石呆子

His Story

In Chapter 48 Ping’er tells the story. Jia She wants twenty old fans, painted and inscribed on antique paper. Shi Daizi is poor enough to go hungry but will not sell them at any price. Jia Lian fails to buy them. Jia Yucun then has him charged with owing government silver, confiscates the fans in settlement, and presents them to Jia She. Nobody knows whether he is alive or dead. When Jia Lian says the fans were not worth a man’s ruin, his father beats him for it.

In Xiang Li's Hands

Almost no colour: grey wash, black slashes, one blue line at the collar and a scarf blown out behind him. He is bent forward, head wrenched back over his shoulder, brows down, mouth shut. The fans are nowhere on the sheet. She paints the refusal and withholds the objects.

The Calligraphy

石呆子 is not a name but a verdict — surname plus 呆子, “the Shi blockhead” — the household’s word for a man who would not sell, brushed low at his left in a heavy upright hand.

Connections

• Jia She 贾赦 — who wants the fans and will not be refused.
• Jia Yucun 贾雨村 — who manufactures the charge that strips him of them.
• Jia Lian 贾琏 — who tried to buy honestly, failed, and was beaten for saying the price was too high.

Others of the same kind · outsider – townsfolk, tenants, tradespeople Liu Xianglian 柳湘莲 · Jiang Yuhan 蒋玉菡 · Liu Laolao 刘姥姥 · Wang Gou'er 王狗儿 · Liu Shi 刘氏 · Ban'er 板儿 · Qing'er 青儿 · Feng Yuan 冯渊 · Ni Er 倪二 · Bu Shiren 卜世仁 · Yinjie 银姐 · Fang Chun 方椿 · Yun'er 云儿 · Wu Liang 吴良 and 4 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