The Dream of the Red Chamber Book I


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(3.5 stars; 25 reviews)

The Dream of the Red Chamber (also known as The Story of the Stone) is one of the Four Great Classical Novels of China, and considered the greatest of them all. Almost 40 main characters and some 500 minor characters tell the fortunes of the Chia family; the book details mainly the life of Chia Pao-yü, the heir apparent, who is described as very intelligent, but also as carefree and self-indulging. The already wealthy Chia family rises to new heights when Pao-yü's elder sister becomes an imperial consort. On her first visit home, a lush garden is built, where much of the rest of the story takes place. The intrigues surrounding Pao-yü and his cousins, especially Lin Tai-yü who he loves, and Hsüeh Pao-ch'ai who he is finally tricked into marrying, make up a large part of the story. The decline of the Chia family begins with the death of the imperial consort, and when they fall into disfavour with the emperor, their mansions and the garden are eventually destroyed.

The whole book has 120 chapters, only 80 of which were written by Cao Xueqin before his death in 1764. Cheng Weiyuan and Gao E claimed to have access to Cao's papers, and published what is now known as the Cheng-Gao version in 1791. Henry Bencraft Joly translated only part of the book written by Cao. Book I contains the first 24 chapters, Book II ends abruptly with chapter 56; a Book III was never published. (19 hr 20 min)

Chapters

Preface and Chapter I, Part 1 17:39 Read by Jing Li
Chapter I, Part 2 28:17 Read by Jing Li
Chapter I, Part 3 15:17 Read by Jing Li
Chapter II, Part 1 21:35 Read by Jing Li
Chapter II, Part 2 25:14 Read by Jing Li
Chapter III, Part 1 26:35 Read by Elizabeth Buchanan
Chapter III, Part 2 19:24 Read by Elizabeth Buchanan
Chapter III, Part 3 19:36 Read by Elizabeth Buchanan
Chapter IV, Part 1 27:05 Read by Elizabeth Buchanan
Chapter IV, Part 2 18:08 Read by Elizabeth Buchanan
Chapter V, Part 1 18:26 Read by Nicholas Clifford (1930-2019)
Chapter V, Part 2 20:55 Read by Nicholas Clifford (1930-2019)
Chapter V, Part 3 22:49 Read by Nicholas Clifford (1930-2019)
Chapter VI, Part 1 24:27 Read by Arie
Chapter VI, Part 2 23:55 Read by Arie
Chapter VII, Part 1 22:17 Read by Arie
Chapter VII, Part 2 22:55 Read by Elizabeth Buchanan
Chapter VIII, Part 1 22:05 Read by Edmund Bloxam
Chapter VIII, Part 2 18:03 Read by Edmund Bloxam
Chapter IX, Part 1 23:41 Read by Jing Li
Chapter IX, Part 2 17:12 Read by Jing Li
Chapter X, Part 1 22:17 Read by Katharina Huang
Chapter X, Part 2 20:21 Read by Katharina Huang
Chapter XI, Part 1 16:49 Read by Mary J
Chapter XI, Part 2 14:08 Read by Mary J
Chapter XII, Part 1 17:49 Read by Elizabeth Buchanan
Chapter XII, Part 2 16:34 Read by Elizabeth Buchanan
Chapter XIII, Part 1 25:22 Read by Jing Li
Chapter XIII, Part 2 15:11 Read by Jing Li
Chapter XIV, Part 1 20:11 Read by Jing Li
Chapter XIV, Part 2 21:00 Read by Jing Li
Chapter XV, Part 1 20:08 Read by Jing Li
Chapter XV, Part 2 16:51 Read by Jing Li
Chapter XVI, Part 1 20:00 Read by Elizabeth Buchanan
Chapter XVI, Part 2 16:57 Read by Elizabeth Buchanan
Chapter XVI, Part 3 19:29 Read by Elizabeth Buchanan
Chapter XVII, Part 1 18:08 Read by Elizabeth Buchanan
Chapter XVII, Part 2 17:42 Read by Elizabeth Buchanan
Chapter XVII, Part 3 17:25 Read by Elizabeth Buchanan
Chapter XVII, Part 4 19:01 Read by Elizabeth Buchanan
Chapter XVIII, Part 1 15:57 Read by Elizabeth Buchanan
Chapter XVIII, Part 2 17:52 Read by Elizabeth Buchanan
Chapter XVIII, Part 3 21:11 Read by Elizabeth Buchanan
Chapter XIX, Part 1 18:49 Read by Lynn Lee
Chapter XIX, Part 2 24:59 Read by Lynn Lee
Chapter XIX, Part 3 18:49 Read by Lynn Lee
Chapter XX, Part 1 16:07 Read by Lynn Lee
Chapter XX, Part 2 21:48 Read by Lynn Lee
Chapter XXI, Part 1 24:59 Read by Elizabeth Buchanan
Chapter XXI, Part 2 18:57 Read by Elizabeth Buchanan
Chapter XXII, Part 1 19:15 Read by Elizabeth Buchanan
Chapter XXII, Part 2 16:58 Read by Elizabeth Buchanan
Chapter XXII, Part 3 18:59 Read by Elizabeth Buchanan
Chapter XXIII, Part 1 22:16 Read by Elizabeth Buchanan
Chapter XXIII, Part 2 20:42 Read by Elizabeth Buchanan
Chapter XXIV, Part 1 18:12 Read by Elizabeth Buchanan
Chapter XXIV, Part 2 17:34 Read by Elizabeth Buchanan
Chapter XXIV, Part 3 16:18 Read by Elizabeth Buchanan

Reviews

Interesting.


(4.5 stars)

The story moves along slowly, and reminds me of Proust. Marvelous attention to detail. The readers were all either Chinese Americans or had studied Chinese, as their diction was excellent. Very well done- a shame there is no reading of Book 2. I will have to find the time to read it!


(1 stars)

The reader's pronunciation was was difficult to understand.

I like the first reader.


(5 stars)

The first reader, Jingli, was very easy to understand with only minor pronunciation errors. the Second reader, Elizabeth Bucannon, is good at the English, but she reads the Chinese names so poorly, it's almost impossible to know who she is talking about.


(5 stars)

Not having time to read this when it was recommended to me as an undergrad I feel I missed out. The readers do an excellent job and I can't wait for book 2 to come out on audio.


(4 stars)

Very good reading, the pronunciation is done very well. Very interesting book.

same as the other volume.


(2 stars)

The reader was overconfident of her knowledge of English. She gets about every third word wrong, more if there is a word in there that ends in "n" which she pronounces as "ng" even when it isn't part of an "ing" ending. I know it was a big job, but somebody else should have done it.