1. Zhou Yu's perfection

Looking at the official history, we can find that Zhou Yu in this biography has no flaws and is indeed a perfect person. A hero should be "a hero who is smart enough to show off, and a hero who is bolder than others" (Liu Shao's "Characters"), plus a high moral character. In addition to meeting the three points mentioned above, Zhou Yu is perfect from another perspective. It can be said that he is a virtuous, talented, graceful and energetic person.

Let’s talk about virtue first: his recommendation of virtuous people can be compared to Uncle Bao; his sacrifice for the country can be compared to Lin Xiangru; his modesty, courtesy and loyalty to the emperor are unparalleled; his magnanimous character and generals are sincerely convinced.

Let’s talk about talents for the second time: He made great contributions to the founding of Soochow in the weak crown conquest; Chibi turned the tide and made the first contribution; later he personally risked the stone to open up Jingzhou for Soochow. Not to mention his great achievements, just talk about the people at that time Regarding his evaluation, his versatility in civil and military affairs has attracted much attention in the eyes of people at the time. "Excellent talent"; "talent of Wang Zuo"; "Beautiful talent at a young age"; "Elite among ten thousand people in civil and military skills", these are the evaluations of Zhou Yu's talent by people at that time, and those who said these words were all top-notch people at that time. figure. Zhou Yu's talent is already recognized and there is no need to make any further fuss.

Let’s talk about demeanor. Zhou Yu is a famous Confucian general. He is elegant and elegant, and there is a popular saying that "the song is wrong for Zhou Lang Gu". He is a graceful and outstanding figure compared with those rough warriors. Just saying "I remember Gong Jin back in the day" already makes people fascinated by his appearance.

Finally, let’s talk about his vitality. Zhou Yu not only has virtue, talent, and demeanor, but he also has a unique kind of vitality, a heroic spirit that is enterprising, confident, and heroic. He is humble and courteous to his own people, but he shows contempt and fearless heroism towards enemies and challenges: when Liu Bei and Zhou Yu met before the battle of Chibi, when Liu Bei said that his troops were too few, Zhou Lang "is self-sufficient." The answer of "fuck you and seek death" is so powerful, and Liu Bei's delay is so despicable in comparison. Zhou Yu's strategies all reveal this preemptive, determined and courageous temperament. This is the most enviable "genius". But there is an essential difference between Zhou Yu's heroism and the arrogance of Guan Yu and others, because his self-confidence is based on reasonable analysis and planning. Compared with Guan Yu and others' senseless arrogance, they only get ruined. Because of this, Zhou Yu is successful. His temperament is similar to that of Sun Ce, but Sun Ce is frivolous and bloodthirsty, but Zhou Yu is calm and elegant. Just like some people say that his temperament is a combination of Sun Ce and Zhuge Liang. In Zhou Yu, he is just as strong and soft. Just the right combination.

Such a strong and soft person has impeccable character and admirable civil and military talents. In addition, God gave him a special preference for his handsome appearance. He is both beautiful and graceful both inside and outside. He cannot be called Who can be called perfect? There is no better way to describe Zhou Yu than in one sentence. He lives up to his name: Zhou Yu is just like his name, a piece of flawless jade.

2. The reason why Zhou Yu was belittled

A passage by Chen Yidong in the book "Three Points of Gossip" is very reasonable. He said that Zhou Yu "is loyal to the Sun family, forgiving to his friends, and has unique tricks for making plans. He is very popular, has a good reputation, is beautiful, and his wife is even more beautiful... It is inevitable for those mediocre people to feel jealous because of their reputation. Therefore, Cao Cao and Liu Bei wanted to ridicule him. In this way, ordinary people in later generations have never seen such a perfect figure. The most important thing is that Zhou Yu joined the Sun Wu Group.

Neither Cao Cao's orthodoxy nor Liu Bei's orthodoxy, the Sun family can only be regarded as a local separatist force, and will not receive high treatment in any dynasty in later generations. How can Zhou Yu, a figure from other groups with such a high status, deal with himself? So they insisted on smearing some mud on Zhou Yu's originally perfect face. Not to mention anything else, they thought that Zhou Yu must be very proud and complacent to be so successful at such a young age, and that he must be young and energetic when he is so confident as a young man. Although Zhou Yu in history was not young when he was in charge of important events, and he was the most humble and polite, in the story of Three Kingdoms, he is already a representative of pride and complacency, because in the eyes of ordinary people, such an outstanding figure coupled with his youth It’s strange not to be proud when you succeed. No matter how Zhou Yu wants to be rehabilitated today, it will be difficult for him to do so because he is young and energetic. Because Zhou Yu's aggressive strategic style, fearless heroism and his humble and submissive personality are really contradictory.

Sometimes I feel that the Zhou Yu in the history books is a bit too perfect to be compared to the world. Perhaps with the fact that he is young and vigorous, he looks more lively, spiritual and like a living person, but then he is no longer perfect.

Of course, Zhou Yu was more belittled and distorted in the novel. In order to beautify Zhuge Liang, the first male protagonist in the novel, Luo Guanzhong can be said to have spent a lot of effort. Because apart from Zhuge Liang's achievements after Liu Bei's death, except for one mission to Soochow before that, the rest of Zhuge Liang's work was to manage food and grass for Liu Bei to provide enough food and soldiers. It would not take any extraordinary measures to elevate him. So I can only feel sorry for Zhou Yu. Besides, as mentioned before, Zhou Yu is a big stumbling block to the development and growth of Liu Bei Group. The theme of the novel is respecting Liu. Who knows that Zhou Yu once had trouble with Liu Bei? You should be sorry. And Zhou Yu is so outstanding and his credit is so great, taking away some of his credit will be enough to make Zhuge Liang's image look better. In addition, Zhou Yu is so perfect and makes people jealous the most. Now you can also experience the discomfort of being jealous of others! And if someone who is jealous of someone as capable as you is, isn’t his capability as great as the ocean? So I don’t need to say more about the rest: Zhou Yu and Zhuge Liang, who had no previous history, became incompatible rivals. Zhuge Liang took away Zhou Yu’s achievements and his excellent character, not to mention taking away the He took his life and refused to let go of Zhou Yu when he died. He forced him to say the famous saying "When Yu is born, why is Liang born?", and forced Zhou Yu to apply some makeup on Zhuge Liang's face before he died. Luo Guanzhong was too cruel to Zhou Yu! The good Zhou Lang not only had some mud smeared on his face, but also wore a big mud mask and was completely unrecognizable. But this is a novel after all, and Zhou Yu and Zhuge Liang in it are just literary images, and the novel's method of using Zhou Yu to set off Zhuge Liang is still successful in shaping the characters. Although Zhou Yu has become a different person, there is still a bit of beauty in him. This is because the original Zhou Yu was too good. Even if he is distorted and ugly, his beautiful essence cannot be erased.

3. About vulgar novels and elegant history

It doesn’t matter if Zhou Yu is vilified and belittled in the novel, as long as everyone understands that he is not a real figure in history. It's a pity that the influence of Romance is too great. Not to mention those rough people who sell milk and sell food, even the so-called educated people can't escape it. But those so-called cultural people who cannot distinguish between romance and history will pay the price. Yuan Mei's "Suiyuan Poetry" talks about a certain literati who was ridiculed as a laughing stock all his life because of a brilliant sentence he said in a poem. Another person used this sentence in the memorial and was dismissed by the Qing emperor. Because it is not too much to ask for a distinction between history and fiction. If your level is limited, you can talk about novels. The most disgusting thing is that someone with only a few jealous words has to talk about history. Because these people are based on fictional things in the novel, no matter how rigorous the derivation is, what will be the result? Besides, using absurd things in novels to talk about historical figures, no matter who they are, not only reflects your own ignorance, but also shows the greatest disrespect for historical figures. Zhou Lang in history is the most generous person. In the novel, he was distorted but created the image of Zhuge Liang, the "eternal perfect man", and the strange "Zhou Yu" he transformed into became a typical narrow-minded character. He is typical. Literary success. Therefore, no matter how much he is wronged, he can tolerate it, but if the fictional things in the novel are used to describe Zhou Yu in history, no matter how generous he is, he will be so angry that he vomits blood. However, vulgar things often have a market, and elegant things like official history will inevitably be highbrow