned every seal, snapped every scale and glued shut the eyes of the man with the best eyesight in history.

He likes it so much that he writes a continuation. He keeps Zhuangzi’s grammar and Zhuangzi’s verbs, and he swaps in Baochai, Daiyu and his two maids, Xiren and Sheyue.

The novel’s word for what he does is 續 (xù), which means “to continue.” It doesn’t call it a parody, a joke or a confession. And that means that it’s up to us to interpret what kind of “continuation” this is.

Why this book, on this night?

Look at what happens right before he picks it up. He has decided to harden his heart and act as if the girls were dead. And the moment he does, he feels great. In my translation: “he didn’t have a care in the world, and he actually began to feel quite content.”

That state of mind has a home in Chinese literature, and it’s the Zhuangzi. Zhuangzi is the philosopher of not being tied down to anything. That means being tied down to your job, your reputation, your grief, or to anything at all. So Baoyu isn’t grabbing a book at random. He’s reaching for the one that matches the mood he’s trying to talk himself into.

And Zhuangzi has a soft spot for drunks. In the chapter called “Mastering Life” (達生), he points out that a drunk man who falls out of a cart doesn’t get hurt the way a sober man would: 「夫醉者之墜車，雖疾不死……其神全也，乘亦不知也，墜亦不知也。」 He didn’t know he was riding, and he didn’t know he was falling, so the fall didn’t break him.

Hang on to that drunk. We’ll see him again.

The question

So there are two ways to read what Baoyu wrote.

One: it’s a joke. A clever, slightly tipsy boy takes a famous text and swaps in the people who are annoying him, the way Weird Al keeps the tune and changes the words.

Two: it’s a confession. The wine loosened him up, and for one night he wrote down what he really thinks: that the girls he loves are traps, and he’d be better off without them. Chinese has a saying for that concept: 酒後吐真言, or “after wine, the truth comes out.”

I have an answer, and I’ll give it to you. But first I want to show you exactly what he did to Zhuangzi, line by line, because the evidence is in the details, and some of it cuts against me.

Zhuangzi in Five Minutes

To see what Baoyu is making fun of, you have to know what Zhuangzi was making fun of.

“Prying Open Trunks” (胠篋) starts with a picture that everyone in ancient China would recognize. You’re worried about thieves, so you tie up your trunk with rope and lock it tight. That’s what the world calls being smart. Then a big thief comes along, picks up the whole trunk and runs off with it. His only worry is that your ropes and locks might not hold: 「然而巨盜至，則負匱揭篋擔囊而趨，唯恐緘縢扃鐍之不固也。」

Then Zhuangzi scales it up. Tian Chengzi (田成子) killed the ruler of Qi and took over the state. And Zhuangzi asks: was it only the state he stole? No. He stole the laws of the state along with it: 「所盜者豈獨其國邪？並與其聖知之法而盜之。」 The laws that were supposed to protect Qi gave the usurper a respectable government to hide behind. And, yes, this should sound familiar to you if you know anything about either history or current events.

That’s where the chapter’s most famous line comes from: 「彼竊鉤者誅，竊國者為諸侯。」 Steal a belt hook, and they execute you; steal a country, and you become a lord.

So here’s Zhuangzi’s argument. The cure feeds the disease. Every tool we invent to keep people honest, from scales and seals to laws and the great experts everyone looks up to, ends up as a tool for the biggest thieves. Get rid of all of it, and there’s nothing left to steal.

That’s the passage Baoyu was reading. It ends with stopping up the ears of Music Master Kuang, gluing shut the eyes of Li Zhu and breaking the fingers of Chui the Craftsman, the greatest ear, eye and hand in history.

So the book Baoyu picked up is already an argument that the things we prize most are the source of our trouble. Keep that in mind, because it’s exactly the move he makes.

Is Zhuangzi Serious?

Here’s the twist. Nobody agrees on whether Zhuangzi meant this literally either.

Zhuangzi tells us himself that most of his book isn’t meant straight. In the chapter called “Lodged Words” (寓言), he says 「寓言十九」: nine-tenths of it is words put in someone else’s mouth, stories built to carry a point.

On the other hand, “Prying Open Trunks” probably wasn’t written by Zhuangzi at all. It’s in the Outer Chapters, and the British scholar A. C. Graham argued that this chapter and its neighbors (Chapters 8 through 10, and the start of 11) come from a later writer he called “the Primitivist,” angrier and more single-minded than Zhuangzi himself. Even the opening slogan is borrowed. 絕聖棄智, “cut off the sages and throw away wisdom,” comes straight from Chapter 19 of the Daodejing: 「絕聖棄智，民利百倍。」

So you can read the chapter two ways. One camp reads it as a real program: go back to a simple life before civilization, the uncarved block. The other reads it as satire, deliberately outrageous, aimed at the Confucian moralists who thought more rules would make better people.

But notice what neither camp thinks. Nobody reads this chapter and decides the author wanted to go glue somebody’s eyes shut. Li Zhu and Music Master Kuang are legends. They stand for something. The violence is the style.

Hold on to that. It’s going to matter.

Joke, or confession? Let’s look at the evidence.

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A maid tells the heir of the family not to set foot in her room, and he sulks off to bed. How does a servant have that kind of power?

Simple: by borrowing it.

Hua Xiren holds power the same way Wang Xifeng does. Both of them borrow their authority from someone higher up. Both of them win by knowing more than anyone around them.

The difference between the two is how they spend this authority they borrow. Xifeng spends fear. Xiren spends affection.

Hold on to the word borrow. We’ll come back to it.

A quick detour first

Before I put these two side by side, it helps to know how old this theme really is.

The servant who knows more than the family is one of the oldest tricks in fiction. Let’s take a look.

Nelly Dean tells the whole story of Wuthering Heights (1847) to a stranger because she was the one in the room. Jeeves, who debuts in Wodehouse’s stories in 1915, keeps Bertie Wooster out of trouble, and the joke is that Bertie never sees it happen. Figaro outwits his own master in Beaumarchais’s plays, and the authorities fought for years to keep The Marriage of Figaro off the stage. And in Downton Abbey, Mr. Carson and Mrs. Hughes actually run the house; the Crawleys only think they run it.

The pattern is always the same. The family has the name, and the staff has the information.

That’s the background. Now back to the Jias, where the information belongs to two women.

Xifeng: authority by token

We’ll start with what we saw back in Chapter 13. When Qin Keqing’s funeral needs a manager, Jia Zhen offers Wang Xifeng the Ningguo Mansion token. As you may recall, she doesn’t just grab it. She looks at Lady Wang first, who tells her to go ahead, but not to act on her own initiative if problems come up. In other words, Xifeng’s power arrives with a leash.

Now look at how she uses that power.

She does what any good manager does: she works out what’s broken. Her list is five items long: too many people coming and going, nobody with clear duties, wasteful spending, unfair workloads, and arrogant staff. She fixes every one of these problems in Chapter 14. She holds a roll call at a quarter past five every morning. She assigns every broom and cushion to a named person. And when one woman shows up late, Xifeng says that if she’s lenient once, she’ll have to be lenient with everyone. The woman gets twenty strokes and loses a month’s pay and rations. (See Chapter 14.)

The narrator’s verdict is that the old habits of shirking and pilfering were gone. Her system worked, and everyone was afraid of her.

Xiren: authority by affection

Now Xiren. She has no token and no title. In fact, the only thing she has going for her is the fact that Grandmother Jia gave her to Jia Baoyu. Everything she does rests on that.

Look at Chapter 19. Xiren’s mother and brother talk of buying her back, and Xiren tells Baoyu she’s leaving. Then the narrator lets us in on the trick. She had already told her family no. She wanted to test Baoyu’s feelings and take the fight out of him before she lectured him. (See Servitude and Xiren’s Loyalty.)

That’s the way Hua Xiren exercises her power. Once she’s seen how much he needs her, she sets her terms, which are three: no more talk of dying, at least pretend to like his books, and no more playing with the girls’ rouge.

Notice how her argument works. She tells Baoyu the Jia family has never used its power to force its own way, and that Grandmother Jia and Lady Wang would never agree to keep her for no reason. She uses the family’s own reputation as her lever. Then on Tuesday, in Chapter 21, she reaches for the same tool: “I’ll go back to waiting on Grandmother Jia, same as before.” The threat works because Grandmother Jia is the one who gave her to him.

Where they match

Put the two women side by side and three things line up.

First, both know the roster. Xifeng demands the register of household members before she does anything else. Xiren packs Baoyu’s school things and knows his habits, down to his warm clothes.

Second, both stage a scene to set the terms. Xifeng’s is the roll call. Xiren’s is the threat to leave.

Third, both are borrowing. Xifeng holds Jia Zhen’s token under Lady Wang’s watch. Xiren holds Grandmother Jia’s gift. Neither can keep that power without the backing of someone above her, because neither is the owner.

Where the comparison breaks

Now, I know what you’re thinking. Xifeng is a mistress and Xiren is a maid, right? And, yeah, that difference is pretty important.

Look back at Xiren’s fight with Nanny Li. Nanny Li, sore about her gambling losses, takes it out on Baoyu’s maids. Xiren is sick in bed and can’t make her stop. What ends it is Xifeng, who takes the old woman by the arm, calls her “Nanny,” offers to beat whoever has been bad, and leads her off to a drink and a meal. (See Hua Xiren and Nanny Li Fight.)

And that’s where you’ve got the difference between Hua Xiren and Wang Xifeng. Xifeng can have a woman beaten. Xiren can only go quiet. And Xiren, as Nanny Li reminds everyone, was bought for a few taels of silver.

Hua Xiren’s power is real, but it can be revoked. Xifeng’s can be revoked too, but only by someone a good deal higher up.

So who runs the house?

Neither of them owns the place. Grandmother Jia and Lady Wang sit above them both and wield the actual authority.

My verdict: Xiren is a small version of Xifeng, with less rank and a lighter hand. If you want to understand how this household really works, you’ve got to understand both of their methods.

So here’s my question for you. Which would you rather work for: the boss who rules by fear, or the one who rules by making you feel needed?

The Silent Treatment is the translation post that accompanies this commentary. Members can read that post and every other post, plus the weekly podcast, for $5 a month.

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Comment prompt: Which would you rather work for: the boss who rules by fear, or the one who rules by making you feel needed? Tell me in the comments.

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Next in the story: On Thursday, Baoyu rewrites a chapter of Zhuangzi. (Free.) Go deeper: The Silent Treatment (Tuesday, paid) Meet them: Hua Xiren / Wang Xifeng / All the characters

Today’s post is all about one of the oddest and most difficult to translate jokes in the classical Chinese novel Dream of the Red Chamber. If you’re interested in starting from the beginning or figuring out what the heck is going on, I recommend starting here. You can also check out this page for more on the many characters in the book.

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In today’s video, I argue that Bopomofo is better than pinyin. Bopomofo is an alphabet of 37 letters, and it can do something pinyin can’t: let you hear one particular joke. The video makes the case. This post gives you the text, the sounds, and the receipts, so you can check it yourself.

The joke comes from Chapter 20 of Dream of the Red Chamber. The whole scene is translated, free, here: Love Brother.

The Setup

Here’s the setup. Baoyu and Daiyu have just had their first real fight, about whose heart belongs to whom. Then their younger cousin Shi Xiangyun bursts in, and she has a lisp.

Keep one sound in your ear. A few posts earlier, the maid Ying’er claps her hands and cries “One! One!” at Jia Huan’s dice roll. (See Jia Huan Cheats at Dice.) That’s the sound of this house at play.

The Lines

These are the lines the video quotes, from the 1792 edition. The Bopomofo sits over the key words. The letters in the joke are in red.

Why 二 becomes 愛

Baoyu is the second son, so everyone calls him 二哥哥, “Second Brother.”

Xiangyun can’t make the sound of 二. It’s èr in pinyin, and in Bopomofo it gets a letter all to itself: ㄦˋ. When she tries, what comes out is ㄞˋ, 愛. So 二哥哥 becomes 愛哥哥.

And 愛 means “love.”

“Second Brother” becomes “Love Brother,” minutes after a fight about love, in front of Daiyu. Then Daiyu pounces: “She can’t even get out ‘Second Brother.’” Even her dice-game “one, love, three” has the joke in it. The video does the rest, but look at the red letters in the image and say them out loud. ㄦˋ. ㄞˋ.

How did the English translators handle this? Hawkes and the Yangs each tried, and neither one could let an English reader hear it. We took it apart on Saturday’s podcast: Why Can’t Anyone Translate “Love Brother”?

Why Daiyu says 幺, not 一

In 幺愛三, “one, love, three,” the “one” isn’t 一 (yī). It’s 幺 (yāo), an old word for the one on a die. My 現代漢語詞典 gives the same meaning: the one on dice and dominoes.

People in China still use it for “one” in phone numbers and room numbers. The reason is 七, “seven.” 一 yī and 七 qī are easy to mix up on a bad line. So the dice game in Daiyu’s joke is still alive every time someone in Beijing gives you their number.

The other joke in the scene

Right before Xiangyun walks in, Daiyu teases Baoyu: 回來傷了風，又該餓著吵吃的了. That’s “You’ll catch a cold, and they’ll make you go without food, and you’ll be whining for something to eat again.” It’s a reference to an old custom of curing a cold by starving it, the reverse of our “feed a cold, starve a fever.” Daiyu is predicting that he’ll catch cold, the household will stop feeding him, and he’ll make a fuss. She’s already worrying about him a few lines before she starts roasting everyone.

Tell me if I’m right. Or tell me what pinyin does better that I’ve left out.

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Read the scene, then meet the girl

If you came from the video, the next step is on this blog. Read the whole scene, free: Love Brother. Or meet the girl who can’t say 二: Shi Xiangyun.

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More than two thousand years ago, the Roman comic playwright Terence wrote a line that’s still quoted today: amantium irae amoris integratio est, or “The quarrels of lovers are the renewal of love.”

Novelists have been proving him right ever since.

Yesterday’s translation post had another one of these fights: Baoyu and Daiyu, a visit to Baochai’s rooms, and a screaming match about death in the first month of the New Year. It’s the second big blow-up in just a few chapters. Back in Chapter 17, Daiyu cut up a half-finished sachet in a rage.

Now, when a book stages the same kind of scene twice, it’s worth asking what the scene is for.

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New here? I’m translating all 120 chapters of 紅樓夢 (Dream of the Red Chamber) into modern American English, one passage at a time. Each passage comes with the Chinese text, a comparison with Hawkes and the Yangs, and notes on the hard words. We’re now in Chapter 20.

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Jia Huan is upset, and rightfully so. The truth is that he simply can’t win, no matter what. After all, he can’t change his mother.

This is what we learned in yesterday’s translation post, which you can see here:

The important part here isn’t the cheat, but, rather, this section:

趙姨娘見他這般，因問：「是那裡墊了踹窩來了？」賈環便說：「同寶姐姐玩來著。鶯兒欺負我，賴我的錢；寶玉哥哥攆了我來了。」趙姨娘啐道：「誰叫你上高臺盤了？下流沒臉的東西！那裡玩不得？誰叫你跑了去討這沒意思？」

When his mother, Concubine Zhao, saw the state he was in, she asked, “Who walked all over you this time?”

“I was playing with Sister Bao,” said Jia Huan. “Ying’er picked on me and cheated me out of my money, and then Brother Baoyu chased me off.”

Concubine Zhao spat at him. “Who told you to go climbing up to the high table? You low-down, shameless thing! Couldn’t you play anywhere else? Who told you to run over there and go begging for humiliation?”

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If you’re like me, yesterday’s translation post is probably confusing you a bit:

Why in the world are Hua Xiren and Nanny Li suddenly fighting?

Now, I don’t know exactly what Cao Xueqin had in mind. However, I do think there are a few clues that might point us in the right direction.

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As I noted in yesterday’s post, Jia Baoyu’s story about the mice is pretty ridiculous:

The conclusion is a bad pun, sort of like a dad joke:

「小耗子現了形，笑道：『我說你們沒見世面，只認得這果子是香芋，卻不知鹽課林老爺的小姐，才是真正的「香玉」呢！』」

黛玉聽了，翻身爬起來，按著寶玉，笑道：「我把你這個爛了嘴的！我就知道你是編派我呢。」說著便擰。寶玉連連央告：「好妹妹，饒了我罷！再不敢了。我因為聞見你的香氣，忽然想起這個故典來。」

“The little mouse turned back to his original form and laughed. ‘I’m telling you, none of you have seen the world,’ he explained. ‘You only know this fruit as a taro, or ‘xiangyu.’ What you don’t understand is that the daughter of Mr. Lin, the salt commissioner, is the real ‘xiangyu,’ the real ‘fragrant jade.’”

When Daiyu heard this part, she flipped herself over, scrambled over to Baoyu and pinned him down. “You moron!” she laughed. “I knew you were making it up about me!” And she started pinching him.

“Good sister, please spare me!” begged Baoyu again and again. “I won’t dare say anything like that again. I smelled your wonderful fragrance and suddenly remembered this old story.”

However, there might be something more going on here than just a play on words.

There are a number of different interpretations out there of precisely what is happening.

The most obvious reading comes straight from the text itself. In the first part of this scene, Jia Baoyu points out a sweet smell that he claims is coming from Lin Daiyu:

寶玉總沒聽見這些話，只聞見一股幽香，卻是從黛玉袖中發出，聞之令人醉魂酥骨。寶玉一把便將黛玉的衣袖拉住，要瞧瞧籠著何物。黛玉笑道：「這時候，誰帶什麼香呢？」寶玉笑道：「既如此，這香是從那裡來的？」黛玉道：「連我也不知道，想必是櫃子裡頭的香氣薰染的也未可知。」

Baoyu didn’t listen to a word of this. He only smelled a subtle fragrance coming from Daiyu’s sleeve, a fragrance so intoxicating it made his soul drunk and his bones melt. He grabbed Daiyu’s sleeve to see what was hidden inside.

“Who wears perfume at this hour?” said Daiyu with a laugh.

“Then where is that smell coming from?” smiled Baoyu.

“I don’t even know,” said Daiyu. “Maybe it’s from the incense in the cabinet.”

Baoyu shook his head: “I doubt it. This scent is strange. It’s not like a scent cake or a scent ball or a satchet.”

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The idea here is that the story itself is just Jia Baoyu commenting on the sweet smell that comes from Daiyu. In other words, it’s really nothing but shameless flirting.

Some Redologists (紅學家) are convinced that Cao Xueqin is making a sort of historical allusion. Apparently there was a historical woman named Li Xiangyu (李香玉) who was the granddaughter of Li Xu, the Suzhou Imperial Textile Commissioner during the Kangxi period of the Qing Dynasty.

This is actually discussed on the Chinese Wikipedia page for Lin Daiyu, which I’ve translated for you below:

經近年主流紅學家考證，林黛玉的原型為康熙年間任蘇州織造李煦的孫女，名叫李香玉，其父是任兩淮鹽課的李鼎。李家，曹家以及孫家之間互有姻親，故曹雪芹和李香玉從小耳鬢廝磨也不足為奇。然而按紅學家周汝昌在《紅樓夢新證》中的說法，李香玉更有可能是史湘雲的原型，故尚未有定論。

在《紅樓夢》十九回《情切切良宵花解語，意綿綿靜日玉生香》一回中，賈寶玉和林黛玉相對而臥，為寬林黛玉的心，賈寶玉胡編了一個小耗子偷香芋的故事：「一天，老耗子叫眾耗子分頭去偷米糧和瓜果為臘八粥，一小耗子自薦去偷香芋。眾耗子笑它身體瘦小，小耗子胸有成竹地說：『我變成香芋，滾在香芋堆裡，使人看不出……卻用分身法搬運。』眾耗子叫它變成香芋看看。小耗子就搖身一變，卻變成了一個最標致美貌的小姐。眾耗子說：『變錯了。』小耗子現形道：『我說你們沒有見過世面，只識得這果子是香芋，卻不知道鹽課林老爺的小姐才是真正的香玉呢。』很明顯，作者借這個故事暗示，林黛玉就是李香玉的化身。

In recent years, mainstream Redologists have concluded through textual research that Lin Daiyu’s prototype was the granddaughter of Li Xu, who served as the Suzhou Imperial Textile Commissioner during the Kangxi era. Her name was Li Xiangyu, and her father was Li Ding, who held the post of Lianghuai Salt Commissioner. The Li, Cao, and Sun families were all intermarried, so it is hardly surprising that Cao Xueqin and Li Xiangyu grew up in close childhood intimacy. However, according to the Redologist Zhou Ruchang in his work New Evidence on Dream of the Red Chamber, Li Xiangyu is more likely the prototype for Shi Xiangyun, so no definitive conclusion has yet been reached.

In Chapter 19 of Dream of the Red Chamber, titled “In a night filled with tender feelings, the flowers speak intelligibly; Through the lingering sweetness of a quiet day, the jade emits fragrance,” Jia Baoyu and Lin Daiyu lie facing each other. To soothe Lin Daiyu’s heart, Jia Baoyu makes up a story about a little mouse stealing taro: “One day, Old Mouse told all the mice to go their separate ways to steal rice, grain, and fruit for Laba porridge. One little mouse volunteered to steal the taro. The other mice laughed at him because he was so thin and small. The little mouse, full of confidence, said: ‘I’ll transform into a taro and roll in among the taro pile, so no one can tell the difference... and then I’ll use a body-doubling method to carry them off.’ The other mice told him to transform into a taro so they could see. The little mouse gave himself a shake, and, lo and behold, he transformed into the most elegant and beautiful young lady. The other mice said, ‘You transformed wrong.’ The little mouse reverted to his true form and said: ‘I tell you, you haven’t seen the world. You only recognize this fruit as taro, but you don’t know that the daughter of Mr. Lin, the Salt Commissioner, is the real “Fragrant Jade” [xiangyu].’” Clearly, the author uses this story to hint that Lin Daiyu is the incarnation of Li Xiangyu.

As is usually the case with public commentary on Dream of the Red Chamber, we’re a bit too quick to jump into the “clearly” (很明顯) line of reasoning. While it’s certainly possible that Cao Xueqin was thinking of a friend namd Li Xiangyu when he wrote this story, we simply don’t have enough evidence to tie Li Xiangyu together with Lin Daiyu.

Besides, there’s actually a better explanation within the text of Dream of the Red Chamber itself.

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Remember that Jia Baoyu proposed the name “Red Fragrance and Green Jade” (紅香綠玉) for one of the buildings in the Grand View Garden back in chapter 17:

賈政道：「依你如何？」寶玉道：「依我題『紅香綠玉』四字，方兩全其美。」賈政搖頭道：「不好，不好！」

“Then what do you suggest?” asked Jia Zheng.

“I propose ‘Red Fragrance and Green Jade,’” said Jia Baoyu. “That would beautifully capture the best of both.”

“That’s awful,” said Jia Zheng, shaking his head. “Simply awful.”

Jia Yuanchun comes along in chapter 18 and changes the name entirely:

又改題：「有鳳來儀」，賜名瀟湘館。「紅香綠玉」，改作「怡紅快綠」，賜名怡紅院。

Jia Yuanchun also changed some of the other inscriptions. She named the building with the inscription “The Phoenix Arrives in Ritual Splendor” the “The Xiaoxiang Building.” She changed the inscription “Red Fragrance and Green Jade” to “Delighting in Red and Rejoicing in Green,” and called the building “The Red Delight Building.”

Now, notice the two characters that Jia Yuanchun took away from the name of this building. These would be 香 and 玉, which makes 香玉 (fragrant jade) when you put them together.

The idea here is that Cao Xueqin is foreshadowing the fact that some sort of imperial intervention will keep Jia Baoyu apart from Lin Daiyu. This relies in part on a color focused interpretation that we’ll come back to later, especially when we discover which character winds up living in each building in the Grand View Garden.

Could all of these interpretations be correct? Of course. And the thing that is most fascinating here is that Cao Xueqin is able to take an otherwise nonsensical story and give it so many layers.

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It’s no secret that the modern world of corporate censorship makes it so that we can’t talk like adults about certain adult subjects.

This is why I had to use some interesting and unusual ways to refer to sexuality in my latest video:

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The truth is that modern society tends to have a lot of odd and bizarre sexual hangups. And there’s really a lot we can learn about human sexuality from novels like Dream of the Red Chamber.

One of the fascinating things about Cao Xueqin’s novel is that it deals with human sexuality in a mature and adult manner. In other words, rather than prattling on and on about the anatomic features of a certain character, Cao Xueqin spends his time writing about how characters relate to one another.

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That’s not to say that the characters don’t have sex lives. They do. And, in fact, the characters in Dream of the Red Chamber seem to always be sleeping around with each other. And if the occasional references to actual sexual activity aren’t enough, there are also all sorts of innuendos and oblique references to sexual desire throughout the book.

This is one of the things that makes Dream of the Red Chamber so fascinating, of course. But it’s not just a book about sex.

Rather, it’s a book about actual human connection. And, in my mind, that’s what sets this novel apart from run of the mill books that occasionally include a steamy scene.

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Today’s post will be short and a little bit unusual.

After reading this post about Hua Xiren’s frustrations in the Jia family, and following it up with yesterday’s post in which her true feelings are made clear, I’m curious to know what you think.

It’s clear that Hua Xiren is testing Jia Baoyu’s loyalty to her. It’s also interesting that she would use this particular technique to test his loyalty. I think it says a lot about her as a character, and it’s not everybody who will say the complete opposite of what they really think to see if someone close to them actually cares for them.

But what do you think about their relationship? What do you think Hua Xiren’s true feelings are towards Jia Baoyu?

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Yesterday’s translation post probably seems a bit odd to you. If it doesn’t seem strange, congratulations, because it certainly seemed strange to me.

Jia Baoyu visits Hua Xiren on the spur of the moment. He arrives at her family’s small house, surprises everybody, has a few things to eat, lets the other girls look at his jade, and then disappears.

So why is this section even in the book?

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Chances are that you’re pretty surprised by the blatant sexuality in Dream of the Red Chamber.

We saw a bit of it in yesterday’s translation post, where Jia Baoyu’s servant Mingyan was caught with a somewhat anonymous girl named Wang’er:

剛到窗前，聽見屋裡一片喘息之聲。寶玉倒唬了一跳，心想：「美人活了不成？」乃大著膽子，舔破窗紙，向內一看。那軸美人卻不曾活，卻是茗煙按著個女孩子，也幹那警幻所訓之事，正在得趣，故此呻吟。

He had just reached the window when he heard heavy breathing coming from the room. “Has the beautiful woman truly come to life?” thought Baoyu in amazement. Baoyu eventually worked up his courage, licked a hole in the paper of the window, and peeked inside.

It turns out that the beauty in the scroll hadn’t come to life. Instead, Baoyu saw Mingyan on top of a girl, doing the thing that the Goddess had taught Baoyu earlier. The two of them were in a deep passionate moment, and they were moaning loudly.

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This isn’t the first example of hanky-panky we’ve seen so far in Dream of the Red Chamber. You might remember this example from the beginning of chapter 6:

襲人本是個聰明女子，年紀又比寶玉大兩歲，近來也漸省人事，今見寶玉如此光景，心中便覺察了一半，不覺把個粉臉羞的飛紅。遂不好再問，仍舊理好衣裳，隨至賈母處來。胡亂吃過晚飯，過這邊來，趁眾奶孃丫鬟不在旁時，另取出一件中衣，與寶玉換上。

寶玉含羞央告道：「好姐姐，千萬別告訴人。」襲人也含著羞悄悄的笑問道：「你為什麼」說到這裡，把眼又往四下裡瞧了瞧，才又問道：「那是那裡流出來的？」寶玉只管紅著臉，不言語，襲人卻只瞅著他笑。遲了一會，寶玉才把夢中之事細說與襲人聽。說到雲雨私情，羞的襲人掩面伏身而笑。寶玉亦素喜襲人柔媚姣俏，遂強拉襲人同領警幻所祕授之事。

Now, Xiren was an intelligent girl to begin with, and was also about two years older than Baoyu. She had recently begun to learn about sexual matters. And so, seeing Baoyu in this state, she guessed what had happened. Instinctively, her cheeks quickly turned red with embarrassment.

And so she thought it would be best not to ask more. Having straightened his clothes properly, she accompanied him to see Grandmother Jia. After he had hurried through his dinner and returned to his room, she waited for a moment when the other maids were not nearby. Then, taking out a fresh pair of underwear, she helped Baoyu change into it.

“Dear sister,” Baoyu said, blushing with shame, “whatever you do, please don’t tell anyone.”

Xiren, also blushing, asked him quietly with a suppressed smile: “Why did you…” At this point, she glanced around cautiously again, and then continued: “Where did that come from?”

Baoyu simply blushed deep red and said nothing. Xiren, however, gazed at him with a smile. After a long pause, Baoyu finally told her the events of his dream in detail.

When Baoyu spoke of the sexual encounter in his dream, Xiren was so overcome with shyness that she covered her face, doubled over, and laughed.

Since Baoyu had always been fond of Xiren for her gentle, charming, and lovely nature, he then insistently shared with Xiren the secret techniques the Goddess taught him.

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And, of course, there are all sorts of direct and frank references to homosexuality in chapter 9:

金榮越發得了意，搖頭咂嘴的，口內還說許多閒話。玉愛偏又聽見，兩個人隔座咕咕唧唧的角起口來。金榮只一口咬定，說：「方才明明的撞見他兩個在後院裡親嘴摸屁股，兩個商議定了，一對一肏，撅草根兒抽長短，誰長誰先幹！」

Jin Rong became more and more pleased with himself. He shook his head, clicked his tongue, and began muttering all sorts of things. Yu’ai, who happened to overhear him, started to argue with him through a series of whispers across the seats.

Jin Rong spoke loudly and confidently. “I just caught them in the courtyard,” he said. “They were kissing and grabbing each other’s bottoms. In fact, they had already agreed, and were getting ready to fuck each other. They were pulling up blades of grass to see whose stalk was longer. The one who got the longer one would go first!”

And I could go on.

The truth is that Dream of the Red Chamber follows the pattern set by 金瓶梅, or The Plum in the Golden Vase, which is clearly the most controversial of the classical Chinese novels. The Plum in the Golden Vase is extremely sexually explicit, so much so that I’m not going to quote any passages here. The Plum in the Golden Vase is also notorious for being likely the most banned book in the history of Chinese literature, despite the obvious fact that there is a lot of literary merit and significance to the book.

The Plum in the Golden Vase is somewhat similar to Fanny Hill, the 18th century British erotic novel that wound up striking down obscenity laws throughout the United States and Europe in the 1960s. See, for example, Memoirs v Massachusetts; my understanding is that Fanny Hill played a similar role in numerous European court cases around the same time.

The problem, of course, is that you can’t discount Fanny Hill or The Plum in the Golden Vase as trash or lacking literary merit merely because of the sexual content. And this is even more true of Dream of the Red Chamber, where the naked sexuality is thankfully an occasional sideshow and not the entire plot of the book.

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It’s kind of hard to believe these days, but there was once a time when using Pinyin to write romanized Chinese was almost like a political statement.

In fact, Pinyin was so fraught with controversy that even Gladys Yang’s A Dream of Red Mansions used the old Wade-Giles convention.

Wade-Giles, of course, is pretty confusing, especially if the person writing the article or translation or book or whatever it is neglects to use the apostrophes. And, well, it turns out that the Yangs didn’t bother to worry too much about apostrophes in their translation of Dream of the Red Chamber:

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Though his translation avoided a lot of the Marxist overtones that the Yangs were forced to use in theirs, David Hawkes decided to use Pinyin instead of the Wade-Giles tradition. And, of course, back in the 1970s Pinyin wasn’t really understood all that well, prompting Hawkes to include notes like this in the beginning of many of the volumes of The Story of the Stone:

Now, if you spend a lot of time digging through older books on Chinese history, you’ll realize just how pervasive (and confusing) Wade-Giles really was. My favorite example of this is The Cambridge History of China. The history is fantastic, but the romanization leaves a lot to be desired:

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I mean, Wade-Giles isn’t necessarily awful, and it’s not as hard to switch between it and Pinyin as you might think at first. But still, you get the feeling with Wade-Giles that every single word starts with a t or ch or tz or ts, and the apostrophes are just annoying after a while.

Anyway, all this and more is the topic of my latest video:

All I can say is that I’m happy to have Pinyin. The alternative is anything but pretty.

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Cao Xueqin has an odd habit of trying to draw no attention at all to some of his most significant passages.

We saw one yesterday, though you probably didn’t realize it at the time:

The issue here comes in this part, where the Emperor rewards the Jia family for taking such good care of Jia Yuanchun:

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龍顏甚悅，又發內帑綵緞金銀等物，以賜賈政及各椒房等員

The Emperor was extremely pleased. He sent gifts of silks, brocades, gold, silver, and so on from his personal treasury to reward Jia Zheng and the various members of Jia Yuanchun’s family.

So what’s the problem with this?

The problem lies in the concept of a 內帑, or the Empror’s own personal purse.

Now, this might strike you as a more intimate act of grace, as if he were trying to tie himself closer to the Jia family. And I can see how members of the Jia family would also interpret things this way.

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However, by avoiding using the state funds (probably something like 國庫), the Emperor is basically making the Jia family subservient to his own whims. The Jia family is quickly turning into a family that is entirely dependent on the grace and favor of the current reigning Emperor, which is extremely dangerous.

This is dangerous because there was a concept at the time of collective guilt. In other words, if anything were to happen to Jia Yuanchun for any reason, her entire family would be at risk because of this personal patronage.

As I’ve noted before, this really points at the fundamental issue that the Jia family faces. Since none of the males in the family have successfully passed the imperial exams, the family has no way to guarantee that it can continue the way of life it has been accustomed to. And, if Jia Baoyu continues to not take the imperial examinations seriously, disaster is indeed inevitable.

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Instead of looking back at where we’ve been, I wanted to give you a sneak picture of where Dream of the Red Chamber is going from here.

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You might remember the video I came out with the other day:

If you haven’t seen it yet, go check it out.

Anyway, I originally wanted Monday’s post to be a full guide to the various editions of Dream of the Red Chamber that are out there. However, I wound up spending more time doing research on those editions than actually piecing together a post.

To make up for that, I’ll just make today’s post the edition guide. Here are the raw notes that I took while piecing together the video, complete with a few comments about where these editions come from.

I’m putting this out for free for all of you who are curious students of this book. It can take quite a bit of time to piece all of this together, especially since almost all the information out there is in Chinese. The names of these manuscripts and variations are also difficult to piece together even if your native language is Chinese.

Anyway, here goes:

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Manuscripts

This includes all handwritten copies of Dream of the Red Chamber. Most of these include commentary in red, which is the famous 脂硯齋 (Zhiyanzhai, or red inkstone) commentary. None of these are original manuscripts; they are all copies of copies.

1754 甲戌本 Jiaxu manuscript

• Purchased by Hu Shi in 1927; is now at Cornell university

• Chapters 1-8, 13-16, and 25-28; original probably had 80 chapters.

• Most copies we have are black and white. A color version was printed in Taiwan in 1961 but is rare.

1759 己卯本 Jimao manuscript

• Held in National Library of China, Beijing

• Originally 41 chapters with 13 recovered later for a total of 54 chapters (this is confusing, I know)

1760 庚辰本 Gengchen

• In Peking University library

• 78 chapters survive; chapters 64 and 67 are missing, and chapters 17 and 18 are unseparated

• This is the most complete “zhi commentary” version and is the basis for most of the modern critical versions of the novel

• This one is the reason why you see chapters 17 and 18 combined in official published editions of the book.

戚序本 Qi-Preface

• Manuscripts that contain a preface by Qi Liaosheng (戚蓼生) who was a scholar-official in the 18^th century

• This includes all 80 chapters with integrated commentary

• These were the earliest manuscripts to reach the public, going back to a photographic reproduction in 1911.

• There are numerous versions of this manuscript out there, which can be pretty confusing. The thing they all have in common is the Qi Liaosheng preface.

蒙府本 Mongol Prince Mansion

• Found in a Mongol Prince palace in the 1960s

• 120 chapters, but the last 40 chapters are unique

• The final 40 chapters are usually considered a later patchwork and are likely not a Cao Xueqin original

• Some variants in first 80 chapters

列藏本 Leningrad

• Found in Leningrad in the 1960s; brought to China in the 1980s for study

• 78 chapters with some commentary but less than other manuscripts

• Also has some unique readings

• Seems to have gone from China to Russia sometime in the 1830s.

梦稿本 Dream

• Owned by Qing dynasty scholar Yang jizhen (楊繼振); he got it sometime in the 19^th century

• 120 chapters

• First 80 chapters seem to be a printed-style text

• Last 40 chapters have traces of a revised draft

• Could this be an earlier version of what Cheng Weiyuan and Gao E were working on?

楊藏本 The Yang Manuscript

• This seems to have originally been published in 1973. This is a 120 chapter manuscript covered with deletions and so forth.

南圖本 The “Nanjing Library” version

• Probably came from sometime in the middle of the 19^th century, kind of hard to tell

• Includes Zhiyanzhai commentaries and the Qi Liaosheng preface

1784 甲辰本 Jiachen

• Dated 1784 in the text

• 80 chapters

• Includes a preface by Mengjuezhuren (夢覺主人)

• Shows some editorial interventions, and seems to be a textual bridge

1789 舒序本 Shu-Preface

• Dated 1789

• Only 40 chapters

• With preface by Shu Yuwei (舒元煒)

郑藏本 Zheng Zang Ben

• Chapter 23 only

• Discovered in Zheng Zhenduo’s collection

卞藏本 Bian Zang Ben

• 10 chapters that surfaced in 2006

• Some people think this is a modern fake

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Printed Versions

There are hundreds of different printed versions of Dream of the Red Chamber, probably because the text itself is not under copyright. It’s common to see random editions spring up from small and somewhat bizarre publishing companies in random parts of China. Some of these use font sizes that are so small that the text is literally unreadable.

I like to collect these different versions. However, the list below includes only the major variants that I am aware of rather than including every single different possible permutation of the book.

1791 程甲本 Cheng Jia edition

• First completed and printed 120 chapter edition

• Lots of differences from the old manuscripts with red ink commentary

• Includes preface in which Gao E and Cheng Weiyuan explain that the final 40 chapters were reconstructed based on different manuscripts.

• This was the most popular version of the text until 1927; almost all easily accessible versions were this text.

1792 程乙本 Cheng Yi edition

• Revised edition that formed the base of the most popular version of this book in the 20^th century

• Most changes in this version came to the final 40 chapters.

• Includes additional preface note with more explanation about the provenance of the final 40 chapters; Gao E and Cheng Weiyuan claim that they found better quality original manuscripts of these chapters, but offer no real provenance information or explanation.

• This is generally considered the popular version of the novel to this day; chances are that your Chinese grandparents read this version.

三家評本 19^th century commentary version

• Includes three different commentators: Wang Xilian (王希廉), Zhang Xinzhi (張新之), and Yao Xie

• This is what basically cemented the Cheng-Gao base in the understanding of this novel.

• These commentaries did not take into consideration any manuscripts, which were difficult to find and very obscure.

Yadong Editions 亞東版

• Published by Yadong Library in Shanghai

• Prefaces by Hu Shi and Chen Duxiu

• 1921 edition was the Cheng Yi edition with Hu Shi’s preface; this is what turned the novel into a modern printed book

• 1927 edition was this version with further revisions and used the 1792 text as the base.

• This is the version most prominent in the Republic of China era

1953 作家出版社 Zuojia Chubanshe

• First standardized popular edition in the PRC

1957 人民文学出版社 Renmin Wenxue Chubanshe

• Base text with the Cheng Yi veresion

• Includes a preface by that reflects the orthodox Marxist interpretation

• This was the standard text for two decades, though there was a period between 1966 and 1971 or so when Dream of the Red Chamber was not allowed to be sold in stores.

• Includes explanatory footnotes for difficult to understand characters

1982 人民文学出版社 Renmin Wenxue Chubanshe

• The first 80 chapters here are based on the Gengchen manuscript primarily

• This is where they started combining chapters 17 and 18

• This instantly became the standard version in China

• This is basically the most important version of the novel since the Yadong Editions, and marked a major scholarly shift towards the manuscripts.

1983 紅樓夢校注 Taipei version

• Also uses the Gengchen manuscript for the first 80 chapters, but with parts of the Leningrad manuscript

• This is the scholarly version in Taiwan

• Note, however, that it’s much easier to find versions of the 1792 text in Taiwan through publishers like 三民書局.

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It’s a little bit late in coming, but I finally finished up a quick overview of the history of the text of Dream of the Red Chamber:

This is what we’d normally call “higher criticism,” which refers to criticism that focuses on the text itself. “Lower criticism” is more like what you read on this blog every day - that involves reading the commonly accepted text and arguing incessantly about what it means.

Of course, the problem with Dream of the Red Chamber is that analysis of the text itself brings with it a lot of assumptions and complications, including some things that can be really difficult to understand.

The other problem is that it’s really not easy to find copies of all these various manuscript variants and the various versions that have been published over the years.

I have my ways, however, and have slowly been piecing together a pretty comprehensive collection of all of this stuff.

Soon - in fact, hopefully by the end of this week - I’ll have a major update to the files area of this site with a bunch of helpful files. These will include:

Published translations in multiple languages (basically as much as I can find)

All Chinese editions of the book I’ve been able to come across, including manuscripts and printed copies

Numerous commentary books and articles that have come up over the years

And more!

Of course, collecting all the books is one thing. Actually reading them is another. But we’ve got time on our hands. Stay tuned as I slowly start working through the world of commentaries.

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A friend of mine had a question after reading yesterday’s poem.

The question revolves around these two lines:

軟襯三春草，柔拖一縷香。

They softly contrast with the late spring grass,

Gently leaving a single sweet scent.

In particular - should we call 三春 “late spring,” or something else?

First of all, you need to realize that the phrase 三春 always has a deeper meaning in Dream of the Red Chamber. The character 春 here refers to the names of the four Jia family “sisters:” Jia Yuanchun, Jia Yingchun, Jia Tanchun, and Jia Xichun.

We were actually introduced to this way back in chapter 2, though it’s easy to forget:

雨村道：「更妙在甄家風俗：女兒之名亦皆從男子之名，不似別人家另外用這些『春』『紅』『香』『玉』等豔字。何得賈府亦落此俗套？」子興道：「不然。只因現今大小姐是正月初一所生，故名元春，餘者都從了『春』字。上一輩的卻也是從弟兄而來的。現有對證：目今你貴東家林公的夫人即榮府中赦政二公的胞妹，在家時名喚賈敏。不信時，你回去細訪可知。」

“What’s even more remarkable,” remarked Yucun, “is the naming custom in the Zhen family. Their daughter’s names follow the same pattern as their son’s names. They’re not like the other households, which insist on gaudy names like ‘spring,’ ‘red,’ ‘fragrant,’ or ‘jade.’ How could the Jia family stoop to such vulgar customs?”

“It’s not like that,” replied Zixing. “It’s only because their oldest daughter was born on the first day of the New Year. That’s why they called her ‘Primordial Spring,’ or ‘Yuanchun.’ The others just followed with the same ‘Spring’ character [Chun]. The daughters of the previous Jia generation, however, did follow the naming pattern of their brothers. Here’s the proof: the wife of your employer, Master Lin, is the full younger sister of the Rong mansion’s Jia She and Jia Zheng. She was named Jia Min. If you don’t believe me, ask them yourself when you go back.”

In general, the phrase 三春 refers to the three remaining Jia family sisters, now that Jia Yuanchun is part of the Imperial harem.

Now, there are actually two different ways to think about 三春. One is “the three springs,” or the three girls with “Chun” in their name, as I described above. And the other way is to think about the three different time periods within spring.

These time periods are pretty easy to understand. You’ve got 初春, or the first part of spring; 仲春, or the middle part of spring, and 暮春, or the late part of spring.

Now, you can assign numbers to each of those. If you were to use numbers to differentiate the different time periods within spring, then 三春 would naturally be the same as 暮春, or “late spring.” That’s how I translated 三春 in yesterday’s poem.

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I’ve used the same translation approach when we came across 三春 in the past, too. See this post, for instance:

三春爭及初春景？虎兔相逢大夢歸。

Can the late spring rival the first dawn of spring?

When the tiger meets the rabbit, the great dream is done.

In this poem, the assocation between 三春 (the third spring, late spring, or whatever) and 暮春 (late spring) is obvious. It’s written in direct contrast to 初春. And there’s a really good chance that this poem refers to one of the three Jia sisters.

However, there are also times where 三春 really can’t be translated as “late spring.” Take this, for example:

將那三春看破，桃紅柳綠待如何？

As she sees through the splendor of the three springs,

She wonders what use the reds and greens of spring are.

In this case, 三春 absolutely needs to refer to all three of the periods of spring, rather than only the last one. Note as well the reference to the colors green and red, which is something that we’ve seen come up pretty frequently in chapters 17 and 18.

There’s also a poem where 三春 is almost impossible to translate to English:

勘破三春景不長，緇衣頓改昔年妝。

可憐繡戶侯門女，獨臥青燈古佛旁！

Clearly seeing that the spring won’t last forever,

She suddenly changed into dark robes.

What a shame that this daughter of wealth

Now sleeps alone by the dim lamp of an ancient Buddha!

I’m really not sure what to do with 三春 here, unless we translate it as “late spring” again. This one is a head scratcher.

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Anyway, in the poem we saw yesterday, 三春 is mentioned in connection with an actual place. While it very likely refers to the three Jia sisters, the context of the visual image makes the most sense if we simply call it “late spring,” and not something like “the three springs:”

蘅蕪滿靜苑，蘿薜助芬芳。

軟襯三春草，柔拖一縷香。

Wild ginger fills the quiet courtyard,

The climbing vines add their fragrance.

They softly contrast with the late spring grass,

Gently leaving a single sweet scent.

Of course, if you think about what this poem represents, it’s pretty clear that it refers to a girl whose appearance and beauty sets herself apart from the three Chun sisters.

I’ll also note in my own defense that both David Hawkes and the Yangs struggle with this passage. Hawkes translates it as “summer” for some bizarre reason:

Fragrance of flower-drifts in these quiet confines

Mingles with headier scents of eglantines,

And summer’s herbs in a soft, spicy bed

Their aromatic perfumes subtly spread.

The Yangs at least call it “spring,” but they seem to get the picture completely wrong:

Alpinia fills the courtyard free from dust,

By climbing fig its fragrance reinforced;

Softly they heighten the fresh green of spring,

Gently they trail their perfume, ring on ring.

Anyway, I’d love to know what you think about all of this!

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Okay - it’s time to start digging.

Yesterday’s poem is confusing. If you have no idea what in the world is going on, don’t feel bad. Join the club.

Let’s back up a little bit and see if we can figure this out together.

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Normally this would be a post for paid subscribers only. However, the poems by Xue Baochai and Lin Daiyu are quite significant when it comes to understanding 紅樓夢, or Dream of the Red Chamber. As a result, I’ve decided to make this post free for all readers. If you enjoy this, please consider a paid subscription to this publication. There’s a lot more like this to come.

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There’s a major difference between actually reading a book and just reading about the book.

I’ve spent quite a bit of time in my life reading articles about Dream of the Red Chamber. And one of the things that pops up over and over again is what a genius Cao Xueqin was, especially when it comes to his poetry. In particular, critics and readers tend to praise Cao Xueqin for giving each character their own unique poetic voice.

Of course, this is one of the hardest things to translate. Poetry can never be translated in a one-to-one sense from one language to the other; it simply doesn’t work that way. And so there’s naturally no way you can simply read two poems translated from Chinese to English and see the original author’s brilliance right away.

The best thing we can do is dive into the language and closely analyze things. And so let’s do it. Let’s compare Xue Baochai’s poem with Lin Daiyu’s poem.

We can start off with the most obvious similarities. Both poems, like the poems by the other girls start off with similar general descriptions of the garden.

Here’s Xue Baochai’s first two lines:

芳園築向帝城西，華日祥雲籠罩奇。

The fragrant garden was built west of the Imperial City;

The bright sun and auspicious clouds envelop it magically.

And here’s what Lin Daiyu wrote:

宸遊增悅豫，仙境別紅塵。

The Imperial visit brings us joy,

This fairyland is cut off from the mortal world.

The basic idea in both poems is the same. There are direct references to the imperial visit in both, as well as a sense of some sort of supernatural blessing on the garden itself.

But that’s where you see the difference in the characters of Xue Baochai and Lin Daiyu. Xue Baochai defines the garden in terms of its relationship to the seat of power. For her, it “向帝城西,” or “it lies to the west of the Imperial City.” Xue Baochai uses the seat of political power as a reference.

Lin Daiyu, on the other hand, sees the garden as completely separate from the mortal world. 紅塵 means “red dust,” and is a phrase we’ve seen pop up from time to time. Lin Daiyu talks about the garden as being a mystical realm (仙境) completely separated (別) from the mortal world, or from the “red dust” (紅塵).

The reason for this difference is quite simple. Xue Baochai represents the more practical side of life. She’s the ultimate Confucian girl, concerned with society and focused on making sure that things happen in proper order. Lin Daiyu, on the other hand, wants to exit the society completely and search for a better world apart from the drudgery of mortality.

When we look at the next two lines, we see a similar contrast. Here’s what Xue Baochai writes:

高柳喜遷鶯出谷，修篁時待鳳來儀。

The tall willows rejoice as the orioles leave the valley;

Tall bamboo trees constantly await the ceremonial arrival of the phoenix.

And here’s what Lin Daiyu created:

借得山川秀，添來氣象新。

Borrowing the beauty of the hills and streams,

This place takes on a brand new air.

Of course, this is where the world of English translation completely lets us down.

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Xue Baochai is making two weighty literary allusions here.

The first one is the talk about “orioles leaving the valley,” or 鶯出谷. This is a direct quotation from The Classic of Poetry, or the 詩經. The original passage is “出自幽谷，遷于喬木,” or “It comes out from the dark valley and moves to a tall tree.”

This passage is an image of a worthy person rising from obscurity into public prominence. Xue Baochai is comparing Jia Yuanchun leaving the palace to visit with the oriole leaving the valley, and brilliantly alludes to the fact that Jia Yuanchun emerged from relative obscurity to her current imperial position. It’s actually a fantastic literary allusion when you think about it.

The same goes for 鳳來儀, or “the ceremonial arrival of the phoenix.” This is an allusion to the 尚書, or the ancient Book of Documents. It’s a symbol of the arrival of a virtuous sage ruler, one who is blessed by the cosmos for his moral virtues.

The rejoicing tall willows and the tall bamboo trees both point towards the splendor and majesty of the imperial visitor. Or, in other words, nature itself respects Confucian virtue in Xue Baochai’s poetic tongue. And, honestly, her two lines are absolutely brilliant.

Lin Daiyu’s two lines are much simpler. The garden manages to borrow its beauty from its own landscape, and is refreshed by the imperial visitor. There’s no amazing poetic allusion in Daiyu’s two lines; instead, she writes a simple natural description, focusing more on the feeling than on the social order.

The next two lines show the biggest contrast between the two poets. Xue Baochai writes this:

文風已著宸遊夕，孝化應隆歸省時。

The power of literature was clear on the night of the Imperial outing;

The transforming power of filial piety reached its peak with this homecoming visit.

And here is what Lin Daiyu writes:

香融金谷酒，花媚玉堂人。

Its fragrance is blended with the wine of Golden Valley,

The flowers smile up at our noble guests.

Xue Baochai makes direct references to two clearly Confucian concepts: the power of literature (文風) and the “transforming power of filial piety” (孝化). And she describes how the Imperial Consort’s brings about the height of both powers.

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Lin Daiyu, on the other hand, makes a reference to 谷酒, or the literary drinking parties of Shi Chong during the Jin dynasty. It’s an intelligent literary allusion, and is combined with the unforgettable sight of the flowers smiling up (媚) at the imperial visitors.

I don’t think there could be any clearer way to distinguish between the mentalities of the two girls. Xue Baochai is focused on decorum and the proper world of Confucianism in these two lines, while Lin Daiyu is focused on personifying nature and making something magical happen.

And then come the final two lines, and both poems have absolutely brilliant final two lines. Here’s Xue Baochai’s:

睿藻仙才瞻仰處，自慚何敢再為辭？

As I gaze up at your immortal literary talent,

I feel so ashamed; what more could I write?

And this is what Lin Daiyu writes:

何幸邀恩寵，宮車過往頻？

How fortunate we are to receive this Imperial grace!

Might the palace carriage return here frequently?

Xue Baochai’s final two lines represent her excellent cultural competence. They are filled with proper praise for the imperial visitor. 睿藻 means something like “brilliant imperial writings” and praises Jia Yuanchun’s literary excellence; 仙才 means “immortal talent” and is another word of praise, and Xue Baochai ends up explaining that she is ashamed and could never write further.

Of course, this is a proper and required gesture of self-effacement, something that is natural for this kind of poem. If you look back, you’ll realize that the other girls also ended their poems on a similar note, though not with quite the same level of literary brilliance.

And this, of course, is where Lin Daiyu’s poem really stands out.

何幸邀恩寵 means something like “How fortunate I am to be favored with such grace.” This isn’t formal language, though. Rather, it feels personal and emotional, as if Lin Daiyu were really writing her heart out on the page.

And the fascinating part about Daiyu’s poem is that 宮車過往頻 line at the end, which is a sincere wish that Jia Yuanchun could come around more frequently.

Lin Daiyu’s final lines are not about giving formal and formulatic praise to the imperial visit. Rather, they read more like a poem written between friends. Daiyu exposes a bit of the emotional reality behind her character with those two final lines.

You can think of it like this. Lin Daiyu’s poem is a direct reflection of who she is, and is almost completely free of convention and self-effacement. Xue Baochai’s poem is filled with ritual and hierarchy, but is curiously lacking in emotion.

That’s not to say that one poem is better than the other. Both are absolutely brilliant, and it’s very rewarding to dive in and see what you can find. They simply represent opposite ends of poetic theory. One is formal and carefully calculated, the other is fully emotional and utterly vulnerable.

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Xue Baochai’s poem tells us a lot about her character. And I’m talking about more than just the fact that she’s got amazing literary talent.

Let’s take a deeper dive. In particular, we’re going to focus on two lines in the middle of her poem:

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