Dream of the Red Chamber. Is Blessing omniscient?
On Jia Baoyu's birthday in Dream of the Red Chamber, the Lady Dowager gave Jia Baoyu her blessings and said,"Baoyu, your birthday is my most important day." Today is your birthday, and I wish you the best. I wish you good health and a long life. May your future path be filled with beautiful blessings and sunshine." From this blessing, it could be seen that Grandmother Jia used an omniscient perspective in her blessing, which meant that she had complete control and understanding of Jia Baoyu's future. However, this omniscient perspective was not a true omniscient perspective because it did not consider the impact of Jia Baoyu's own choices and actions on the future. The omniscient perspective meant that the author or the narrator had complete knowledge and understanding of the world of his work and could accurately predict and describe everything that might happen. The omniscient perspective used in Grandmother Jia's Blessing in Dream of the Red Chamber shows that Cao Xueqin used this perspective in the novel. However, this perspective was not truly omniscient because it ignored the influence of the actions and choices of the characters in the novel on the development of the story.