Hong lou meng: chapters 61-63, Patience, flowers, 2 worlds in the novel

1/ In chapter 61, it becomes obvious that Bình Nhi (Ping’er/ Patience) and Vương Hy Phượng (Wang Xifeng) act as foils to each other. 

In an earlier chapter, Lý Hoàn (Li Wan) and some other characters jokingly say they should exchange places; an outsider wouldn’t be able to tell that Bình Nhi (Patience) is not a mistress, and it’s just unfortunate she’s not born to the right family; and how mean and petty Vương Hy Phượng (Wang Xifeng) would be, were she a servant. 

Normally Vương Hy Phượng (Wang Xifeng) always goes for a heavy punishment, which is also a warning to others, whereas Bình Nhi (Patience) handles all conflicts with both sense and compassion, and considers everyone involved. 

In the theft incident with Trụy Nhi (Trinket), she contrasts with the hot-tempered Tình Văn (Qingwen/ Skybright). But in the incident with con Năm (Fivey), daughter of thím Liễu (cook Liu) in chapter 61, Cao Xueqin clearly means to contrast her with her mistress—she is not only kinder but also more intelligent. 

2/ Chapter 62 is about birthdays: Bảo Ngọc (Baoyu) shares a birthday with Bảo Cầm (Baoqin), Hình Tụ Yên (Xing Xiuyan), and Bình Nhi (Patience). Note that several people including the matriarch think that Bảo Ngọc (Baoyu) and Bảo Cầm (Baoqin) are a perfect match, and he also seems to fancy her, but she’s engaged. Now it turns out that they have the same birthday. 

Nguyên Xuân (Yuanchun) is born on Lunar New Year, hence the name. 

Bảo Thoa (Baochai) shares a birthday with someone in January but there seems to be some continuity error because her birthday has been mentioned before without it being said to clash with anyone else’s.  

Đại Ngọc (Daiyu) shares a birthday with Tập Nhân (Xiren/ Aroma) in February. 

This is the lunisolar calendar by the way.  

3/ Chapter 62 has a drinking game (why do Chinese people have so many different drinking games?), and again the stars are Sử Tương Vân (Shi Xiangyun) and Đại Ngọc (Daiyu). There’s a striking image of the former in the chapter, a feminine image that is rather contrary to her tomboy style. 

Hong lou meng is apparently Cao Xueqin’s way of immortalising the girls he knew in his youth, and I think anyone who spends some months reading the novel would gradually feel like the characters or at least some of them are friends, and they would probably stay with you the way Tolstoy’s and Jane Austen’s characters stay with you. 

I may not identify with characters and do not see likable characters as a criterion of literary merit, but I’ve always liked well-written and believable characters. 

4/ I don’t quite understand the significance of the pants and Hương Lăng (Xiangling/ Caltrop) in chapter 62. 

5/ Chapter 63 has another drinking game—these kids drink a lot (readers of Hong lou meng are advised not to do the same). 

This game is fun: they sit in a circle and in the middle is a thing containing a bunch of cards; the first one throws a dice, gets a number, and counts from herself; the one being named draws a line, which contains a flower, a line of poetry, and a drinking rule; after following the drinking rule, she now throws a dice and counts to pick the next one, and so on. 

Because this is a great novel that is full of symbolism, nothing in it is ever random and without meaning. I’ve made a note of the girls and the flowers: 

Bảo Thoa (Baochai)=> hoa mẫu đơn (peony). 

Thám Xuân (Tanchun)=> hoa hạnh (almond blossom). 

Lý Hoàn (Li Wan)=> cành mai già (winter-flowering plum). 

Tương Vân (Xiangyun)=> hoa hải đường (crab-apple blossom). 

Xạ Nguyệt (Sheyue/ Musk)=> hoa đồ mi (rose). 

Hương Lăng (Xiangling/ Caltrop)=> hoa tịnh đế (purple skullcap). 

Đại Ngọc (Daiyu)=> hoa phù dung (hibiscus flower). 

Tập Nhân (Xiren/ Aroma)=> hoa đào (peach blossom). 

These all have meanings. The peony is the king/ queen of flowers in Chinese culture—it symbolises wealth, opulence, beauty, and high social status. 

Regarding Tương Vân’s (Xiangyun) flower, which is also the name of their poetry club, if you want to know what the flower looks like, I think it’s better if you search for the original word 海棠 (haitang) or the Sino-Vietnamese name hải đường rather than the English word. 

Hibiscus flowers are short-lived, so in Chinese culture they’re a symbol of delicate and fleeting beauty. 

Both plum blossoms and peach blossoms are the flowers of spring but Lý Hoàn’s (Li Wan) card says old plum blossom. On a side note, in Vietnam the symbol of Tết or Lunar New Year in the North is peach blossom and in the South is plum blossom. 

6/ Curiously it’s revealed in this chapter that Hương Lăng (Caltrop), Tình Văn (Skybright), Bảo Thoa (Baochai), and Tập Nhân (Aroma) are all the same age. 

I’ve somehow always thought the last one to be older. 

7/ The detail about Diệu Ngọc (Miaoyu/ Adamantina) in chapter 63 is rather telling. 

First of all, she is eccentric—“a monk no monk, a maid no maid” as her close friend Hình Tụ Yên (Xing Xiuyan) says. She is meant to be a Buddhist nun but seems to have one foot outside—her hair is still long, she joined the temple because of her illnesses rather than anything else, and apparently has not fully renounced life. 

Secondly, does she have a thing for Bảo Ngọc (Baoyu)? She sends him a birthday card. In an earlier chapter she gives him a branch but Cao Xueqin focuses the perspective somewhere else and we never know what they say to each other. Is this a hint of something going on? 

8/ The chapter has a passage that is removed from the Vietnamese text because many versions of Hong lou meng remove it, considering it unnecessary. It’s the one about Bảo Ngọc (Baoyu) randomly dressing up Phương Quan (Parfumée) as a boy and changing her name into something that David Hawkes translates as Yelu Hunni, and later, Aventurin. The scene retained in the Penguin English version. 

I forgot to mention that Bảo Ngọc’s (Baoyu) building in the garden is Di hồng viện, the word “hồng” (hong) meaning “red”, but David Hawkes changes it into Green Delights because of the different connotations of the colours in Western culture. His name in the poetry club is therefore Di hồng công tử, which becomes Green Boy in Hawkes’s translation. 

9/ There is a death in the chapter, which again shows the insincerity and hypocrisy of their family members. The shameless horniness of Giả Dung (Jia Rong) is a lot worse than Tần Chung (Qin Zhong) earlier in the novel after his sister’s death.

That makes me think of a good essay I read yesterday: 

Bản tiếng Việt—“Hai thế giới trong Hồng lâu mộng” của Dư Anh Thời: https://bookhunterclub.com/hai-the-gioi-trong-hong-lau-mong/

English text—“The Two Worlds of Hung-lou meng” by Ying-shih Yu: https://www.cuhk.edu.hk/rct/pdf/e_outputs/b02/v02p005.pdf

According to Yu Yingshi, there are 2 worlds in Hong lou meng: the utopian world and the world of reality. 

The garden in the novel, Đại quan viên (Daguanyuan/ Prospect garden), is the utopian world. But if it is the utopian, idealised world, what is the relation between it and Thái hư ảo cảnh (The land of illusion)? He argues that the garden is “the shadow of the Land of Illusion projected onto the world of man”—these 2 worlds are one and the same.

Bảo Ngọc (Baoyu) and the girls live and play in the garden, the utopian world, the world of goodness and sincerity and purity. Outside the garden is the real world, the impure and dirty world, the world of lust and competition and malice and cruelty. As Yu Yingshi argues, it’s not without reason that Đại Ngọc (Daiyu) earlier buries the fallen flowers within the garden, instead of throwing them into the water to flow outside the garden and become dirty. The girls are like the flowers—they should stay in the garden or they become dirty and contaminated. 

The entire essay is interesting and should be read in full. 

In these chapters, Cao Xueqin writes at length about Bảo Ngọc (Baoyu) and the girls, and the moment he leaves the garden and writes about Giả Trân (Jia Zheng) and Giả Dung (Jia Rong), there is lots of falsity, lots of filth, and there’s just a strong sense of disgust, contrasting with the love and warmth and purity of the world in the garden.  

Hong lou meng has so many layers of meaning that reading it once wouldn’t be enough.