A Dream of Red Mansions (Chinese Classics, Classic Novel in 4 Volumes) [Box set] [Paperback]

Cao Xueqin (Author), Yang Xianyi (Translator), Gladys Yang (Translator)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 7119006436 | ISBN-13: 978-7119006437 | Publication Date: January 1, 2001 | Edition: First Edition

Also known as Hong Lou Meng, this is arguably China's greatest literary masterpiece. A chronicle of a noble family in the eighteenth century; but the splendor of enchanting gardens, pleasure pavilions, and daily life of the most sophisticated refinements hides the realities of decay and self-destruction.

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Cao Xueqin (1715? - 1763?) is the author of A Dream of Red Mansions. His personal name was Zhan, and his style (name adopted by a man at his coming of age), Mengruan. He was also know as Xueqin, Qinpu or Qinxi.His ancestral home was in what is now Liaoyang City, in Northeast China, and his forebears, although Han Chinese themselves, had been accepted into the ManchuRight White Banner. For three successive generations, a period of some 60 years, his ancestors had held the post of Textile Commissioner in Jiangning (present-day Nanjing). His paternal great grandmother, surnamed Sun, had been nursemaid to the infant who was later to become the Kangxi emperor's study companion and close attendant, accompanying him when he came to the throne on four of his six inspection tours of the south, a singular honor. After the death of Cao Yin, the family, under the headship of Cao Xueqin's father Cao Fu, continued to enjoy the emperor's favor, but when the Yongzhen emperor ascended the throne, Cao Fu was removed from his office and punished on charges of financial mismanagement and incompetence in the management of courier stations. The family property was confiscated, and the Caos' halcyon days came to an end. They moved to eijing. Cao Xueqin, who had spent his childhood in pampered luxury, now shared the family's fate of a wretched existence. Dogged by poverty, he eventually moved to arustic hovel on the western outskirts of the capital. The death of his young son in 1762 was a crushing blow to Cao, from which he never recovered, and on February 12, 1763 he himself passed away.

Cao Xueqin was haughty by nature, but an extremely talented literary man. His friend Dun Cheng compared his poems to those of the Tang Dynasty poet Li He, descbribing them as bold, solid and having the cold glitter of a knife blade. Unfortunately, all that survives of Cao's poetry is two lines of a poem dedicated to a play adapted by Dun Cheng from the famous Tang Dynasty poet Bai Juyi's long narrative poem Song of a Lute Player. Cao was also a painter who liked painting stones, in a style described by another friend, Dun Min, as sturdy. But Cao Xueqin's fame rests on his magnificent achievement in writing the full-length novel A Dream of Red Mansions.

About the Translators:

Yang Xianyi was born in Tianjin in 1915. His wife Gladys was born in England in 1919. They both graduated from Oxford University in the 1930s. They were married in 1940 in China.

After teaching at several universities, they went to work for the National Compilation and Translation Bureau in 1943, in charge of translation of literary works. In 1952, they joined the Foreign Languages Press (now the China International Publishing Group) in Beijing, where Yang Xianyi worked as the cheif editor of the magazine Chinese Literature. At the same time, he was a foreign literature research fellow of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, A council member of the Chinese Writers Association and a council member of the Chinses Translators Association.

For many decades, Yang Xianyi and Gladys Yang have devoted themselves to translating and research into Chinses and foreign literary legacies. Their translations of classic Chinese works of literature especially have brought them global fame, making a great contribution the the cultural exchanges between China and the rest of the world. Apart from their monumental translation of A Dream of Red Mansions, they have translated the Elegy of Chu, Selections from the Records of the Historian, The Dragon King Daughter, The Courtesan's Jewel-box, The Man Who Sold a Ghost, Palace of Eternal Youth, The Scholars and a number of works by the famous modern Chinese writer Lu Xun.

Product Details

• Paperback: 1887 pages
• Publisher: Foreign Languages Press; First Edition edition (January 1, 2001)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 7119006436
• ISBN-13: 978-7119006437
• Product Dimensions: 7.3 x 4.6 x 3.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 3.3 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (16 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #133,037 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

97 of 108 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars A Wonderful Novel Ruined by a Poor Translation, June 15, 2003

By 

Brendan O'Kane "bokane" (Beijing, China) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: A Dream of Red Mansions (Chinese Classics, Classic Novel in 4 Volumes) (Paperback)

The Yangs' translation of "A Dream of Red Mansions" is extremely accurate. That's about the best thing to be said about it.
Unlike David Hawkes and John Minford's masterful translation, which can stand on its own as a work of literature, this edition reads like...well, like a translation. The prose is flat, the puns of the original are translated literally, rather than being approximated as in the Hawkes-Minford version, and on the whole, the flavour of the original Chinese text is missing.
A person trying to read the original Chinese text of "A Dream of Red Mansions" might find this translation useful to keep at hand for a side-by-side comparison; it reads like a translator's crib. The Yangs of this edition take fewer liberties with jokes, puns, and poems than do Hawkes and Minford. (I should stress that when Hawkes and Minford deviate from the original text, it is only in minor and inconsequential ways, and is always in service of the text.) The Yangs failed to realise, apparently, that being faithful to the precise words of a book isn't necessarily the same as being faithful to the spirit, and their translation is no fun at all to read.

38 of 40 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The Chinese "Anna Karenina", January 14, 2004

By 

Frikle - See all my reviews

This review is from: A Dream of Red Mansions (Chinese Classics, Classic Novel in 4 Volumes) (Paperback)

This book is like Anna Karenina in the following ways: Both are masterpieces of epic proportions. Both are considered contenders for being the greatest works of fiction in their respective languages. Both deal with large, upper class families and the lifestyle and intrigue involved. Both are works of realism and paint a complete picture of a society.

A Dream of Red Mansions focuses on the love between Baoyu, an unusual child in his early teens who is temperamental and spends most of his time with the girls in the family mansion and Daiyu, a delicate, sensitive and yet witty and extremely clever girl. The two grow up as children and live in the same mansion but the family does not hurry to marry them off as they have other plans for Baoyu.

This is the main thread that runs through the novel's amazing 120 chapters. The other sublots are very numerous - there are hundreds - but none of them are sustained for the whole book. The main part of the book is the set of characters. Again there are hundreds but a few main ones which become the most interesting in this drama. There's the conniving Xifeng, Baoyu's strict father, Baoyu's assertive "other love" Baochai and the like.

Unlike Anna Karenina, this book is full of humour, jokes and poems (which was where I think the translation failed the most as Chinese poetry rendered into English seems to lose the plot!). It contains moments of great sadness but also wit and quirkiness.

There's been controversy with the amazon reviews of this particular translation. I don't speak Chinese so can't judge it but reading the text, it seemed fine. I guess if I saw another or the original it would change my mind but this one isn't too bad.

The novel deals with so many topics that you really get an overview of what life in 18th century upper class urban China was about. It is VERY long but it's amazing how in relating heaps and heaps of seemingly trivial incidents you grow to love many of the characters. It's like most novels are like meeting someone and hence only seeing what they want to show while this novel is like living with them. And trivialities aside, it's very moving.

A must for all interested in Chinese society or who don't mind persevering through 1200 pages to read a one of the world's unusual and amazing dynasty chronicles and love stories.

24 of 26 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Great translation of a Chinese Classic, October 17, 2002

By 

Maria Teresa Penna "Maite" (France) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: A Dream of Red Mansions (Chinese Classics, Classic Novel in 4 Volumes) (Paperback)

One of the great classics of world literature. Having read both this translation and the David Hawkes' five volume translation of this novel, I personally prefer this one. Although the David Hawkes translation is smoother and more literary for the English speaking reader, I find that the Yang translation better conveys the atmosphere of 17th and 18th century China and the complex relationships between the various members of the upper class Chia household and their omnipresent bevy of slaves and servants. I even greatly enjoyed, from a tongue-in-cheek perspective, the "sayings of Chairman Mao" inspired introduction to this translation. I'm now ready to embark on my fourth reading of this book in about as many years.