Abstract
This chapter introduces and defines the subject for the book, outlines its theoretical underpinnings in transcultural adaptation studies, the socio-historical, cultural as well as critical context, and provides a brief chapter-by-chapter summary of the research, analyses, and findings.
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- 1.
Some scholars see such characterization as inaccurate, which resulted from complicated historical circumstances. See Fu Jin’s article in 2010, 85–90.
- 2.
According to Gao Ziwen in his article “Writing and Difference: The Reception of the Concept of Avant-Garde Theatre in Contemporary China,” the introduction of the term “avant-garde” into Chinese aesthetic discourse was closely associated with the translation and introduction of the Theatre of the Absurd (Z. Gao 93). The 1982 production of Jue dui xin hao (Absolute Signal), co-created by Gao Xingjian (playwright) and Lin Zhaohua (director), is regarded as the first avant-garde theatre production in China (Z. Gao 94). As Chen Shixiong indicates in his 2003 book Sanjiao duihua: Sitanni, Bulaixite, and Zhongguo xiju (Triangle Dialogues: Stanislavsky, Brecht, and Chinese Drama), Gao Xingjian was the first among the new generation of playwrights to be interested in Brecht (S. Chen 320). In his 2004 book Gao Xingjian and Transcultural Chinese Theater, Sy Ren Quah states that “Gao Xingjian is the rare exception to the rule of the Stanislavskian paradigm. Gao joins the ranks of Brecht and others who have consciously attempted to search for a new relationship between actor and character and to experiment with unique forms of narrative” (Quah 130). Chen Shixiong believes that Brecht’s theatrical view (戏剧观) comprehensively affected Chinese script creation, stage art, and theatrical criticism from the 1980s to the 1990s (S. Chen 320). Rosella Ferrari in her article “The Avant-Garde Is Dead, Long Live the (Pop) Avant-Garde! Critical Reconfigurations in Contemporary Chinese Theatre” points out that “the avant-garde rose in an era of utopias and dreams—the 1980s—and fell in the next decade under the onslaught of its age-old adversaries: institutional autocracy and cultural reification” (1129). This quote pretty much sums up the rise and fall of “the avant-garde” in China. However, it is far from dead. As a matter of fact, as Claire Conceison suggested, “Meng’s [Meng Jinghui’s] plays continued to be described as avantgarde; the Chinese term for ‘avantgarde’ itself became a de-marginalized term and concept: the designation of a play as xianfeng made it trendy and it became increasingly difficult to distinguish between the avant-garde and the popular, the experimental and the mainstream” (74).
- 3.
In 1907 a group of talented Chinese students in Tokyo mounted their adaptation of Uncle Tom’s Cabin under the Chinese title Black Slaves Cry to Heaven, which has been hailed as the birth cry of huaju (spoken drama) and indeed modern Chinese drama, as opposed to traditional xiqu.
- 4.
Many Chinese scholars regard the November 1982 production of Jue dui xin hao (Absolute Signal), written by Gao Xingjian and directed by Lin Zhaohua, as the beginning of the “little theatre” movement in modern China (Hu Xingliang, “On the Artistic Transformations of Little Theatre” 198; Pei Jingyu, “Beijing Little Theatre Spoken Drama Market” 58). The premiere venue for this production was an unused space in the Beijing People’s Art Theatre (now the Experimental Theatre of the BPAT). It is a play about three people, a seasoned train engineer, an unemployed young man, and his former girlfriend, and the choices they are forced to make when a robber hops on the train and goes for the ride. This was followed by Che zhan (Bus Stop), also written by Gao Xingjian and directed by Lin Zhaohua, which premiered in July 1983 at the Beijing People’s Art Theatre.
- 5.
There are two existing Chinese translations of Brecht’s term “epic theatre,” that is, shishi ju (史诗剧, grand poetic theatre) and xushi ju (叙事剧, narrative drama). As early as 1980 Yu Kuangfu in his article “Is Brecht’s ‘Episches Theatre’ Shishi ju?” pointed out that shishi ju (史诗剧, grand poetic theatre) was a mistranslation because “Brecht’s Episches Theatre has nothing to do with shishi ju (史诗剧, grand poetic theatre) in content and form,” and that a more appropriate Chinese translation would be xushi ti xiju or xushu ti xiju (叙事体戏剧或叙述体戏剧, narrative drama) since it is more aligned with Brecht’s theatrical theory and structural form (K.Yu 54–55). Yu further states that Brecht himself makes it very clear that his works are not “dramatisches theater” (xiju xing de xiju, 戏剧性的戏剧) as conventionally understood, but narrative theatre (叙事性的戏剧)” (K.Yu 55). I prefer xushi ju (叙事剧, narrative drama) as a better, more appropriate Chinese translation of Brecht’s term “epic theatre” for the same reasons Yu Kuangfu laid out in 1980.
- 6.
Richard Wilhelm (Chinese name: Wei Lixian) was the scholar who introduced the German public to Chinese thought. He lived in China for 25 years and could speak and write fluently in Chinese. He wrote and translated numerous books on Chinese philosophy and, in many ways, represented for Germany what Arthur Waley represented for England.
- 7.
Dao de jing (Tao Te Ching) is a classic Chinese text written, according to tradition, around the sixth century BC by the sage Laozi, a record-keeper at the Zhou Dynasty court.
- 8.
Wuwei, literally “non-action” or “non-doing,” is an important concept in Daoism. In Dao de jing Laozi explains that beings are wholly in harmony with the Dao if behaving in a completely natural, uncontrived way. The goal of spiritual practice for the human being is the attainment of this purely natural way of behaving.
- 9.
See Renata Berg-Pan, “Brecht and Chinese Philosophy,” 307.
- 10.
See the preceding note.
- 11.
Berg-Pan translates wuwei as “no-action” although now it is usually translated as “non-action.”
- 12.
Some of my ideas here were inspired by the THEA 699 Directed Research I took in the fall 2015 semester at University of Hawai‘i at Mānoa.
- 13.
My understanding of Lao Tzu’s philosophy is primarily based on Ya Se’s version of the Dao de jing.
- 14.
Xiezi (lit., wedge; a short scene setting up a premise of the plot or facilitating transition between two acts) is usually placed at the beginning of Yuan zaju , or sometimes between acts.
- 15.
The heroine of Li Qianfu’s Huilang ji (The Chalk Circle ), Zhang Haitang, is born into a scholarly family but later sold to a whorehouse as a prostitute after her family has become impoverished. She is befriended by Ma Chunshing, a wealthy and childless tax collector, who later becomes a concubine (second wife) of Ma. She bears him a son by the name of Shoulang but earns the jealousy of his first wife. Ma’s first wife poisons Ma, blames Haitang for the crime, and claims in court that Shoulang is her own child in order to inherit Ma’s fortune. Bao Zheng, an upright official, rescues Haitang. He places Shoulang in a circle of chalk between the two women, and each is ordered to pull; as Haitang cannot bear to hurt her child, she is judged his true mother.
- 16.
Zhang Li thinks that the plot of Brecht’s The Good Person of Szechwan is similar to that of the Chinese Yuan zaju Jiu feng chen (Rescuing a Prostitute) (“The Good Person of Szechwan”).
- 17.
See Huang Aihua (2006, 121), Yuan Guoxing (2000, 1–16).
- 18.
For a more in-depth discussion of xieyi theatre, see Hu Xingliang’s book in 2009, chap. 10, 397–406.
- 19.
See Huang Zuolin, “Thoughts on the Theatrical View”; Tian Jia, “The Theatrical View of Xieyi and Its Contention,” 128; and Hu Xingliang’s book in 2009, chap. 10, 399–405.
- 20.
See Ding Luonan’s article “Toward a New Paradigm of Chinese Spoken Drama: On Huang Zuolin’s Conceptualization of Xieyi Theatre and Its National Characteristics,” 100; and Chen Shixiaong’s book in 2003, 318.
- 21.
See Hu Xingliang’s book in 2009, 387–406.
- 22.
For Meng Jinghui’s 2014 production The Good Person of Szechwan, see Zhang Xiaoyu’s article in 2014, 16–17.
- 23.
For Meng Jinghui’s 2018 production Sun and Temple, see Fan Qie’s article in Beijing Youth Daily in 2018. Meng’s experimental approach to adapting Brecht—though only two plays so far—calls for a separate study all by itself, which I plan to do in the near future.
Works Cited
Chen, Gang. 1979. “Jiechu de daoyan yishujia Jiao Juyin” [Brilliant Theatre Artist and Director Jiao Juyin]. Xiju yishu [Theatre Arts] Z1: 86–95.
Huang, Aihua. 2006. Ershi shiji zhongwai xiju bijiao lungao [A Comparative Study of Sino-foreign Dramas in the 20th Century]. Zhejiang daxue chubanshe [Zhejiang University Press].
Lao Tzu. 2009. Tao Te Ching. Ed. Sam Torode. Trans. Dwight Goddard. Ancient Renewal.
———. 2011. Daode jing (Tao Te Ching). Ed. Ya Se. Beijing: Xin shijie chubanshe [New World Press].
Yuan, Guoxing. 2000. Zhongguo huaju de yunyu he shengcheng [The Gestation and Growth of Chinese Spoken Drama]. Zhongguo xiju chubanshe [China Theatre Press].
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Zhang, W. (2020). Introduction. In: Chinese Adaptations of Brecht. Chinese Literature and Culture in the World. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-37778-6_1
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