Description
Book SynopsisXiaomei Chen offers a new account of the origins, evolution, and legacies of key trends in twentieth-century Chinese theater. Instead of seeing the Republican, high socialist, and postsocialist periods as radically distinct, she identifies key continuities in theatrical practices and shared aspirations for the social role of performance.
Trade ReviewIn her newest work, Xiaomei Chen confirms her position as the leading chronicler and analyst of modern and contemporary Chinese theater. Focusing on three dramatists of central importance before, during, and after the socialist era, she provides a nuanced and fascinating overview of the theater’s reflection of these turbulent times. -- Marvin Carlson, author of
Ten Thousand Nights: Highlights from Fifty Years of Theatre-GoingIn her study of theater, politics, and performativity in modern China, Chen tells a compelling story of three leading dramatists in search of socialist modernity—their aspirations, their inventions and interventions, and their own tragedies amid the state's staging of the most brutal theater of revolution. A powerful book. -- David Der-wei Wang, author of
Why Fiction Matters in Contemporary ChinaThis is an illuminating narrative of modern Chinese theater culture exemplified by Tian Han, Hong Shen, and Ouyang Yuqian. These legendary dramatists navigated the treacherous political terrains of different eras and built a modern theater from the crosscurrents of East and West. Xiaomei Chen is the best writer for keeping their legacy alive. -- Ban Wang, author of
China in the World: Culture, Politics, and World VisionThis magisterial book chronicles the cross-media story of spoken drama from its inception through Republican, Maoist, and Post-Maoist appropriations in the forms of women’s theater, socialist theater, and “red classic” films. This capacious history offers, among many gems, a diachronic study of the “sonic theater” of the Internationale over the past hundred years. -- Alexa Alice Joubin, author of
Shakespeare and East AsiaEminently readable, the entire volume is noteworthy for its detailed, fascinating, and nuanced analysis of not only modern Chinese theater and drama but also Chinese theater historiography . . . A valuable and significant contribution to Asian theater studies. * Choice Reviews *
Table of ContentsAcknowledgments
Introduction
Part I: Theater Founding Fathers: Liberal Aesthetics in the Republican Period1. Tian Han and His Legacy: Proletarian Modernism and “The Theater of Dramatists”
2. Hong Shen and His Discontent: Canonicity Through Theory and Practice
3. Ouyang Yuqian and His Theater Dream: Cross-Dressing, Drama Schools, and Theater Reforms
Part II: Chinese Socialist Theater and Its Afterlife: Shifting “Classics” and Their Place in Cultural Transformation4. Is Socialism Good? Satirical Comedy and the Gray Theater of the 1950s
5. The Tales of the Wives: The Mao-Era Metamorphosis of the “Red Classics” and Their Postsocialist Reinscriptions
6. “The Song of the Geologists”: Remembering Scientists Onstage
7. Monumental Theater: Soldier Plays and History Plays
8. Singing “The Internationale”: One Hundred Years of Sonic Theater
Notes
Bibliography
Index
