Youth Popular Reading Sunshine Volume -- Mirror Flower Boundary: Mirror Flower Boundary

Author: Zhong Lei
Publisher:
Publishing Date: 2004-05-01
Features: Empress Wu Zetian seized the power of the Tang Dynasty and changed the country's name to Zhou. One day, while visiting the imperial garden, Empress Wu issued an edict forcing the flowers in the garden to bloom amidst the winter snow. Seeing the flowers bloom without permission and out of season, the heavens punished the hundred flower deities by sending them to the mortal world. The, the chief deity overseeing the flowers, was reborn into the family of a scholar, Tang Ao, and later named Tang Guichen.
Tang Ao, dissatisfied with Empress Wu, traveled overseas with the Nine Olds and Lin Zhiyang, visiting over forty countries such as the Gentleman's Kingdom, the Women's Kingdom, the Immortal Land, the Two-Faced Kingdom, the Land Without Intestines, and others. They witnessed many strange people and customs—some had two faces, others had ears that hung to the ground, some were crooked-hearted, some had no intestines, some loved to lie, some were stingy, and the like. During his travels, Tang Ao unintentionally met many flower deities who had been banished to the mortal world. Later, he realized the truth and began practicing cultivation in the Little Penglai Mountain.
To select talented women, Empress Wu issued an edict for a imperial examination for female scholars. The hundred flower deities who had descended to the mortal world gathered from all over the world to take the exam and all passed. They celebrated together, playing the lute, composing poetry, playing chess, painting, proposing games, guessing riddles, showcasing their talents, and parted in joy. Meanwhile, the descendants of Xu Jingye and Luo Binwang, who were persecuted by Empress Wu—Yu Chengzhi and Luo Chengzhi—along with Wen Jiang, the governor of Jiannan, rebelled against the Wu family's regime. They successively broke through the four gates of wine, beauty, wealth, and desire that the Wu family's army had guarded, forcing Empress Wu to agree to the restoration of Emperor Zhongzong of the Tang Dynasty, thus returning the power to the Li family.
Dozens of flower deities who had been banished to the mortal world perished in the rebellion against the Wu family's regime. Tang Guichen also left to seek her father in the Little Penglai Mountain and never returned.
The author was dissatisfied with many of the time and exposed and criticized them in the book. Due to the author's erudition and strong writing skills, he woven the story together with myths and legends from ancient texts. Using arguments, poetry, jokes, and adventures, he satirized reality with ease, creating a fantastical and humorous narrative that was vivid, flowing, and highly readable.
The author had reformist tendencies, advocating for gender equality and opposing false scholars, hypocritical gentlemen, and certain feudal superstitions. He meticulously crafted stories of ideal societies like the Gentleman's Kingdom, but due to the author's class, ideological contradictions, and the limitations of his time, the book could not escape the shackles of feudal. Despite this, A Dream of the Red Chamber remains an accomplished classic novel.