What is the relationship between costume color and character in A Dream of Red Mansions?

A Dream of Red Mansions has created many vivid images, and Cao Xueqin skillfully uses the rich emotional expression of color itself to enrich the characters' images by describing the colors of characters' costumes, implying their personality characteristics. Take Jia Baoyu as an example. Red is almost the background color of Jia Baoyu's life. From the perspective of clothing alone, there are "two-color monarch butterflies wear big red arrow sleeves", "silver-red half-worn flower coat" and "big red golden python fox armpit arrow sleeves", which shows his preference for red. Even at the end of one hundred and twenty times, Jia Baoyu ended up in a bleak snow, barefoot and bareheaded, leaving with the monk in such a bleak scene, wearing a gorgeous orangutan felt.

Since the Zhou Dynasty, red has been endowed with orthodox status. From ordinary people's weddings, newlyweds wearing red clothes to traditional festivals, red has become the most representative popular color in ancient times. Jia Baoyu always appears in red, which also conforms to the elegant character image of Jia Baoyu's rich son and his absolute leading role in the whole novel.

Looking deeper, since ancient times, in China's color culture, red symbolizes flame and sun, freedom and unrestrained, which is also a metaphor for Jia Baoyu's rebellious spirit, escaping from the secular world and not being bound by feudal ethics. Only striking red is the most suitable way to walk. In addition, red has a strong rouge powder in traditional culture, which is inextricably linked with women. Women's rouge is red, and women also have a name called "beauty", which also conforms to Jia Baoyu's image of loving, respecting and cherishing women.

All this can be summed up in the final analysis: Jia Baoyu's "love for red" comes from his pure and enthusiastic love for others such as Red Sun. He is as sincere and flawless as a child, as clean and bright as the most dazzling red. The connection between such colors and characters' personality images is also reflected in other characters.

For example, when Lin Daiyu first entered Jiafu, Wang Xifeng, who was known as the "first show", wore a golden beaded bun, a red silk coat, a bean green sash and a pink Yu Pei. It was really colorful embroidery, just like a fairy princess. It is true that judging from the principle that we modern women should not have too many colors, Xifeng's colors are messy and complicated, and it is hard to escape the fate of being too fancy. However, it is this flamboyant color that best reflects Wang Xifeng's personality characteristics.

Therefore, I don't need to go into details, and the image of Wang Xifeng, who is provocative and flamboyant, is vividly on the paper. As a novel, the description of clothes in A Dream of Red Mansions serves the characters completely, and the author's control over the relationship between the color connotation of clothes and the characters' characters undoubtedly brings the most direct sublimation to the characterization of the novel. It can be said that without such a deep impression on the color of clothes, the characters would not be so vivid.

The costumes in A Dream of Red Mansions are rich in color and harmonious. For example, Baoyu went to visit Baochai, and Baochai's dress description was: "Honey cotton-padded jacket, rose purple gold silver mouse shoulder gown, onion yellow silk cotton skirt." Honey color, that is, light yellow with a little red, with a little red tone in rose purple, echoes up and down with onion yellow, gentle and subtle, and fits Baochai's fresh and elegant lady image. In this way, you have me and you live in harmony, even in today's rapid development of fashion, it still has its reference significance.

Cao Xueqin, who knows the way of color matching, is not limited to the color matching of clothes in traditional thinking. But he has a unique vision. People in China are modest and restrained, and can't make public. Many people have the idea that clothes should not be too bright since childhood. And Cao Xueqin showed us many very bold TINT in his book. The most representative thing is that red and green, which are criticized by people in the traditional concept, are complementary colors. The contrast between the two is so great that people don't accept such strong color stimulation.

There is a folk saying that "red with green is nonsense". But in the book, red and green show a very harmonious unity. For example, Wang Xifeng is wearing a red coat and a green skirt. "She is wearing a narrow coat of bright red satin and a jade crepe skirt." However, here, colorful embroidery is brilliant. After the green echoes the red, it is Hongyi Kuai Green, which has its own flavor. It can be seen that the collocation of colors should not be rigid, but should have a refreshing and eye-catching visual effect.