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At the beginning of the 20th century, the question of "Who is the original author of A Dream of Red Mansions" once caused a debate in China academic circles, and this debate continues to this day. It can be roughly divided into two parts:

A Dream of Red Mansions was written by Cao Xueqin.

Cao Xueqin, a great writer in China in Qing Dynasty, was born in 1724 and died in 1764. Its predecessor was the Han nationality, and later it was the Manchu Zhengbaiqi (domestic slave). Cao Xueqin's great-grandfather Cao Xi, his grandfather Cao Yin, and his parents Cao Qing and Cao Fu worked as Jiangning weavers for more than 60 years, which was highly prized by Emperor Kangxi. Cao Xueqin grew up in splendor. In the early years of Yongzheng, due to the internal struggle of the feudal ruling class, the Cao family suffered many blows, was dismissed from office and imprisoned, and their family property was confiscated and returned to Beijing. Since then, his family has been going downhill. This turning point made Cao Xueqin deeply feel the coldness of the world and more clearly understand the essence of the feudal social system. Since then, he has lived a poor life. He is good at writing and devotes himself to the writing and revision of the novel A Dream of Red Mansions. He read it for ten years, added and deleted it five times, and wrote this literary masterpiece that pushed China's classical novel creation to the peak. A Dream of Red Mansions, with its rich content, tortuous plot, profound ideological understanding and exquisite artistic techniques, has become a great realistic work in China's classical novels. In the twenty-seventh year of Qianlong (1762), his youngest son died prematurely, and Cao Xueqin fell into excessive grief. On New Year's Eve of this year (1764 February 1), he died of poverty (about the year of Cao Xueqin's death, there were twenty-eight years of Qianlong (1763). On New Year's Eve, before the book was finished, Qin died in tears. I cried tears, and the funeral expenses were funded by my friends.

In the first text of A Dream of Red Mansions, the author is called "Stone", which is naturally said by the novelist. Then he mentioned that "Cao Xueqin spent ten years for Hongxuan, adding and deleting five times, cataloguing and dividing chapters". However, a large number of fat reviews in early manuscripts pointed out that Cao Xueqin was the author. For example, there was a comment in the JOE edition for the first time: "If Yun Xueqin reads it and adds or deletes it, who wrote it after opening the book?" It shows that the author's pen is very cunning. "According to the research of some redologists, Zhifu has said many times that many stories in A Dream of Red Mansions are based on the historical facts of Cao Cao and can also be used as circumstantial evidence. The Fat Review reveals that the author is closely related to Cao Xueqin and his family, and is familiar with and even partially involved in the creation of A Dream of Red Mansions, so the Fat Review can be said to be the most direct evidence that Cao Xueqin is the author of A Dream of Red Mansions. However, some factions believe that the fat criticism is purely fabricated by later generations and cannot be used as research evidence.

Fu Cha Yiming, a poet in the Qing Dynasty, said in the preface to tihongloumeng: "A Dream of Red Mansions written by Cao Zi Xueqin is a record of the prosperity of romantic scenery, which was built by Jiangning Weaving Room. Its so-called Grand View Garden is the former site of today's garden. I am sorry that his book has not been passed down, and little-known people in the world will see his banknotes. " Yong Zhong, another poet of the imperial clan in the Qing Dynasty, wrote a poem called A Dream of Red Mansions in the thirty-third year of Qianlong (1768), in which he wrote: "Looking at the novel A Dream of Red Mansions with Mo Xiang, there are three quatrains (surnamed Cao)". This is probably the earliest record that Cao Xueqin is the author of A Dream of Red Mansions besides A Dream of Red Mansions itself and Zhi Pi. Ming Yi and Yong Zhong are both Cao Xueqin's contemporaries. Although there is no evidence that they know Cao Xueqin, they have close contacts with Cao Xueqin's friends Duncheng and Dunmin, so their statements are considered highly reliable. But so far, in the works of Duncheng and Dunmin brothers, there is no record that Cao Xueqin is the author of A Dream of Red Mansions.

In addition, in the notes of Yuan Mei, Yu Rui and others who were contemporaries or later than Cao Xueqin, there are also records that Cao Xueqin was the author of A Dream of Red Mansions. 192 1 year, Hu Shi published Textual Research on A Dream of Red Mansions. According to the notes of Qing Dynasty and the textual research of Cao Xueqin's family background, Cao Xueqin was identified as the author of A Dream of Red Mansions, and since then he has become an authoritative theory. Later, the discovery of fat-based fat batches more strongly supported this conclusion, but the problem is that there are many contradictions between different fat batches, and fat batches are probably forged.

Second, the author of A Dream of Red Mansions is another person.

In recent years, although some people have suggested that the author of A Dream of Red Mansions is someone else, there is no evidence to support it.