Seeking Truth and Inquiring into Beauty -- A New Exploration of Classical Novel Masterpieces

Author: Pan Chengyu
Publisher:
Publishing Date: 2005-09-01
Features: Research on classic texts of ancient vernacular novels in China has a long history, enduring and fruitful achievements by predecessors; yet many academic puzzles and gaps remain, awaiting exploration and fulfillment by later scholars. This book is the crystallization of the author's decade-long calm deliberation and discovery in this field. The first part, "Origins," belongs to the study of the emergence of ancient vernacular novels, exploring their religious origins, clarifying the true nature of the earliest vernacular novel collections, and grasping the aesthetic style of their formative period. By examining the evolution of a literary motif, it reveals the cultural significance and intergenerational connections of ancient vernacular novels. The second part, "Periphery," focuses on the two renowned classics, Dream of the Red Chamber and Golden Lotus, which have achieved the highest acclaim in classical fiction and given rise to two major popular academic fields, "Red Studies" and "Golden Lotus Studies." Employing a combination of historical and literary research, as well as documents and texts, it offers a series of important redological documents with new discoveries on controversial academic issues such as the pseudo-completed versions of Golden Lotus, its composition period, the investigation of its possible authors, the ancestral origins of Dream of the Red Chamber's author Cao Xueqin, and the key foundation of the New Red Studies after the May Fourth Movement. The third part, "Inner Essence," expands the exploration to five major classics, forging new paths between traditional and modern methods, and the unity of text and culture. Whether revisiting old topics with new evidence or proposing new perspectives on established issues, it powerfully clarifies key questions such as the themes of Romance of the Three Kingdoms and Water Margin, the merits and demerits of the Jin-prefixed edition of Water Margin Xu, the relationship between Romance of the Three Kingdoms and traditional "re-telling" culture, the reaction of Fable of the Investiture of the Gods against traditional Confucian values, the characterization and aesthetic features of Golden Lotus, and the naming, themes, and creative methods of Dream of the Red Chamber. Rich in academic rigor and aesthetic talent, the book offers innovative and scientifically grounded arguments on many hot topics in classical fiction studies and the profound cultural connotations of these classics, marking a significant achievement in recent research on classical novels.