Dream of the Red Chamber Essay Example for Free

Dream of the Red Chamber Essay In the first chapter, the author first writes about the origin of the stone. Then it comes to the very end of the story and writes a conversation between the stone and the Taoist called Vanitas. Next, it starts to talk about the story which first starts with the decline of Shi-yin Zhen`s family. When reading the origin of the stone, I find the description of the stone provides me with a great sense of mystery, which keeps me reading forward. Maybe it is because the stone is of magic power which makes it unreal from the reality. However, the story happens in the real world. As a result, it forces me to read and explore what will happen if the unreal meets with the real. Then it continues to write about the conversation between the stone and Taoist after â€Å"countless aeons†. The conversation suggests a lot of clues about the whole book. According to the self description of the stone, the story`s main theme is love, and purpose of this story is to record the real events and make those who indulge in the eroticism aware of their wrongdoing. Although it gives some clues to the story, but it never gives the detail to readers. Thus, it is just like it gives you soul of the book, but it never gives the appearance or skin of the book, which makes the reader know something about the book but not everything about it. Consequently, as one of the readers, there is no doubt that I want to get to know more about the book. It is very surprising that the whole story starts with the tragedy of Shi-yin Zhen`s family. Personally, I myself very compassionate him. Before I read the book, I thought the book should be very light and happy since it was a book about love among young boys and girls. It is widely acknowledged that the first impression about one thing will keep affecting your view for a long time. Maybe the author wants to suggest something about the later story, so he writes such a tragedy and makes the atmosphere sad and dark. Shi-yin is a good man who helped Yu-cun. He does not deserve such misfortune. Maybe it is the â€Å"Fate† that the author wants to focus on. Another feature that I find in the first chapter is that Taoist and monk frequently appear in the context. In my impression towards Taoist, such kind of people, who are totally different with the ordinary ones, have higher-level thoughts towards the world. They always have deeper thoughts towards everything. I am quite confused by the frequently appearance of Taoist. Is it very common at that time to have Taoist or is there any other reason? What does the author want to express with the use of Taoist? According to my point of view, maybe he wants to compare the Taoist and the ordinary people to emphasis what ordinary people do are always secular and profane, which is because they lack of the understanding of the true life and indulge in the real material world. The first chapter tells us much and also leaves many unsolved questions which force us to explore the answer by reading the rest of the book. I will keep on reading and figure out the answer myself.