CAD Xueqin
曹雪芹 CAD Xueqin (1724? or 1715? - 1763? 1764?) is a Chinese writer active under the reign of the emperor Qianlong of the Dynastie of Qing.
Descendant of an big family déchue, it wrote the large novel Rêve in the red House (紅樓夢) that it left unfinished and who was published several years after his death.
Dynasty CAD
One knows few things about CAD Xuequin, but there are more information on the
dynasty CAD. Originating in
Liaoyang in the
Liaoning, several generations of CAD lived
Shenyang, subdivision of the
Mandchourie nearest to the China. The two localities remain still today.
The father of the great-great-grandfather of the novelist, CAD Shixuan, was commander-in-chief of the garrison of Shenyang under the Dynastie of Ming, place whose the Jurchen founders seized the Dynastie Jin, in
1621 and who passed under the command of Tong Yangxing, founder of the new dynasty (1630). Captain CAD Shixuan, incorporated in the Manchu white banner, joined
Beijing in
1644, and after the last Ming emperor had hung himself on the hill of Jingshan (Bellevue), the CAD were from now on attached to the imperial house of the new sovereign:
Shunzhi. CAD Shixuan became prefect of
Datong
Wire of the precedent. He exerted the military function of instructor of the troops of Jurchen, (1630).
Oldest son of the precedent (1630? - 1684) and also the great-grandfather of the novelist, was the husband of Sun Lady, controlling of the young emperor (Xuanye)
Kangxi (gone up on the throne at the eight years age). Named at the post of intendant of the imperial silk trade of Nankin, it kept this function during twenty years. Regarded as a dignitary in province, he travelled in Palanquin and provided the court not only in silk trade but also in information on the population, administration etc, by way of secret reports/ratios
Oldest son of the precedent and grandfather of the novelist was the fellow student of the young emperor Xuanye (Kangxi). Named by him captain of the imperial guard in Beijing, it succeeded his father as intendant of the silk trade imperial with Nankin of 1692 to 1712. It shared with his beautiful brother Li Xu the monopoly of the intendance of the silk trade which made their fortune. The oldest daughter of CAD Yin married a prince madchou bordered red banner, and her second daughter another prince Manchu.
CAD Yin was at the same time poet, collector and editor of beautiful books. It bound friendship with many poets and playwrights, which having to exert later a great influence on the literary training of his/her small son CAD Xueqin. The visits which the emperor returned to his large father are evoked in
the Dream in the red house although CAD Xueqin was too young at the time to assist to with it. It is supposed that it took as a starting point accounts and family descriptions.
Only sons of preceding succeeded his/her father at the post of intendant of the silk trade of Nankin in 1712. But he died three years later, before even the birth of his heir CAD Fu that his/her large mother adopted.
The death of the Kangxi emperor, friend of the CAD, involved a radical change of situation for them. the new emperor (
Yongzheng) made control their accounts, to relieve the two intendants Li Xu and CAD Fu. The first was exiled in
Mandchourie and died in 1729, the other was found in the destitution. However the emperor left with the CAD their housing and some servants.
Wire of CAD Fu.
C-Ws communication of the name of the author and significances
According to the Larousse encyclopedia, CAD Xueqin can be also written:
Ts' ao Siue-K' in , while the dictionary of the authors, offers the C-W communication:
Ts' ao Tchan and the nickname
Siue K' in .
The social name of the writer was Qinfu (garden of cresses) that itself transformed into Xueqin (cress under snow), the term
qin meaning in Chinese is:
celery , is
cress . These details are useful to follow sometimes unobtrusive traces.
Biography of CAD Xueqin
The author knew at the same time the size and the decline of family CAD. Born in opulence from this dynasty of mandarins, CAD Xueqin (member of one of the eight Manchu banners) lived in the luxury until 1728, time during which he worked in one of imperial manufactures of textiles. But the emperor
Qianlong completed the ruin of the family started with his predecessor the emperor
Yongzheng, and it confiscated all their goods with the pretext which they had contracted of the debts towards the government. Reduced to deepest misery, the CAD left the South of the country and Xueqin settled in a district poor of the Western banlieu of
Beijing where he lived alone, as recluse. Here the portrait which makes of him the Manchu writer Yu Rui (or If Yuan zhai) in his work
With the liking of the brush in front of the crossing of the jujube tree I learned, thanks to friends, parents by alliance of the author, that it had a corpulent size, a dark dye, a glibness exceptional, at the same time elegant and amusing; that very of it evoked gave birth to spring. Suspended all the day with its extraordinary accounts, the audience never tested lassitude. It eeset from there which the marvellous one comes from its book
Work and its discovery