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As the novel describes how a mythical stone, left behind by the goddess Nuwa, turns into a human being and feels puzzled by his fellow human beings' spiritual rootlessness and their absurd pursuit of things unimportant to life, it offers a truthful depiction of the dilemma humanity faces in life. Picking up where Wang Guowei leaves off, Liu Zaifu transcends Wang Guowei's views on tragedy and ethics by pointing out that Dream of the Red Chamber is not just a great tragedy but also a great novel about absurdity. His exploration of the meaning of life finally leads him to the insightful conclusion that one should "have no ground on which to stand" so as to make a clean break with the mundane world. Convincing and inspiring, Liu Zaifu's conclusion pinpoints the spiritual gist of Cao Xueqin's novel.
As it uses the intuitive approach of Zen to get to the heart of Dream of the Red Chamber, Reflections on Dream of the Red Chamber distinguishes itself from the commonly seen evidential studies and analyses of the novel. With his interpretations of Cao Xueqin's novel as both a novel about life and an unconventional work and with his discovery of Cao Xueqin as a great philosopher who conveys his philosophy through fiction, Liu Zaifu has established himself as a scholar with a unique perspective of an "outsider" in the crowded field of the study of Dream of the Red Chamber. I recommend this book to English-speaking readers as an aid on their journey into the spiritual world of Dream of the Red Chamber, a world that transcends both the boundaries of time and the boundaries of geography.
Gao Xingjian
Winner of the 2000 Nobel Prize for Literature