Drafting Cao Xueqin's Reply to the Guest's Question: On the Research Methods of the Hidden Meaning School in Red Studies

Author: Guo Yushi
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2006-09-01
Features: In recent years, more and more people in China and abroad have been researching Dream of the Red Chamber. "Red Studies" has become a worldwide field of study. Overall, "Red Studies" research has achieved significant results and is advancing, which is very. However, we also see that there are indeed some flaws in the study of Dream of the Red Chamber. Some articles have an overly "old-fashioned" tone, with a strong flavor of the "conspiracy theory" and "self-origin theory," as if they are the only way to reveal the mysteries of the "remarkable book" Dream of the Red Chamber in terms of its ideological and artistic essence. Some readers also mistakenly believe that this is some new invention or creation. In fact, for those research methods that dig deep into hidden meanings and illogical "insights," Cao Xueqin himself would have frowned upon them back then. This book collects the author's previously published reviews of "Red Studies" conspiracy theories, especially those critical of their research methods. At the suggestion and urging of friends, it is now compiled and published by East China Normal University Press. The main purpose of publishing this book is to demonstrate that the research methods of the "Red Studies" conspiracy theory are wrong and unscientific.