Between Noble and Humble: Cao Xueqin and the Dream of the Red Chamber ( literally New
Biography of Cao Xueqin) is a translation of a scholarly work by the famous mainland Chinese
critic Zhou Ruchang. Written for the Western reader it historicizes the life and times of the
Chinese novelist Cao Xueqin (c. 1715-1763) and comprehensively introduces the origins of the
novel Dream of the Red Chamber (Honglou meng). This translation is unique because it offers the
first book-length biography of Cao Xueqin in English. Zhou carefully historicizes the decline
of the once illustrious Cao clan and he demonstrates how Cao Xueqin's own childhood
experiences in a wealthy bondservant family during the Qing dynasty profoundly informed the
encyclopedic narrative that he would later write. In Between Noble and Humble Zhou also offers
intriguing and controversial theories about Honglou meng based on decades of careful research
for instance that the famous commentator Red Inkstone was in fact a female relative of Cao
Xueqin.
