I have not yet finished reading the entire story — I have only read through the end of the third volume, up to where Second Young Master Gu pressures Minglan into marriage and Minglan awaits her wedding. So I am unaware of what happens afterward, and this review covers only the half I have read so far. Properly speaking, one ought not write a review this way — the greatest pitfall in criticism is incomplete knowledge, especially when evaluating people. What one knows is never the full truth, and judgments made on partial information tend toward emotion and away from fairness. But I simply could not help myself; I climbed out of bed to write this review precisely because I am so deeply fond of Minglan’s eldest brother, Changbai. To be honest, once Minglan is married off, Changbai will probably have very little screen time — he never had a great deal to begin with, and what I know of him now is likely most of the story there is to tell.
By the standards of ancient China — particularly the environment of the Ming and Qing periods — among all the various men in this story, Changbai is not the most dazzling. But he is, by my reading so far, the finest husband. I exclude Second Young Master Gu from this assessment since I have not read his portion yet, and besides, he is the male lead, born already equipped with a protagonist’s advantages that make comparison unfair to begin with.
Changbai appears severe and speaks little, but is in truth sharp-minded and perceptive. He has a sense of responsibility, holds his own convictions, possesses genuine discernment, has a conscience, and has real ability — the very embodiment of an upstanding young man in every respect.
Though serious, Changbai is not rigid. When Hai Shi came into the household as his bride, he did not fall into the trap of blind filial piety as Hualan’s husband Yuan Er had done. Instead, he assessed both his wife and his mother with clear eyes: his wife was shrewd and capable yet also well-bred, aware of the broader picture, and kind-hearted; his mother had a somewhat narrow disposition but was not malicious, and was not particularly clever. So he told his new bride to serve Wang Shi attentively, thoughtfully, and flawlessly for a month or two — after which she would be liberated. Once the mother-in-law was satisfied, she would have no cause to make life difficult, and the days ahead would be comfortable. On the surface it appeared that the new bride endured a month or two of hardship, but in fact this was a husband who genuinely cared for his wife. Newlyweds in the first flush of tender feeling — how could he not care for her? He was pointing her toward a path of lasting harmony. He was also making clear to Hai Shi: your husband adores you, but you must win over your mother-in-law, for filial piety comes first. This was the governing principle of a society where the Emperor himself knelt at his ailing father’s bedside, placing that relationship above even the throne — how much more so should everyone else honor filial piety above all. The relationship between a mother-in-law and daughter-in-law depends enormously on how the husband and son conducts himself. Handled well, the whole family is at peace; handled poorly, the household becomes chaos. Wang Shi never once chafed against her daughter-in-law on account of her son, and Hai Shi thrived with great ease — which shows that Changbai managed the situation masterfully.
Then there is the question of his serving-room companions. In ancient times, given Changbai’s circumstances, having even one such companion was on the modest end — a man completely without any would have been considered strange by the standards of the day, his own parents included. And here again I must praise Changbai, for he handled the matter with both decency and elegance. Changbai understood that as the eldest son and pillar of the family, he had to be exceptionally scrupulous. Minglan noted that when Changbai selected a serving girl, he chose none of the pretty ones, picking only the plain and docile. This was not a matter of unusual taste — we know he glanced twice at the very beautiful Ruomei when he saw her sweeping the courtyard, which confirms his aesthetic sensibilities were perfectly normal. I believe his reasoning was much as Minglan herself once reflected: the prettier these serving girls were, the more unfortunate their fates tended to be. Even his own mother, guileless as she was, had driven out the serving girls at Sheng Hong’s side upon entering the household. Those who had been admitted to a young master’s bed, however lovely, actually fared worse when eventually married off than plain ones did. He could not bring himself to treat these girls cruelly by dismissing them to a harsh fate, nor could he afford to anger his new bride over them. So he simply chose one of unremarkable looks and no scheming nature to keep nearby. With only one, and one of this description, even Hai Shi with her household rules would not bother to drive the girl away. Unbeautiful, guileless, and prevented from bearing children by Hai Shi besides — she posed no threat whatsoever, and could even serve as a shield against further additions later. Driving her away would earn Hai Shi a reputation for jealousy, so better to let her remain. She was not left to a comfortable life exactly, but neither was she pitiable. Had there been two or three, a new bride entering the household would certainly have had them all sent away. With only one of this kind, Hai Shi had little grounds to object. Had there been only one but a beauty like Ruomei, or a pitiful figure like Ke’er, she would equally have been turned out. So by choosing Yanghao, and declining to touch any of the pretty girls, Changbai showed a genuine decency.
Why not choose even a single pretty one? Changbai likely understood that however strong his principles, no one is proof against accidents. Many pretty serving girls harbored ambitions of attaching themselves to young masters of the household — a life of at least material comfort, even if it could never rival that of a proper wife or favored concubine, was preferable to marrying a farmer or a blacksmith. Keep them near, and even if he had no intention of touching them, there were always those who might scheme — if he were drunk, if some incense were burned, if something were slipped into his drink, could his principles hold as firm? His own father had principles too, and was still outmaneuvered time and again. Prevention is worth more than remedy. That era did not speak the language of romantic love, and he and serving girls could share no common ground for such things anyway. It was simply not worth disrupting his wife’s peace and his household’s stability for the sake of one or two moments of desire. Better to want none at all.
My fondness for Changbai began from the moment after Minglan returned from her first journey away from home — he pulled her over and measured their heights against each other, remarking: “Two inches and six fen difference.” He must have been checking her height. It showed that though he seldom spoke, he kept close watch over his younger sister, especially this one he was particularly fond of. His fondness for Minglan probably had nothing to do with her having sided with the right faction — Changbai never treated Molan worse on account of her being Lin Yiniang’s daughter — but rather because he recognized in Minglan a sharp, perceptive, clear-minded nature. So Changbai allowed himself one moment of muddled thinking: the matter of Qi Heng’s pursuit of Minglan. This sister of his was so outstanding — of course he hoped she would marry well. Qi Heng was capable, decent, and genuinely fond of her; at first glance, such a match looked entirely sound. His confusion arose from love for her, not from any lack of intelligence. Though Changbai and Minglan exchanged few words, there was genuinely something of an elder brother who is like a father in their relationship. In many matters Changbai did not appear to step forward to protect Minglan — to a great extent, sons in that household could not entangle themselves in the battles of the inner women’s quarters. With Old Matriarch guarding Minglan, there was no need for him to act. In truth, no one in the household was as capable as the Old Matriarch. When Minglan was to be married, Hai Shi offered her own dowry to supplement Minglan’s wedding goods — partly because the two of them were genuinely close, given how dearly Minglan doted on her son, and partly because it was her husband’s own deep regard for this sister. So in household matters, Hai Shi tended to quietly favor Minglan time and again.
Looking at everything, across the first three volumes, the happiest daughter-in-law is Hai Shi. We say Changbai has great fortune with his wife — but Hai Shi is equally fortunate in her husband. Sheng Hong’s greatest pride in this lifetime ought not to be his own career achievements, but rather having raised such a fine son capable of holding up the entire family.
Among the remaining men: Qi Heng has admirable qualities, but falls short of Changbai in firmness of conviction. Consider the incident before the examinations, when he returned to the capital with his mother for the Spring Festival. Had he truly resolved not to go, would his mother — who adored him — have sacrificed his examination preparation for the sake of her own face? Junzhu was not a shallow woman. And then there is the matter of a Junzhu for a mother-in-law — not easy to manage. His family circumstances are too elevated. An ill-matched pairing.
As for Sheng Changfeng — I genuinely dislike him. I suspect not many readers feel differently.
He Hong is kind-hearted, comes from a harmonious household, is fond of Minglan, and his mother is not a bad person. The matter of his female cousin cannot be placed entirely at his door — he truly did exert his utmost effort to meet Minglan’s demands. Reading that passage moved me, because given his ordinarily gentle nature, getting that far was genuinely remarkable. And in ancient times, a man of his comfortable means keeping a concubine was utterly unremarkable. Even in Hai Shi’s household with its rules against concubines, she still kept Yanghao nearby. He Hong moreover swore repeatedly and came as close as possible to saying outright — pushed to his limit by Minglan — that he would never so much as touch this cousin of his. In ancient times, whether a man took concubines or not was a matter of his own moral character. There were those who gained reputations for virtue by refraining, but this did not mean women had any standing to demand it. As Mencius would have it, even a nobly-born woman married to a beggar could not openly make such demands. That He Hong went as far as he did showed genuine determination to win Minglan, and genuine feeling for her. However — like Sheng Hong himself, He Hong has principles in his heart, but his head is not as clear as Changbai’s. A few coaxing words from his cousin, a few tears from his mother, and he wavers. That cousin is no simple creature. Her failure to mention her inability to bear children from the start was calculated advantage, certainly not the absurd excuse of not wanting to worry anyone. First she plays for sympathy, then she invokes shared memories — and He Hong is shaken. Mother and cousin perform their roles in perfect, unspoken coordination: mother creates a scene while cousin appears fragile and yielding. Then, when all that fails, out comes the claim that being turned away means certain death — knowing precisely that her kindhearted cousin would not watch her die. The earlier threat of suicide was a bluff, this was real, a passive dying that would simply happen — of course He Hong’s heart softened. With a cousin like that always present, the days ahead, even if not full household chaos, would hardly be tranquil. Fortunately Minglan is a capable woman, so the cousin could not stir up too great a storm. With someone like Rulan or Wang Shi in her place, the outcome would have been far less certain. This marriage, by ancient standards, is not a bad one — but calling it truly excellent would be an overstatement.
Second Young Master Gu is of course wonderful — but he is playing on an entirely different level. Everyone knows that winning the top lottery prize is wonderful, and yet in this life one buys a ticket only once, and it decides everything, and everyone must buy one. Can you really expect to win on a single try? And let us not forget — Minglan is also playing on an entirely different level.