Zhang Ye smiled and said, “If I were an ordinary reader, or an ordinary researcher, the problem with Grandmother Jia’s age could be explained this way. The author did not edit it in time, and everyone would definitely be able to accept this explanation. There would then be no need to come up with more superfluous explanations, but, I can’t do that. This is because my role now is that of a teacher. I have to be rigorous in academia. The reason why I singled out the problem with Grandmother Jia is because her situation is more special. It cannot be explained using the same generalizations as before. If I were to lecture in that manner, then that would be me being irresponsible to my students!”
“Special?”
“What’s special about it?”
“It feels the same?”
“That’s right. Grandmother Jia’s problem is just with her birthdate and age?”
The Peking University students began talking about it.
Zhang Ye began to speak in detail. “If no one mentioned it, I was not planning on talking about it, but since we are on the topic, I’ll briefly talk about it. About Grandmother Jia’s birthday problem, is it Chapter 71’s ‘third day of the eighth month’? Or is it Chapter 62’s ‘the fifteenth of the first month is Aunt Xing’s birthday and also Cousin Chai’s’? These two original texts are conflicting. However, according to my research, according to matching with Baochai’s birthday, I deduce that chapter 62’s ‘the fifteenth of the first month’ is a birthday that will agree with the plot. The other reason is because of Grandmother Jia’s words in chapter 39. “Now, old kinswoman,’ said Grandmother Jia, ‘and what would your age be?’ ‘Seventy-five this year’, said Grannie Liu. Grandmother Jia turned round to the others present. ‘That’s several years older than me. Fancy still being so fit and lively! Heaven only knows what I shall be like at that age!’ This also indicates that Grandmother Jia’s birthday does not exceed 74 years of age, but Chapter 71’s words were ‘the third day of the eighth month was Grandmother Jia’s eightieth birthday’!”
Everyone recalled it!
Indeed, there were the exact words!
Zhang Ye summed up his conclusions and said, “So I can be certain that the third day of the eighth month is fake. 80 years old? This age is a giant leap. No matter how you arrange it or fictionalize it, it is clearly not Grandmother Jia’s true birthday and age. Hence, the text in chapter 71…was post-edited. This is also why when everyone raised their questions, I had specially emphasized that I can only explain the logical errors of the first eighty chapters ‘on the whole’. This is because the text and original manuscript of the first 80 chapters of Cao Xueqin were also lost or tampered with, or could also be erroneously copied. Grandmother Jia’s birthday problem is a result of that. This passage might have been lost along with the chapters after the eightieth. It might be Gao E or some other anonymous writer who continued the story, that took the liberty of modifying it! This resulted in such a major flaw. Hence, this flaw is different from the other flaws. Naturally, I need to single it out!”
It was reasonable!
It was well explained!
Zhang Ye once again stunned everyone!
Those reporters could not understand a thing. Even if they had read ‘Dream of the Red Chamber’, they still could not react to the various things Zhang Ye mentioned. They found it extremely profound and intricate. Them not understanding did not mean they could not observe others. When they saw the expressions of the literary scholars and Redologists in the first row, no matter how dumb they were, they could tell that Teacher Zhang Ye’s explanation and analysis was very convincing!
“It’s reasonable!”