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Tonight a pair of cooing doves under red bridal curtains,
Tomorrow a heap of bleached bones like those of yesteryear.
[...]
One moment we grieve over a short-lived friend,
The next we are ourselves overtaken by death.

— Wang Chi-chen Dream of the Red Chamber (1958)

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More quotes by Wang Chi-chen

What bustle and confusion, as one set of actors exits and another enters,
Each taking the illusory for the real.

Dream of the Red Chamber (1958)

When the unreal is taken for the real, then the real becomes unreal;
Where non-existence is taken for existence, then existence becomes non-existence.

Dream of the Red Chamber (1958)

Pages full of unlikely words,
Handfuls of hot, bitter tears.
They call the author a silly fool,
For they know not what he means.

Dream of the Red Chamber (1958)

"What follows the way of Heaven prospers and what goes against it perishes."

Dream of the Red Chamber (1958)

Enduring as heaven and earth—no love however ancient can ever die;
Timeless as light and shadow—no debt of breeze and moonlight can ever be repaid.

Dream of the Red Chamber (1958)

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Attribution

Quote text and notes from Wikiquote: Wang Chi-chen (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0. Source quality and labels are our own summary of what Wikiquote records.