Fu Shi
傅试
“The Brother Who Waited Too Long”
His Story
A sub-prefect and a protégé of Jia Zheng, who has made his career on the Jia name and keeps sending his people round to the house to keep the connection warm. In Chapter 35 two of his old women call on Baoyu and stay to talk. His sister Fu Qiufang is handsome, twenty-three and still unmarried: he has been holding out for a match grand enough to be worth the wait, and the novel says plainly that he has ruined her life doing it.
In Xiang Li's Hands
Pale green robes, a thin moustache, and black plumes massed either side of his head that could be his own hair or the bird’s — a red-combed rooster rides at his shoulder. Something small, round and pale sits in his open palm. The most equivocal face in this group.
The Calligraphy
The inscription gives the bare two-character name 傅试, with none of the office he spends the novel trading on.
Connections
- Jia Zheng 贾政 — his patron, and the whole basis of his career.
- Fu Qiufang 傅秋芳 — his sister, kept unmarried while he waits for a better offer.
- Jia Baoyu 贾宝玉 — whose rooms his two old women visit in Chapter 35.
Others of the same kind · official / noble / royal Qin Zhong 秦钟 · Jia Yucun 贾雨村 · Bei Jing Wang 北静王 · Leng Zixing 冷子兴 · Zhang Rugui 张如圭 · Menzi 门子 · Xiping Junwang 西平郡王 · Nan'an Taifei 南安太妃 · Zhangshiguan 长史官 · Feng Ziying 冯紫英 · Sun Shaozu 孙绍祖 · Yun Guang 云光 · Fu Qiufang 傅秋芳 · Li Yanei 李衙内 and 9 more
Named on these pages Fu Qiufang 傅秋芳
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
