Caiping
彩屏
“The Painted Screen”
Her Story
Maid to Jia Xichun, the youngest of the four Jia daughters — the one who paints the Garden, and who at the end of the family’s collapse cuts off her hair and takes the veil. Caiping is named on the roll of her rooms and is there through it. The novel keeps her at exactly that distance: attending, counted, present at her mistress’s decision, without a scene she can call her own.
In Xiang Li's Hands
Strict profile. Pale green jacket, mint skirt, a blue sash trailing to the floor. A small gilt-rimmed box rests flat on one palm; the other hand lifts a dark oblong to eye level. Nothing behind her but paper. She is painted mid-errand, carrying the tools of somebody else’s art.
The Calligraphy
彩屏 — the two-character given name alone, no surname and no diminutive, set into the open right-hand field at the height of her raised hand.
Connections
- Jia Xichun 贾惜春 — her mistress, the youngest Jia sister, who ends as a nun.
- Ruhua 入画 — Xichun’s other maid, turned out of the house before the end.
Others of the same kind · maid – Yingchun, Tanchun, Xichun, Li Wan, Xiangyun Siqi 司棋 · Xiuju 绣橘 · Lianhua'r 莲花儿 · Shishu 侍书 · Cuimo 翠墨 · Xiaochan 小蝉 · Ruhua 入画 · Cai'er 彩儿 · Suyun 素云 · Biyue 碧月 · Cuilü 翠缕 · Baoqin 抱琴 · Xiaoque 小鹊 · Xiaojixiang'r 小吉祥儿 and 5 more
Named on these pages Cai'er 彩儿
Dream of the Red Chamber
Xiang Li painted all 413 characters of the novel between 1975 and 1985, the first person to complete the entire cast. See the whole collection · Chinese Empresses
