How to Read Chinese Drama: A Guided Anthology

Description

This book is a comprehensive and inviting introduction to the literary forms and cultural significance of Chinese drama as both text and performance. Each chapter offers an accessible overview and critical analysis of one or more plays―canonical as well as less frequently studied works―and their historical contexts. How to Read Chinese Drama highlights how each play sheds light on key aspects of the dramatic tradition, including genre conventions, staging practices, musical performance, audience participation, and political resonances, emphasizing interconnections among chapters. It brings together leading scholars spanning anthropology, art history, ethnomusicology, history, literature, and theater studies. How to Read Chinese Drama is straightforward, clear, and concise, written for undergraduate students and their instructors as well as a wider audience interested in world theater. For students of Chinese literature and language, the book provides questions to explore when reading, watching, and listening to plays, and it features bilingual excerpts. For teachers, an analytical table of contents, a theater-specific chronology of events, and lists of visual resources and translations provide pedagogical resources for exploring Chinese theater within broader cultural and comparative contexts. For theater practitioners, the volume offers deeply researched readings of important plays together with background on historical performance conventions, audience responses, and select modern adaptations. Contents Thematic Contents Preface to the How to Read Chinese Literature Series A Note on How to Use This Anthology Chronology of Historical Events Symbols, Abbreviations, and Typographical Usage Introduction: The Cultural Significance of Chinese Drama • Patricia Sieber and Regina Llamas Part I: Yuan and Ming Dynasties: Zaju Plays 1. The Story of the Western Wing: Tale, Ballad, and Play • Wilt L. Idema 2. Purple Clouds, Wrong Career, and The Tiger Head Plaque: Jurchen Foreigners in Early Drama • Stephen H. West 3. The Pavilion for Praying to the Moon and The Injustice to Dou E: The Innovation of the Female Lead • Patricia Sieber 4. The Story of the Western Wing: Theater and the Printed Image • Patricia Sieber and Gillian Yanzhuang Zhang 5. The Orphan of Zhao: The Meaning of Loyalty and Filiality • Shih-pe Wang 6. The Female Mulan Joins the Army in Place of Her Father: Gender and Performance • Shiamin Kwa Part II: Ming Dynasty and Early Qing Dynasty: Nanxi and Chuanqi Plays 7. Top Graduate Zhang Xie and The Lute: Scholar, Family, and State • Regina Llamas 8. The Southern Story of the Western Wing: Traditional Kunqu Composition, Interpretation, and Performance • Joseph S. C. Lam 9. The Peony Pavilion: Emotions, Dreams, and Spectatorship • Ling Hon Lam 10. The Green Peony and The Swallow’s Letter: Drama and Politics • Ying Zhang 11. A Much-Desired Match: Playwriting, Stagecraft, and Entrepreneurship • S. E. Kile 12. The Peach Blossom Fan and Palace of Everlasting Life: History, Romance, and Performance • Mengjun Li and Guo Yingde Part II: Mid–Qing Dynasty: Zaju and Chuanqi Plays 13. Song of Dragon Well and Other Court Plays: Stage Directions, Spectacle, and Panegyrics • Tian Yuan Tan 14. The Eight-Court Pearl: Performance Scripts and Political Culture • Andrea S. Goldman Part IV: Ming, Qing, and Modern Eras: Ritual Plays 15. Mulian Rescues His Mother: Play Structure, Ritual, and Soundscapes • Sai-shing Yung 16. The Story of Hua Guan Suo: Chantefable and Ritual Plays • Anne E. McLaren Acknowledgments Contributors Visual Resources Glossary-Index