“Why should the founding of poetry clubs be the sole prerogative of the whiskered male, and female versificators allowed a voice in the tunable concert of the muses only when some enlightened patriarch sees fit to invite them? Will you come, then, and rhyme with us?”

New poetry club “The Crab-flower Club” 海棠社 just dropped!

The latest installation of our exploration of Dream of the Red Chamber ( Hongloumeng, 紅樓夢, 红楼梦).

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Baoyu expounds upon one of his favorite topics, his notion of the ideal death, linking it to idle visions shared by his soulmate. He then goes off in search of a song, only to find the baleful laments of a caged bird in a hall of mirrors. 

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Time to choose: do you believe in the marriage of gold and jade, or do you believe in the marriage of stone and flower? Check out part 1 of our discussion of chapter 36 of Dream of the Red Chamber, or The Story of the Stone.

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Baoyu is poorly regarded by visitors, and Baochai sends subtle signals to Aroma. We discuss families and fortunes. 

Note: I’ve preserved a weird audio effect at the end of the episode for a behind-the-scenes feel, and because I thought it was funny.

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Daiyu is expertly trolled by a bird, and Baoyu tries to charm Silver. Baoyu tries to get Grandmother Jia to praise Daiyu, but she praises Baochai instead. Meanwhile we attempt to ascertain the social-hierarchical significance of who serves whom, and who sits when. 

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Is love disgusting? Why wouldn’t it be? If your love is not reaching toward some infinite embrace, the quality of being unqualified, is it love? After a discussion of the handkerchief verses, we discuss Xue Pan and the “dark social alchemy” of violence and quantification. 

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In the aftermath of the beating, who really cares and who is putting on appearances? What pain can more tears rebalance? A stained handkerchief can be a symbol, and a medium for artistic response. There is mutual understanding developing in the garden, but does falsity fatally ruin the whole concept of meta-cognition?

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Baoyu is beaten! How does the ideology of filial piety inform this scene, when it is intra-familial conflict that, in part, brings it in being? 

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An actor, the female impersonator Jiang Yuhan, has exited the Prince of Zhongshun’s stage, his gifted sash contradicting Baoyu’s claims of ignorance. Which path of fate is being depicted, and why must extreme violence befall Baoyu? 

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The death of Golden 金釧! Who is at fault for her premature demise? Is there any agency in, and meaning to one’s actions, when symbols prefigure, and fate seems fixed? 

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