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Dream of the Red Chamber
by Hsueh-Chin Tsao
Product Group: Book
Publisher: Heian International (1996-05)
ISBN: 9812180060
EAN: 9789812180063
Dewey Decimal #: 813
Paperback: 574 pages
SKU: 01TB-039-7-0408
Condition: VG
Comments: Clean copy, no markings by previous owners; Covers slightly creased; Spine slightly creased; Corners and ends of spine lightly bumped; Pages bright and tight. *International Buyers Welcome!* (except for prohibitively heavy items, as noted) - Satisfied customers in over 40 countries! We ship quickly and guarantee satisfaction. Your purchase helps support a U. Chicago student
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Customer Reviews
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More Than Just Assigned Reading
Rating  (5)
Date: 2000-01-04
10 out of 12 customers found this reveiw helpful
I had to read this book for a class as well, but found it to be more than just "something I had to read". It is a beautiful work of Chinese art and not just a mere "soap opera". The characters in the novel are moving and sentimental and the description is absolutely musical in how it paints a delicate portrait of Chinese court life. One reading this novel has to be careful of taking it out of ancient context and applying modern standards. Reading this novel can transport one from the dirty subways of New York City into a whole new world of beautiful courtesans and lotus flowers. This novel is an escape and a glimpse into a place much different than the one we all live in. The characters become a part of your life and once you've met them, you will never forget them.
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A Long, Confusing Soap-Opera
Rating  (1)
Date: 1999-11-22
2 out of 15 customers found this reveiw helpful
I admit, I was assigned this book to read for class. It is supposed to be showing us the place of culture in the lives of the characters and how it forms who they are. I think the people that set up the course could have chosen a better selection, especially at this time in the semester. Sure, we are supposed to be honors students, but we aren't superman (or should I say woman?). It may be a rather interesting book, but let me warn you it takes forever to figure out who these people are! On top of that, you can't pronounce their names or remember them, each chapter is like another episode of "Days of Our Lives" or the "Young and the Restless." It is quite digusting in many places as well. In closing, if this said to be "China's greatest novel," then I sure don't want to read any of the others!
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Like eating chips, once you begin, you won't want to stop.
Rating (5)
Date: 1999-04-27
6 out of 6 customers found this reveiw helpful
I am not a reader--I would not read unless I had to(i.e. for a class). Although this is a long novel, the details, hilarious situations the author comes up with, sarcastic remarks made by people...everything makes you want to read on, because slowly...you have become one of the characters..you'd feel like you're a part of the enormous household. It's lengthy, but you will not regret reading it.
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18th-century book:one of the world's greatest novels.
Rating (5)
Date: 1998-06-05
20 out of 20 customers found this reveiw helpful
Dream of the Red Chamber, by Cao Xueqin, is my favorite book of all time, and without question one of the world's great novels. In China, it has much of the status of Shakespeare's plays. It is not for everybody; it has hundreds of characters, and most of them are teenage girls. It describes the life of a vastly rich and huge Chinese family in the early 1700s. The young cousins, mostly between 13 and 15, spend their lives in an enormous, beautiful garden, each with their own house; the girls paint, have poetry contests, and play games, the boys have to go to school occasionally. Their servants, the same age, have all kinds of amorous and business intrigues going on. Beyond is the background of a fabulously wealthy household run by a strongminded, beautiful, exacting young woman named Phoenix. The men of the house, who can't be bothered with the practical details Phoenix handles, are scholars, ne'er-do-wells, and government officials. When Cao Xueqin wrote this book, in a hovel in Beijing, he was describing his own fairy-tale youth, and his family's sudden and utter ruin. The detail, the vivid conversations, the personalities make everything so real that you forget that these people lived in a faraway country almost two hundred years ago.The Chinese names are hard to keep straight (like the Russian names in War and Peace); I suggest reading an abridged version with the names translated into English, so that the heroine becomes Black Jade instead of Daiyu. If you don't like the abridged version, don't bother with the long one. But if you do like the abridged version, you have a great pleasure in store for you when you read the original. I suggest David Hawkes' English version.
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This book is boring.
Rating (1)
Date: 1998-05-13
0 out of 8 customers found this reveiw helpful
I don't like Dream of the Red Chamber by Tsao Hsueh Chin for many reasons. For one, it is way too long for people my age. Come on, 567 pages when your teacher only gives you nine days to read it. Second of all, the Chinese names get me confused, and the author put in way too many descriptions. If you want to read a good book, don't read this one.
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