茜雪
茜雪 茜雪 — 为一杯茶而被赶出。在第8章宝玉醉酒回家，要求他浸泡了三天的枫露茶 枫露茶。
茜雪
“Dismissed Over a Cup of Tea”
Her Story
In Chapter 8 Baoyu comes home drunk and asks for the maple-dew tea 枫露茶 he had left steeping for three days. His wet-nurse, Li Nanny 李嬷嬷, has drunk it. Baoyu smashes the cup on the floor — and it is Qianxue, who served him the wrong tea, who is turned out of the house. Li Nanny herself brings it up afterwards: the girl expelled over a cup of tea. A note in the Zhiyanzhai manuscript commentary refers to a lost chapter in which Qianxue visits Baoyu in the prison-temple. No such chapter survives.
In Xiang Li's Hands
She is painted from behind. The face is entirely hidden — only the black coil of her hair, a blue jacket, a yellow embroidered pouch, and a red-and-pale-green skirt sweeping off to the left against grey reeds. Every other sheet in this group turns its subject toward us. This one refuses.
The Calligraphy
茜雪, upper left, the given name alone, placed on the bare side of the sheet as far from the turned-away figure as the paper allows.
Connections
- Jia Baoyu 贾宝玉 — her master, whose broken teacup cost her the position.
- Li Nanny 李嬷嬷 — Baoyu’s wet-nurse, who drank the tea Qianxue was dismissed over.
- Xiaohong 小红 — the maid named with her in the commentary’s note on the lost prison-temple chapter.
Others of the same kind · maid – Baoyu (Green Delights / 怡紅院) Qingwen 晴雯 · Xiren 袭人 · Sheyue 麝月 · Xiaohong 小红 · Qiuwen 秋纹 · Bihen 碧痕 · Tanyun 檀云 · Qixian 绮霰 · Huixiang 蕙香 · Jiahui 佳蕙 · Zhui'er 坠儿 · Liang'er 良儿 · Chunyan 春燕 · Liu Wu'er 柳五儿 and 1 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
