费婆子
费婆子：浏览李湘艺术网站的红楼梦资料。本页正文暂为英文，完整译文待补充。
费婆子
“Trading on Her Age”
Her Story
One of Lady Xing’s dowry servants, and an old woman who trades on her seniority. She belongs to the faction that forms around Lady Xing against Xifeng’s running of the house, and she works the Garden’s serving women — stirring, carrying talk, making trouble at a level the family never quite sees. The novel gives her a temperament rather than a plot.
In Xiang Li's Hands
Caught mid-stagger, the whole body swept into an S, both sleeves flying, a mauve sash whipping out behind. Pale celadon robe. She holds a small white cup to her mouth with both hands, eyes shut, grinning. Nothing in the roster says she drinks. This sheet decides that she does.
The Calligraphy
The inscription is 费大娘, not the narrative’s dismissive 费婆子 — “Goodwife Fei,” what you would call her to her face rather than behind her back.
Connections
- Lady Xing 邢夫人 — the mistress whose dowry staff she belongs to.
- Wang Shanbao’s wife 王善保家的 — the other of Lady Xing’s women, who pushes the night raid on the Garden.
Others of the same kind · servant's wife / senior serving-woman Zhou Rui jia de 周瑞家的 · Lin Zhixiao jia de 林之孝家的 · Lai Da jia de 赖大家的 · Wang Shanbao jia de 王善保家的 · Wu Xindeng xifu 吴新登媳妇 · Wang'er xifu 旺儿媳妇 · Zhang Cai jia de 张材家的 · Zheng Hua jia de 郑华家的 · Wu Xing jia de 吴兴家的 · Laixi jia de 来喜家的 · Qin Xian jia de 秦显家的 · Bao Er jia de 鲍二家的 · Liu jia de 柳家的 · Shan Daniang 单大娘 and 10 more
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
