According to the book "My Half of the Red Chamber", the work is based on texts and historical materials, and explores the real people and real events behind the story of the Red Chamber. The book contains a quote from a poem that describes the author's emotional expression of the story of the Red Chamber. Then, the book mentions that in early 1921, Hu Shi wrote the first draft of "The Dream of the Red Chamber", in which he put forward the conclusion that "Cao Xueqin is the son of Cao Yin". The main basis for this conclusion comes from a note in Yuan Mei's "Suiyuan Poems". Yuan Mei mentioned in his notes that Cao Neem Pavilion was woven by Jiangning, and he carried a book with him every time he traveled, in order to cover his eyes, because he was not a magistrate, but every time the people saw him, they would stand up, which made him feel uneasy. Yuan Mei also mentioned that Cao Neem's son was Cao Xueqin, who wrote the book "Dream of Red Mansions". Hu Shi almost perfectly proved that Cao Xueqin was Cao Yin's son, and wrote the first draft of "The Dream of Red Mansions". However, it is a pity that Hu Shi later revised his own view to believe that "Cao Xueqin is Cao Yin's grandson", and included this view in the revised version of "A Dream of Red Mansions", which influenced the research direction of many scholars. So, why did Hu Shi change his opinion?
The reason is that he found another record of Cao Xueqin's identity, which is from the sequel to Yang Zhongxi's "Snow Bridge Poems". Yang Zhongxi mentioned in the book that Cao Xueqin was the grandson of Cao Neem, and he was passionate about poetry all his life, but he experienced many ups and downs. A "Cao Xueqin's identity dispute" has attracted a lot of attention recently. The incident involved a number of famous scholars such as Yang Zhongxi, Hu Shi and Duncheng. It is reported that in Yang Zhongxi's collection, he called Cao Xueqin Cao Yin's grandson, but used vague wording such as "probably". Unexpectedly, Mr. Hu Shi at that time actually accepted this statement, and after verification by letter, he wrote this statement into the official draft of his "Dream of Red Mansions". Afterwards, Mr. Hu Shi found the "Four Songtang Collection" given to him by Cai Yuanpei, and found the evidence that Mr. Yang Zhongxi said in it. According to the note in Duncheng's poem "Sending Memories to Cao Xueqin", it is recorded: "Xueqin once followed his ancestor Yin to weave." Mr. Hu Shih was happy to think that his new point of view had been confirmed, but he did not think much about it and directly wrote it into the book. Since then, in the past 100 years, almost every lover of red studies has been convinced of the statement that "Cao Xueqin is Cao Yin's grandson".
However, the credibility of this claim is highly debated. Who is more reliable and credible than Duncheng (1734-1791), Yuan Mei (1716-1797) and Yang Zhongxi (1865-1940).In fact, Duncheng and Yuan Mei are both friends of Cao Xueqin, and they are very clear about Cao Xueqin's identity. The evidence that Mr. Yang Zhongxi said is unclear, and the wording "probably" is also very vague. In such a situation, we should be skeptical and not believe anyone's claims. Regarding this incident, netizens also expressed their opinions. Some argue that scholars should be more cautious and should not be gullible in believing unclear evidence;Others believe that Mr. Hu Shih should be held responsible for his mistakes and correct them in a timely manner. Others believe that this incident tells us that we must be practical in our studies, not just based on our own subjective assumptions, let alone take our own assumptions as facts. Overall, the impact of this incident on the red academic community is far-reaching. The issue of Cao Xueqin's identity is a very important topic, and we need more scholars to dig deeper and scrutinize.
At the same time, we should also note that this incident also reflects that scholars should maintain a cautious, objective and prudent attitude in their research. Recently, a discussion about the identity of Cao Xueqin, the author of "Dream of Red Mansions", has sparked heated discussions among netizens. The focus of this discussion is that Duncheng and Yuan Mei, both in Cao Xueqin's time, do not agree with Cao Xueqin's identity, and Yang Zhongxi, who is now identified as a descendant of Cao Yin, says he is not entirely sure about this. It is understood that Duncheng and Yuan Mei are both contemporaries of Cao Xueqin and have a close relationship with the Cao family. Duncheng is Cao Xueqin's old friend, and the poetry exchanges between the two are frequent, and they know each other. After Cao Xueqin's death, Duncheng also wrote poems to commemorate him. And Yuan Mei is not only a scholar, but also has served in Jiangning and surrounding counties for many years, so it is difficult not to know the situation of the Cao family. Therefore, the information they recorded about Cao Xueqin and the Cao family should be quite accurate. But why are there different statements on the question of "whose descendants are Cao Xueqin?".It turns out that the crux of this problem lies in the different meanings of Duncheng and Yuan Mei's writing.
Duncheng, as Cao Xueqin's old friend, never revealed any information about Cao Xueqin's identity, except for writing ambiguously in a poem that "Xueqin once followed her ancestor Yin to weave". This is due to the need to keep Cao Xueqin's identity secret, because it is said that Cao Xueqin actually died in the 54th year of Kangxi (1715) as Cao Hao, and after faking his death, he lived in the world as Cao Xueqin. Although Yuan Mei knows some about the Cao family, he has no direct contact with Cao Xueqin, and there is no need to keep his special identity secret, so his statement that "Cao Xueqin is Cao Yin's son" is more credible. Regarding this question, Yang Zhongxi, who is now identified as a descendant of Cao Yin, said that he is not entirely sure about it. He believes that Duncheng and Yuan Mei are both contemporaries of Cao Xueqin and have a great relationship with the Cao family, while Yang Zhongxi was born more than 100 years after Cao Xueqin's death, and has nothing to do with it at all. Therefore, Yang Zhongxi's claims are not as credible as the first two. In the comments of netizens, some people believe that this issue is not important, and Cao Xueqin's identity does not affect his literary achievements. Some people also believe that since Cao Xueqin himself did not reveal his identity, we should respect his privacy and should not blindly pursue it.
Others believe that this question is worth **, because Cao Xueqin's identity is closely related to his literary achievements. In any case, the controversy over this issue will continue. However, we should realize that no matter how Cao Xueqin's identity is finally determined, his literary creation and the shock and influence of his classic "Dream of Red Chambers" will forever be remembered for centuries and become a treasure of Chinese culture. Event review: When Hu Shi researched Cao Xueqin's identity, he adopted an untrustworthy point of view, which made Cao Xueqin's identity even more confusing, which brought a lot of trouble to later red lovers. It is unbelievable that a famous scholar would adopt an implausible view to verify Cao Xueqin's identity. Hu Shi, as the originator of forensics, made the question of Cao Xueqin's identity even more ambiguous by his erroneous views. This not only made later red science lovers more troublesome, but also affected Cao Xueqin's research and evaluation. Prior to this incident, there had been similar incidents. For example, some people have questioned whether the author of "Dream of Red Mansions" is Cao Xueqin or Gao E. This problem has not been completely resolved. And Hu Shi's erroneous views make people even more confused and confused about Cao Xueqin's identity.
Netizens also have different opinions and evaluations on this incident. Some netizens believe that Hu Shi's erroneous views have made Cao Xueqin's identity more complicated and made later researchers more laborious. Some netizens believe that although Hu Shi has made mistakes, his research spirit and contributions are still worthy of our respect. Some netizens put forward their own opinions and speculations, believing that Cao Xueqin's identity may never be completely resolved. In any case, this incident has had a certain impact on Cao Xueqin's research and evaluation. It reminds us that when studying a person or an event, we should be as accurate and objective as possible, and the correctness of the research conclusion should not be affected by personal subjective bias. At the same time, it also requires us to maintain a cautious and rigorous attitude towards the study of history and culture.