The Biggest Scandal in Dream of the Red Chamber
As you can see in my latest video, the biggest scandal in Dream of the Red Chamber isn’t the death of Qin Keqing. Instead, it’s the apparent cover up of her relationship with Jia Zhen.
Jia Zhen clearly has raped Qin Keqing. This is not a consentual relationship by any means. It’s not entirely clear what Jia Zhen’s motivation is, but I’m also not sure that it entirely matters at this point.
Qin Keqing is destined to take her own life as a result. This is clear from the poems about her fate. Both the first and second poems convey the same information, often using the exact same language:
Most people ignore the items in Qin Keqing’s room. Her room is filled with legendary items from China’s literary history. These mythical items convey not only a sense of sensuality, but also the inevitability of loss and failure as a result of that sensuality:
Now, I’ve written about the Qin Keqing affair several times, though this post is probably the best summary of everything:
However, the best evidence of this comes from the Zhiyanzhai commentary, as I mentioned in the video.
In his handwritten notes at the end of chapter 13 in one of the early manuscripts, Zhiyanzhai takes credit for convincing Cao Xueqin to remove all references to Qin Keqing’s suicide:
「秦可卿淫喪天香樓」，作者用史筆也。老朽因有魂托鳳姐賈家後事二件，的是安富尊榮坐享人不能想得到處。其事雖未行，其言其意則令人悲切感服，姑赦之，因命芹溪刪去。
“Qin Keqing Dies Wantonly at the Celestial Fragrant Tower” - the author used the brush of a historian here. Because Qin Keqing’s spirit entrusted to Wang Xifeng two things concerning the Jia family’s future, things that those who, like me, enjoy wealth, honor, and ease, who sit and reap the fruits of the labors of others, could never conceive of. Though these matters were never carried out, her words and her intentions are enough to make one both grieve her loss and admire her. I therefore pardoned her, and ordered Cao Xueqin to delete the section.
Or, in other words, Zhiyanzhai has taken credit for ordering Cao Xueqin to delete the section in question.
Now, Zhiyanzhai does note two sections in chapter 13 that still refer to the deleted parts about the suicide. However, he does not make those comments regarding the predictive poems in chapter 5. Instead, his only remarks indicate that he felt the poems were extremely well written.
Could there have been a conspiracy to cover things up? Perhaps. However, it seems more likely to me that Cao Xueqin is deliberately having fun with his audience by subverting its expectations.