In the dream, unaware that one is a guest

Author: Nan Fei Yan
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2005-08-01
Features: A generation of college students at the turn of the century, including wealthy scions with luxurious lives, rural children with unfortunate fates, and high-ranking officials' daughters who indulged in emotions. After graduating from school, they face conflicts between reality and dreams, and the pain of desires and self-reproach. Those former ideals gradually fade, former love loses its purity, and former friendships also deteriorate. Through the protagonist's decline, self-awareness, enlightenment, salvation, and self-redemption, the novel portrays a complex human nature, hinting at the doubts and uncertainties of typical college students about life. The protagonist Yu Xiaobei eventually endures guilt and self-reproach from his spiritual awakening, bringing him pain and torment. This not only demonstrates the consequences of spiritual decline but also reflects his hope of saving his numb soul by saving others.