The general theme of A Dream of Red Mansions is anti-feudalism. Under this general theme, the author expressed his opposition to the existing orthodox feudal social order through two typical figures, Jia Baoyu and Lin Daiyu, and these two typical figures became rebellious images of feudal society.
In Cao Xueqin's works, Guo Rongfu and Ning Guofu, which symbolize feudal society, are two feudal families. The author borrows Liu Xianglian's words: "Except for those two stone lions, I am afraid that even cats and dogs are not clean in your East House." This is the author's summary of this feudal family and the most incisive and profound exposure and criticism. Readers can see that the masters of these two feudal bureaucratic families, large and small, have nothing serious to do but enjoy themselves and do dirty deeds, and they collude with the government and ignore human lives. In Cao Xueqin's works, even the feudal court at that time was just a "shady place". Jia Fei returned to the house, but she just "cried with her eyes full" and "sobbed against her tears". Everyone else was "silent with tears". In addition to ostentation and extravagance, this maternal picture written by the author is a crying scene that touches the true feelings.
Through Jia Baoyu, the author opposes "admonishing the dead by words, but remonstrating the dead by force" and thinks that "only a bad king can remonstrate the dead". Call those bureaucrats "traitors". The classic works of Confucius and Mencius are just "fabrications". The author also borrowed Tan Chun's words and said: "He who climbs the field of Li Lu and is in the field of logistics steals Yao Shun's words and backs the way of Confucius and Mencius." The words of Zhu, the master of Neo-Confucianism, are just "empty words, where is it?" As we all know, Confucianism and Zhu Cheng's Neo-Confucianism are the criteria of feudal laws and regulations in Qing Dynasty and the outline of governing the country, and no one can violate them. But Cao Xueqin used these words to ridicule and deny.
Jia Baoyu is particularly opposed to the "official career economy", which is to let him take the road of studying and being an official. This "official career economy" is the fundamental system for the feudal regime to continue from generation to generation, which is also commonly known as the imperial examination system. Cao Xueqin's opposition to "official career economy" through Jia Baoyu is tantamount to pointing the criticism at the foundation of feudal regime.
In A Dream of Red Mansions, the author focuses on the love and tragedy between Jia Baoyu and Lin Daiyu. This love story is profound and different from all previous love stories. First of all, the love between Jia Baoyu and Lin Daiyu is not love at first sight, but love produced by living together for a long time. In this way, this kind of love also has the foundation of life and thought. Secondly, their love is based on * * *' s life ideal and social ideal, and it is * * *' s anti-feudal thought. This is a solid foundation for their love. Because Xue Baochai lacked this, Jia Baoyu finally chose Lin Daiyu. Third, they are congenial in character and temperament. Jia Baoyu advocates nature and innocence, likes freedom, gets rid of the shackles of feudal thoughts and ethics, gets rid of all the conventions in the world, and pursues the free liberation of personality, which is exactly in line with Lin Daiyu's character and temper. And this just shows that they are pursuing the liberation of personality!
In the history of marriage in China, it was impossible to regard the above three principles as the standard of marriage choice in ancient times. In fact, Cao Xueqin put forward a principle of modern marriage here. And this principle has not really been realized in today's world. Because this principle is advanced, it is a progress of human civilization and development.
In the past, when we studied A Dream of Red Mansions, we paid more attention to its criticism and exposure of feudal society, but paid little attention to its new social ideal and life ideal. Now it seems that this is a bit one-sided. Cao Xueqin's criticism of feudal society is undoubtedly profound, but at the same time he put forward a new ideal of life. The love description of Jia Baoyu and Lin Daiyu in Cao Xueqin's works is actually the reflection and pursuit of Cao Xueqin's new social ideal and life ideal. Cao Xueqin's criticism belongs to his own real society, but his ideal belongs to the future society.
Through Jia Baoyu and Cao Xueqin, he also put forward the requirements of opposing feudal hierarchy and advocating freedom and equality. In particular, Cao Xueqin put forward the idea of valuing women over men through Jia Baoyu, and even said that "men are made of mud", but when they meet men, they are "smelly and disgusting". It seems incomprehensible to look at this sentence in isolation, but from a historical perspective, the feudal society in China has always been a patriarchal society, and it is only natural that men are superior to women. Jia Baoyu's words are undoubtedly a denial of the patriarchal society and an overkill appeal for equality between men and women.
What is the essence of Jia Baoyu's anti-feudal thought? Some people think it is feudal democratic thought, but I don't think so. Feudal democratic thought is beneficial to feudal rule, and Jia Baoyu's thought is a rebellion against feudal society, which is contrary to Jia Zheng's thought. Therefore, Jia Zheng said that Jia Baoyu would kill his father when he got it, so he should kill him as soon as possible. This plot clearly explains the opposition between Jia Baoyu and Jia Zheng. What's more, during the Qianlong period, China's budding capitalist economy has made great progress since the Ming Dynasty. In the late Ming Dynasty, there appeared a thinker who consciously or unconsciously reflected this new relationship of production. This is the radical early democratic thinker Li Zhuowu. And the thought of A Dream of Red Mansions is obviously influenced by him. Therefore, from the anti-feudal content reflected in A Dream of Red Mansions; From the love connotation of Jia Baoyu and Lin Daiyu, from the essence of the ideological conflict between Jia Baoyu and Jia Zheng, and from the ideological origin of A Dream of Red Mansions, I think that the democratic thought of A Dream of Red Mansions is already a democratic thought with the nature of capitalist germination. This kind of thought is contrary to feudal orthodoxy and has historical progress. But it borrows a special typical image and expresses it in a special language way, which is different from the intuition of philosophical language.
A Dream of Red Mansions has written more than 700 characters, including dozens of typical ones. For example, Jia Baoyu, Lin Daiyu, Xue Baochai, Wang Xifeng, Qingwen, xiren, Shi Xiangyun, Miao Yu, Jia Mu and Granny Liu are all household names.
This novel has been handed down from generation to generation with its typical image. There are so many vivid typical images in A Dream of Red Mansions, which is also very prominent in Chinese and foreign classical novels.
Cao Xueqin left only eighty copies of A Dream of Red Mansions, and some of them were written after 1980s, but they have never been handed down. The last forty chapters of this biography were added by Gao E and Cheng Weiyuan when they printed A Dream of Red Mansions with wooden movable type in Qianlong fifty-six years. According to Cheng Weiyuan's preface, the manuscript source was bought from Drum Bear, and some people said it was written by Gao E, but what I said earlier is more credible.
From the last years of Qianlong to Jiaqing, there were many sequels to A Dream of Red Mansions, but the sequels of Cheng and Gao were better, so the instinct of Cheng and Gao continued to this day. However, compared with the original work of Xueqin, there is still a big gap.
The ideological and cultural connotation of A Dream of Red Mansions is very rich and profound, so the study of A Dream of Red Mansions is called "Dream of Red Mansions".
A Dream of Red Mansions has a leading position in the history of realistic novels in the world. It is more than a century earlier than Stendhal (1783- 1842) and Flaubert (1821-kloc-0/880). More than 80 years earlier than Balzac (1799— 1850); It is about a century earlier than Russian realists Nikolai Gogol (1809- 1852) and lev tolstoy (1828- 19 10). Therefore, in the history of world literature, the strong light of realistic novels created by writers was first radiated by Cao Xueqin's Dream of Red Mansions.
Cao Xueqin's Dream of Red Mansions is both realistic and ideal. His criticism of China's feudal society in the18th century is realistic, while his profound and touching description of Baodai's love and their unremitting pursuit of a beautiful, free and happy life are both realistic and idealistic, and this desire and pursuit of an ideal life is Cao Xueqin's dedication to the next century!