Chinese 264 Notes

2: Storytelling | 3: Yuan drama A: Basics | 4: Yuan drama B: History
5: Yuan drama C: Characteristics | 6a: Yuan drama D: Some of the Playwrights
6b: Wang Shifu and his Story of the West Wing
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Chinese 264: Lecture Outline, January 29 through February 27 of Spring semester 1998.

Note: Chinese characters are in Big5 code, which looks like nonsense if your computer cannot display Chinese text.

1. Tang Transformation Texts 唐朝變文

Tang chao (618-907) bianwen
Discovered early in the 20th century in Dunhuang 敦煌
"Transformation texts"
First extended vernacular narratives in China
Folk tradition
Secular or Religious Buddhist stories told by lay entertainers who would illustrate his performance with pictures--變相 bianxiang "transformation scenes"--on paper, silk, or on walls
Thus a kind of early performance
A kind of modern successor is:

連環畫 : Lianhuanhua
Though these were primarily for reading.

The technique is illustrated in Chap. 56 of The Complete Story Telling of Yue Fei 說岳全傳
And in "Man of the Way" a Ming (1368-1644) song-poem by Chen Duo 陳鐸
A typical example of a bianwen text is "Transformation text on Mahamaudgalyayana's Rescue of His Mother from the Dark Regions"

{Reference: Mair, T'ang Transformation Texts 1989}

2. Storytelling

|||| 說書 shuo shu, 評話 pinghua ('storytelling')--ex.: Hangzhou pinghua--has types:

大書 dashu ('grand tales')

Long--100 or more episodes
--水滸傳 Water Margin/Outlaws of the Marsh/All Men Are Brothers
--三國演義 Three Kingdoms
--"Kung Fu" Tales
--Detective tales

評詞 pingci ('lyric tales')

Shorter--20-30 episodes
Love stories and domestic intrigue
May be accompanied by the 'Chinese fiddle' 二胡 erhu

|||| Other storytelling forms:

小鏍書 : xiaoluoshu (gong stories)
獨腳戲 dujiaoxi ('one part plays')

|||| Other props used in shuushu:

table rapper--醒目 / 木 xingmu
teacup and/or teapot
fan
varies by region

|||| Other features of the storyteller's art:

Stories are told usually by one storyteller who enacts all the parts and adds commentary as a narrator.
He may include verse or song, though the content of the verse may not be a part of the narrative.
A song or poem--called a 開篇 kaipian--may introduce a story.
Each days telling ends with a cliffhanger to attract the audience back.
Storytellers traditionally learned their art as apprentices to masters.
Storytellers were known for specific stories--they "owned" their own version and another could only use it if they agreed to pass it on.

3.Yuan Drama: 元雜劇 Yuan zaju

(A) Some basics on Chinese Drama in general:

|||| From the earliest times stages and dramatic performance were associated with and featured by temples, which were the traditional center of village and urban life.

|||| But drama always was, and still is, essentially secular in nature.

|||| Drama's early roots are in prosimetric performances and literature shuochang wenxue 說唱文學 --hence it is music drama.

|||| Historically in China, drama is characterized by regional variation

|||| But all variants share a set of similar characteristics:

--Chinese drama is music drama--Hence it is often termed Chinese opera.

The music has both foreign and native sources.

--The operas or plays are staged in scenes.
--The major literary form in the construction of dramatic texts is poetry.
--All forms rely on role types.

|||| There are three major traditions:

Northern: known as zaju 雜劇 'variety plays', Yuan qu 元曲 'Yuan lyrics', or beiqu 北曲 'northern lyrics'
Southern: know as xiwen 戲文 'drama', chuanqi 傳奇 , kunqu 昆曲 ,
Later: Jingju 京劇 'Beijing opera', major descendant of the northern tradition, and kunqu, major descendant of the southern tradition.

{Reference: West in Indiana Companion, 13-30}

(B) About the history of Yuan drama.

|||| As noted by Dolby in Mackerras' Chinese Theater, in the Yuan for the first time we "see that combination of acting, costume, stagecraft, and the complex interrelation of characters in a detailed story that makes real drama."

|||| The term zaju originally referred to 'variety shows' which included a mix of short skits and comedy performances by jesters or clowns.

|||| By the Southern Song (1127-1279) variety plays often involved a story in song form presented in a daqu 大曲 --a long narrative song recitation.

|||| Another popular Song performance genre was the Drum Song 鼓子詞 . Many of these survive in written texts, for example:

"Die lian hua in the Shang mode" 商調：蝶戀花 by Zhao Lingzhi 趙令畤 (1086-1127)
This is a version of the precursor to The Story of the Western Wing.

|||| The Southern Song was initiated when the Chinese were forced south with the occupation of North China by the Jurchen.

|||| The north saw the development of yuanben short for 行院之本 'script from entertainers' quarters'.

|||| Also the genre called 'All-keys-and-modes' 諸宮調 had its origins as early as the 11th century, probably in the north in Shandong.

Mixes prose and verse in a prosimetric or chantefable type form.
Had innovative features of prosidy that differed from formal literature.
Told by a narrator.

|||| An example of an innovative southern chantefable form from the Song is taozhen 淘真 , a rhymed storytelling performed usually by blind women accompanying themselves on the lute.

|||| A descendant of taozhen is tanci 彈詞 , which appeared at least as early as the Ming.

Suzhou has long been the center of tanci performance.
Tanci ballads can be very long or very short.
The performer adopts his/her voice and expressions to the character.
The accompanying 'lute' is either a four stringed pipa 琵琶 or a three stringed sanxian 三弦 which are plucked by the performer or an accompanist.
Tanci styles are identified by school and the master who originated them. The 19th century Yu diao 俞調 is one of the oldest surviving styles.

|||| Yuan drama emerged out of this mix of various forms in the north and south.

Northern and Southern forms existed simultaneously.
But the northern form--beiqu--held the greatest prestige and a strong influence in subsequent times.

|||| Both regional type were performed on stages.

Permanent or portable.
Associated with a temple.

|||| Division into acts.

Usually four acts per play, plus an optional act called a 'wedge'.
The linear action usually peaks in the 3rd act, and the 4th act brings resolution and restores harmony.

|||| Music was integral to the performance.

Instructions regarding singing modes are built into the scripts.
Modes set the mood and related to the type of action of the scene--they are usually identified with a certain emotional quality.
Arias in rhymed verse--in Yuan the rime was the same throughout the act.
One singing role per act in the northern forms.
Characters with the singing role are the most developed.

|||| Set character types.
Four classes of role type:

Mo 末 serious male lead.
Dan 旦 serious female lead.
Jing 淨 usually a villainous character.
Chou 丑 a clown.

|||| In southern forms there is also the Sheng 生 ---young serious male lead.

|||| Men or women could perform any role type.

|||| Mo, Dan, and Sheng were the singing roles.

(D) The playwrights and their plays

|||| Not much is known about the authors.

The main source of information on their lives is Lu gui bu 錄鬼簿
"A record of ghosts" by Zhong Sicheng 鍾司成
It lists 111 playwrights & 400 play titles

|||| Perhaps the most famous Yuan playwright is Guan Hanqing 關漢卿 (1220?-1310)

A northerner
He wrote perhaps as many as 60 plays--but only about 18 survive
Including "The Injustice Done to Tou Ngo"
His main characters are female in most of his plays
But he also wrote historical plays with male leads

|||| Ma Zhiyuan 馬致遠 (ca.1260- ca.1324)

Wrote about 16 plays
Including "Autumn in Han Palace," his most famous
Served as a tax collector on the southeast
An avid student of history
Wrote historical plays and plays on the carefree life of Taoist immortals and recluses

|||| Ji Junxiang 紀君祥 (dates unclear)

His only existing play is "The Orphan of Chao"

(E) Wang Shifu 王實甫 (fl. 1250-1300) and the evolution of Xi xiang ji 西廂紀 "The Story of the Western Wing"

|||| The original story was written as a classical tale in Tang (618-907).

Entitled "The Story of Yingying" 鶯鶯傳 , it is considered one of the finest examples of its genre.
By Yuan Zhen 元稹 (775-831), a scholar of great accomplishment.
The story is autobiographical.
But the story ends with Scholar Zhang abandoning Yingying.
And there is only one brief mention of the maid Crimson.

|||| The story became very popular and went through a long evolution in continual adaption to other genres.

We have already mentioned the Song adoption of the story into a Drum Song 鼓子詞 : "Die lian hua in the Shang mode" 商調：蝶戀花 by Zhao Lingzhi 趙令畤 (1086-1127)
After this the story was adopted into an 'All-keys-and-modes' 諸宮調 zhu gong diao chantefable form.

By Dong Jieyuan 董解元 (1190-1208).
Dong significantly developed the story: Expanding it, adding characters such as Crimson, and changing the ending to an elopement.

|||| According to the Register of Ghosts, Wang Shifu was from Dadu (now Beijing).

He is said to have written 14 plays; but only three survive.
He also wrote non-dramatic arias called sanqu 散曲
From what survives, it is obvious that Wang Shifu had a strong classical education and was widely read in both the classics and popular tales and lyrics.
He apparently was a "versatile professional playwright who regularly provided zaju for the commercial stages of the capital (Wang & Idema, 21).
He is considered certainly to have penned the first four plays of the West Wing; while the authorship of the fifth is suspected perhaps to be by a less skilled collaborator.

|||| The Xi xiang ji follows Dong Jieyuan's version closely, even lifting sections from it.

But Wang's play does add many new characters and enhances Crimson's role.