The Eternal Present of the Past (China Studies)

The Eternal Present of the Past

China Studies Published for the Institute for Chinese Studies University of Oxford

Editors

Glen Dudbridge Frank Pieke

VOLUME 12

The Eternal Present of the Past Illustration, Theater, and Reading in the Wanli Period, 1573–1619

By

Li-ling Hsiao

LEIDEN • BOSTON 2007

Cover Illustration: Min Qiji. The nineteenth illustration of Xixiang ji. Color print. Wuxing: Min Qiji, 1640. Museum für Ostasiatische, Köln. Inv.-No. R61,2 [no. 19]. Photo: Rheinisches Bildarchiv, Köln, Germany. This book is printed on acid-free paper.

ISSN 1570-1344 ISBN 978 90 04 15643 2 © Copyright 2007 by Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, The Netherlands. Koninklijke Brill NV incorporates the imprints Brill, Hotei Publishing, IDC Publishers, Martinus Nijhoff Publishers and VSP. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, translated, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without prior written permission from the publisher. Authorization to photocopy items for internal or personal use is granted by Koninklijke Brill NV provided that the appropriate fees are paid directly to The Copyright Clearance Center, 222 Rosewood Drive, Suite 910, Danvers, MA 01923, USA. Fees are subject to change. printed in the netherlands

To my Parents, Who Continue the Tradition of Chinese Art and Literature as Puppeteers

CONTENTS

Acknowledgments ....................................................................... List of Illustrations ......................................................................

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Introduction: Theater, Illustration, and Time ...........................

1

Chapter One: Toward the Contextualization of Woodblock Illustration: A Critique of Art Historical Method .................

5

Chapter Two: The Stage or the Page: Competing Conceptions of the Play in the Wanli Period ........................

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Chapter Three: Performance Illustration ..................................

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Chapter Four: Performance as an Interaction with the Past ....

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Chapter Five: Image as an Interaction with the Past ...............

202

Chapter Six: Reading as an Interaction with the Past ..............

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Conclusion: The Role of the Publisher .....................................

293

Appendix .....................................................................................

299

Glossary .......................................................................................

305

Bibliography ................................................................................

313

Index ...........................................................................................

335

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

This book evolved over a period of sixteen years. It began to take shape in 1990, when I was a master’s degree student in Chinese art at Chinese Culture University in Taipei. I continued to test and develop my ideas while a doctoral student in Chinese art and literature at Oxford University and a faculty member at the Universities of Minnesota and North Carolina. During these years, I was extremely fortunate in my teachers, colleagues, and friends, and I beneted enormously from the experience and the insight of others. Professor Shi Shouqian, later the director of the National Palace Museum in Taipei, encouraged me to take up the study of Chinese book illustration while I was his student at Chinese Culture University. Under his guidance, I acquired basic skills of visual analysis that have served me well ever since. The late Edward Chien, professor of history at Taiwan University, further encouraged me, and set me an example of scholarly rigor and commitment that I have tried—not with complete success—to live up to. His death from cancer in 1996 was a terrible loss to the profession of Chinese studies, as all his students felt at the time and continue deeply to feel. My fellow graduate student Yuecen Zhong cared for Professor Chien during his nal illness. Her selessness during those painful months remains an inspiring memory. Xu Hong, then the chair of the history department at Taiwan University, and his wife, Wang Zhizhi, professor of history at Fujen University, were extremely supportive of my work and extended to me their warm and unwavering friendship. I value their friendship to this day. My years as a doctoral student at Oxford University were the most enriching of my life. I owe this experience to the teachers, the staff, and the students of the Institute for Chinese Studies. I would particularly like to thank Dr. Jessica Rawson, warden of Merton College, who co-supervised my work in its early stages; Dr. Alison Hardie and Dr. Henrietta Harrison, then my fellow graduate students, with whom I shared many pleasant hours of study and conversation; Dr. Robert Chard, an important mentor in the classroom; and Dr. Taotao Liu, Dr. Shelagh Vainker, Dr. Andrew Lo, and Professor Craig Clunas, who read my doctoral dissertation and provided helpful guidance and criticism. I would particularly like to thank Professor Glen Dudbridge,

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who supervised the research of my dissertation. I have tried to follow the example of his commitment to scholarly excellence, but it has been no easy task. This book represents my effort. Its weaknesses are my own, its strengths are largely his. My debt to Professor Dudbridge is incalculable. I had the further good fortune while at Oxford to serve as personal assistant to Professor Michael Sullivan. Over a period of years, I helped Michael catalog his extraordinary collection of contemporary Chinese paintings. Michael’s love of Chinese art—guileless, tireless, seless—a lifelong act of service—is something I will not forget. Michael and his lovely wife Khoan took me in and made me feel a member of their family. Whatever I learned about Chinese painting, Michael and Khoan’s devotion to each other was the great lesson of the innumerable hours I spent in their home. I arrived at the University of North Carolina in 2002. From the very rst, I felt that I had found my home as a teacher and scholar. I thank my departmental colleagues Sahar Amer, Jan Bardsley, Inger Brodey, Mark Driscoll, Miles Fletcher, Eric Henry, Wendan Li, Robin Visser, and Nadia Yaqub, for their encouragement, assistance, and friendship. Gang Yue, chairman of the Department of Asian Studies, has been a staunch supporter of my research method and direction, and an invaluable source of sound advice. I am lucky to have his assistance and the benet of his conversation. Hsi-chu Bolick, East Asian bibliographer at Davis Library, has been a help in too many ways to count; she is the ace up my sleeve. I completed this work with the help of fellowships and grants provided by the Institute of Arts and Humanities and the University of North Carolina. I am indebted to both institutions. My husband Dr. David Ross—himself part of the bounty of Oxford—advised me on matters of style throughout. I have him to thank wherever the language of this book contributes to the success of its argument. We hope that this book will one day inspire our daughter, Hsiao-fei, to embark on her own study of Chinese art and literature.

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

1–1. “The Banquet.” In Yipengxue, by Li Yu. N.p.: unknown publisher, 1628–1644. Reproduced from GBXQCK, 3rd series, box 4, vol. 6. Shanghai: Shangwu yinshuguan, 1955–1957 .................................................... 3–1. Liang Chenyu. Yujue ji. Jinling: Fuchun Tang, 1581. Reproduced from GBXQCK, 1st series, box 6, 5:2.1a. Shanghai: Shangwu yinshuguan, 1954 ............................. 3–2. Shi Hui. Baiyueting ji. Jinling: Shide Tang, 1589. Reproduced from GBXQCK, 1st series, box 1, 10:2.40b ... 3–3. Frontispiece of Diamond Sutra, from Dunhuang, 868. British Museum. Reproduced from Zhongguo meishu quanji: huihua bian, 20:2. Taipei: Jinxiu chubanshe, 1989 ... 3–4. Panel of a painted wooden screen, from the tomb of Sima Jinlong at Datong, Shanxi Province, 484. Height 81.5 cm. Datong City Museum, Shanxi, China. Reproduced from The Three Perfections, by Michael Sullivan, 21. New York: George Braziller, 1999, c. 1974 ............................................................................... 3–5. Quanxiang Sanguo zhi pinghua. Jian’an: the Yu family, 1321–23. Naikaku Bunko, Japan. Reproduced from Zhongguo gudian wenxue banhua xuanji, edited by Fu Xihua, 1:18–19. Shanghai: Renmin chubanshe, 1981 ................. 3–6. Wang Shifu. Xixiang ji. Beijing: The Yue family, 1498. Reproduced from Zhongguo gudian wenxue banhua xuanji, edited by Fu Xihua, 1:48 .................................................. 3–7. Picture of Four Beauties. Pingyang: The Ji family, 1115–1232. Reproduced from ChÖgoku kodai hanga ten, edited by Takimoto Kiroyuki, 89. Tokyo: Machida shilitsu kokusai hanga bijutsukan, 1988 ............................ 3–8. Mural painting in the Hall of King Mingying in the Temple of Guangsheng in Hongdong County in Shanxi Province, 1324. Reproduced from Zhongguo meishu quanji: huihua bian, 13:91. Taipei: Jinxiu chubanshe, 1989 ..................................................................................

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3–9. Zhu Yu (attributed). Dengxi tu. Ming dynasty (1368–1644). Reproduced from Song Jin Yuan xiqu wenwu tulun, edited by Shanxi Shifan Daxue Xiqu Wenwu Yanjiusuo, 46. Taiyuan: Shanxi renmin chubanshe, 1987 ...................... 3–10. Wang Shifu. Xixiang ji. Jinling: Qiaoshan Tang, 1592. Reproduced from GBXQCK, 1st series, box 1, 2:1.1a ....... 3–11. Chalou tu. In Tangtu mingsheng tuhui, edited by HÔkyÔ, illustrated by Gyokuzan ShyÔyÖ, Kumagata Funki, and Higashino Minji, 4.3b–4a. Japan: 1805 .................... 3–12. Painting of a theatrical performance. Painted during Guangxu’s reign (1875–1908). Reproduced from Jingju shizhao, edited by Lu Qing et al., 22. Beijing: Yanshan chubanshe, 1990 ................................................ 3–13. Mao’er xi. In Shenjiang shengjing tu, by Zunwen Ge zhuren, painted by Wu Youru, 1884. Reproduced from the reprinted 1884 edition. Taipei: Guangwen shuju, 1981 .................................................................................. 3–14. Qin bing liuguo pinghua. Jian’an: the Yu, 1321–23. Reproduced from Zhongguo gudian wenxue banhua xuanji, edited by Fu Xihua, 1:12–3 .............................................. 3–15. Wang Zhideng. Quande ji. Jinling: Guangqing Tang, 1573–1619. Reproduced from GBXQCK, 2nd series, box 3, 7:1.12b–13a. Shanghai: Shangwu yinshuguan, 1955 .................................................................................. 3–16. Lu Huafu. Shuangfeng qiming ji. Jinling: Shide Tang, 1573–1619. Reproduced from GBXQCK, 2nd series, box 4, 4:1.2a ..................................................................... 3–17. Duanfa ji. Jinling: Shide Tang, 1586. Reproduced from ChÖgoku gikyoku zenpon sanshu, edited by Kanda Kiichiro, 410. Kyoto: Shibun kaku, 1982 ........................ 3–18. Photo of a scene in the Peking Opera Shizi jingfeng, Shang Xiaoyun as Hu shi and Shang Changrong as the Bandit Jinyan bao. Reproduced from Jingju Shizhao, edited by Lu Qing et al., 141 ........................................... 3–19. Lu Huafu. Shuangfeng qiming ji. Jinling: Shide Tang, 1573–1619. Reproduced from GBXQCK, 2nd series, box 4, 4:1.28b ................................................................... 3–20. Herong ji. Jinling: Fuchun Tang, 1573–1619. Reproduced from GBXQCK, 2nd series, box 1, 6:1.4a ................................................................................

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list of illustrations 3–21. Zheng Guoxuan. Baishe ji. Jinling: Fuchun Tang, 1573–1619. Reproduced from GBXQCK, 1st series, box 5, 6:2.35b ................................................................... 3–22. Tang Xianzu. Zixiao ji. Jinling: Fuchun Tang, 1573–1619. Reproduced from GBXQCK, 1st series, box 10, 2:3.15a ................................................................. 3–23. Photo of “The Addressing Sleeve.” Reproduced from Secrets of Chinese Drama, by Cecilia Zung, 85. New York: Arno Press, 1980, c. 1964 ................................................. 3–24. Wang Tingna. Toutao ji. Xiuning: Huancui Tang, 1573–1619. Reproduced from GBXQCK, 2nd series, box 2, 8:2.13b–14a ........................................................... 3–25. Herong ji. Jinling: Fuchun Tang, 1573–1619. Reproduced from GBXQCK, 2nd series, 6:2.22a .............. 3–26. Zhou Lüjng. Jinqian ji. Jinling: Jizhi Zhai, 1608. Reproduced from GBXQCK, 2nd series, box 3, 4:2.24a .............................................................................. 3–27. Gao Ming. Pipa ji. Anhui: Wanhu Xuan, 1597. A facsimile of the Jiyi Tang edition. Reproduced from ChÖgoku kodai hanga ten, edited by Takimoto Hiroyuki, 109 ................................................................... 3–28. Zheng Zhiwen. Qiting ji. Jinling: Jizhi Zhai, 1603. Reproduced from GBXQCK, 2nd series, box 3, 9:1.18a .............................................................................. 3–29. Shen Jing. Shuangyu ji. Jinling: Jizhi Zhai, 1573–1619. Reproduced from GBXQCK, 1st series, box 11, 1:1.29b .............................................................................. 3–30. Shen Jing. Shuangyu ji. Jinling: Jizhi Zhai, 1573–1619. Reproduced from GBXQCK, 1st series, box 11. 1:2.24a ... 3–31. Photo of a scene in the Peking Opera Cimu lei given in 1980s. Reproduced from Jingju shizhao, edited by Lu Qing et al., 198 ........................................................... 3–32. Zheng Zhizhen. Mulian jiumu. Anhui: Gaoshi Shanfang, 1582, 1.2a. National Central Library, Taipei ................... 3–33. Xu Qiao. Liangjiang ji. Jinling: Jizhi Zhai, 1608. Reproduced from GBXQCK, 2nd series, box 5, 2:1.5 ....... 3–34. Gao Ming. Pipa ji. Jinling: Shide Tang, 1573–1619. 1.22a. National Central Library, Taipei ........................... 3–35. Gao Ming. Pipa ji. Jinling: Shide Tang, 1573–1619. 1.2a. National Central Library, Taipei .............................

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3–36. Gao Ming. Pipa ji. N.p.: Zunsheng Guan, 1573–1619. 1.3b–4a. National Palace Museum, Taipei, Taiwan, Republic of China ............................................................ 3–37. Gao Ming. Pipa ji. Xin’an: Wanhu Xuan, 1597. A facsimile of the Jiyi Tang edition. 1.1b–2a. HÔsa Bunko, Nagoya ................................................................. 3–38. Gao Ming. Pipa ji. Jinling: Jizhi Zhai, 1598. 1.1b–2a. Kokuritsu KÔbunsho Kan, Tokyo .................................... 3–39. Sishu ji. In Baneng zoujin. Jianyang: Airi Tang, 1573–1619. Reproduced from ChÖgoku kodai hanga ten, edited by Takimoto Hiroyuki, 106. Tokyo: Machida shilitsu kokusai hanga bijutsukan, 1988 ....................................... 3–40. Gao Ming. Nan Pipa ji. Anhui: Qifeng Guan, 1573–1619. 1.1b–2a. National Palace Museum, Taipei, Taiwan, Republic of China ............................................................ 3–41. Photo of “The Concealing Sleeve,” demonstrated by Mai Lanfang. Reproduced from Secrets of Chinese Drama, by Cecilia Zung, 78 .......................................................... 3–42. Wang Shifu. Li Zhuowu xiansheng piping Xixiang ji. Xiling: Tianzhang Ge, 1640, picture 3b–4a. National Central Library, Taipei .................................................................. 3–43. Gao Ming. Pipa ji. Jinling: Shide Tang, 1573–1619. 1.5b. National Central Library, Taipei ............................. 3–44. Gao Ming. Pipa ji. N.p.: unknown publisher, 1573–1619. 1.5b–6a. National Palace Museum, Taipei, Taiwan, Republic of China ............................................................ 3–45. Yang Zhijiong. Lanqiao yuchu ji. N.p.: Wanyue Xuan, 1606. Reproduced from GBXQCK, 1st series 1, box 11, 5:2.44b–45a ...................................................................... 3–46. Tu Long. Tanhua ji. Hangzhou: Weng Wenyuan, 1573–1619. 1.7b–8a. National Central Library, Taipei ... 3–47. Gao Ming. Pipa ji. Jinling: Shide Tang, 1573–1619. 2.2b. National Central Library, Taipei ............................. 3–48. Gao Lian. Yuzan ji. Jinling: Jizhi Zhai, 1599. A facsimile of Guanhua Xuan 1598 edition. Reproduced from GBXQCK, 1st series, box 11, 6:2.10b–11a ........................ 3–49. Zheng Zhizhen. Mulian jiumu. Jinling: Fuchun Tang, 1573–1619. 3: 1.7a. National Palace Museum, Taipei, Taiwan, Republic of China ..............................................

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list of illustrations 3–50. Zhang Fengyi. Hufu ji. Jinling: Fuchun Tang, 1573–1619. Reproduced from GBXQCK, 1st series, box 8, 3:2.27a ................................................................... 3–51. Photo from a performance of the Peking Opera Gucheng hui. Lin Shusen plays Guan Yu. Reproduced from Jingju shizhao, edited by Lu Qing et al., 76 ............... 3–52. Xu Qiao. Liangjiang ji. Jinling: Jizhi Zhai, 1608. Reproduced from GBXQCK, 2nd series, box 5, 2:2.2b ................................................................................ 3–53. Gao Ming. Pipa ji. Jinling: Shide Tang, 1573–1619. 1.11b. National Central Library, Taipei ........................... 3–54. Yang Zhijiong. Lanqiao yuchu ji. N.p.: Wanyue Xuan, 1606. Reproduced from GBXQCK, 1st series, box 11, 5:2.37b–38a ...................................................................... 3–55. Gao Ming. Pipa ji. N.p.: Zunsheng Guan, 1573–1619. 1.17b–18a. National Palace Museum, Taipei, Taiwan, Republic of China ............................................................ 3–56. Tang Xianzu. Zixiao ji. Jinling: Fuchun Tang, 1573–1619. Reproduced from GBXQCK, 1st series, box 10, 2:1.16a ................................................................. 3–57. Mural painting from a tomb in Wuling Village in Xinjiang County in Shanxi Province, Yuan dynasty. Reproduced from Song Jin Yuan xiqu wenwu tulun, Shanxi Shifan Daxue Xiqu Wenwu Yanjiusuo, 51. Shanxi: Renmin chubanshe, 1987 ................................... 3–58. Li Gongling. Xiaojing tu. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. Reproduced from Li Kung-ling’s Classic of Filial Piety, by Richard Barnhart, 120–1. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1993 ................................ 3–59. Liu Dui. Jiaohong ji. Jinling: Jide Tang, 1435. Reproduced from GBXQCK, 1st series, box 2, 10:10a ...... 3–60. Wang Tingna. Sanzhu ji. Xiuning: Huancui Tang, 1608. Reproduced from GBXQCK, 2nd series, box 2, 7:2.30b–31a ...................................................................... 3–61. Tu Long. Xiuwen ji. N.p.: publisher unknown, Late Ming. Picture 1.1a. National Central Library, Taipei ...... 3–62. Photo from a performance of the Peking Opera Chen Sanliang patang given in 1980s. Reproduced from Jingju shizhao, edited by Lu Qing et al., 198 ......................

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3–63. Photo of a stage in the Temple of Dongyue in Dongyang Village in Linfen City of Shanxi Province, 1345. Taken by Wang Jianmin, reproduced from Song Yuan xiqu wenwu yu minsu, by Liao Ben, color plate 54 (between pages 200–202). Beijing: Wenhua meishu chubanshe, 1989 ............................................................... 3–64. Ji Zhenlun. Wuhou qisheng ji. Jinling: Guangqing Tang, 1573–1619. Reproduced from GBXQCK, 2nd series, box 5, 4:1b–2a .................................................................. 3–65. Li Zicheng chengwang, Ninghe in Hebe Province, mid-Qing. Reproduced from Zhongguo meishu quanji: huihua bian, 21:77. Taipei: Jinxiu chubanshe, 1989 ............................. 3–66. Mural painting from tomb no. 1 in the town of Baisha in Beiying County in Henan Province, Song dynasty. Reproduced from Song Yuan xiqu wenwu yu minsu, by Liao Ben, color plate 9 (between pages 40 and 41) .......... 3–67. Zhuangyuan tukao. N.p.: unknown publisher, 1607. Reproduced from Zhongguo gudian wenxue banhua xuanji, edited by Fu Xihua, 1:355 ................................................ 3–68. Wang Tingna. Toutao ji. Xiuning: Huancui Tang, 1573–1619. Reproduced from GBXQCK, 2nd series, box 2, 8:1.12b–13a ........................................................... 3–69. Lanling Xiaoxiao Sheng. Jinping mei. N.p.: publisher unknown, 1644. Reproduced from Quanben Jinping mei cihua. 2:63.picture 2 (between pages 1764 and 1765). Jiulong: Xianggang Taiping shuju, c. 1982, 1986 .................................................................................. 3–70. Wang Zhideng. Quande ji. Jinling: Guangqing Tang, 1573–1619. Reproduced from GBXQCK, 2nd series, box 3, 7:2.25b–26a ........................................................... 3–71. Photo of a scene of the Peking Opera Tan qinjia, Liu Gansan as Madam Hu, early 20th century. Reproduced from Jingju shizhao, edited by Lu Qing et al., 14 ............... 3–72. Photo of a scene in the Peking Opera Jinshan si, Mei Lanfang as White-snake and Zhu Guifang as Green-snake, early 20th century. Reproduced from Jingju shizhao, edited by Lu Qing et al., 44 ........................ 3–73. Shen Cai. Qianjin ji. Jinling: Shide Tang, 1573–1619, 4.4b. National Palace Museum, Taipei, Taiwan, Republic of China ............................................................

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list of illustrations 3–74. Liang Chenyu, Yujue ji. Jinling: Fuchun Tang, 1581. Reproduced from GBXQCK, 1st series, box 6, 5:1.13b .... 3–75. Gao Lian, Yuzan ji. Jinling: Jizhi Zhai, 1599. A facsimile of Guanhua Xuan 1598 edition. Reproduced from GBXQCK, 1st series, box 11, 6:2.19b–20a ........................ 3–76. Zhou Lüjing, Jinqian ji. Jinling: Jizhi Zhai, 1608. Reproduced from GBXQCK, 2nd series, box 3, 4:2.2b ................................................................................ 3–77. Xu Qiao, Liangjiang ji. Jinling: Jizhi Zhai, 1608. Reproduced from GBXQCK, 2nd series, box 5, 2:1.10a ... 5–1. Unknown Artist, attributed to Zhou Wenju. A Court Concert (Heyue tu) or Femail Musicians Playing Before the Emperor. Ming dynasty (1368–1644), early 15th century. Handscroll, ink and color on silk. 41.9 u 184.2 cm. Buckingham Endowment Fund, 1950.1370 Overall. Reproduction, The Art Institute of Chicago, C20198 ......................................................... 5–2. Gu Hongzhong (after). The Night Banquet of Han Xizai (Han Xizai yeyan tu). Ink and color on silk. 28.7 u 335.5 cm. Palace Museum, Beijing. Reproduced from Zhongguo meishu quanji: huihua bian. 2:128. Taipei: Jinxiu, 1989 ...................................................................... 5–3. Du Jin. Enjoying the Antiques (Wangu tu). Ink and color on silk. 126.1 u 187 cm. National Palace Museum, Taipei, Taiwan, Republic of China ................................. 5–4. Zhou Wenju (after). Emperor Houzhu of the Southern Tang Playing Chess (Houzhu guanqi tu). 11th century. Ink and color on paper. 31.3 u 50 cm. Freer Gallery of Art ......... 5–5. Min Qiji. The nineteenth illustration of Xixiang ji. Color print. Wuxing: Min Qiji, 1640. Museum für Ostasiatische, Köln. Inv.-No. R61,2 [no. 19]. Phto: Rheinisches Bildarchiv, Köln, Germany .......................... 5–6. Picture of Puppet Show (Kuilei tu). In Sancai tuhui, edited by Wang Qi. A facsimile of 1609 edition, 140a. Shanghai: Guji chubanshe, 1988 ..................................... 5–7. Tang Yin (attributed). Portrait of Yingying. Hou Zhenshang Zhai collection. Reproduced from Comprehensive Illustrated Catalog of Chinese Paintings, Vol. 2: Southeast Asian and European Collections, edited by Suzuki Kei, II-2, S 1–008. Tokyo: University of Tokyo Press, 1982 ...........................

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5–8. Chen Juzhong (attributed). Portrait of Yingying. In Xixiang zalu, edited by Gu Xuanwei, 1.1a. N.p.: Zhongfang shuzhai, 1569 ................................................................... 5–9. Tang Yin (attributed). Portrait of Yingying. In Xixiang ji kao, Wanli. Reproduced from Zhongguo gudian wenxue banhua xuanji, edited by Fu Xihua, 1:338 ..................................... 6–1. “Opening Scene” of vol. 1. In Mulian jiumu, by Zheng Zhizhen, 1:1.1a. Anhui: Gaoshi Shanfang, 1582. National Palace Museum, Taipei, Taiwan, Republic of China ........................................................................... 6–2. “Opening Scene” of vol. 2. In Mulian jiumu, by Zheng Zhizhen, 2:1.1a. Anhui: Gaoshi Shanfang, 1582. National Palace Museum, Taipei, Taiwan, Republic of China ........................................................................... 6–3. “Opening Scene” of vol. 3. In Mulian jiumu, by Zheng Zhizhen, 3:1.1a. Anhui: Gaoshi Shanfang, 1582. National Palace Museum, Taipei, Taiwan, Republic of China ........................................................................... 6–4. “Title Page” of vol. 2. In Mulian jiumu, by Zheng Zhizhen, 2:title page. Anhui: Gaoshi Shanfang, 1582. National Palace Museum, Taipei, Taiwan, Republic of China ........................................................................... 6–5. “Opening Scene.” In Xunqin ji, by Wang Ling. Jinling: Fuchun Tang, 1573–1619. Reproduced from GBXQCK, 1st series, box 3, 4:1.1a ..................................................... 6–6. “Opening Scene.” In Yuchai ji. Jinling: Fuchun Tang, 1573–1619. Reproduced from GBXQCK, 1st series, box 5, 4:1.1a ..................................................................... 6–7. “Opening Scene.” In Zixiao ji, by Tang Xianzu. Jinling: Fuchun Tang, 1573–1619. Reproduced from GBXQCK, 1st series, box 8, 6:1.1a ..................................................... 6–8. “Opening Scene.” In Fenjin ji, by Ye Liangbiao. Jinling: Fuchun Tang, 1573–1619. Reproduced from GBXQCK, 1st series, box 7, 9:1.1a ..................................................... 6–9. “Opening Scene.” In Shuangzhong ji, by Yao Maoliang. Jinling: Fuchun Tang, 1573–1619. Reproduced from GBXQCK, 1st series, box 4, 3:1.1a .................................... 6–10. “Opening Scene.” In Xiangshan ji. Jinling: Fuchun Tang, 1573–1619. Reproduced from GBXQCK, 2nd series, box 1, 3:1.1b .....................................................................

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list of illustrations 6–11. “Opening Scene.” In Baishe ji, by Zheng Guoxuan. Jinling: Fuchun Tang, 1573–1619. Reproduced from GBXQCK, 1st series, box 5, 3:1.1a .................................... 6–12. “Opening Scene.” In Baitu ji. Beijing: Yongshun shutang, 1470s. Reproduced from Ming Chenhua shuochang cihua congkan, edited by Shanghai Wenwu Baoguan Weiyuanhui, 12:1.1a. Beijing: Wenwu, 1979 .... 6–13. “Opening Scene.” In Lijing ji. Jian’an: Yu Xin’an, 1566. Reproduced from Sanbun jiryaku, Sento yowa, Reikyoki, 1.1a. Tenri: Tenri Daigaku Shuppanbu, 1980 ................. 6–14. “Opening Scene.” In Lizhi ji, by Li Dongyue. N.p.: Yugeng tang, 1581. Reproduced from Mingben Chaozhou xiwen wuzhong, 1.1a. Guangzhou: Guangdong Renmin chubanshe, 1985 ............................................................... 6–15. “Opening Scene.” In Jinyin ji, by Su Fuzhi. Jinling: Jizhi Zhai, 1573–1619. Reproduced from GBXQCK, 1st series, box 3, 7:1.1b–2a ............................................... 6–16. “Opening Scene.” In Chundeng mi ji, by Ruan Dacheng. N.p.: Yonghuai Tang, 1633. Reproduced from GBXQCK, 2nd series, box 9, 6:1.1a .................................. 6–17. “Opening Scene.” In Guanyuan ji, by Zhang Fengyi. Jinling: Fuchun Tang, 1573–1619. Reproduced from GBXQCK, 1st series, box 7, 2:1.1a .................................... 6–18. “Opening Scene.” In Shiyi ji. Jinling: Fuchun Tang, 1573–1619. Reproduced from GBXQCK, 1st series, box 5, 2:1.1a ..................................................................... 6–19. “Zither from the Jade Emperor.” In Herong ji. Jinling: Fuchun Tang, 1573–1619. Reproduced from GBXQCK, 2nd series, box 1, 7:2.25b ................................................. 6–20. Portrait of Yingying. In Xixiang ji, by Wang Shifu. N.p.: Yan Ge, 1630. Reproduced from Zhongguo meishu quanji: huihua bian, 20:125 ............................................................

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INTRODUCTION

THEATER, ILLUSTRATION, AND TIME

This study draws together the various elements of Wanli culture—illustration, painting, theater, literature, philosophy—and examines their interrelation and intersection in the context of the drama publication. In her essay “Printing as Performance,” the scholar Katherine Carlitz suggests the logic of conceiving drama publication as a distinct genre, making the point that “the structure and prosody of drama gave rise to specialized printing conventions,” from which it follows that drama publishing should be studied “as a discrete category, separate from the late Ming publishing boom.”1 This study particularly focuses on drama illustrations because they epitomize most of the important trends and developments in illustration during the Wanli era (1573–1619). What is more, both the quantity and quality of plays published during the period are unmatched in all of Chinese history. During these years, then, drama illustration was at the very center of Chinese culture. Illustration illuminates not only the drama and printing culture, but aspects of late Ming philosophy, religion, morality, and aesthetics. There is thus the opportunity not only to explore the formal language of illustration, but also to reconstruct something of the late Ming worldview. This study is not primarily concerned with market forces, or the advance of technology, or the celebration of aesthetic achievement, all of which are legitimate but by now familiar avenues of exploration. The attempt, rather, is to reconstruct the cultural complexity of drama illustrations—that is, illustrations originally included in editions of printed plays—by recognizing their sometimes obscure and always subtle relation to the traditions of theater, literature, and printing. Only after establishing each illustration in relation to text, edition, and genre—and beyond these in relation to the culture in its full scope—can we approach the full complexity of its expression, for illustrations are carefully crafted to resonate within each of these contexts. In the main, illustrations have been studied as isolated instances of artistic expression, as if analogous

1

Katherine Carlitz, “Printing as Performance,” 269.

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introduction

to paintings. The necessity of restoring illustrations to their original context—of conceiving them as essentially contextual—is the most fundamental emphasis of the present study. As drama illustrations are bound up with two different and conicting media—the book and the stage—this study attempts to illuminate how these media responded to each other and collided with each other due to the sudden increase in quantity and quality of printed plays during the Wanli period.2 The collision of these two media brought the relation between printed plays and theatrical performance under the close scrutiny of contemporary literati and drama critics. There was a widespread anxiety, expressed by almost every drama critic in the late Ming, that the popularity of published drama was severing the traditional relation between the play and the stage, and that the new market for published drama was creating a temptation to write for the reader rather than for the actor and the theatergoer. Many literati rightly feared the overthrow of the theater as the dominant cultural and moral institution, and they struggled on numerous fronts to uphold the status of the printed play as a medium rooted in the traditions of the theater, and illustration became the primary eld of ideological battle. The most interesting questions—those with which the present study will largely be involved—are why this rearguard action against the incursions of a purely literary culture was so vehemently undertaken and how the literati went about the attempt to preserve the centrality of the theater within a rapidly burgeoning print culture. The answer to these questions, by no means obvious, has to do with the Chinese conception of the past as a perpetual moral and intellectual example. Scholar Stephen Owen’s Remembrances, a study of the experience of the past in classical Chinese literature, makes all the salient points. If the master gure in Western literary discourse is metaphor, Owen argues that the comparable gure in Chinese literary discourse is “synecdoche, the part that leads to the whole, some enduring fragment from which we try to reconstruct the lost totality.”3 In terms of temporal conception, this implies that each moment beckons to all past moments and functions as a means of access to the larger temporal

2 In many American lms produced in the early and mid-twentieth century, the opening credits are framed by a proscenium or by theatrical curtains. This practice also demonstrates a reluctance to abandon the familiar conventions of the theater. When lm found its own footing as an autonomous medium, this practice was dropped. 3 Stephen Owen, Remembrances, 2.

theater, illustration, and time

3

continuum. From the era of Confucius to the late nineteenth century, the impulse to recover and reclaim the past manifested itself equally in all expressions of Chinese culture: literature, art, politics, philosophy. More than anything else, this impulse—by turns denominated ‘Imitating the Past’ (Fanggu), ‘Copying the Past’ (Mogu), and ‘Recovering the Past’ (Fugu)—unied the culture as a single vast enterprise. But as Owen indicates, this incessant mindfulness of the past created “a gap of time, effacement, and memory” and resulted in a mood of loss and melancholy.4 The perpetual question of Chinese culture is how to bridge this gap. In the literary and artistic elds, especially during the Ming period, the most ambitious and imaginative thinkers pursued a seemingly impossible aim: the full recovery of the past, the full conation of past and present. The anxiety and desperation that colors this attempt has much to do with the political circumstances of the era. The advent of the Yuan dynasty in 1280 constituted a traumatic break with the centuriesold traditions of China. For the rst time the entirety of China (as it was then constituted) came under the rule of invading Mogolian tribes who were not culturally Han (the term Han here connotes a cultural rather than an ethnic identity). Although non-Han northern tribes such as the Northern Dynasties, the Liao, and the Jin had established dynasties in the past, the Han had always maintained rule over the south.5 With the advent of the Ming dynasty in 1368 political supremacy was restored to the Han-cultured ruling class. Ming intellectuals naturally felt an urge to bridge the cultural disjunction represented by the Yuan era and to recreate a cultural continuity with the past. The imaginative labor of the next two centuries was pervaded by this ambition to ‘restore the past’ ( fugu). The theater was the principal locus of this ambition during the late Ming period. Theater was conceived not as a mere venue of entertainment, but as a temporally transcendent space capable of bringing the past to life within the present moment. The assumed interconnection between historical reality and dramatic reality is all-important: it distinguished drama from other literary genres and made it a crucial conduit between the past and the present. This was not merely a matter 4

Ibid., 1–2. One might argue that the Tang dynasty was not ruled by a Han-dominated class. But the Li family was ‘Han-ized’ (Han hua) and accepted as Han during the era of its reign. 5

4

introduction

of analogy (the stage is like the past) or memory (the stage recalls the past), but of outright identity, of ontological equation (the stage is the past). This notion is vaguely suggested by some of the era’s rhetorical ourishes. The passage connecting the stage and the backstage, for example, was called ‘Path through the Door of Ghosts’ (Guimen dao). The phrase ‘door of ghosts’ refers to the threshold separating the natural and supernatural worlds, but also, tellingly, to the threshold separating present and past. With similar rationale, the oldest extant bibliography of Yuan drama is titled The Book of Ghosts (Lugui bu). The actors, it is to be inferred, were considered vessels of ghostly possession, and drama itself was understood not merely as a representation or simulacrum of the past, but as a re-enactment of the past, a ghostly reincarnation of the past. There was no sense in which the reincarnated historical episode was considered ontologically inferior or subsidiary either to the rst incarnation of events or to the present reality (in the Chinese tradition, the ‘ghost’ is not a faded residuum, as it is in the West, but rather a fully manifest entity, different but analogous to the living). The historical events brought to life on the stage were considered—strictly speaking—‘real.’ This metaphysical dynamic is so counter-intuitive to the modern metaphysician—not to mention to the modern theatergoer—that it will require a good deal of elaboration and explanation. These larger cultural and metaphysical dynamics explain the sudden importance and prominence of drama illustration during the Wanli period. As chapter three explains, drama illustration increasingly assumed the trappings of the stage—full frontal address, stylized theatrical gesture, various framing devices reminiscent of the proscenium. This type of illustration, termed ‘performance illustration’ and discussed in detail in chapter three, initiated a new phase in the tradition of the medium. In its attempt to export the conventions of the stage into the realm of literature, it represents an important development in the struggle to preserve the dominance of the theater and the metaphysics of the theater—what I call the ‘eternal present of the past.’ Though scholars have widely recognized performance illustration as a distinct and dened phenomenon, its moral, cultural, and metaphysical signicance—its implication in the late Ming era’s most profound debate—has gone unnoticed. To recover the full meaning of illustration is, by the logic of synecdoche, to recover the full meaning of this debate and of the late Ming world that hung upon its outcome.

CHAPTER ONE

TOWARD THE CONTEXTUALIZATION OF WOODBLOCK ILLUSTRATION: A CRITIQUE OF ART HISTORICAL METHOD

Woodblock book illustration has long been seen as one of China’s minor arts. It evoked little discussion in the Ming and Qing periods. It was—and is to this day—seen as secondary to the text it illustrates. The common view is that illustration depicts only the most obvious surface actions of the story, and that illustrated images are crude, repetitive, and conventional. In recent years, however, theoretical developments in the eld of art history have inspired a renewed interest in the relation between word and image,1 and the study of illustration has gradually attracted the attention of scholars working in different elds. In Reading Illustrated Fiction in Late Imperial China (1998), literary scholar Robert Hegel argues that illustration is no more repetitive and conventional than painting, and that in this respect it is not inconsistent with the aesthetic of the elite literati culture.2 Hegel sees illustration as essentially decorative, its purpose to “capture the richness and fullness of human sensual experience, not just the positions or movements of characters.”3 In Pictures and Visuality in Early Modern China (1997), art historian Craig Clunas argues that illustration embodies important trends in the nonelite visual culture of the late Ming period, and is, at the very least, a major cultural phenomenon.4 These scholars disagree as to whether illustration reects elite taste or popular culture, but both see illustration as a signicant part of the attempt to understand the culture of late imperial China, or ‘early modern China’ as some scholars prefer to

1

Norman Bryson’s groundbreaking study Word and Image: French Painting of the ancien régime initiated a new interest in the exploration of the relation between word and image. Inspired by this new trend, Fong Wen and Alfreda Murck edited a volume that explores the same relation in the eld of Chinese art titled Words and Images: Chinese Poetry, Calligraphy, and Painting. 2 Robert Hegel, Reading Illustrated Fiction Fiction, 164–289. Hegel proposes that illustrations “were reective of the arts of the elite strata of society” (290). 3 Ibid., 184. 4 Craig Clunas, Pictures and Visuality, 29–41.

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call the period from the late-sixteenth century to the mid-seventeenth century.5 This study is inspired by this trend of academic interest but with an important methodological difference: it attempts to examine illustration not merely as image, but as illustration, which is to say, as image embedded in and responding to specic textual contexts.

For Decoration or for Elucidation? The conventional approach to the study of illustration is deeply rooted in the precedent set by the study of painting. As many of the scholars who pioneered the study of Chinese woodblock illustration are art historians by training and institutional afliation, it is no wonder that illustration came to be studied on the model of painting, and that the assumptions that apply to painting—that images are essentially free-standing and self-sufcient, without textual and sequential entanglements—were equally applied to illustration. By emphasizing aesthetic criteria rather than the context of the publication, scholars have overlooked much that is most interesting about illustrations.6 While it is undeniably true that illustration is a branch of graphic art, in many cases imitating the characteristic motifs and styles of painting, illustrations have a very important purpose of their own, which is to illustrate in the sense given by The Oxford English Dictionary: “To elucidate (a description, etc.) by means of drawings or pictures.”7 To remove illustration from its context is to overlook this role of ‘elucidation,’ and to undermine both the meaning and the signicance of illustration, while holding it to purely aesthetic standards that, for the most part, it does not even attempt to meet. Illustrations provide ornament, to be sure, but their principal

5 Clunas, for example, considers late Ming culture the earliest stage of Chinese modern culture. A review of Clunas’ contribution to the study of late Ming culture by Timothy Brook titled “Picturing Clunas: A Review Essay” can be found in volume 40 of Ming Studies (117–124). Kai-wing Chow likewise associates the late Ming period with early modern China in his study of printing during the 16th and 17th centuries as his book is titled Publishing, Culture, and Power in Early Modern China. 6 There are several scholars who do correlate the illustration and the text. Jan Fontein, for example, uses the text to illuminate the iconography of the illustrations in Wenshu zhinan tuzan and Wuxiang zhishi song, printed in the twelfth century. See “Sudhana’s Pilgrimage in Chinese Art,” in The Pilgrimage of Sudhana, 23–77. Julia K. Murray uses the text to reconstruct the original sequence of illustrations in Nü Xiaojing. See “The Ladies’ Classic of Filial Piety and Sung Textual Illustration,” 95–129. 7 OED, second edition, CD-Rom.

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function is to enter into relation with the text. Indeed, an illustration divorced from its accompanying text is no longer an illustration, but a mere print. To read the text without reference to illustrations, or to examine illustrations without reference to the text, is to dissolve the phenomenology of the late Ming publication. For our purposes it is important to note that despite their different specialties both Hegel and Clunas share this common view that illustration is a branch of the visual arts, and that its primary purpose is to make books more appealing and marketable.8 This study shares Hegel’s premise that illustration is a crucial element in the experience of reading, but takes exception to his unstated assumption that illustration and text are discrete elements, physically juxtaposed but intellectually and aesthetically separable. This study also rejects Clunas’s method of entirely removing illustration from the context of the published book. Both approaches see that illustration can be isolated and studied on its own terms, and that the marriage of text and illustration is more an economic happenstance than an artistic necessity. The tendency to divorce illustration and text is not specic to Hegel and Clunas, but has been widespread in China and Japan since the early 1960s, when scholars began compiling anthologies of late-Ming and post-Ming illustration. The very concept of the anthology assumes that the meaning or value of each illustration is independent of its original context. Among the most famous of these anthologies are Min Shin e-iri hon zuroku (1980), edited by Japanese Sinologist Nagasawa Kikuya; Zhongguo gudai banhua baitu (1984), edited by scholar Zhou Wu; and Zhongguo banhua shi tulu (1988), likewise edited by Zhou. These anthologies include a few illustrations from each of dozens of different publications, spanning the spectrum of literary genres. Other anthologies utilize a more restricted organizing principle. Zhongguo gudian wenxue banhua xuanji (1981), edited by scholar Fu Xihua, for example, exclusively excerpts illustrations that originally appeared in literary works. Zhou Wu’s Huipai banhua shi lunji (1984) exclusively features illustrations in the style of the so-called ‘Hui School,’ and his Jinling gu banhua (1993) limits its selection to material originally published in Nanjing. Many other anthologies of woodblock illustrations were subsequently compiled, but most follow one of these 8 Robert Hegel, Reading Illustrated Fiction, 133. Both scholars approach the book as a material artifact: Hegel emphasizes sizes, font, paper, binding, and even fragrance. Clunas sees illustration as a signicant expression of the ‘materiality’ that generally characterizes late Ming society.

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models. In all cases, the anthologies remove illustration from the context of the written work and encourage an approach to illustration that disregards the very idea of context. Consistent with this editorial approach—perhaps even inuenced by it—the study of illustration has been devoted to the analysis of printing and engraving techniques and to the assessment of aesthetic merit, always with a focus on the individual illustration. As a function of the dominant aesthetic approach, enormous attention has been given to the Huang family of Anhui. Over the course of the late Ming period, the Huang family created the distinctive style known as ‘Hui School’ and established illustration as a respectable art form. Zhou Wu’s Huipai banhua shi lunji is exclusively devoted to the work of the Huang family and the other engravers who worked in the same style, as is art historians Kobayashi Hiromitsu and Samantha Sabin’s paper “The Great Age of Anhui Printing.”9 The scholar Wang Bomin’s Zhongguo banhua shi (1962) gives substantial space to the Huang family in its discussion of the Ming woodblock print, as well as to famous painters like Chen Hongshou (1599–1652) and Xiao Yuncong (1596–1673) who moonlighted as illustrators.10 This near-exclusive interest in aesthetics has done a great deal to illuminate the very signicant contributions of the Huang family and various painters, but it has done nothing to illuminate illustration as a broad eld of cultural expression. Moreover, the emphasis on the Anhui engravers has led to an overriding concern with regional styles as part of an attempt to distinguish the Anhui style from its counterparts in Jinling, Hangzhou, and Fujian.11 This methodology assumes that these printing centers were gated communities, when in fact they were knit together by a constant interchange of styles and ideas and by an immersion in a shared artistic tradition. Not only did books circulate from city to city, but illustrators and engravers were frequently offered work away from home. This methodology, then, misrepresents the mobile and dynamic nature of late Ming society.12

9 Kobayashi Hiromitsu and Samantha Sabin, “The Great Age of Anhui Printing,” 25–33. 10 Wang Bomin, Zhongguo banhua shi, 63–79. Zhou Xinhui, Zhongguo gu banhua tongshi: Chen Hongshou: 209–214, and Xiao Yunchong: 252–261. 11 Zhou Wu’s Huipai banhua shi and Jinling gu banhua are examples. 12 Robert Hegel acknowledges regional styles in the early Wanli period, but does not discuss how the styles differ. He agrees, however, that the relocation of skilled craftsmen from one area to another “resulted ultimately in the decline of clear differentiation between regional styles” during the Wanli period, and he attributes this result to the dominance of the Huizhou illustrators and engravers (Reading Illustrated Fiction, 196).

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The temptation to emphasize aesthetic and technical criteria is even greater when it comes to the study of color illustration, which rst appeared during the Wanli period. In many cases color prints closely resemble paintings and openly imitate painting technique and subject matter. Color prints are thus particularly amenable to the traditional approach of the art historian.13 Here again, however, art history has projected its disciplinary assumptions in a problematic fashion. Unquestionably there is a visual analogy between painting and illustration, but this analogy does not get at the essential meaning or function of illustration. Consider, for example, the widespread critical attention that has been given to illustrations that originally appeared in the 1640 edition of Xixiang ji published by Min Qiji (1580–after 1661) in Zhejiang. In a precedent for later decontextualizations, the illustrations were long ago excised from the text and sold as objets d’art, and they now constitute all that remains of the original edition.14 Among the scholars who have been attracted by the visual beauty of this edition are art historians Kobayashi Hiromitsu, who catalogs the motifs of the illustrations,15 and art historian Wu Hung, who mines the illustrations for examples of the ‘metapicture’ (a painting that acknowledges itself as a painting), on which basis he theorizes the self-conscious ctiveness of art in the Chinese tradition.16 In all of these studies, craftsmanship and aesthetic concerns are emphasized to such an extent that the context of illustration—in this case, one of the arch-canonical plays of the Chinese tradition—is ignored. The fact that these illustrations originally appeared amid the complexities and nuances of the play is

13 Artistic primers like Shizhu Zhai shuhua pu utilize color prints to demonstrate painting techniques, suggesting the congruity of the painting and color print traditions. The volume was printed by Hu Zhengyan with a preface dated 1633. It was reproduced by Duoyun Xuan in 1985. For an English catalogue of selected prints from Shizhu Zhai huapu see Joseph Vedlich, ed., The Ten Bamboo Studio. 14 The whole set of illustrations is now in the collection of Museum für Ostasiatische Kunst der Stadt Köln, Köln. Bettina Clever, museum archivist, says that the set originally belonged to the collection of Dr. A. Breuer, but the museum has no information about when or where Dr. Breuer acquired the set. The set is reproduced in Hsi-hsiang chi, chinesische Farbholzschnitte von Min Ch’i-chi 1640. 15 Kobayashi Hiromitsu, “Mindai hanga no sÏda,” 32–50. Hiromitsu also studies carefully the ve illustrations drawn by Chen Hongshou in a 1639 edition of Xixiang ji published by Zhang Shenzhi. See “Kin Koju no hanga katsudÔ (I & II),” 25–39 and 35–51. He further cooperated with Samantha Sabin to explore how woodblock prints relate to the Anhui (or Xin’an) style of painting during the early Qing period. See “The Great Age of Anhui Printing,” 25–33. The subject matter of his three studies clearly indicates his art-historical perspective. 16 Wu Hung, The Double Screen, 237–59.

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considered incidental. The scholar Dawn Ho Delbanco, meanwhile, attempts to match each illustration with a corresponding scene in the play. This work begins to see the text and illustration in relation, but without attempting to explain illustration and text in terms of one another. Delbanco concludes that the illustrations are merely decorative, which is to say that their function is essentially aesthetic.17 This study attempts to reverse this common tendency and to set an example by restoring illustration to its necessary context or rather contexts. An illustration’s immediate context is three-fold: rst, there is the text in which it is embedded (e.g., Pipa ji by Gao Ming, ca. 1306–1359); second, there is the specic edition in which it is embedded (e.g. the 1610 edition of Pipa ji published by Rongyu Tang); third, there is the literary genre that informs both text and publication (e.g. traditional Chinese drama).

The Text as Context The relationship between illustration and text—to consider the rst of these contexts—has multiple aspects. Most basically, illustration attempts to represent in visual terms the overt action of the plot, thus lending literary abstraction an apprehensible basis in daily visual experience. In this respect illustration serves what might be called a ‘mimetic function,’ a term used in a strict sense to describe illustration’s depiction of textual content. In its mimetic function, illustration powerfully conditions the reception of the text by directing and circumscribing the reader’s freedom of imagination. What is described in the text as a ‘pond,’ for example, becomes something more specic through the work of the illustrator—say a pond with a small wooden bridge and a pavilion islanded at its center. Deeply relevant to this function is the ‘layout’ of text and image. Layout indicates both the graphic conguration of the individual page and the sequential placement of images throughout the publication. Not surprisingly, illustrations that attempt to fulll the mimetic function are deliberately laid out to comprise a visual narrative that runs parallel to the text. In this layout the image is displayed in a strip at the top of the page directly above the text it illustrates, making the parallelism between word and image unmistakable. Typically, this parallelism is maintained throughout the 17

Dawn Ho Delbanco, “The Romance of the Western Chamber,” 12–23.

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entire publication, with a single illustration at the top of each page or straddling half-folio pages. In Chinese, the term ‘pictures-above-text’ (shang tu xia wen) describes both the placement of the illustration above the text and the placement of such illustrations on each page in a continuous sequence. This arrangement was very popular from the earliest eras of illustration until the early Wanli period. The decline of this convention in the Wanli period suggests that the mimetic function of illustration was challenged, and that a new layout was required to accommodate a new function. The relationship between illustration and text, however, is not limited to the mimetic function. Performance illustration—to take the most signicant example—entirely dispenses with the mimetic function in an attempt to embed the story within the ontological frame of the stage. Illustration of this type, which takes the liberty of depicting the story with all the trappings of stage performance, in some cases showing the proscenium itself, does not mimic but rather ‘performs’ the text. While mimetic illustration reinforces the plot structure of the play, performance illustration often departs entirely from the plot, seizing on a specic scene, detail, or moment as somehow deeply symbolic and informative of the whole. In this respect, performance illustration not only borrows the trappings of the theater, but enacts something of the essence of the theater, for traditional Chinese stagecraft is more than anything the art of framing subtly symbolic moments; in this respect Chinese theater is closely analogous to the art of painting. Understanding illustration, then, rst depends on grasping its multiple functions and placing each within its necessary historical and cultural context. In the case of performance illustration, this requires contextualizing each image not only within the specic text and the specic publication, but also within the larger theatrical tradition. Whatever its function—mimetic or performative—illustration necessarily involves interpretation, augmentation, and revision of the text; in short, it necessarily involves commentary. Oftentimes, the illustrator maintains the basic mimetic or performative function while adding symbolic or allusive elements that function as a commentary on the text, bringing to bear the illustrator’s personals views of the characters and the action.18 This phenomenon became especially marked during the late Wanli period, by which time illustration had achieved a degree of

18

For a fuller discussion see Li-ling Hsiao, “Political Loyalty and Filial Piety,” 9–64.

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respectability and had begun to attract well-known painters who were accustomed to trafcking in interpretive subtleties. In this light it does not go too far to consider illustration a form of literary criticism and the illustrator a literary commentator.19 As early as 1548, the concept of illustration as commentary was spelled out in Yuan Fengzi’s preface to the novel Sanguo zhizhuan, which bluntly afrms that “illustrations comment on the narrative [. . .].”20 The illustrator and publisher Zhong Renjie, who painted and published Sisheng yuan written by Xu Wei (1521–1593), indicates clearly in the preface that “the pictures are meant to invoke the meaning of the play.”21 Like any literary commentator, the illustrator hopes to offer a compelling interpretation and to sway the opinion of the reader. At times the illustrator works in support of the author’s seeming intention, but at other times he disputes the author at every turn, accentuating marginal or subversive details and urging the reader’s attention in new directions. Thus the intentions of the author are quietly, but sometimes powerfully mediated by the illustrator.

The Edition as Context We may now consider illustration’s second crucial context: the specic edition of the text, which is to say, the physical entity of the book as published. Just as illustrations must be seen in relation to the text, so too they must be seen in relation to each other, and in relation to the general graphic arrangement of a given published work.22 As a rule 19 Li-ling Hsiao’s paper titled “Reading the Illustrator’s Reading” demonstrates the benet of approaching illustration from this angle (137–151). 20 Feng, “Preface,” in Sanguo zhizhuan, preface 1a. In Escorial Museum, microlm at the Harvard Yenching Library. Anne mcLaren, “Constructing New Reading Publics,” 171. 21 Zhong Renjie, “Introduciton to Sisheng yuan,” 864. 22 There are scholars who have attempted to study the illustrations of a single text, but they have not attempted to explore the interrelationship between these illustrations. Fontein, for example, has discussed the illustrations of “The Pilgrimage of Sudhana” in Wenshu zhinan tuzan and Wuxiang zhishi song. Max Loehr has studied the landscape woodblock prints in the Mizang quan, included in the 1108 edition of Tripitaka. See Chinese Landscape Woodcuts. Miya Tsugio has studied the illustrations in Mulian jiumu jing, printed in 1251 in China and then re-engraved and reprinted in 1346 in Japan. See his “Illustrated Scripture of the Story of Mokuren’s Salvation of his Mother,” 155–178. Julia K. Murray has studied illustrations of the life of Confucius in several editions published between the late-fteenth and mid-seventeenth centuries. See her “Illustrations of the Life of Confucius,” 73–134. Yao Dajuin has studied the illustrations in the 1498 edition of Xixiang ji. See his “The Pleasure of Reading Drama,” 437–92.

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illustrated books feature multiple illustrations, sometimes as few as ve, sometimes as many as two hundred.23 These illustrations often build and comment on one another, and together embody a unied and coherent interpretation of the text. In this respect they are very much like the literary commentary often included in the page margins of late Ming publications. These literary commentaries seem to involve fragmentary or isolated statements that merely respond to the plot, but on closer inspection almost always show a good deal of design and coherence, suggesting the commentator’s reading of the text and the bent of his aesthetic and moral philosophy. In order to arrive at an understanding of this kind of literary commentary, one must correlate each comment with the entire body of comment and develop a sense of the commentary as a system of thought. The same approach must be applied to the study of illustration. The 1610 edition of Pipa ji published by Rongyu Tang may be taken as an example. The play is a tragicomedy that centers on the conict between political loyalty and lial piety. The late Ming commentator seizes on this conict and relentlessly assaults the text’s assumption that political loyalty is a form of lial piety, and that service to the state fullls the obligation to the family. Likewise, the illustrator systematically—even exclusively—centers his depiction on symbolic details that privilege lial piety and domesticity.24 In this case, the illustrator no less than the commentator functions as a critic, and the illustration becomes the visual expression of the illustrator’s ‘reading’ of the text. Illustration can thus be understood as a form of criticism: an attempt to form a coherent response to the complexities of a literary work. The reception of the individual illustration is largely determined by the arrangement of the entire series within the specic publication. As the pictures-above-text layout began to fade in popularity during the late Ming period, publishers turned to alternate layouts such as the ‘pictures-amid-text’ (cha tu) and ‘pictures-before-text’ (guan tu). In the former conguration, illustrations appear on half-folio (dan mian quan ye) or double half-folio pages (shuang mian quan ye) without accompanying 23 The 1498 edition of Xixiang ji includes more than two hundred illustrations, while the 1639 Zhang Shenzhi edition of Xixiang ji includes only ve illustrations; the latter illustrations are by Chen Hongshou. 24 Li-ling Hsiao’s study of Rongyu Tang’s 1610 edition of Pipa ji attempts to demonstrate that both the commentary and illustration in the edition challenge the conceptions of political loyalty and lial piety advanced by the playwright Gao Ming. See “Political Loyalty and Filial Piety,” 9–64.

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text. Such illustrations appear at regular or irregular intervals throughout the publication. In the latter conguration, illustrations again appear on half-folio or double half-folio pages without accompanying text, but in this case the illustrated pages are clustered at the front of the text and function as prefatory material. The aesthetic and philosophical implications of these different layouts have not been thoroughly addressed by scholars: the crucial point is that each of these layouts suggests a completely different interaction between illustration and text, and each deliberately attempts to induce a different reading experience.25 This attempt to control reader reception may seem tenuous and vague today, but during the late Ming period readers paid very close attention to illustration and allowed meaning to emerge from the tension between image and word. The pictures-above-text layout allows the reader to absorb the word and the image more or less simultaneously. The image and text thus immediately and continuously inform each other during the course of reading. Moreover, illustration guides the reader’s reception of the text at every stage, and the tension between word and image is thus maximized. The pictures-amid-text layout, which entails illustrations interspersed at intervals, poses an entirely different phenomenology. The strict parallel between illustration and text is broken down. In this case, the reading experience no longer involves a simultaneous apprehension of word and image; rather the image occasionally intrudes upon the word. Illustrations of this type are not interspersed randomly, but strategically, in the attempt to keep the reader on an interpretive course at moments when there is a particular temptation to go astray. The logic of each illustration’s placement can be teased out by careful attention to the text: it will be seen to reinforce, or undermine, or emphasize, or complicate, or remind. What such illustrations sacrice in terms of omnipresence, they make up for in terms of dramatic presence, in each instance taking the reader ever so slightly by surprise. This theoretical understanding, however, is by no means obvious, and by no means universally accepted. Robert Hegel, for example, proposes the picturesamid-text layout as a device that provides “a break from the text and the conrming view of an illustration after turning a number of pages,”

25

Anne Burkus-chasson has an interesting discussion about how the different forms of traditional Chinese books informed the interpretation of Liu Yuan’s illustration of Lingyan ge. See “Visual Hermeneutics and the Act of Turning the Leaf,” 371–416.

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thus encouraging “the poor reader to struggle onward.”26 Hegel’s view suggests that illustrations are rest stops, intermissions analogous to those between the acts of a play, without an integral function in relation to the text. It implicitly denes illustration in relation to the absence or suspension of the text, and conceives the illustration as purely decorative. This overlooks the likelihood that illustrators, by virtue of a lifetime’s exposure to drama, had the impulse to comment and interpret, and it undermines the intellectual ambition of the medium, as this study hopes to show. The pictures-before-text layout, meanwhile, attempts to predetermine an interpretive course and to x the tone of the reading to come. This layout serves illustration’s attempt to function as commentary on the text by preempting the reader’s formation of opposed ideas or interpretations. This preemptive capacity largely explains why the pictures-before-text layout became dominant during and after the late Wanli period, when illustrators had learned to challenge the text more ambitiously. Taking note of this preemptive dynamic, Robert Hegel discusses a frontispiece that appears in an 868 edition of The Diamond Sutra ( Jingang jing, or Vajra-Prajñâpâramitâ-Sûtra). It shows Subhûti (Xuputi) listening to Buddha. Hegel says, “The picture serves a prefatory function to induce in the reader an appropriately serious frame of mind in approaching the text.”27 Hegel is surely correct that such illustrations attempted to induce a serious frame of mind, but they had more specic objectives as well. They attempted not only to induce a specic mood, but also to impose the intellectual and moral premises of the reading experience and to orchestrate in advance a specic interpretation of the text itself.

Literary Genre as Context As discussed above, illustration must be understood in relation to the text and in relation to the specic edition; it must nally be placed within the context of the overarching literary genre, whether poetry, drama,

26

Robert Hegel, Reading Illustrated Fiction, 183. Ibid., 166. Hegel does not expand on this theory but falls back on the view that this layout is more “aesthetically pleasing” (Ibid., 314). 27

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ction, reference, history, philosophy, or some analogous category.28 No less than poems, plays, and novels, illustrations establish their meaning within the expectations and conventions specic to the literary genre and attempt to embody the particular effects that dene the genre. The genre of poetry, for example, depends on allusion, symbol, and metaphor to suggest subtle shades of abstract meaning, and in many instances illustration attempts to wed itself to the technique of the accompanying poem by utilizing the same devices. In the same way illustration may attempt to embody the conventions of drama. Many drama illustrations incorporate elements of the stage (curtain, table and cloth, the stage structure itself ) and depict gures gesturing in the characteristic manner (shenduan) of stage actors. Illustrations of this type search for their creative inspiration outside the plot structure and introduce a foreign element (in this case theatrical performance) to the experience of reading. Other drama illustrations forgo this conventional homage to the stage, implying the printed publication’s autonomy. The choice to adopt or eschew the trappings of the stage was very much deliberate, signaling a conscious response to a debate that raged during the late Ming period as to whether drama was primarily a theatrical or a literary genre. Illustrators depicted the trappings of the stage in the attempt to maintain the relation between the text and the theater, and thus endorsed the former view in terms that would have been readily understood by a contemporary reader with any degree of sophistication. When studying illustrations, then, a familiarity with the conventions and expectations of different literary genres, and a constant awareness of genre as an informing context, are essential. Let me note that there is much work to be done in this direction. Most studies go no farther than conceiving illustration as a sub-category of the painting genre, while the overarching literary genre goes unheeded. This despite the fact that an illustration in a drama publication and an illustration in a printed painting manual are likely to have only the most supercial technical elements in common. The essential meaning of each illustration is relational, and it can be established only with reference to the literary context that it was created to serve.

28 Julia K. Murray sets an example for other scholars by properly locating Buddhist illustration within the larger genre of Buddhist literature. See her “The Evolution of Buddhist Narrative Illustration,” 125–149.

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The Relation between Function, Layout, and Literary Genre After identifying an illustration’s function in relation to the text (mimesis, performance, or commentary), mediating layout (pictures-above-text, pictures-amid-text, pictures-before-text), and literary genre, we are in a position to ask how these relate and mutually inform each other. More specically, we can ask whether there is a systematic relation between function, layout, and literary genre. Are the combinations of these variables determined by some deep cultural logic or by happenstance—say by the whim of a particular publisher or some passing contingency of the market? In order to answer this most fundamental question, we must look to the history of book illustration in traditional China and examine closely the relations of these elements. The present study examines these issues as they specically relate to illustrated drama publications; ideally, it will set a precedent for the study of other elds within Chinese publishing history.29 The relation between function, layout, and literary genre has slowly evolved over the centuries-long history of Chinese illustration. The most simple function of the illustration—the mimetic—can be traced back at least to the ninth century, as evidenced by a pictorial scroll (catalogue number P4524) depicting the ancient Buddhist story popularly known as “The Devil’s Defeat” (Xiangmo bianwen). In her study Performing the Visual, art historian Sarah E. Fraser calls this “possibly the only veriable extant example of a storyteller’s scroll from China.”30 Local monks found the scroll when they unsealed ‘cave seventeen’ in Dunhuang, and the Sinologist Paul Pelliot brought the scroll to Europe in 1906 or 1907. In 1954, the French scholar Nicole Vandier-Nicolas

29 For the history of Chinese woodblock prints see Wang Bomin, Zhongguo banhua shi; Guo Weiqu, Zhongguo banhua shilue; Robert Hegel, Reading Illustrated Fiction, 164–214; Kobayashi Hiromitsu, ChÖgoku no hanga; Pan Yuanshi, “Zhongguo banhua yishu fazhang jianshi,” 7–17; Wang Fangyu, “Book Illustration in Late Ming and Early Qing China,” 31–43; Frances Wood, Chinese Illustration; Li Pingfan, “ChÖgoku kodai hanga no sÔshi to hatten,” 12–25; and Zhou Xinhui, Zhongguo gu banhua tongshi. 30 Sarah E. Fraser, Performing the Visual, 162. Both Eugene Eoyang and Victor Mair believe this scroll was used and possibly owned by a storyteller. See Eugene Eoyang, “Word of Mouth,” 162; Mair, Tang Transformation Texts, 115, 121. In his later study, Mair revises his opinion and theorizes that the verse written on the scroll was written much later than the picture in front. See “sÊriputra Defeats the Six Heterodox Masters,” 41. For details concerning the story, the scroll, and the wall painting of “The Magic Competition” see “Performance: Orality and Visuality” in Fraser’s Performing the Visual, 159–196.

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was the rst to suggest the connection between the verse written on one side of the scroll and the pictures on the other side.31 More recently, scholar Victor Mair has suggested that the scroll ingeniously allowed the storyteller to read aloud from the verse while simultaneously displaying the accompanying illustrations to the audience. Further, Mair theorizes that the pictures on the walls of caves in Dunhuang—which include scenes from “The Devil’s Defeat” as well as other traditional tales, with appropriate snippets of text accompanying each image—were also intended to illustrate oral tales. There remain disagreements as to the nature of the painted murals within the caves of Dunhuang, but there is fairly unanimous agreement that scroll P4524 provided a visual narrative in conjunction with an oral tale, and thus functioned in an essentially mimetic fashion.32 Mair argues that such visual props were common during the Tang era, and especially common within the traditions of Buddhist storytelling and preaching.33 The scholar Jaroslav Pr%šek holds that public entertainers (by which he means those who performed on the streets and in teahouses) illustrated popular historical tales in this same way through the mid-twentieth century.34 In these cases, images are employed to vivify the story and enhance the visual appeal of the performance. The images further provide the storyteller with a structural framework that functions almost like a script. The use of these images subtly altered the phenomenology of public storytelling, establishing the tale as something xed rather than spontaneous, something complementary rather than autonomous. The important point about scroll P4524 and the cave murals of Dunhuang is that in both instances image and text are apparently arranged with strict parallelism. This convention was extended to printed prayer sheets during the era of the Five Dynasties, and was especially prominent in published versions of Buddhist stories that appeared between the ninth century and the mid-sixteenth century. An extant manuscript

31

Nicole Vandier-Nicolas, Sariputra et les six maître d’erreur, 1–32. The Chinese scholars Cai Weitang and Li Yongning do not think the mural paintings inside the caves of Dunhuang played a role in storytelling. See “Xiangmo bianwen yu Dunhuang bihua zhong de Laoducha dou Sheng bian,” 167–233. Wu Hung follows this opinion in his article “What is Bianxiang?” 190–1. Sarah Fraser proposes that the mural painting shows many dramatic poses and postures, and thus bears a relation to performance. See Performing the Visual, 177–196. 33 Victor Mair, Painting and Performance, 1–16. 34 Jaroslav Pr%šek, The Origins and Authors of the hua-pen, 112–3. 32

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fragment of the Japanese sutra E IngakyÔ, according to art historian Julia Murray, is based on a Chinese model, which allows us to speculate that the ‘pictures-above-text’ layout can be traced at least to the Six Dynasties period.35 This layout also appears in Buddhist prayer books, as demonstrated by editions of Wenshu zhinan tuzan, Wuxiang zhishi song,36 and Tianzhu lingqian published during the Southern Song,37 and in more popular volumes of Buddhist tales, as demonstrated by an edition of Mulian jiumu jing published during the Yuan dynasty, perhaps in order to assist readers who were illiterate or semi-literate.38 This layout was still popular in the early and mid-Ming era. It is used to good effect, for example, in the anthology of Buddhist stories Shishi yuanliu. Both Mair and Pr%šek offer interesting asides in which they relate this tradition to the series of ve books of pinghua, or ‘popular tales’ related in prose,39 that were printed by the Yu family in Fujian between 1321 and 1323.40 Mair observes, for example, that the Buddhist tradition of oral storytelling branches in two directions, evolving into oral performance without pictures, on the one hand, and written texts with illustrations, on the

35 Julia K. Murray, “Evolution on Buddhist Narrative Illustration,” 137–8. See also Robert Hegel, Reading Illustrated Fiction, 168–72. In China, the earliest example of this layout is the 1063 edition of Gu Lienü zhuan. The 1215 edition published by the Fujian publisher Yu indicates that it is a reprint of the 1063 edition. The edition is reprinted in Baibu congshu jicheng. 36 For a study of the illustrations of these two works see Jan Fontein, The Pilgrimage of Sudhana, 24–52. 37 Zheng Zhenduo proposes without explanation in his afterward to the reprint of a Southern Song edition of Tianzhu lingqian that it was published in the Jiading era (1208–1224). He adds, however, that the edition was published around 1250 while including several illustrations by both the Ming and Yuan artists. See “Afterward,” in Tianzhu lingqian, 301–5. Though he mentions that the book dates from the Jiading era, Robert Hegel following Zheng’s second opinion, without further explanation, puts the date “around 1250” in Reading Illustrated Fiction (168). Its publishing date thus remains obscure. 38 There is an illustrated edition of Mulian jiumu jing in the Kimpika Temple in Kyoto. It is a Japanese reprint of a 1251 Yuan edition published by Cheng Jiliu and others. The 1251 edition was brought to Japan in 1304 and was reprinted by the monk Fazu in 1346. See Miya Tsugio, “Mokuren kyÖbo setsuwa to sono kaiga,” 155–78. 39 Glen Dudbridge translates pinghua as ‘popular tale’ in The Hsi-yu chi (56, note 5), Anne McLaren as ‘plain tale’ in Chinese Popular Culture and Ming Chantefables (337); and Robert Hegel as ‘plain[ly told] tales’ in Reading the Illustrated Fiction (26). Having to choose, I follow Dudbridge’s translation because the tales seem to me more popular than plain. 40 The ve extent pinghua stories are Quanxiang Sanguozhi pinghua, Quanxiang Wu Wang fa Zhou pinghua, Quanxiang Qiguo chunqiu houji, Quanxiang Qin bing Liuguo pinghua, and Quanxiang Qian Hanshu xuji. For a discussion of the language in these pinghua and their relation with vernacular literature see Robert Hegel, Reading Illustrated Fiction, 23–25.

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other. He cites the volumes of pinghua as the earliest dated example of this kind of illustrated text. It can be argued that the parallelism between image and word is traceable to an even earlier date, and that it is rst instanced in the traditions of narrative painting. It is not accidental that the earliest example of printed illustration in the pictures-above-text layout appears in a 1063 edition of Gu Lienü zhuan attributed to the famous narrative painter Gu Kaizhi (c. 344–c. 405). We see a similar strict parallelism in the famous narrative painting Picture of “The Female Historian’s Teachings” (“Nüshi zhen” tu), which is attributed to Gu, but is more likely a Tangera reproduction of his original work. It is composed of eight or nine panels (the divisions are ambiguous), each of which includes a textual excerpt from “The Female Historian’s Teachings” (an anonymous essay on female etiquette) and a painted scene attempting to depict the gist of the text.41 This parallelism continues in many later hand-scroll narrative paintings such as Picture of the King of Jin ( Jin Wengong fuguo tu), an anonymous work of the 1140s; Pictures from The Books of Songs (Mao Shi tujuan) by Ma Hezhi (active ca. 1130–ca. 1170);42 Picture of “The Poem of Return” (“Guiqu lai ci” tu) painted by Li Gonglin (1049–1106), which depicts the famous poem by Tao Qian (365–427);43 and Pictures of The Nine Songs ( Jiuge tu) an anonymous work dated 1361 that illustrates Qu Yuan’s (B.C. 343–277) famous anthology of poems about the gods. Narrative illustration continues this painting tradition but places the corresponding picture above the text, which helps to explain why illustration and painting were considered analogous during the Ming era, a topic discussed in chapter ve. The pictures-above-text layout bears close resemblance to the traditional conguration of the painted hand-scroll, which is the essential medium of the narrative painting tradition. Both the pictures-above-text layout and the painted hand-scroll involve a sequential visual narrative that moves from right to left in tandem with a related text. Some handscrolls attempt to relate the narrative of literary works without including the text or excerpts from the text, suggesting the capacity of images to

41

The picture is now in the collection of the British Museum. For a study of Ma’s scroll see Julia K. Murray’s Ma Hezhi and the Illustration of the Book of Odes. 43 Attributed to Li Gonglin. For studies of this painting see Elizabeth Brotherton’s “Beyond the Written Word,” 225–263, and Martin J. Powers’ “Love and Marriage in Song China,” 51–62. 42

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bear—or reproduce—narrative content. Famous examples include Picture of “The Rhapsody of the Goddess Luo” (“Luo Shen fu” tu) attributed to Gu Kaizhi, which depicts a poem written by Cao Zhi (192–232) during the Three Kingdoms era;44 Picture of “The Rhapsody of the Red Cliff ” (“Chibi fu” tu) painted by Wu Yuanzhi (1126–1223), and Picture of “The Second Rhapsody of the Red Cliff ” (“Hou Chibi fu” tu) by Qiao Zhongchang (active in the rst half of the twelfth century), which depict the two famous prose-poems of Su Shi (1037–1101);45 and Picture of The Classic of Female Filial Piety (Nü Xiaojing tu), an anonymous painting that depicts scenes from the famous book of Confucian teachings.46 As Wu Hung indicates in his study The Double Screen, the hand-scroll painting is to be appreciated section by section.47 It is important to add that each ‘section’ of the scroll closely resembles the open book in both height and width. It was natural, then, that book illustrators drew inspiration from the example of the hand-scroll. Like the conguration of the hand-scroll, the pictures-above-text layout unfolds sequentially in accordance with the narrative content of the text. In some cases, a hand-scroll painting was sectionalized and reproduced as a series of woodblock prints. Zhang Kai’s (1398–1460) Pictures of the Sage’s Life (Shengji tu) according to Julia Murray, for example, was painted in 1444, engraved onto stone tablets in 1460, and engraved onto woodblocks in 1497.48 Some of these woodblock prints were preserved and served as blueprints for reproductions of hand-scroll paintings that had long been lost.49 The dominance of the pictures-above-text layout prior to the late Ming period suggests that illustration followed its counterpart handscroll narrative painting in the attempt to narrate the text in sequential, visual terms. The attempt is to represent the story in images as well as

44 There are at least ve different versions of the painting extant to modern days. They are respectively in the collections of Beijing Palace Museum, Taipei Palace Museum, Liaoning Provincial Museum, and Freer Gallery. 45 For a study of these paintings see Jerome Silbergeld’s “Back to the Red Cliff,” 19–38. 46 For a study of this painting see Julia K. Murray’s “The Ladies’ Classic of Filial Piety and Sung Textual Illustration,” 95–129; and “Didactic Art for Women,” 27–53. 47 Wu Hung, The Double Screen, 57–61. 48 A reproduction of the woodblock illustrated edition, Zheng claims it was published in 1444, is included in Zhongguo gudai banhua congkan, edited by Zheng Zhenduo, 1:371–92. 49 For a study of Shengji tu, see Julia K. Murray, “Illustrations of the Life of Confucius,” 73–134. A hand-scroll of Shengji tu, ink and colors on silk, signed by Kong Zhenyun, is preserved in Idemitsu Museum in TÔkyÔ. See Ibid., 120–1.

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in words—a union that has an underlying logic in the basic aesthetic principles of the Chinese tradition, as articulated in such common maxims as ‘Painting within poetry, poetry within painting’ (shi zhong you hua, hua zhong you shi) and ‘Words and painting share a single origin’ (shu hua tong yuan). In her study of woodblock versions of Zhang Kai’s painting Pictures of the Sage’s Life, Julia Murray calls this type of illustration ‘narrative illustration’ and places it in the context of ‘narrative representation,’ which she denes “simply as a picture that refers to a story, as opposed to the icon, which is experienced as an isolated timeless image.”50 In Murray’s use of the term, ‘narrative illustration’ refers to both painting and woodblock illustration, and indeed to any picture that attempts to narrate a story. Given the wide scope of her discussion, the term ‘narrative picture’ would be more suitable, while the term ‘narrative illustration’ is useful in describing the development of woodblock illustration published prior to the Wanli period. But in this study the term ‘narrative illustration’ refers only to the type of woodblock illustration that attempts to repeat the narrative content in pictorial terms. In order to avoid confusion, painting that serves the same function is here termed ‘narrative painting.’ ‘Narrative illustration,’ however, refers not only to illustration in the pictures-above-text layout, but to all illustration that attempts to reproduce narrative content. The illustrations in the pinghua run parallel to the text, summarizing and highlighting the actions described. The extant ve pinghua publications feature the same pictures-above-text layout: the image is displayed across the top of two half-folio pages (printed on the same sheet but folded into a verso and a recto page, as in gure 3–5). The image usually depicts several successive actions that ow from right to left as in a hand-scroll painting. The corresponding text is displayed below the illustration. This parallelism of the image and the text in a publication demonstrates an effort to incorporate the traditional dual narration of oral performance (as suggested by scroll P4524) into texts intended as reading material. The text explains and elaborates the image just as the storytellers did. These ve illustrated pinghua publications attempt to preserve the uninterrupted ow and the liveliness of storytelling. We

50 Ibid., 77. Two useful studies concerning narrative representation in Western art are Herbert L. Kessler and Marianna Shreve Simpson, eds., Studies in the History of Art, and W. J. T. Mitchell Picture Theory.

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can further say that the pictures-above-text layout attempts to recreate something of the formal structure of oral storytelling as traditionally practiced. We can also infer that the juxtaposition of image and word is essential or even intrinsic to the effectiveness of the mimetic relation between the two. The attempt to combine visual and literary narration, as in oral storytelling, is continued in published ction and drama.51 Much ction published prior to the Wanli period adopts the pictures-above-text layout.52 Characteristic is Hua Guan Suo zhuan, a ‘chantefable’ (shuochang cihua)—that is, a story told and sung in verse—published in 1478 by Yongshun Shutang.53 Also characteristic is the anthology of short stories Qimeng gushi published by the Zhan of Xiqing Tang in Fujian during the Jiajing era (1522–66). As both pinghua and ction are written in mostly colloquial prose, it is not difcult to see the continuity between these two genres of popular literature. It is signicant that some illustrated drama publications, like the 1498 edition of Xixiang ji published by the Yue family in Beijing,54 and the 1581 edition of Lizhi ji published in Fujian,55 also adopt the pictures-above-text layout as seen in the pinghua. This borrowing suggests that drama, like pinghua and ction, was both a popular literary and a popular performance genre. A 1566 edition

51 The ‘pictures-above-text’ layout is particularly popular in ction published during the late Ming period, and especially in ction published by Yu Xiangdou’s rms Shuangfeng Tang and Santai Guan in Fujian area, to the extent that Robert Hegel refers Yu’s publishing style as the ‘Jianyang School’ of book illustration. Hegel wrote “by presenting both text and illustration on the same page, Yu brought equal attention to both, thus helping the less literate and for those who could read easily and quickly, enhancing the experience of the text” (Reading Illustrated Fiction, 139). I think Hegel gives too much credit to Yu Xiangdou as the attempt to establish a parallelism between word and image did not begin with him. 52 A reproduction of Hua Guan Suo is included in Shanghai Wenwu Baoguan Weiyuanhui, ed., Ming Chenghua shuochang cihua congkan (here after cited as MCHSCCHCK ). Some of the illustrations of Qimeng gushi are included in Fu Xihua’s Zhongguo gudian wenxue banhua xuanji, 1:55–6. 53 Anne McLaren uses the word ‘chantefable’ to describe a tradition of oral storytelling that incorporates musical elements. See Chinese Popular Culture and Ming Chantefables. 54 This is the earliest edition of Xixiang ji among the currently extant editions. Wilt Idema and Stephen West’s English translation of the play titled The Moon and the Zither is based on this edition. Their interpretation of the play tends to emphasize the erotic, in keeping with the illustrations included in the edition. The 1991 edition of this translation includes an article by Yao Dajuin discussing the illustrations of the edition titled “The Pleasure of Reading Drama” (437–92). A reproduction of the 1498 edition is included in Guben xiqu congkan (here after cited as GBXQCK ), 1st series. 55 For a reproduction of the edition see Mingben Chaozhou xiwen wuzhong.

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of Lijing ji published by Yu Xin’an in Fujian, meanwhile, includes a variation on the traditional pictures-above-text layout.56 In this case, an illustration appears on every single page. It is centered in the middle of the text and surrounded on all four sides, rather than placed above the text. The illustrations constitute a sequential pictorial narration of the story just like illustrations laid out above the text. The illustrator did not depart from the tradition of narrative illustration, but worked a variation within its dening conventions. From these editions—Hua Guan Suo zhuan, Xixiang ji, Qimeng gushi, Lizhi ji, and Lijing ji—we can infer that the attempt to create a sequential pictorial narration in parallel with the text was a constant element in illustration prior to the Wanli period, and that these illustrations serve a narrative function analogous to that developed in painting. Whatever the format and layout they adopted, the publishers and illustrators in the pre-Wanli era did not seem to question the essential premise that illustrations of literary works (whatever the genre) ought to be narrative. The use of the pictures-above-text layout, indeed, became so commonplace that it began to complicate or extenuate the traditional divisions between literary genres. Pinghua, ction, and drama publications, for example, were understood to be distinct literary genres, and yet they were importantly united by the layout that characteristically governed their publication, and by the resulting commonality of reader response. In this regard, the pictures-above-text layout began to dene an emergent genre based on parallelism of image and text that amalgamated traditionally distinct literary genres. Published drama, in particular, was removed from its traditional association with the theater and became swept into the more general category of illustrated ction. It was to be read exactly as if it were ction; rather than the eye shuttling between the page and imagined visions of the stage, the eye was to shuttle between the page and essentially naturalistic representations of everyday life. A reader could move between ction and drama with little sense of disjunction, with his basic habits of reception intact. During this phase in Chinese publishing history, then, there was little sense of bifurcation between published drama and published ction: in their essence, each involved narrative text and complementary illustration.

56 There are two copies of the edition extant: one in the Tianli Library in Japan and one in Bodleian Library of Oxford University in England. For a reproduction of the Tianli edition see Mingben Chaozhou xiwen wuzhong.

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This mimetic relationship between text and image failed to take account of the reality of the theater, and thus fell out of favor during and after the Wanli period, when there was a sudden theatrical renaissance and theater became the primary cultural touchstone. Inevitably the development and unfolding of the plot became secondary to the representation of the trappings of theater. Illustrations ceased to function as complementary visual narratives, instead coming to function as symbols or reminders of the intrinsic relationship between text and theatrical performance. This departure can be clearly observed in almost all of the drama illustrations published during and after the Wanli period. The attempt to pair each section of a story with an illustration was discontinued, and there were changes as well to the layout of illustrations. The pictures-above-text layout was completely replaced by the pictures-amid-text layout.57 On the basis of the extant drama publications, it appears that the pictures-amid-text layout rst appeared in the 1435 edition of Jiaohong ji printed by Jide Tang in Jinling (modern Nanjing).58 This edition breaks with the pictures-above-text layout, but it maintains a more general parallelism between image and word, as illustrations appear with perfect regularity on alternate pages (illustration and the text are placed on opposite sides of the same folio with each illustration on the right side facing text on the left), thus achieving much the same parallelism as the earlier pictures-above-text layout. In this edition each illustration precedes the textual content, so that the viewer absorbs the image before encountering the accompanying text.59 The alternation between illustration and text allows the story to unfold alternately in visual and literary terms. This arrangement has a precedent in handscroll paintings like Picture of “The Female Historian’s Teachings” and Picture of The Nine Songs, which alternate blocks of text and corresponding images, creating almost precisely the same effect as the illustrations in 57 Robert Hegel thinks that this change from the pictures-above-text layout to the pictures-amid-text layout was inspired by a desire for a ‘competitive edge’ in rapidly expanding eld of commercial publishing (Reading Illustrated Fiction, 129). 58 Only one copy of this edition has survived; it is now in the collection of Kyoto University Library. A reproduction of the edition is included in GBXQCK, 1st series. 59 The format might be designed for the traditional ‘buttery-binding’ (hudie zhuang) in which the folio is folded inward and bound in the middle. The extant copy at Kyoto University is ‘thread-bound’ (xian zhuang). That is, the folio is folded with the image and text facing outward and then stitch bound at the edge of the folio. In its current form, the image and text are back to back so a reader encounters the image rst and then the text after turning the page.

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Jiaohong ji. The same is true of Li Gonglin’s famous painting album Pictures of The Book of Filial Piety (Xiaojing tu), in which images and their corresponding text alternate in precisely the same fashion as the 1435 edition of Jiaohong ji.60 Although the 1435 edition of Jiaohong ji retains the parallelism between image and word, it effects a drastic change in reading experience. Faced with the traditional pictures-above-text layout, a reader could choose to read the text continuously, page by page, without shifting his attention to the pictures above. Alternately, as Robert Hegel points out, the reader could focus on the illustration while paying scant attention to the text.61 Faced with the pictures-amid-text layout, however, the reader cannot maintain continuous absorption in either image or word; the interruption of the one by the other forces the reader to engage both. It would have been possible simply to skip from image to image or word to word, but the conguration of the publication did not encourage this approach, or rather allowed this approach only at the cost of a certain jarring discontinuity. This development suggests that the publisher of the 1435 edition of Jiaohong ji—and nearly all the publishers that were to follow during the early and mid-Wanli period—were concerned to intrude the image on the reader’s attention. More broadly, it reects an elevation in the status of the illustration that would become all the more clear with passing decades. This new layout, moreover, forecasted a change in the function of illustration. No longer would illustration simply mimic the text; increasingly it would challenge the text and interject the theater’s claim to cultural preeminence. The 1435 edition of Jiaohong ji may be understood as an important transitional publication that looks backward in its retention of the parallelism between image and word, as well as forward in its abandonment of the pictures-above-text layout. By the 1470s, the pictures-amid-text layout had become commonplace, and the parallelism between illustration and text had broken down. Illustrations began to appear at wider intervals, and in some cases the alternation between illustration and text was highly irregular. Most signicantly, the pictures-amid-text layout insured that the illustration would interrupt the ow of the text and arrest the attention of the reader. The new layout gave publishers and

60 For a detailed discussion of Xiaojing tu, see Richard M. Barnhart, Li Kung-lin’s Classic of Filial Piety, 73–155. 61 Robert Hegel, Reading Illustrated Fiction, 192.

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illustrators a new creative role, as the selection of scenes to be illustrated allowed them to emphasize particular junctures and characters, and to provide an implicit interpretation of the text. Thus illustration assumed a role that went well beyond merely re-narrating the play’s action in visual terms. The new layout also gave latitude to publishers in the placement of illustrations, and especially latitude to remove illustrations from the vicinity of the accompanying text. An illustration might appear, for example, several pages from the textual passage that describes the depicted scene. This allowed publishers to reiterate specic textual content, again as a means of emphasis. Early examples of this freer placement of illustration include the sixteen chantefables and the play Baitu ji that were published during the 1470s by Yongshun Shutang in Beijing and excavated in 1967 in Jiading County in Shanghai.62 These publications—with the exception of Hua Guan Suo zhuan, which adheres to the traditional pictures-above-text layout—adopt the pictures-amid-text layout with illustrations placed at irregular intervals. Even more unusually, most of the editions include some full half-folio pages that feature two distinct illustrations, one placed above the other, a conguration unusual enough to suggest an active experiment.63 Including two images on one full half-folio was interestingly ambitious. Keeping in mind that traditional Chinese books are read from top to bottom, the two images constitute a continuous (if abbreviated) visual sequence that recalls the continuity inscribed by the pictures-above-text layout, and attempts to incorporate the advantages of both the pictures-above-text and pictures-amid-text layouts. This format did not catch on, however, presumably because it constantly threw off the rhythm of the reader; the momentum of the visual narration was constantly interrupted by the textual narration and vice versa. In this respect illustration and text were set in competition with each other, thus introducing a subtly uncomfortable element in the reading experience. In the more conventional version of the pictures-amid-text layout this is a lesser problem, of course, as the single illustration does not create the same momentum of visual narration. More generally, these editions 62 Anne McLaren, Chinese Popular Culture and Ming Chantefables, 15. These excavated editions are reproduced in an anthology: Shanghai Wenwu Baoguan Weiyuanhui, ed., MCHSCCHCK. 63 Four different stories form Hua Guan Suo’s biography. The stories respectively relate his origins (Chushen zhuan), the reunication with his father (Renfu zhuan), his expedition to Sichuan (Xia Xichuan zhuan), and his demotion to Yunnan (Bian Yunnan zhuan). The Wenwu publisher counts these as four stories rather as a single story.

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suggest both uncertainty and experimentation, representing a moment of ux in the history of Chinese illustration; it is nonetheless clear that the pictures-amid-text layout was becoming increasingly dominant. As the pictures-above-text layout attempts to preserve the experience of oral storytelling, so the pictures-amid-text layout, attempts to preserve the experience of theatrical performance. Anne McLaren divides the development of Chinese book illustration into two phases with the crucial juncture marked by these Yongshun Shutang editions of chantefables. According to McLaren, the pinghua illustrations published during the Yuan dynasty belong to the rst phase. These illustrations are characteristically employed either to “explain the text, or relate each episode of the story.”64 The pictures-amid-text layout, then, characterizes the later phase in which “illustrations are used for aesthetic and decorative appeal.”65 McLaren describes these illustrations as “stereotyped line drawings, which call to mind stage performance and the picture-recitation mode of storytelling,” and she notes that they “further enhanced the reader’s perception that the text is modeled on or even a substitute for an oral or dramatic performance.”66 Here McLaren conates ‘oral performance’ and ‘dramatic performance’ as inuences on later book illustration. These inuences, however, are entirely distinct and yield entirely different sub-traditions of illustration. We can see clearly the inuence of oral storytelling in the pictures-above-text layout: both maintain a parallel progress of image and text. The pictures-amid-text layout, however, rejects the continuous ow of the pictures-above-text layout in order to establish a xed frame that allows the replication of the xed frame of the stage. The illustrations included in the play Baitu ji exemplify this dynamic. The volume’s rst illustration (gure 6–12) shows a single character framed by a pavilion that resembles a stage structure. The image recalls the theatrical convention in which the fumo (i.e. the ‘secondary protagonist’ or supporting male actor) enters the stage and introduces the play with a moralizing soliloquy.67 Not coincidentally, this illustration appears on the very rst page of the volume. Again, these volumes of chantefables suggest a period of transition. While the edition of Hua Guan Suo maintains the picturesabove-text layout, the edition of Baitu ji —signicantly, a play—adopts 64 65 66 67

Anne McLaren, Chinese Popular Culture and Ming Chantefables, 59. Ibid., 59. Ibid., 66. For further discussion of this theatrical convention, see chapter six of this study.

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not only the pictures-amid-text layout, but also the specic trappings of the theater and the general inspiration of the stage. In these respects, Baitu ji was ahead of its time. It was to be another hundred years before these innovations became commonplace. Even after the precedent set by Baitu ji, drama publications such as the 1498 edition of Xixiang ji, the 1566 edition of Lijing ji, and the 1581 edition of Lizhi ji—to take the three most prominent examples—remained faithful to the older conventions. The gradual shift in layout responded, as it were defensively, to a general transformation of the theatrical culture. With the sudden and dramatic expansion of the printing industry during the Wanli period, there was a surge in the publications of plays, and drama itself rapidly evolved into a predominantly literary rather than performance medium. Tending to cater to the reader rather than to the theatergoer, plays became increasingly abstruse and difcult to stage. Many literati were alarmed by this transformation, believing that the theater provided an indispensable moral education to the masses, the majority of whom could not read. Much illustration of the Wanli period must be understood as part of this larger rearguard action against the bookishness of contemporary drama. In an attempt to counterbalance the movement away from performance, illustrators incorporated within their work elements of the stage; this was to remind readers that drama was not merely a creature of the page. The pictures-above-text layout was inconsistent with this rearguard action because of its historical association with strictly literary genres like ction and pinghua, and because of its emphasis on plot development and narrative continuity. Chinese theater, of course, is far less plot-driven than Chinese ction, oftentimes involving a series of near-discrete soliloquies and songs; in this respect, traditional theater is closer to poetry than ction, as suggested by the traditional classication of drama and poetry as equally belonging to the category of ‘literary works’ ( ji bu). The pictures-amid-text layout, on the other hand, seemed better styled to serve the aspirations of theatrical loyalists. While the pictures-above-text layout suggested a continuous linear movement through space that was incompatible with the xed frame of the theatrical stage, the pictures-amid-text layout seemed to embody this xed frame and seemed to recognize a spatial boundary consistent with the boundary of the stage. On this basis the pictures-amid-text layout became dominant during the early and mid-Wanli eras, especially within the pages of published plays, which is to say, within the teeth

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of the enemy. This type of illustration—that which brings the stage to bear on drama publications—is termed ‘performance illustration’ in this study. The mimetic function of illustration is replaced by the performative function in which the stage is conjured as the imaginative space of the narration. As performance illustration attempts to reestablish the relation between the printed play and the performed play, the conventions and issues of drama inevitably become deeply intertwined with the conventions and issues of illustration. Drama and illustration of the Wanli period, then, can only be understood in terms of each other, and in terms of the larger metaphysical debate that informed the debate about drama. Performance illustration rapidly rose to dominance, but just as rapidly began to fade in the late Wanli period. In the attempt to redene the drama publication as a theatrical space, the publication itself seemed to lose its autonomous status as a printed medium and the published play came to seem a mere script, a mere handmaiden to the stage. There inevitably developed a backlash against performance illustration during the late Wanli and the early Qing periods. This reaction attempted to afrm the autonomy of the drama publication as a reading medium and the play itself as a species of literature. The primary manifestations of this reaction were the inclusion of interlineal commentaries by or attributed to famous literati, which had no possible analogy to the experience of theatergoing, and the adoption of a new layout (‘picturesbefore-text’) that grouped illustrations together as prefatory material, thus erasing illustration’s ability periodically to remind the reader of the play’s theatrical backdrop.68 In place of theatrical inspiration, publishers and illustrators sought inspiration in the eld of landscape gure painting. This type of illustration, here termed ‘landscape illustration,’ features a poetic inscription

68 Robert Hegel in Reading Illustrated Fiction overlooks the theatrical inuence on the illustrations in late 16th and early 17th centuries; he also overlooks the obvious stylistic change from performance-oriented to landscape-oriented illustration during and after the mid-Wanli period. Craig Clunas likewise overlooks this stylistic change in his Pictures and Visuality. Most other scholarly studies of illustration either focus on a particular edition (see for example studies of Min Qiji’s edition of Xixiang ji by Ho Dalbanco, Wu Hung, and Kobayashi Hiromitsu) or focus on different editions of the same work (see for example Julia Murray’s study of Nü Xiaojing and Shengji tu, and Kathryn Carlitz’s study of Lienü zhuan) or focus on the work of a single artist (see for example Kobayashi’s study of the illustrations of the famous late Ming painter Chen Hongshou). None of these studies note the change from performance-oriented to landscape-oriented illustration.

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or ‘caption’ culled from the text in its margins. Scenery of landscape or gardens tends to dominate the image, while the human gure tends to be reduced in size. In any given edition the succession of illustrations recall the kind of landscape albums that were popular at the time. There were so many illustrations in the style of landscape painting during and after the Wanli period that the scholar Yao Dajuin attributes the genre to “an obsession with landscape on the part of the woodblock illustrator—an obsession that often results in gures so inexpressive and insignicant that they become no more than decorative motifs in a landscape, difcult for the viewer to relate to emotionally.”69 Yao makes this comment in the context of his own study of the 1498 edition of Xixiang ji, and can perhaps be suspected of attempting to enshrine this edition. In fact, there is no reason to believe that the landscape illustrations of the late Ming period are inferior in quality and technique to the illustrations of the 1498 edition. Indeed, many of the most famous painters—giants like Chen Hongshou, Xiao Yuncong and Ding Yunpeng (1547–1628)—produced landscape illustrations, and the acclaimed carvers of the Huang family of Anhui were responsible for producing many of the woodblocks that were used. Landscape illustration must have fullled the artistic impulses of these serious artists, and if only for this reason does not deserve to be dismissed hastily. After the mid-Wanli era the landscape illustration quickly became dominant, a development readily understood and emphasized by the art historians who have been responsible for most of the scholarship pertaining to illustrations. Art historian James Cahill, for example, associates the Hui School woodblock print with the indigenous painting of the Anhui region, as exemplied in contemporary exhibition catalogs like Shadows of Mt. Huang.70 The most pronounced inuence on post-Wanli illustration is the painting style of the Wu School, which emerged in the Soochow area and became prominent under the leadership of well-known literati painters such as Shen Zhou (1427–1509) and Wen Zhengming (1470–1559).71 Its intention was to compete against the dominant professional style of the Zhe School, which was

69

Yao Dajuin, “The Pleasure of Reading Drama,” 445. The exhibition is held at the University Art Museum, Berkeley, Jan. 21–Mar. 22, 1981. 71 For a detailed study of Wen Zhengming’s social activities as an artist see Craig Clunas’ Elegant Debts. 70

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favored in imperial and ofcial circles.72 The Wu School dominated Chinese painting from the era of Wen Zhengming until the fall of the Ming dynasty. It is not surprising that the style of the work of the Wu School struck late Ming publishers as just the thing to serve their purpose, as the school was essentially a literati movement with deep literary sympathies. Most obviously, the Wu School was dened by its taste for scenes of literati activity (painting, writing, tea drinking, and so forth); less obviously, it created a complex system of visual symbols and allusions drawn from literary and artistic history. Post-Wanli illustrators were happy to appropriate and utilize this system as a means of interpreting and commenting on the text. Thus the forty-year reign of performance illustration came to an abrupt close, and the moral allure of the theater was supplanted by the vastly expanded range of expression made possible by the newly imported painting style. This new style of landscape illustration implies a very different reading practice, but this is an issue too vast and too complicated to be covered in the present study. Toward the end of the Ming dynasty illustration expanded its expressive range even further. Having absorbed the example of landscape painting, illustrators began to seek inspiration in other painting genres (such as ‘Birds and Flowers’ or Huaniao) and other painting methods (such as the use of embedded scenes or frames, a phenomenon treated in Wu Hung’s celebrated study The Double Screen). This creativity gained momentum over the course of the Ming period. As the eld became more innovative and interesting, it began to attract painters of renown, who in turn catalyzed yet further innovation. As illustration became a suppler expressive medium, it became a more sophisticated vehicle for critical commentary and an increasingly important component of the literati culture. Many literati, in fact, became sufciently intrigued with the publishing culture to take up publishing themselves. This led to the publication of so-called ‘literati editions,’ which were carefully edited by scholars and featured illustrations and commentary by well-known literati. The most famous of these literati editions is the 1639 edition of Xixiang ji published by Zhang Shengzhi, who listed many famous literati as editors and contributors to this edition. The edition includes ve illustrations by Chen Hongshou, one of the most famous gure

72 See James Cahill’s study Parting at the Shore for the intertwined development of Zhe and Wu Schools throughout the Ming dynasty.

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painters of the era.73 The illustrations, not surprisingly, demonstrate the characteristics of Chen’s painting technique: a preference for morally provocative subject matter and highly stylized depiction reminiscent of the Luohan paintings of the Song dynasty.74 Of the many new inspirations brought to bear on illustration during the late Ming era, Huaniao painting was undoubtedly the most signicant. Dating from at least the Song dynasty, Huaniao painting was largely restricted to the depiction of birds and owers—hence its name—but it invested these commonplace aspects of nature with intense symbolic meaning derived from the traditions of poetry. It evolved a rich vocabulary of symbol, allusion, and metaphor by which even the simplest images could be made to carry complex moral and cultural signications. The techniques of Huaniao were thus perfectly calculated to serve the purposes of illustrators who wanted to act as literary commentators, and to compensate for the roughness of line intrinsic to woodblock illustration. What could not be expressed by the connotation of line and form might be expressed by the denotation of symbol. The most typical examples of the appropriation of motifs from Huaniao painting are the twenty-one illustrations included in the 1640 edition of Xixiang ji published by Tianzhang Ge. Departing from the precedent of both performance illustration and interpretive illustration in the landscape style, which consistently depict multiple gures in a single frame, eleven of these illustrations show only the female protagonist Cui Yingying. The remaining ten illustrations, moreover, are even more radically conceived, decisively breaking with the entire idea of illustration as a visual expression of narrative action. Instead of representing the characters of the play going about their business as described in the text, these illustrations depict still-life images of birds, trees, owers, and rocks, none of which are so much as mentioned in the text.75 Each of these images, however, carries a specic symbolic

73 In her survey of the history of woodblock prints in China, Zhou Xinhui attributes all works to Chen. See Zhongguo gu banhua tongshi, 209–214. But only the illustrations in the Zhang Shenzhi edition of Xixiang ji and the 1639 edition of Jiaohong ji can be condently attributed to Chen. 74 These ve illustrations are the subject of Kobayashi’s study “Kin Koju no hanga katsudo (I & II),” 25–39 and 35–51. The Zhang Shenzhi edition is reproduced in GBXQCK, 1st series. 75 The illustrations of this edition are the subject of two papers by Li-ling Hsiao: “Reading the Illustrator’s Reading of the Tianzhang Ge edition of Xixiang ji (1640),” 137–151; and “The Allusive Mode of Production,” 37–73.

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meaning established by the traditions of painting and poetry, and provides a subtle moral commentary on the relevant juncture in the narrative action.76 The techniques of Huaniao painting are intrinsically sophisticated, and that their adoption naturally suggests the attempt to engage in the kind of moral commentary for which they had originally been devised. It is only on this assumption that the adoption of such images makes any sense; the denial of this assumption renders the images—which have no manifest relation to the play—entirely random and meaningless. A simultaneous development during the last decade of the Ming period and the early Qing period was illustration’s depiction of framing devices like stage structures, paintings, and screens. The motif of the so-called embedded frame was a gesture toward a traditional Chinese metaphysical conception according to which the universe itself was understood to comprise a sequence of realities embedded within realities; it was also a nod to the theater, which, in keeping with the general structure of the universe, seemed to embed a distinct and autonomous reality within the reality of everyday life. More specically, the sudden popularity of this motif had much to do with a contemporary preoccupation with the analogy between drama and dream as realities embedded within our ‘everyday’ reality. This preoccupation was most likely instigated by Tang Xianzu’s (1550–1616) plays, Mudan ting (preface dated 1598), Nanke meng (preface dated 1600), and Handan meng (preface dated 1613), all of which powerfully explore this analogy. The most celebrated examples of this kind of illustration are to be found in the 1640 edition of Xixiang ji published by Min Qiji. All twenty-one of these color illustrations encompass subsidiary frames—paintings, vases, screens, lanterns, stages—which depict scenes of their own. These illustrations, sophisticatedly self-conscious, have become the most studied illustrations of the period among contemporary scholars, some of whom (Wu Hung, Kobayashi, Delbanco) are discussed above.77

76

At an annual meeting of the Association of Asian Studies in 2000, James Cahill took exception to my notion that these illustrations constitute a sophisticated variety of literary criticism, doubting that illustrators were as sophisticated as I claimed. I hope that my arguments in this chapter answer something of his criticism. 77 Li-ling Hsiao’s paper titled “The World on Puppet Strings,” read in the annual Conference of AAS in 2003, discusses the philosophical implication of the nineteenth illustration, which depicts a puppet show. In the same conference Kimberly Besio read a paper titled “Writing Poetry on a Leaf,” which includes a discussion of the third

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In a less elaborate version of the same framing technique, many illustrations began to feature circular, rectangular, or fan-shaped frames— simple bounding lines within the larger boundary of the illustration. A rectangular illustration, for example, might encompass a circular frame, which might in turn encompass a banquet scene. Robert Hegel argues that this kind of framing draws “further attention to the pictures as art, which may also have reduced the immediacy of the relationship between text and picture.”78 Hegel’s view that the use of such frames works to establish illustration as ‘art’ is constructive, but his further view that it may have “reduced the immediacy of the relationship between text and picture” is questionable. By adopting the convention of the frame, illustration attempted to associate itself with painting. This was not in order to abandon the text, but to establish a new authority in relation to the text by appropriating the symbolic and metaphorical vocabulary developed in the eld of painting. An illustration appearing in the Shunzhi edition of Yipengxue by Li Yu (b. 1610–1620, d. after 1671) demonstrates the point (gure 1–1).79 It includes a circular frame; within the circular frame appears a wooden proscenium; within the proscenium appears a ‘carpet stage’ (zhanyu juchang). Upon the carpet stage the play Zhongshan lang by Wang Jiusi (1468–1551) is being acted. These multiple frames go far beyond the simple framing line that might suggest the frame of a painting; the logic of this complex arrangement lies elsewhere. The illustration takes it cue from the narrative of Yipengxue, which embeds a performance of Zhongshan lang. The illustrator’s decision to depict the embedded frames suggested by the text constitutes both a recognition of the importance of this structure and an endorsement of its philosophical complexity. The illustration, as it were, privileges the particular element within the play.

illustration. Jennifer G. Purtle’s paper titled “Scopic Frames” studies the entire set of illustrations from the perspective with reference to the ‘cinematic visuality’ in Chinese visual culture. Ma Mengjing discusses the decorative appeal of color illustration in the publishing culture of the late Ming, see “Ermu zhi wan,” 201–276. 78 Robert Hegel, Reading Illustrated Fiction, 206. 79 The Li Yu mentioned here is to be distinguished from the famous playwright and drama critic Li Yu (1611–c. 1680). The former was known by his penname Sumen Xiaolü or The Master of Yili’an. The Shunzhi edition of Yipengxue is reproduced in GBXQCK, 3rd series.

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1–1. “The Banquet.” In Yipengxue, by Li Yu. N.p.: unknown publisher, 1628– 1644. Reproduced from GBXQCK, 3rd series, box 4, vol. 6. Shanghai: Shangwu yinshuguan, 1955–1957.

Conclusion As this brief historical exploration suggests, the sudden rise of drama illustration in the early Wanli period constitutes a very signicant development in the history of Chinese woodblock illustration. A thorough investigation of the cultural meaning of this sudden change is especially important and timely as print culture has become, in recent years, a focus of academic study. In this study drama illustration will not be treated as merely decorative, but as highly self-conscious and purposeful, and fully complicit in the most important intellectual movement of the day. Rather than simply dismissing illustration on the grounds of aesthetic inferiority, a student of late Ming culture should give Ming

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readers the benet of the doubt and ask what illustration signied and what role it served in its original historical context. It is true that illustration is repetitive and conventional, but then so is painting, and in many of the same ways. In both cases, the repeated elements constitute a kind of coded visual language that was implicitly understood by the reader. As words are used to form new sentences, each visual device is used to construct a new syntax within the frame of the image. Like its linguistic counterpart, the visual device is necessarily repetitive and conventional in order that it may be shared and comprehended by the members of a given society. Considering illustration in this light, we begin to have a better understanding of its role within late Ming culture. Readers did not look to illustration for beauty, but for insight, information, commentary, and, most importantly, as with the theater, for moral education. The contemporary scholar must also look to illustration for these meanings. As meaning emerges from the complicated interplay of contexts, the scholar must have some formal training in a number of elds: the histories of literature, art, theater, and printing. Illustration must become a eld of broad interdisciplinary inquiry. Only then can the study of illustration shed the biases of art history, and illustration itself come into focus as a central cultural phenomenon.

CHAPTER TWO

THE STAGE OR THE PAGE: COMPETING CONCEPTIONS OF THE PLAY IN THE WANLI PERIOD

Prior to the Wanli period, Chinese drama was inseparable from the act of performance.1 Performance, in the Chinese idea, embodies not only the recitation and dramatization of a text, but as a strict rule singing and dancing as well, and thus combines elements of Western drama, ballet, and opera. Not only were plays composed exclusively for performance, but the essential quality of a play was considered to inhere in the performance rather than the text. A play like Mudan ting by Tang Xianzu, for example, was often criticized during the late Ming period for failing to lend itself to live performance.2 It was considered

1 That performance played a more important role than publication in the Yuan and early Ming periods is revealed in several respects. First, most of the Yuan plays that we know are from editions published during the late Ming period, including the Maiwang Guan edition in 1588–9, Zang Maoxun edition in 1616, and Meng Chengshun edition in 1633, which leads modern scholars to conclude that the study of Yuan drama is actually a study of Ming drama. For a discussion of the editorial intention of the late Ming editors/publishers in rewriting and publishing the Yuan drama see Patricia Sieber’s study Theaters of Desire. Second, but there are many mural paintings, art objects, stage constructions, and sculptures that offer us a chance to glimpse the reality of the theater during the Yuan dynasty. The dissemination of the stories thus largely depended on performance. Third, the early play Huanmen zidi cuo lishen written by Gu Hang cairen informs us that the performance scripts actors used were in manuscript form, suggesting that drama was not common reading. A reprint of the manuscript in Yongle dadian is included in GBXQCK, 1st series. 2 Zang Maoxun was Tang’s chief critic. He edited an anthology of Tang’s plays titled Linchuan simeng. In his annotations on the margins of the pages, Zang explains his textual changes and constantly criticizes Tang’s plays as poorly suited to the demands of performance. His comments on Zichai ji are typical (see Zang Maoxun, ed., Linchuan simeng, 8b, 10b, 12a–b). Late Ming playwrights like Shen Jing, Feng Menglong, Ling Mengchu all criticized Tang for not knowing the Kunqu music, an important dramatic music genre that emerged in the late Ming period and dominated the theaters of the era, as will be discussed later in this chapter. Modern scholar Xu Shuofang argues that Tang’s musical lyrics were grafted onto Yihuang rather than Kunqu music. See “Tang Xianzu xiqu de qiangdiao he ta de shidai,” 105–110. Catherine Swatek proposes that Mudan ting was performed both in Yihuang style (following the opinion of Xu Shuofang) and in Kunshan style. See Peony Pavilion Onstage, 5, 294–295 (note). Zhou Yude cites

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a great play on its literary merits, but also very awed. It was only after a purely literary conception of drama became dominant during the Tianqi and Chongzhen periods that it came to be recognized as the pinnacle of Chinese drama. The plays of Shen Jing (1553–1610), on the other hand, were considered among the greatest plays of Ming drama during the late Ming period solely on their merits as performance pieces, but have since fallen into relative obscurity with the change in standards.3 Xu Fuzuo (1560–1630) describes Shen’s work Nan jiugong shisan diao qupu, which emphasizes the harmony between the intonation of each character and the accompanying melody, as “a shining compass that provides direction for playwrights amid the forest of poetry.”4 This emphasis on performance is attested by Li Yu (1611–c. 1680) in his miscellany Xianqing ouji, published in 1671:5 Lyrics [plays] are composed exclusively for performance. The philosophy of performance is difcult to propound. It is a waste when good lyrics are performed by the wrong people and good singers are taught in the wrong way. These sins are tantamount to tearing paintings and smashing jade.6

Li Yu equates inadequate performance with the physical destruction of the work of graphic art. The metaphor suggests that performance is an integral part of the dramatic work; an inadequate performance destroys the work as entirely as a painting is destroyed when it is torn up. Performance was not only indispensable but was perhaps a more essential component than the text itself in Chinese drama culture. It was held that performance brings the text to life; unperformed, the text is all but meaningless. The indispensability of the musical and visual

evidences from the writings of late Ming scholars that Tang’s plays were performed in both Yihuang and Kunshan styles (“ Linchuan simeng he Ming Qing wutai,” 79–87). 3 The competition between Shen Jing and Tang Xianzu eventually led to the formation of two major camps in drama theory during the late Ming: School of Music (Gelü pai ) and School of Literary Talent (Caiqing pai ). See Zhang Jing, Ming Qing chuanqi daolun, 30–41; Guo Yingde, Ming Qing wenren chuanqi yanjiu, 10–5; Zhang Geng and Guo Hancheng, Zhongguo xiqu tongshi, 2:85–124; John Hu, “Ming Dynasty Drama,” 72–4. Xu Shuofang holds that Tang wished to preserve the local theatrical traditions while Shen wished to establish Kunqu as the universal musical form of the stage. See “Tang Xianzu xiqu de qiangdiao he ta de shidai,” 105–110. 4 Xu Fuzuo, Qulun, in Zhongguo gudian xiqu lunzhu jicheng (here after cited as ZGGDXQLZJC), 4:240. 5 For a study of Li Yu’s life and his writing see Patrick Hanan’s The Invention of Li Yu. 6 Li Yu, Xianqing ouji, in ZGGDXQLZJC, 7:4.73–4.

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components in Chinese drama culture made it impossible to reduce drama to a mere textual composition. Drama publication, however, does reduce drama to textual composition and risks the danger of removing it from its theatrical context. This irreconcilable conict brought by the collision between the medium of book and the medium of theater became a serious issue in the Wanli period as the number of drama publications increased signicantly both in quantity and in quality. Before the Wanli period, plays were published only infrequently because most of the performers learned the stories and lyrics by heart from their masters, and, according to He Liangjun (1506–1573), because “the literati were ashamed to pay attention to drama” (of course literati playwrights such as Qiu Rui [1418–1495], Wang Jiusi, Kang Hai [1475–1540], and Li Kaixiang [1501–1568] were the exception).7 These circumstances left little market for drama publications. During the Wanli period, however, drama became the major entertainment of the literati culture, and this new popularity heightened the demand both for new plays and for published texts. The attention of the literati lent the drama culture of the day a new literary aspect. They wrote and attended plays, but they also tended to conceive drama from the perspective of their own bookishness, and devoted themselves to commenting on, collecting, and exchanging published texts. This elite enthusiasm increased demand for more and better plays, but more and better plays in turn tended to increase demand. Publishers sprang up to provide multiple editions of popular plays, and new performing groups sprang up to satisfy new audiences. This circular dynamic led to a theatrical Renaissance—the greatest period of dramatic activity since the Yuan period. The textual emphasis of the literati, however, brought to dramatic composition an increasingly literary language intended more for the reader than for the theatergoer.8 This language was often too involved for both the performers and the average audience. Under the divergent pressures of the textually minded literati and the performance-loving public, the drama culture began to bifurcate. The literati increasingly came

7

He Liangjun, Qulun, in ZGGDXQLZJC, 4:6. Catherine Swatek in her study Peony Pavilion Onstage also indicates that “[b]y the late Ming times, chuanqi [i.e. Ming theater] playtexts were not scripts as we think of them. Many were written in the form of plays, but were read—almost like novels—and seldom, if ever, performed” (8). 8

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to conceive drama as a literary genre divorced from the context of the theater, while performers increasingly found themselves having to adapt and simplify plays for their popular audiences, oftentimes retaining the plot but entirely revising the language. In explanation of this tendency to adapt plays for popular audiences, modern scholars in China and Japan have invoked a distinction between the ‘elegant’ ( ya) and the ‘plebian’ (su). The Japanese scholar Tanaka Issei, for example, proposes that the discrepancies in language found in different editions of Xixiang ji and Pipa ji are explained by the attempt to appeal to audiences representing different social strata.9 Scholar Lu Eting, a historian of Kun opera, proposes that the amalgam of ya and su in ‘scene performance’ (zhezi xi: performances of selected scenes rather than the whole play) is the key factor in the popularity of Kunqu (the dominant theatrical form from the late sixteenth to the early nineteenth centuries).10 Inuenced by Lu Eting, scholar Catherine Swatek argues that the amalgam of ya and su is likewise reected in the adaptations made by performers to Mudan ting during the Qing dynasty.11 These theories have merit, but there is more to say. The trend of adaptation was at least in part a response to a moral crisis, as performance had always been understood as a didactic tool that played an important role in the edication of society.12 This function seemed to be breaking down as drama became rareed and inaccessible, and the needs of the audience became a secondary consideration. It also seemed a response to an aesthetic crisis, as performers were being forced to take liberties with texts, sometimes with vulgar results. These new developments problematized the role of drama and stimulated heated debates among playwrights and drama critics during and after the Wanli period. Almost all of the important drama critics during the era participated in these debates and took positions regarding the bifurcation of the drama culture. These debates over the role of the play suggest a tension between the drama publication and theatrical performance and the anxiety of

9

Tanaka Issei, “The Social and historical context of Ming-Ch’ing local drama,” 143–160. 10 Lu Eting, “Tan Kunju de ya he su,” 19–23. 11 Catherine Swatek, Peony Pavilion Onstage, 158–202. 12 The denition of morality changes in each era. In their advocacy of the qing, the dominant late Ming thinkers had a very different moral agenda than their counterparts, the Orthodox Confucianists. For this complicate issue, see Martin Huang, Desire and Fictional Narrative, especially the rst three chapters (5–85).

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the literati themselves over the gradual departure of drama from its original theatrical context. This bifurcation creates a disparity, as the Shakespearean scholar Gary Taylor puts it, “between the pleasure of spectators and the displeasure of readers.”13 This disparity—this tension and this anxiety—ultimately required a resolution. Similar issues have become a major concern in Shakespearean studies during recent years.14 In the past few decades, scholarly enquiry has turned to stage-centered criticism. The stage-centered critics argue that Shakespeare wrote for the theater and never intended his plays to be published as reading literature, and thus “the kind of interpretation playgoers practice under conditions of actual performance should provide the model and criteria that govern reading.”15 This new line of enquiry splits Shakespeare critics into two camps. In the Shakespearean scholar Harry Berger’s description, there is the text-centered reading that bears “the anti- or non-theatrical tendencies of the armchair approach that dominated Shakespearean studies for several decades in this century,” and the stage-centered reading that argues “reading is irresponsible unless it imitates playgoing.”16 This split in Shakespearean studies seems to echo perfectly the bifurcation of drama during the late Ming but with a signicant difference as the former approaches the issue from the perspective of textual reception—i.e. the interpretation of Shakespeare—while the latter from the perspective of textual creation—i.e. the writing of the play. The Shakespearean scholars’ concerns lie in the question of the proper reception of Shakespeare’s plays—a straightforward and spontaneous reception in keeping with the phenomenology of stage performance or a carefully analytical reception attentive even to the minutest details of the text. The drama critics in the late Ming recognizes these different modes of reception, and took exception to plays that were incompatible with the former mode, perhaps having less faith in audiences, and less faith in the multivalence of drama, than did Shakespeare himself. Many modern scholars, such as Denda Akira (1965),17 Jiang Xingyu (1982),18 Xu Fuming (1985),19 Xu Shuofang (1985),20 Akamatsu Kenji 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20

Gary Taylor, Moment by Moment by Shakespeare, 112. See Martin Buzacott, The Death of the Actor, 1–20. Harry Berger, Jr., Imaginary Audition, xi. Ibid., xi–xii. Denda Akira, “Bonleki han SÏshoki no kÏtÊ to sono sÏkaku,” 93–106. Jiang Xingyu, Ming kanben Xixiang ji yanjiu, 215–226. Xu Fuming, “Shilun Ming Qing chuanqi fumo kaichang,” 140–57. Xu Shuofang, Yuanqu xuan jia Zang Maoxun, 5–7.

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(1991),21 Hirose Leiko (1991),22 Tan Fang (1992),23 Kimberly Besio (1997),24 and Patricia Sieber (2003),25 have also taken note of the debates in Ming culture about the role of drama. Their work largely focuses on different editions of plays in the attempt to identify them as intended either for literary consumption or for theatrical use. These scholars, however, have not placed the distinction between the literary and the theatrical in a wider cultural context or postulated this distinction as a manifestation of a larger cultural debate. It is not merely a matter of publishers attempting to cater to the tastes and abilities of different audiences, but a matter of publishers (as well as playwrights and readers) taking a position in one of the most urgent moral debates of the era. Catherine Swatek is correct to see Zang Maoxun (1550–1620) and Feng Menglong’s (1574–1645) adaptations of Mudan ting as responsive to the requirements of theatrical performance. Her book on the staging of Mudan ting is a valuable case study of theatrical practice, but the developments that she so capably chronicles are more complicated and weighty than she has theorized, belonging to the culture’s most important quarrel with itself. In his study Zhongguo xiju xue shigao, to take another example, the dramaturgic scholar Ye Changhai notes that late Ming dramaturgists varyingly prized musical harmony and literary quality, but he has not seen this difference of opinion as something more than a matter of taste, when in fact it is profoundly a matter of moral ideology.26 This chapter attempts to outline the terms and logic of the larger cultural debate that crucially contextualizes so many of the particularities of late Ming drama culture noted by contemporary scholars, but understood only as part of the practical business of staging plays and printing books, in isolation from the larger currents of the culture. This chapter will explore how the rise of drama publication engendered a moral crisis in the late Ming drama culture and in late Ming culture generally, and how partisans of the theater, ghting a losing battle, attempted to respond to this crisis by advocating the imitation

21

Akamatsu Kenji, “Genkyokusen ga mezashita mono,” 161–86. Hirose Leiko, “ZÔ Mojun ni yoru Botan tei Kankon ki no kaihen ni tsuite,” 71–86. 23 Tan Fang divides editions into three rather than two types: those for scholars (xueshu xing), those for enthusiasts (xinshang xing), and those for performers ( yanju xing). See Jin Shengtan yu Zhongguo xiqu piping, 158. 24 Kimberly Besio, “Gender, Loyalty, and the Reproduction of the Wang Zhaojun Legend,” 251–82. 25 Patricia Sieber, Theaters of Desire, 114–5. 26 Ye Changhai, Zhongguo xiju xue shigao, 87–280. 22

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of theatrical elements within the printed play. Two points concerning this study must be made. First, this study makes no systematic attempt to speculatively evaluate the extant editions with the respect to the distinction between ‘script’ and ‘literature.’ The late Ming literati playwrights might have claimed they wrote specically for the theater even though their language was rareed and inaccessible. This study is not a bibliographic exercise, but an attempt to illustrate a general perception of the bifurcation of drama culture and to theorize the cause and nature of this bifurcation. Second, this study does not intend to suggest that plays embodying the new literary emphasis were indifferent to performance. Rather, such plays envisioned an audience equally composed of theatergoers and readers, with the interests of the former arguably sacriced to the interests of the latter, perhaps even unconsciously. Even as Tan Xianzu’s plays were being criticized as un-performable by his contemporaries, for example, they were in the process of being performed, as shown by the work of Catherine Swatek and Zhou Yude.27

Lyrics for the Banquet or Books for the Desk? In the eld of Chinese drama, performance and publication occupy two opposite ends of the spectrum. The stage audience perceives a performance rather than a text, while in the book the reader perceives a text rather than a performance. Performance has an important spatial dimension; reading has no spatial dimension, but unfolds in the imagination. Performance brings human beings into contact, reading does not. A theatergoer has no inuence over the unfolding performance, while a reader can stop, start, and move backward and forward within the narrative. A theatergoer’s experience is always mediated by the interpretation of the performers, while the reader’s experience is a direct response to the original artistic conception exhibited in the text. The thread that links these two media is that the published play can function as a script for performance. A published play, however, can also be created and read out of theatrical context, and thus, each drama 27 Catherine Swatek studies the staging of Mudan ting in Peony Pavilion Onstage; Zhou Yude studies the performance of Tang’s four plays Zichai ji, Mudan ting, Nanke ji, and Handan ji in both Yihuang and Kunqu styles. See “ Linchuan simeng he Ming Qing wutai,” 79–87.

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publication inevitably embodies two roles: as a script for performance and as a work of literature to be read for its own sake. The playwrights and drama critics during the late Ming period were very conscious of the dual roles of drama publication and the issues surrounding its production. As the differences between watching a performance and reading a play are so intrinsic, the playwrights and drama critics ultimately perceived the dual roles as irreconcilably conicted. The dual roles of the drama publication are recognized in the terms ‘yanshang zhi qu’ or ‘lyric for the banquet’ and ‘antou zhi shu’ or ‘book for the desk.’ The terms were rst used by Shuai Ji (1537–1595) to describe Tang Xianzu’s Zichai ji (preface dated 1595), a revision of his rst play Zixiao ji, as a ‘book for the desk’ rather than ‘a lyric for the banquet.’28 At stake in the debate over the issue of the dual roles of drama was control.29 Under the idea that drama texts were ‘lyrics for the banquet,’ the literati attained a role in the important institution of public performance; their words and ideas shaped what occurred on the stage. Under the idea that drama texts were ‘books for the desk,’ literati gained a freedom of literary expression, but lost their hold on the theater. Many literati were uncomfortable leaving the most powerful medium of the culture completely in the hands of the performers and wanted as much as possible to appropriate drama not only for their own self-gratication, but for the sake of spreading belief, ideology, and morality and thus uplifting the society. Most deeply underlying this debate was the role of the literati in society. Were they to be public leaders or retiring aesthetes? There was pleasure and renement in the latter role, but also the risk of becoming inconsequential, or perhaps even of being superseded by new forces and energies. The debate about the nature of drama thus held the attention of the most talented literati during the late Ming period. Far from being abstract or academic, the debate was as much about the future direction of the literati class as it was about the future direction of drama.

28 Tang Xianzu, “Preface to Zichai ji,” in Zang Maoxun, ed., Linchuan simeng, 1b–2a. 29 Catherine Swatek makes the similar point that much late Ming editorial activity allowed “individuals other than the original authors [. . .] to impose control on the meanings of the texts.” See Catherine Swatek, Peony Pavilion Onstage, 17. Swatek also argues that Feng Menglong and others adapted Tang’s plays to reappropriate them “for public poetry, asserting control over the ideas expressed in them in the name of performability” (98).

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In this debate the primary controversy was whether dramatic lyrics should be tailored for performance (and especially for singing) or for reading. In his miscellany Xianqing ouji, Li Yu illustrates straightforwardly the differences between lyrics composed for performance and those for reading. The rhetoric of a dramatic text and that of a literary text is not only different, but must be absolutely opposite. Why is that? The rhetoric of a literary text prizes elegance and disdains vulgarity, and should be indirect rather than straightforward. But this is not the case in drama. The words [in drama] should be based on the speech used in the street, and matters should be described directly and straightforwardly. [From dramatic perspective] those plays that are incomprehensible even when read or do not reveal their merit when read for the rst time but only yield their point after deep thought, are not good works [i.e. t for performance].30

Li’s commentary shows clearly that drama requires a distinctive style that distinguishes it from literature.31 Unlike literature, which is composed exclusively for reading and is permitted to make signicant demands on a reader’s intellect and attention, drama must be easily comprehensible, as the pace of performance leaves no time for interpretation or reection. As performance is rst a reection of daily life, and second directed at often less educated audiences, dramatic language itself must be accessible. In the same essay, Li alludes to the acclaim that has been given by his contemporaries to two scenes, “Alarming Dream” ( Jingmeng) and “Seeking Dream” (Xunmeng) in Mudan ting. Li dismisses these scenes on the grounds that their language is too elevated for theatrical purposes: “Such wonderful language can only be seen as literature, and must not be seen as drama.”32 Although in the traditional classication drama is considered a genre of poetry, the unique limitations on its style separate it from all other styles of poetry.33 As drama and literature were increasingly conated during the late Ming period, there was a reactive tendency to insist on an important distinction. In the collection of drama criticism Qulü, Wang Jide (died in 1623) asserts that the three traditional poetic genres—poetry (shi),

30

Li Yu, Xianqing ouji, 7:1.22–23. Li Yu’s attentiveness to performance is portrayed as a desire to please his patrons in Guo Guangyu’s “Li Yu de bianju lilun yu chuangzuo shijian,” 198. 32 Li Yu, Xianqing ouji, 7:1.22–23. 33 Patricia Sieber makes the point that “song-drama” as a rhymed literary form allowed for its canonization as a literati genre. See Theaters of Desire, 47–51. 31

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lyric-poetry (ci), and drama (qu)—are entirely distinct, and further that those who incorporate poetry or lyric-poetry in drama should not be considered playwrights: The reason that lyric-poetry is different from poetry, and drama is different from lyric-poetry, is that the methods of composition cannot be equated. Those poets who create drama from poetry and those literati who create drama from lyric-poetry are mistaken, and must not talk about drama.34

Wang was apparently anxious about the conation of drama with other literary genres and deliberately attempted to reverse this conation by rejecting both poets and literati as playwrights. Wang also implicitly took exception to a common view that these genres had an evolutionary relationship, poetry having evolved into lyric-poetry and lyric-poetry into drama. It was this evolutionary relationship that sanctioned the literati’s involvement in drama to begin with: as masters of poetry, they merely extended their eld of expertise in taking up drama. It was this relationship, too, that legitimated the free borrowing of poetic technique for dramatic purposes, resulting in plays with complicated allusions and metaphors, archaic diction, and heightened expression. Drama, according to Wang and those of similar mind, was distinct aesthetically and historically, stemming from performance rather than poetry.35 They felt, furthermore, that this distinction should be upheld in order to preserve the social function of drama. Wang thus questioned the value of those plays composed for ‘desks,’ and considered them a mistaken development in the history of drama: There are very good reasons why drama succeeds or fails. When they encounter the works of the literati, the unsophisticated performers are both perplexed [by the meaning] and unable to sing the lyrics. The plebian village plays are quite compatible with their views and knowledge. Straightforward and accessible lyrics, on the other hand, allow those who are illiterate to learn by oral means. [ Illiterate] performers compete with each other to learn and perform [the plebian village plays] because it is within their capacity. It is obvious, then, that it is no benet

34

Wang Jide, Qulü, in ZGGDXQLZJC, 4:4.159. Li Huimian studies Wang Jide’s theories of music, poetic meters, rhetoric, and performance, but she does not discuss how these different elements intertwine in Wang’s overarching theory of drama. See Wang Jide qulun yanjiu. 35

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chapter two to compose over-rened literary works that will only be piled upon a desk [my emphasis].36

Wang makes it very clear that drama is to be composed for performance to meet the demands of spontaneous understanding through ‘listening,’ which is also the main argument of the stage-oriented scholars in Shakespearean studies.37 He further proposes that those plays that are merely “piled upon a desk” are wasted efforts, not only failing to nd a mainstream audience, but ceding the mainstream audience to the plebian village plays. Wang is impatient of wasted literary effort, but even more, he is anxious that drama will become debased without the guiding spirit of the literati. What is effectively proposed is a compromise between aesthetic values and social obligations; under this compromise, the literati must popularize their work in order to compete with genuinely popular work. To insist on drama as a form of literature is to concede control of the popular stage. Wang also makes clear that dramatic texts have no intrinsic quality or even identity, but exist always in collaboration with actual performers. Dramatists must cooperate with these performers, even when it means recognizing and accommodating the performers’ limitations. In place of the kind of willful aesthetic isolation that was a temptation to the literati, Wang proposes that literati playwrights work to achieve a “harmony recognizable to the ears of the commoners”: If they cannot achieve a harmony recognizable to the ears of the commoners, those plays with rened phrases and wonderful meanings will become books for the desk and descend among the second-rate. And those plays that are neither elegantly tuneful nor possess accessible language (bense), but only offer clichés strung together and interspersed with accessible language, are merely bookish and academic. It is advisable not to compose them.38

36

Wang Jide, Qulü, 4:3.154. Philip McGuire criticizes the literary approach in his study Speechless Dialect: “Those who utilize that approach . . . seek to understand Shakespeare’s plays by treating the words that Shakespeare wrote as if they were elements of a literary text rather than parts of a dramatic script. They take assumptions, concepts, and processes of analysis developed for and appropriate to works written to be read by individuals in silent solitude and apply them to works designed to be heard and seen by people who have come together as a group in public in order to see and hear a play.” See Speechless Dialect, XVIII. 38 Wang Jide, Qulü, 4:3.137. 37

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This suggests that Wang divides plays into three categories: those suitable for performance (those that achieve a “harmony”), those suitable for reading (“rened phrases and wonderful meanings”), and those suitable neither for performance nor for reading (“bookish and academic”). The ranking of these categories is explicit. Even brilliant works of language are ultimately second-rate when divorced from the popular stage. In his Yuefu chuansheng (preface dated 1744), the Qing drama critic Xu Dachun (c. 1699–1778) reiterates Wang’s opinion, but goes a step farther to ask directly why those who write poetic drama do not dispense with the pretence of the stage and stick to poetry proper. He notes of Yuan drama: [. . .] Its style is completely different from poetry and lyric-poetry [ci ]. It adopts the direct rather than the indirect, the common rather than the literary, the obvious rather than the obscure. This is because drama speaks the language of the ancients and allows illiterate men and women to share in sights and sounds. Drama is not for literati and scholars to recite in privacy. If one must display elaborate allusions and paint with ornamental lyrics, why establish drama as a style instead of composing poetry and literary prose?39

All three critics—Wang Jide, Li Yu and Xu Dachun—object to the conception of drama as a genre of poetry. All three emphasize that the function of drama is to provide a script for theatrical performance rather than mere material for leisure reading. All three critics emphasize that a play should appeal to the commoners who attend the theater rather than to the more exquisite appreciation of the literati. In published form, however, a play will almost inevitably come to be read, at least by some, as a literary rather than theatrical product. This conception is reected in the sensibility of many readers as well as in the language and arrangement of specic plays. In his comment on the play Qingliang shan by Wang Yinglin, late Ming drama critic Qi Biaojia (1602–1645) discloses his own sense of the play as a literary text rather than dramatic script: The play’s comprehensive account [of historical events] is clear and detailed and historically accurate. The sins of these debauched women and treacherous cabals could not be exhausted in ten performances of

39

Xu Dachun, Yuefu chuansheng (preface dated 1744), in ZGGDXQLZJC, 7:158.

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chapter two singing and dancing in the theater, but are all adduced by an inch-long brush on printing blocks [my emphasis]. This play is the denitive chronicle of a generation. It should not be a mere means of earning a living on the musical stage!40

In Qi’s opinion, Wang’s play should be seen not merely as a script for performance, but as an important historical record. The value of the play lies in the fact that it records the truth of history and embodies an important social and moral criticism rather than provides entertainment. There is also the implication that books, unlike performance, have a claim to permanence and general attention (thus “denitive chronicle,” which implies an ongoing tradition of literary inheritance). The pejorative emphasis on “singing and dancing” implicitly asserts the gravity of literature. In opposition to “singing and dancing” there are the “printing blocks” ( piandu), which inscribe an idea of physical permanence that performance cannot achieve. In Qi’s mind, a published play is something more than a script for performance. As a book, it transcends its original genre limitation and becomes a thing of the ages rather than a thing of the moment. Qi’s conscious choice to oppose “singing and dancing” and “printing blocks” suggests that the drama culture bifurcated when print began to impinge on the realm of drama. The defenders of drama as literature also noted that reading is less mediated than performance. The reader directly confronts the text and escapes an array of potential distortions to which the theatergoer is exposed. In his Qulü, Wang Jide, who sees the advantages and disadvantages of both positions in the debate on drama, indicates that performance often obscures the imperfections of the text: In the world there is much drama that can be sung, but little drama that can be read. Flaws are often concealed when lyrics are set to music. But there is no way that these can be hidden from a reader.41

It is obvious that Wang uses two sets of terms that oppose each other: ‘sung’ versus ‘read,’ and ‘music’ versus ‘reader.’ These deliberate oppositions show that Wang conceives theater and the book as mutually exclusive and incompatible. During a performance the audience’s attention is distracted from the bare literary content by other artistic elements, like the singing, dancing and stage design. The reader, on the other hand, is absorbed by the literary content, and is in a position to be highly 40 41

Qi Biaojia, Yuanshan Tang qupin, in ZGGDXQLZJC, 6:48. Wang Jide, Qulü, 4:3.154.

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discriminating. Performance, then, muddies the direct interaction with the text and its recipient, and thus hampers the reception of the text. Wang’s comment also sharply distinguishes between drama written for the stage (“drama that can be sung”) and drama written for the desk (“drama that can be read”). Success on the stage by no means implies literary quality; literary quality, presumably, by no means implies success on the stage. Thus we see the bifurcation of the old drama culture into increasingly divergent traditions. The conception of drama as literature shapes not only reception, but also composition. Plays conceived as reading material tend to ignore the actual practices and capacities of the theater. Sometimes, for example, plays will call for casts far larger than any performing group or theater could have been expected to accommodate. Sometimes, also, the same actor will be called on to play several roles, which, in actual practice, might be confusing to an audience. In his Xianqing ouji, Li Yu criticizes the kind of plays written without attention to the realities of the theater: A major aw of Ming drama [chuanqi] is that it includes too many extraneous details. Jingchai ji, Liu Zhiyuan Baitu ji, Baiyueting ji and Shagou ji have come down through the generations because they include a single story line from beginning to end. There are no digressions. With no distracting subplots, and only one leading character, which imposes unity, even young children can learn them by heart and recite them by mouth. Later writers are not after the root and the trunk but only after the branches. They think that by including an additional character they increase the complexity of their story. These complicating elements multiply the play’s subplots. The audience feels as if it has entered the highway of Shanyin with people coming and going incessantly. [ Later writers] do not understand that the theater requires only a few roles. Even if there are hundreds or thousands of names upon the stage, there remain only these few roles. What matters is the frequency with which actors appear on the stage, not whether their names change or not. Rather than an actor suddenly becoming Zhang, then suddenly becoming Li, which confuses an audience, better to create only a few characters who enter and exit the stage more frequently [i.e. to maintain plot complexity]. Is it not better to diversify the plot rather than the characters, and thus allow the audience the pleasure of encountering old friends?42

Li Yu’s main criticism is not that plays contain too many trivial subplots but too many characters. As the characters in Chinese theater

42

Li Yu, Xianqing ouji, 7:1.18.

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were represented by only a few ‘role-types’ such as sheng, dan, jing, chou, adding characters necessarily meant a repetition of the same role-type. On stage these different characters with similar make-up and costume were only likely to confuse the audience. Moreover, the confusion was likely to be compounded by the fact that performers usually specialized in a single role-type. Not only would there be repetition of role-type, make-up, and costume, but also of performer, making characters in some cases all but indistinguishable from each other. The phenomenon that Li describes is attributable to playwrights who perceived drama as a form of literature akin to the novel, and not as a script for theatrical performance. In a novel, of course, characters can be multiplied without concern for the constrictions of role-types or the dangers of visual overlap. Li’s critical viewpoint is shared by Qi Biaojia, who makes analogous comments about the play Sai jiaorong written by Prince Zhouxian Zhu Youdun (1374–1437): This play excels in its beautiful lyrics and unique craftsmanship, but needs a company that can present fteen or sixteen barbarians, and thus cannot be performed on the stage at all.43

The aws of the play might be explained in two ways. On the one hand, Zhu was a prince of wealth and power, and he did not need to concern himself with the practical realities that impinge on a performing troop; indeed, he may have been entirely unaware of these realities. On the other hand, there is good reason to think that Zhu wrote his play as a literary rather than theatrical exercise, and may not have cared about the theatrical challenges presented by his text. It is an important detail that Zhu published his plays. This was very unusual during the early fteenth century and suggests a strong literary bent.44 It was only during the Wanli period, however, that the incompatibility between literary and theatrical aspirations became sufciently pronounced that a systematic body of criticism emerged in reaction to the crisis. Qi’s criticism, then, projects late Ming concerns onto the work of an earlier era. It is likely that Zhu would have understood Qi’s criticism, but he might have been taken aback by the urgency and moral coloration of Qi’s position.

43 44

Qi Biaojia, Yuanshan Tang jupin, in ZGGDXQLZJC, 6:176. Zhu Youdun, Chengzhai yuefu, Beijing National Librqary, no. 4899.

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Conceived as reading material, the play became a eld that allowed the literati playwrights to display their literary skills. They packed their work with literary allusions that ignored the traditional simplicity of drama. Language replaced performance as the criterion by which drama was judged. In his anthology of drama criticism Tanqu zazha, Ling Mengchu (1580–1644) concisely narrates this development: When drama began in the barbarian-ruled Yuan dynasty, appropriate language [danghang] was more highly prized than beautiful lyrics. This so-called appropriate language is known as the true color [bense]. Since the days of Yuan drama, we have seen excessively ornamental words and lyrics and dense allusions that have nothing to do with [drama]. This is why Jingchai ji, Liu Zhiyuan Baitu ji, Baiyueting ji, and Shagou ji are the four greatest plays, and why a play showing as much talent as Pipa ji cannot compete with them. Pipa ji occasionally betrays its pursuit of renement, and initiates a style in which sentences are sculpted and trimmed; although [Pipa ji] does possess a rich share of the true color of drama, it also shows many symptoms of ‘lyric-poetry’ [ci]. Playwrights of our dynasty like Tang Juzhuang, Feng Haifu, and Chen Qiubi have barged into the same territory as Pipa ji. Although their work is not exemplary, these playwrights are prolic. Despite their literary leanings, they carry forward the tradition of Yuan drama. It was only with the emergence of Liang Bolong [Liang Chenyu] that the emphasis on renement and elegance began in earnest. He quickly achieved a glorious reputation as a writer of lyric-poetry [ci].45

Here Ling gives the term ‘lyric-poetry’ a highly ironic value. Liang Chenyu (ca. 1508–ca. 1581) might have been a great lyric-poet, but only because he allowed himself to stray from the proper work of the dramatist. Elsewhere in the same essay, Ling describes Liang as “shallow in the art [of drama].”46 Ling implies that Liang essentially indulged himself at the expense of the paying audience. The terms ‘appropriate language’ (danghang) and ‘true color’ (bense) stand in opposition to ‘lyric-poetry,’ representing the true character of the theater. These terms suggest that characters should speak not in high-own metaphors and allusions (as they do in Liang’s work), but in a style that is true to their rank, class, and education, and comprehensible to an actual theatrical audience. This is to say that servants should speak like servants and not like their literati masters. Ling maintains that Pipa ji displays this literary tendency, but keeps it under control, thus retaining the “true

45 46

Ling Mengchu, Tanqu zazha, in ZGGDXQLZJC, 4:253. Ibid., 4:253.

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color of drama.” Ling goes on to detail the problems with Liang’s literary drama. He argues that the constant play of allusion and ornament fragments the text and breaks up the ow of the plot, making it difcult to memorize the text and difcult to recover when a performer forgets a line.47 These deciencies presented no problem when a play was read but were fatal when it came to performance, especially in an era when many performers were illiterate and plays tended to be extremely long. Ease of memorization was of vital practical importance. Ling was not wrong to attribute the initiation of the literati style drama to Liang.48 Liang’s famous play Wansha ji was composed around 1579, according to Xu Fuming.49 It created a new era in Chinese drama culture by shedding all the mundane aspects of the traditional theater and creating a drama of poetic expression. He coupled highly rened language with a new musical style known as Kunqu, adapted by Wei Liangfu (active during 1522–66) from the local music of his native Kunshan county, and popular among the literati class.50 Often described as ‘water polished’ (shuimodiao), this style of music was very slow and soft, and the general effect was one of ethereal languor.51 Here was the spirit of the literati for the rst time proclaiming its true colors on the stage. In the wake of Wansha ji, the Kunqu style became immediately dominant, and the literati playwrights felt suddenly interested in drama as a medium and empowered to diverge from the traditions of the stage. Wang Jide explained this literary bent by theorizing that the “literati and scholars cannot forget their habits and cannot escape their own over-renement.”52 The literati playwrights could not help but display their literary skill and thus turned drama into a literary

47

Ibid., 4:255. The innovation of the new literary language is attributed to several different playwrights. In Qupin Lü Tiancheng cites Zheng Ruoyong from Kunshan county, while Wang Jide, following Xu Wei, cites the play Xiangnang ji by Shao Can. Modern scholar Zhou Yibai, on the other hand, cites Liang Chenyu’s Wansha ji. Ye Changhai also cites Xiangnang ji. For a general discussion see Ye’s Zhongguo xiju xue shigao, 85, 110, 211–2. 49 Xu Fuming, “Liang Chenyu de shengping he ta chuanzuo Wansha ji de yitu,” 28. 50 After Wei refashioned it, Kunqu became the most popular musical genre from the late Ming to the mid-Qing eras. Wei was thus credited with being the inventor of Kunqu by literati such as Wang Jide (see Qulü, 4:2.117) and Shen Chongsui (see Duqu xuzhi, in ZGGDXQLZJC, 5:198). 51 For discussions of Wei’s reform of Kunshan music and Liang’s adoption of the new music style see John Hu, “Ming Dynasty Music,” 69–72; Yang Yinliu, Zhongguo gudai yinyue shigao, 4:116–120. 52 Wang Jide, Qulü, 4:2.121–2. 48

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form expressive of their own aestheticism. Wansha ji was a success not only because of its novelty and originality, but also because it coincided with the rise of publication as an important force within the drama culture. It may be that Liang was inuenced by this essentially new medium and composed with it in mind, but whatever the case his style of drama arrived at just the right time and found its perfect vehicle in the exploding world of print. Thus Ling was not merely reacting against Liang’s poetic tendencies, but against a larger cultural movement to reconceive drama as a literary rather than strictly theatrical pursuit. Liang’s success was a manifestation of this transformation. Like Ling, Wang Jide maintained that a dramatic text should be easy for the performers to memorize. Discussing ‘exit-poems’ (luoshi)—the brief poems recited at the end of each scene—Wang says: When it comes to exit-poems, only those in Pipa ji are proper. In each scene, [the playwright] rst selects two lines from old proverbs, and then composes two lines of his own to precede them. Such poems are not only easy for the audience to understand but also easy for the performers to memorize. Ever since Yujue ji introduced a more poetic version of the exit-poem, [all playwrights] have raced after literary language. Recently, there have appeared playwrights who bring together lines of Tang poetry to show off their originality, and you cannot begin to follow their mumbling.53

In Wang Jide’s view, poetic digressions of this type merely alienate the audience and perplex the performers. The criticism of playwrights who cull their lines from Tang poetry is again an implicit criticism of Tang Xianzu, who was noted for this practice. Pipa ji and Mudan ting are the two most famous and celebrated chuanqi plays. Wang implicitly promotes the former as the ideal theatrical piece while demoting the latter as a digression from the theatrical model. Wang sees the playwrights’ making a spectacle of their literary talents as essentially unworthy. Even Tang poetry, misapplied, becomes merely nonsensical “mumbling.” Both Ling Mengchu and Wang Jide were not only drama critics, but also publishers—a role that might seem paradoxical given their emphasis on performance. If publication tended to undermine the historical link between drama and performance, why did Ling and Wang (and many like them) bother to publish plays? Playwrights and

53

Wang Jide, Qulü, 4:3.142.

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readers in the late Ming period, even those committed to the ideal of performance, perceived that publication had compelling benets. One of these benets was the preservation and dissemination of plays that might otherwise be lost and forgotten. In keeping with He Liangjun’s observation that “the literati were ashamed to pay attention to drama,” the transmission of plays was necessarily in the hands of performers. The written play typically remained in manuscript and was rarely printed, as the performers were often illiterate. Most of the plays of the Yuan period—including most of the plays of Wang Shifu (c. 1250– c. 1337)—were presumably transmitted in this fashion and were subsequently lost. This anxiety was due not only to the example of the Yuan period, but to the observable process of plays falling into obscurity and extinction during the Ming period itself. He Liangjun testies to this phenomenon in his Qulun: Although some performers in the Musical Studio can still perform them, the old songs are unfamiliar to the ears of the commoners, and the Southerners are ignorant of the Northern music. As listeners diminish, fewer actors bother to learn the parts.54

Another rationale for publication was to ensure an uncorrupted text. He Liangjun himself argued that performers were not intelligent enough to grasp the full meaning of the text and tended to alter whatever parts they could not understand.55 The text was thus subject to constant change and in some cases debasement. Publication arrived as a way to meet all of these crisis, lending a reassuring continuity and consistency to the dramatic tradition and enshrining a more authoritative text. Publication also increased the general interest in drama by disseminating plays among readers as well as theatergoers. With the advent of widespread publication, it became easier to acquaint oneself with theatrical history and follow theatrical developments. He Liangjun further indicates that Xixiang ji and Pipa ji became the most popular plays only after they were published and became best-sellers, going through dozens of editions during the late Ming period.56 Publication rather than performance was the basis of their preeminence. Widespread publication additionally changed the way performers learned the text of plays.

54 55 56

He Liangjun, Qulun, 4:6. Ibid., 4:10. Ibid., 4:6.

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Plays had previously been passed down as an oral inheritance from performer to performer, but during the late Ming period performers were often tutored directly from the text and were sometimes even tutored by the playwright himself. Tang Xianzu, for example, lamented that performers were incapable of properly interpreting his play Mudan ting. He thus decided to tutor a performer from Yihuang County named Luo Zhang’er.57 Many playwrights, like Ruan Dacheng (1587–1646), even trained their own performing groups. The catalyzing role of publication is suggested by Lü Tiancheng’s (1580–1618) comment about Shen Jing’s play Yixia ji: “After it was published, [the performing groups] in the Wu area raced with each other to perform the play.”58 Lü Tiancheng’s remark makes it clear that drama publication spurred performance and accelerated the dissemination of plays. Where previously plays crept across the countryside by word of mouth or were slowly popularized by traveling groups, plays now arrived almost immediately in what had effectively become a regional market, often creating a groundswell of interest that could not have existed before. The sudden boom in publication brought with it new roles for the literati within the drama culture. Wang Jide urged literati to ensure the accuracy of dramatic texts by participating in the publication process. Literati often took it upon themselves to edit texts and present the nished product to publishers; sometimes they edited and published texts themselves. Echoing He Liangjun’s skepticism about performers, Wang argued that the performers and commoners were ignorant, and that literati must ensure the accuracy of plays in order to save “the past and future generations from becoming deaf to the meaning [of drama].”59 Only the literati had the skill, knowledge, and sense of tradition that were required by the new medium of print. By imposing their aesthetic standards on the copious production of texts, literati exerted their inuence on performance, not only because publications doubled as scripts, but also because the literati began to include complicated stage directions and interpretative guidelines. In a note to his play Jingzhong qi, for example, literati playwright Feng Menglong species that when the mother of the male protagonist Yue Fei engraves the four

57 Tang Xianzu, “On the Seventh day of the Seventh month I drunkenly respond to Jundong with Two Poems,” in Tang Xianzu ji, 2:18.735. 58 Lü Tiancheng, Qupin, in ZGGDXQLZJC, 6:2.229. 59 Wang Jide, Qulü, 4:3.146.

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characters ‘jing zhong bao guo’ (Repay your country with loyalty) on her son’s back, the actor should seem composed rather than pained.60 In Menglei chuanqi, Feng even instructs performers to prepare a better prop (wheeled chariot made of bamboo and paper) to replace the improper one used by troupes from Zhejiang Province (sedan chair suggested by spears and cloth).61 Many performers, especially those who worked closely with literati, gradually abandoned their tradition of improvisation and adaptation. Once nothing more than rough notes for performance, plays began to assume a canonical authority. An episode recorded by Zhang Dai (1597–before 1690) in his miscellany Tao’an mengyi indicates this shift in sensibility. He recounts a performance of Pipa ji: There was an old gentleman sitting in front of the stage who would compare the performance with the book. One word was omitted by the performers. The audience heckled the performance, and so the performance was started all over again.62

As we see here, a high standard of textual integrity came to be applied not only to published plays, but also to the performances of plays, while the literati became the monitors of this integrity. Their power thus extended over the entire drama culture. As an inevitable consequence of these deep changes in the drama culture, plays began to assume a life beyond the context of the theater. Drama publication thus created a dilemma for the drama culture of the late Ming period. While the literati became the dominant force and drama publication became the dominant medium, the need to balance the dual roles of the play—‘lyrics for the banquet’ and ‘books for the desk’—became a preoccupying concern. Playwrights and critics of the late Ming period were anxious that the drama culture was in the process of bifurcation, and they struggled to reconcile these potentially divergent tendencies. The opposition between performance and literature remains a pressing theoretical issue among scholars of Chinese drama to this day.

60 61 62

Feng Menglong, Jingzhong qi, 1.3a. Feng Menglong, Menglei chuanqi, 1.47a. Zhang Dai, Tao’an mengyi, 4.34.

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Rened Language or Harmonious Music? The debate over literature and performance manifested itself in a subsidiary debate over words and music. The kind of literary language introduced by the literati was not only obscure in its meaning and difcult to memorize, but its meter and intonation was often at odds with the traditional melodies of the theater. Performance groups found it difcult to graft the new language onto the traditional melodies. This issue was of the highest importance because music was considered the very heart of the traditional theater, as indicated by the interchangeability of the phrases ‘to hear a play’ (ting xi) and ‘to watch a play’ (kan xi). Li Yu indicates the primacy of music over all the other non-literary elements of drama like dancing, makeup, costume and acrobatics: These days the members of the imperial family and nobles do not like discussing the various techniques [of the stage], as they value only singing. We can say that they are connoisseurs with a deep understanding and that their admiration is proper.63

A similar emphasis is given in Wang Shizhen’s (1526–1590) remarks about Li Kaixian’s plays Baojian ji and Dengtan ji: [ Li Kaixian] asked me one day: “How do my plays compare to Pipa ji?” I replied: “The renement of your lyrics is indisputable. If you let a dozen drama teachers from the Wu region sing them one after the other, adapting the language to the music as they go along, only then your plays will be worthy of transmission.” Li was annoyed and dropped the conversation.64

Wang’s criticism suggests the limitations placed on dramatic language; it may pursue poetic effect, but not to the extent that it ignores musical obligations. Music, then, was not considered ornamental, but central to the meaning and emotion of the play. Traditionally, in fact, drama was broken into sub-genres based on the type of regional music (qiang) performed. Among these subgenres of music (and of drama) were Haiyan, Yiyang, Kunshan, and Yihuang. These genres of music were characterized by different tempos, instruments, vocal techniques, and pronunciation of words. As these singing styles were dependent on local dialects, the drama that grew up around them was not easily exported to other regions. In the

63 64

Li Yu, Xianqing ouji, 7:4.73–4. Wang Shizhen, Quzao, in ZGGDXQLZJC, 4:36.

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mid-sixteenth century, however, Wei Liangfu rened the old Kunshan style by incorporating both Haiyan and Yiyang tunes and employing a new combination of instruments—di (ute), xiao (a bamboo pipe played vertically rather horizontally), pipa (lute), and sheng (a kind of Pan pipe with thirteen reeds)—while eliminating much of the percussion.65 Wei’s primary emphasis in his own drama theory Qulü, and according to Shen Chongsui (d. circa 1645) in Duqu xuzhi, focuses on the coordination of the melody and the intonation of the words.66 He also slowed the tempo to create a languid, almost dreamy mood. This new style was so compelling and popular that within twenty years it became a national style, with performers from the Wu Region (which includes Kunshan County) hired to perform throughout China. The Kunshan style remained dominant until the late-eighteenth century, when it was supplanted by the Peking Opera.67 The new Kunshan style was so subtle and sophisticated that it quickly captured the heart of the literati and, following the success of Liang Chenyu’s Wansha ji, became the dominant musical form in the late Ming theater. The Kunshan style was so dominant that late Ming drama came to be known as chuanqi, or ‘Song of Kun’ (Kunqu). After the Kunshan style became the dominant form of theatrical music during the Wanli period, it became a challenge for playwrights to compose lyrics that were tonally congruous with the rise and fall of pitch. Ling Mengchu suggests this challenge in his account of Li Rihua’s (1565–1635) attempt to adapt Xixiang ji to the Kunshan style: The effort to adapt Northern Music to Southern Drama [i.e. Kunshan] is demonstrated in Li Rihua’s version of Xixiang ji. His lengthening and shortening of lyrics in order to t the alien music is like dissecting a crane and trying to t the parts onto a waterfowl. [. . .] When he comes to passages that he cannot adapt [to the music], Li ddles with the music in order to suit the original words. [. . .] It is ludicrous that our contemporary performers do not realize the awkwardness [of such material]. [. . .] [The original] Xixiang is the supreme work of romantic drama but is not suitable to be sung by the people of the Wu Region. If they want to

65

Xu Wei, Nanci xulu, in ZGGDXQLZJC, 3:242. Wei Liangfu, Qulü, in ZGGDXQLZJC, 5:5–7; Shen Chongsui, Duqu xuzhi, 5:202; Shen Chongsui’s opinion is summarized and elaborated by Yang Yinliu in Zhongguo gudai yinyue shigao, 4:117. 67 Four troupes from Anhui performed in Beijing in 1799, inspiring the local theatrical culture and initiating the modern form of Peking Opera. 66

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perform Xixiang in the Southern style, they have no choice but to adopt Li’s version. There is nothing else to be done.68

Ling Mengchu’s comments imply the gap between the standards of the literati and of the traditional theater. Ling considers Li’s adaptation of Xixiang ji almost a monstrosity, yet the singers are apparently satised. It also implies the urgency of coordinating language and music in an era when dramatic language was rapidly evolving and theatrical traditions were breaking down. Insisting that language accord with music was a means of asserting and constraining potentially subversive linguistic experimentation. This ability to graft poetry onto the traditional music of the theater came to be regarded—at least by the defenders of performance—as the highest skill of the playwright. Those literati who spurned the conventions of the musical theater were criticized, and their plays were often adapted to suit the traditional music of the theater. For examples, Tang Xianzu’s Mudan ting was adapted several times for these reasons, and as were dramatic anthologies such as Yuefu hongshan (preface dated 1602). Scholar Patrick Hanan observes that some of the dramatic extracts in Yuefu hongshan “have a practical air . . . which bets an anthology of pieces intended to be performed.”69 The irony is that the poetic quality of the lyrics—the success of the playwright on his own terms—often resulted in thorough redaction. The literati themselves were divided on the relative importance of music and language. The champions of music (which is to say the champions of performance) were led by He Liangjun and Shen Jing, while the champions of language (which is to say the champions of literature) were led by Tang Xianzu. In his anthology of drama criticism Qulun, He Liangjun initiated the debate and drew the battle line by insisting that language should be tailored to music even at the cost of poetic quality: As [drama] takes its name from the song-lyric [ci], I would rather have an unrened lyric that harmonizes with the music than a rened lyric than clashes with the music.70

The late Ming playwright Shen Jing took He Liangjun’s argument to an extreme degree, seeing second-rate language as less a deciency

68 69 70

Ling Mengchu, Tanqu zazha, 4:257. Patrick Hanan, “The Nature and Contents of the Yüe-fu hung-shan,” 348. He Liangjun, Qulun, 4:12.

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than an opportunity for performance to exercise its magical powers of transformation. Shen’s philosophy of dramatic language is recorded by his contemporary, fellow drama critic Lü Tiancheng. As Lü quotes Shen: I prefer harmonious music even if the lyrics are unrened. The sentence may be incomplete on the page, but it becomes harmonious when sung. This is where the real skill of drama comes in.71

The quality of language is largely irrelevant, because the language assumes a whole new character in the context of performance. In keeping with his conviction about the inextricability of music and language, Shen wrote a guide to the music of the Southern Drama titled Nan jiugong shisan diao qupu. The book indicates different musical forms (geshi) and different rhythmic accents (ban and yan), and it advises how to write lyrics that are consistent with the traditional melodies (qupai) of the theater. It thus became possible for playwrights to compose suitable lyrics without knowing the music that they would eventually be set to. The book became an important reference tool for the more performance-oriented playwrights of the late Ming period, many of whom cited Shen as their most important teacher and master. Shen thus became a symbol of the ght to maintain the priority of music in the drama culture. As mentioned above, Shen suffered an ironic fate: as print became an increasingly important medium, his own plays, which were mediocre from the literary perspective, fell into obscurity. He was also a victim of the emergence of the Peking Opera, which revised all of the musical conventions that premised both his book and his plays.72 The extreme position of He Liangjun and Shen Jing aroused opposition from literati with a more literary bent, and especially from Tang Xianzu. As one of the most talented and celebrated playwrights of the period, Tang’s linguistic radicalism inevitably aroused controversy and heated debate. In his preface to his play Zichai ji (preface dated 1595), a revision of his very rst play Zixiao ji, Tang recorded the comment of his friend Shuai Weishen (courtesy name of Shuai Ji): “This is a

71

Lü Tiancheng, Qupin, 6:1.213. Modern musicologist Yang Yinliu considers Shen’s insistence on musical orthodoxy stubborn and inexible. This position typies the critical perspective following the decline of Kunqu in the nineteenth century. See Yang Yinliu, Zhongguo gudai yinyue shigao, 4:200–6. 72

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book for the desk, not a drama for the stage.”73 Far from disputing or taking offense, Tang seems to accept the validity of this judgment, and quotes it perhaps even proudly. Shen Jing’s observation that the incomplete sentence becomes “harmonious when sung,” inspires Tang to retort, “How can he understand the meaning of drama! In pursuit of my object, I do not mind breaking the throats of all the people in the world.”74 Rather than sacricing the autonomy of the playwright to cater to the performer, Tang wanted the performer to submit to the art of the playwright. As the studies of Catherine Swatek and Zhou Yude have shown, Tang was not blind to issues of performance—he took the trouble to train Luo Zhang’er, after all—but his clear priority is the quality and integrity of language, which, in opposition to Shen, he was clearly unwilling to sacrice for any improvement in musical performance. Tang writes in a letter to Lü Jiangshan—Lü Yusheng (date unknown), Lü Tiancheng’s father—that “a lyric composed in strict obedience to melody will be uneven and abrupt, making it impossible, I am afraid, even to compose a proper sentence.”75 As indicated in his apparent endorsement of the idea that his play is a ‘book for the desk,’ Tang conceives the medium of publication to be at least as essential as the stage.76 The book—especially in its rapidly growing popularity—justies his unwillingness to cater to the stage and provides a logical vehicle for his style. Without the book, Tang’s uncompromising position would not have been possible without completely sacricing his career. Shen’s and Tang’s opposed conceptions of dramaturgic language led to two rival camps in the drama culture of the late Ming period.77 Shen 73 Tang Xianzu, “Preface to Zichai ji” (1595), in Zang Maoxun, ed., Linchuan simeng, 1b–2a. 74 Lü Tiancheng, Qupin, 6:1.213. Ye Changhai criticized this quip in his discussion of Tang’s drama theory, insisting that the playwright should always pay attention to the issue of performability. He gives several examples of Tang’s personal involvement in preparing his plays for performance, thus exonerating Tang of his own words. See Zhongguo xiju xue shigao, 143. 75 See Tang Xianzu, Tang Xianzu quanji, 44.1302. 76 Scholars like Catherine Swatek (Peony Pavilion Onstage), Xu Shuofang (Tang Xianzu nianpu) and Wilt Idema (“ ‘What Eyes May Light Upon My Sleeping Form?’”) defend Tang’s plays as theatrical pieces (133). But theirs are not necessarily the criteria of the late Ming theatrical culture. We must not lose sight of Tang’s controversial status as a playwright in his own era. Tellingly, many of his contemporaries questioned the performability of his plays. 77 Ye Changhai proposes that both Shen and Tang were inuenced by Xu Wei’s drama theory. Shen adhered to Xu’s conception of drama as ‘thoroughly enjoyable’ ( yi su), while Tang adhered to his conception of drama as ‘thoroughly authentic’ ( yi zhen). See Zhongguo xiju xue shigao, 114.

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and his followers were called either the School of Wujiang (Wujiang Pai), as Shen was from Wujiang, or the School of Music (Gelü Pai).78 According to Ye Changhai, Shen’s theory of drama “connects the ‘lyricist’ (ciren) to the ‘singer’ (geke) and emphasizes the need to coordinate dramatic composition and vocal performance.”79 Tang and his supporters were called either the School of Linchuan (Linchuan Pai), as Tang was from Linchuan in Jiangxi province, or the School of Poetic Talent (Ciqing Pai), as Tang emphasized language as the primary vehicle of his art. This rivalry is reected in the dramatic anthologies that were popular during the late Ming period: Yuefu hongshan (mentioned above) exemplies the ideology of Shen’s camp, while Xuanxue pu, whose preface defends the purity of the text against the bungling of performers, exemplies the ideology of Tang’s camp.80 In Qulü, Wang Jide describes the differences between these two rival theorists, and by extension their schools: The relation between Linchuan [Tang] and Wujiang [Shen] has long been one of ice and re. Wujiang subjects everything to rules and cautiously investigates the law. He wants no word to clash with the music, but his brush tip is very clumsy. Linchuan values lively content and writes with no restraint. The renement of his arrangements can almost compete with the craftsmanship of the Weaving Girl [a goddess]. However, [his lyrics] are so winding and convoluted that they are difcult to recite, and leave most singers with twisted tongues.81

Shen’s lyrics are easy to sing because he followed all the musical rules, but the quality of his language is very poor, while Tang Xianzu achieved literary distinction but failed to coordinate his language with the theatrical melodies. The twentieth- and twenty-rst-century reader, who knows the work of these playwrights only as a reader, will tend to sympathize with Tang, but for the late Ming acionado of theater there was genuine cause to nd both camps decient in crucial ways.

78 Ye Changhai cites several scholars, including Aoki Masaru, Zhou Yibai, and Qian Nanyang, as to which playwrights belong to the camp of Shen Jing. See Ibid., 160. 79 Ibid., 155. 80 Cai Yi, Zhongguo gudian xiqu xuba huibian (here after cited ZGGDXQXBHB), 1:453. Catherine Swatek likewise observes that late Ming editors tended to defend ‘textual purity’. See Peony Pavilion Onstage, 104. 81 Wang Jide, Qulü, 4:4.165.

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Achieving a balance between the competing concerns of the two camps became a preoccupying ideal of late Ming drama criticism.82 Wang Jide, for example, criticized He Liangjun’s position as “provocative,” and commented, “If they are not to be rened, why compose lyrics!”83 At the same time, Wang agrees that harmony between words and music is essential to successful drama: Certain plays are not beautiful to hear because [the playwrights] have no feeling for tones and melodies. [. . .] People in the old days said that the poems of Meng Haoran had been recited so continuously because they ring with the sound of bells and chimes and were written in the keys of Gong and Shang. People also said that the poems of Qin Shaoyou [Qin Guan] can be sung in the key of Dashi. This is because [their poems] are beautiful in their sound and melody.84

While recognizing the importance of rened lyrics, Wang is not willing to dispense with the musical standards of the theater. Indeed, he implies the best poetry is itself essentially musical. Far from being at odds, poetry and music tend to be complementary. By praising great poets of ancient times such as Meng Haoran (689–740) and Qin Guan (1049–1100), who achieved a harmonious relation between language and music, Wang implicitly insists on a balance between the quality of language and the requirements of music. Wang’s position suggests a middle ground between the extreme positions staked by He Liangjun and Shen Jing on the one hand, and Tang Xianzu on the other. The desire for balance is even more stark in Lü Tiancheng’s remark: Wouldn’t one who could obey the laws of Mr. Ciyin [Shen Jing] but compose with the talent of Qingyuan Daoren [Tang Xianzu] be a perfect combination of the two?85

Lü goes on to acknowledge that he has yet to “see such a person.”86 Another drama critic, Zhang Qi (Saoyin Jushi), in his Hengqu zhutan, highlights this difculty in his discussion of Tang Xianzu:

82 Li Huimian notes that the drama critic Zhou Deqing (. 1314–1324) envisioned this reconciliation long before the competing camps emerged in the late fteenth century. Li Huimian, Wang Jide qulun yanjiu, 10. 83 Wang Jide, Qulü, 4:3.151. 84 Ibid., 4:2.122–3. 85 Lü Tiancheng, Qupin, 6:1.213. 86 Ibid., 6:1.213.

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chapter two The works of Linchuan [Tang Xianzu] are comparable to any in the eld of drama. Now the plays of Yuming Tang [the studio name of Tang] compete to be devoured. The best among them is the play about Du Liniang [Mudan ting]. It comes close to “Guofeng” [a chapter in Shijing] and “Lisao” [a chapter in Chuci] and triumphs over Qu Yuan and Song Yu [two ancient poets]. It is comparable to Wang Shifu’s Xixiang. But in [Tang’s] hands the musical keys of Gong and Shang are half broken. If he could harmonize lyrics and the music, would it not be splendid? What a pity that he nds it so difcult!87

In his “Preface” to Xiansuo bian’e (On the Errors of Music, preface dated 1639), Shen Chongsui voices the desperate longing for such reconciliation: To ask for a play that equally pleases the hearts of the sophisticated and the common, that amazes the banquet audience and wins the admiration of the solitary reader, is almost like asking for the ultimate truth. Alas, it is difcult even to talk about [such a play].88

Shen grafts the conict between language and music onto the more fundamental conict between literature and performance, and moreover suggests that it is the incompatibility of language and music that drives apart literature and performance to the detriment of both. Shen’s exclamation “alas” expresses a melancholy resignation and regret that was very much characteristic of the mainstream Ming drama critics. It does not go too far to say that this regret shadows the entirety of the late Ming drama culture. Frustrated desire is a dening note during the period, especially with reference to Tang Xianzu, who was the greatest talent and best hope of Ming drama. Tang inspired a love/hate relationship like few other gures in the history of Chinese theater. At the very end of the Ming dynasty—in the 1640s—a satisfactory synthesis was nally achieved by Ruan Dacheng, whose play Yanzi qian (preface date 1642) was considered equally brilliant in its language and in its sensitivity to the traditional melodies.89 Ruan was born a generation later than Tang Xianzu and consciously conceived himself in opposition to the earlier writer. The late Ming critic Wang Siren deemed Ruan a playwright comparable to Tang,90 while in his own

87

Zhang Qi, Hengqu zhutan, in ZGGDXQLZJC, 4:270. Shen Congsui, Xiansuo bian’e, 5:19. 89 The modern scholar Zhang Jing proposes that the late Ming playwrights Ruan Dacheng and Wu Bing both achieve the rare success of harmonizing the lyric and music. See Ming Qing chuanqi daolun, 41–9. 90 Wang Siren, “Preface to Chundeng mi,” in Ruan Dacheng, Chundeng mi ji, preface 1a–5b. 88

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preface to another play, Mouni he ji, Ruan indicates that he hoped to achieve what Tang had not—a perfect match of existing melodies and beautiful lyrics. Late Ming critics granted Ruan a fair amount of success in this pursuit. In his memoir Tao’an mengyi, Zhang Dai describes his experience of watching Ruan’s plays, including Chundeng mi, Mounihe, and Yanzi qian, performed by Ruan’s own troupe. Zhang praises the superiority of Ruan’s plays in terms of both performance and literary quality: “Everything they have performed—play after play, actor after actor, scene after scene, sentence after sentence, and syllable after syllable—is excellent.”91 One anonymous critic praised Ruan as “peerless” in his achievement of the long-awaited harmony between language and music and called him “the true heir of drama.”92 It is a supreme irony that Ruan—a political villain who conspired with both the eunuch Wei Zhongxian (died in 1627) and Ma Shiying (c. 1590–1646), grand tutor of the emperor Hongguang, and later collaborated with the victorious Qing rulers—inspired even more violently mixed feelings than Tang.93 His artistic triumph was so tainted by his political infamy that he was rarely even mentioned until 1699 when he was portrayed as a villainous but brilliant playwright in Kong Shangren’s (1648–1718) popular play Taohua shan.94 Today Ruan is primarily remembered as the arch-villain in this play, which ironically has come to overshadow his own. His rehabilitation is less likely now than ever, because the conundrum that he solved so brilliantly has become an antiquated concern, and in any case his plays are set to the Kunshan style of music, which has since been supplanted by the Peking Opera. It may be, then, that Ruan—one of China’s greatest dramatists, at least by the slightly eccentric standards of the late Ming period—will rest in permanent obscurity. Ignoring the strange case of Ruan, the playwrights and critics of the late Ming period generally chose sides in the debate over the claims of literature and performance. Lü Tiancheng was typical of drama critics (though not necessarily of playwrights) when he placed Shen Jing ahead of Tang Xianzu in his work of drama criticism Qupin:

91

Zhang Dai, Tao’an mengyi, 8.73–4. Xiangcaozhe Chanmin, “Preface (Tici) to Mounihe ji,” in Ruan Dacheng, Mounihe ji, 4b. 93 Mingshi contains only a brief biography of Ruan Dacheng, and this is merely incidental to the biography of Ma Shiying, which is given under the heading of “Vicious Ofcial” ( Jianchen). See Mingshi, 308.7937–45. 94 Kong Shangren, The Peach Blossom Fan, translated by Chen Shih-Hsiang and Harold Acton, 34. 92

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chapter two I must place Shen ahead of Tang. When I think of the need to rescue our era, I cannot overlook the moral teaching that is transmitted only by pleasing the ear. I thus slightly distinguish between them in the order of my list.95

Even so, Lü places both Shen and Tang in the category he calls “the best of the best.”96 Critics such as Lü, however, were ghting a rearguard action against the burgeoning publishing industry and the increasingly literary style of drama, in the belief that theater is a much better vehicle for moral education. As a literatus, Lü’s concern is not his personal aesthetic enjoyment but his social obligations, which seemed to be threatened by the printing of plays. As the years and decades passed, Shen’s reputation would sink just as steadily as Tang’s would rise. The late Ming period was thus a seeming stalemate that masked a decisive shift in energies and ideas.

Rened or Natural Language? The debate over literature and performance, language and music, manifested itself in yet another opposition along the same lines. As we have seen, the defenders of literature favored a highly cultivated and literary language. The defenders of performance objected to this ‘rened language’ (zaohui), not only because it tended to go over the head of the audience and to clash with the traditional melodies of the theater, but also because it was incompatible with their own theatrical philosophy of ‘true color’ (bense), which can be understood as a variety of realism or naturalism. However beautiful, the poetry of Tang Xianzu was unsatisfactory for the simple reason that it was unrealistic. People—and especially servants and commoners—spoke not in rened language but ‘natural language’ (bense). In Qulü, Wang Jide illustrates the emergence of this ‘rened’ language in place of a dramatic language that was far more accessible and natural: At rst, there was only the style of natural language [bense] in drama. We can see this style in Yuan plays, as well as in Pipa ji and Baiyueting ji. Xiangnang ji was composed in the style of the Confucian scholars and initiated a more lyrical and literary style. More recently, Zheng Ruoyong,

95 96

Lü Tiancheng, Qupin, 6:1.213. Ibid., 6:1.213.

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author of Yujue ji, has devoted even more energy and attention to the renement of lyrics, and thus the essential quality [of drama] is almost completely buried. Drama was meant to imitate and delineate the emotion that attaches to all things, and to comprehend tenderly the workings of human reason. [Zheng] adopts circuitous and indirect language to replace the daily speech. As soon as drama incorporated rened language [zaohui], its original style was obscured. However, the literati and scholars cannot forget their old habits and cannot overcome their custom of renement. Thus this literary style cannot be dislodged.97

“The method of the Confucian scholars” (ru men shou jiao) here refers to the characteristic writing style of the literati, who were trained to be gurative rather than literal, suggestive rather than direct, rened rather than natural. Writing plays in the style of the Confucian scholars necessarily contradicted the traditional conception of drama as a popular (if didactic) entertainment that should be grounded in daily life and accessible to all types of audience. To write plays in the commonplace or ‘natural’ language lamented by Wang Jide, however, posed little artistic challenge to the highly educated and well-versed literati. The naturalism associated with this language was, moreover, intellectually constricting, leaving no room for philosophical reection and digression. In his discussion of the ‘guoqu’ (the song that follows the prologue in a traditional play) in Qulü,98 Wang Jide once again proposes a compromise position: There are two forms of the guoqu. The long suite should be rendered in rened language, but should avoid excessive obscurity. The short song should be rendered in natural language, but should avoid excessive colloquialism.99

Wang proposes a balance between rened and natural language, guided by the concern that drama remains accessible to average theatergoers, many of whom were illiterate. According to Catherine Swatek, Wang “doesn’t envision mingling these languages [i.e. rened and natural] in a single aria; the two languages can and should coexist, but should not encroach too closely on each other.”100 Wang goes on to argue:

97 98 99 100

Wang Jide, Qulü, 4:2.121–2. Catherine Swatek translates ‘guoqu’ as ‘main arias.’ Peony Pavilion Onstage, 200. Wang Jide, Qulü, 4:3.138–9. Catherine Swatek, Peony Pavilion Onstage, 201.

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chapter two Literati, women in boudoirs, children in villages, and illiterate elders in the countryside must equally be able to understand [the guoqu] as it is being performed on the stage. Only in this case can [the guoqu] be considered universal.101

The demand for natural language, then, springs from a conception of drama not only as a performance art, but as a popular performance art. Wang demands a delicate balance between the rened and the natural that would allow both the literati and the commoners to enjoy the same drama and would help maintain a cultural unity. Such unity was of the utmost importance in a society that was becoming increasingly stratied and diversied. In his Yuanshan Tang jupin, Qi Biaojia comments on Wang Jide’s effort to balance rened and natural language in Wang’s own play Qiannü lihun: As the poetry of Bai Xiangshan [Bai Juyi] must be comprehensible to an old woman [so drama should be comprehensible]. Thus Fangzhu [Wang Jide] wants drama to become something more than a mere book for the desk [my emphasis].102

Thus Bai Juyi (772–846), who was able to balance poetry and accessibility with rare skill, serves as an example for the work of the traditional Ming playwrights. Qi’s allusion to Bai Juyi pointedly suggests that such a balance is a viable objective, and that the literati playwrights, far from embodying the spirit of the literary tradition, are departing from it. Qi’s conscious choice of the term “antou shu” (book for the desk) clearly indicates that this theatrical crisis had everything to do with the printing of plays. In his anthology of drama criticism Xianqing ouji, Li Yu elaborates further this quest for balance, but denes literary renement as the achievement of simplicity: Drama is different from the essay. Essays are composed for the literati to read and thus we do not take exception to their difculty. Plays, however, are composed for the benet of both the literate and the illiterate. And not only for the illiterate, but for illiterate women and children. [Drama] should thus uphold a standard of simplicity rather than complexity. If essays were written not only for the literate, but also for the illiterate,

101 102

Wang Jide, Qulü, 4:3.138–9. Qi Biaojia, Yuanshan Tang jupin, 6:162.

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for women, and for children, then the scriptural texts composed by the ancient sages and worthies would have been rendered in a simple rather than difcult fashion, just as ction is rendered these days. Someone said: “The literati do not distinguish between writing drama and other types of books. They use it to exhibit their talent for composition. How can their talent nd display in simplicity?” I answered: “Those who can express their talent in simple terms are the true masters of composition.”103

The difference between Wang Jide and Li Yu in their respective views of dramatic language is subtle. Wang Jide emphasizes the importance of simplicity but is not willing to sacrice literary quality. Li’s conception—very much like Qi’s—eliminates the tension between rened language and natural language by dening the former as the latter.104 By this standard, ironically, the language of the literary playwrights becomes vulgar (at least in a sense). Thus Wang seems to speak from a writer’s point of view insofar as he equates literary quality and literary renement (however much he is willing to sacrice the latter to some degree); Li seems to have internalized the requirements of performance to such an extent that he equates literary quality and theatrical accessibility. In his work of drama criticism Qulun, Xu Fuzuo adopts a position along the same lines as Li Yu, but goes farther, insisting that even essays should not be too obscure: “Even the essay should not be difcult, let alone the musical lyrics that emerge from the mouths of the performers and enter the ears of the banquet guests.”105 Simplicity respects the limitations of the audience, but it also ensures the enthusiasm of the performers, who may not share the rened aesthetic of the literati, as Qi Biaojia indicates in his comment on Shi Pan’s (c. 1530–c. 1630) play Shuangyuan ji: The play is mostly about the parting and joining of the sexes. It is free of parallel couplets [ pian yu] and difcult language. It strikes the ears of the village as harmonious. As soon as Shukao [Shi Pan] nishes a play, therefore, performers compete to sing and dance it.106

103

Li Yu, Xianqing ouji, 7:1.28. Li Yu advocates a style that should “Write as if you were talking face to face, and not to literary men, but to your wives and children and servants,” quoted and translated by Patrick Hanan in The Invention of Li Yu, 42. 105 Xu Fuzuo, Qulun, 4:238. 106 Qi Biaojia, Yuanshan Tang qupin, 6:43. 104

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Rather than consent to Wang Jide’s view that simplicity chains creativity, Li and Qi see it as the ultimate creative challenge. Simplicity does impose an expressive constraint, but this constraint (like traditional verse forms in both Chinese and Western poetry) demands all the more ingenuity and skill from the artist. Thus Li and Qi map a clever strategy for keeping the literati within the theatrical fold; in their argument, the theater is an intensely creative context that should call out to every self-challenging playwright.

Performance Cues or Comprehensive Script? Simplicity was not only a standard applied to poetic lyrics, but also to the prose dialogue (binbai) that made up roughly half of a traditional Chinese play. In his Tanqu zazha, Ling Mengchu notes the simplicity in both lyrics and dialogue that at least partially characterized Chinese drama during the Southern Song period. This was hardly surprising, he says, as scripts were composed by performers in the Musical Studio ( Jiaofang, an imperial troupe) or by performers in the public theater (goulan). As these performers lacked the renement of the literati, “neither lyrics nor dialogue were difcult,”107 and they might “be grasped and enjoyed just as completely by an audience as noble as the emperor himself or as low as the common folk.”108 As with lyrics, the demand for simple dialogue was for the sake of accessible performance that would appeal to all strata of society. More deeply, it was premised on the hope for a unied culture. Under the traditional arrangement described by Ling Mengchu, scripts were produced by artists personally involved in the practical and everyday enterprise of performance. Literary concerns, if these even existed, were subordinated to the practical requirements of the stage. This form of drama production began to change in the Yuan period, when composition was increasingly taken up by playwrights. These playwrights, according Li Yu, wrote the full lyrics of their plays, but indicated the dialogue only by rough cues that were meant to be interpreted and elaborated by the performers, often improvisationally (an arrangement that persists to this day in the traditional Taiwanese

107 108

Ling Mengchu, Tanqu zazha, 4:259. Ibid., 4:259.

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opera).109 This arrangement almost ensured that the dialogue of the plays remained simple, as the performers did not have the language to be more rened. In Xianqing ouji, Li Yu writes: The brevity of the dialogue in plays by past playwrights was not due to any precept of concision. It was because past playwrights understood that it was their primary responsibility to compose the lyrics, and they left the performers some freedom [to create the dialogue]. [A poem] describes this practice thus: “To elaborate in the key of Shang and to carve in the key of Yu is my charge/But to ornament what is heard and seen by the audience is their charge.” This is to say, “I convey the meaning of the dialogue in a few summary words, but leave its completion to [the performers].”110

Li Yu’s comments indicate the traditional discrepancy between the text as written and the text as performed. Performers were not merely passive mouthpieces, but active co-creators of the play. This collaboration resulted in necessarily simple dialogue. The performers were not literary, but they understood intimately the kind of thing that would appeal to actual audiences. This collaboration began to break down during and after the Wanli period, when literati playwrights became interested in controlling as much of the creative process as possible. As drama was increasingly subjected to literary standards and was brought under the auspices of the publishing industry, the conception of textual integrity that governed printed material was gradually applied to the entire literary-dramatic nexus. As the author’s intentions were to be preserved in print, so too they were to be preserved in performance. The kind of performance cues given in traditional scripts became increasingly detailed and the script itself became increasingly comprehensive. Under these new circumstances, the performers were denied their traditional role in shaping the play. Wang Jide’s criticism of Yuan drama illustrates this uneasiness with leaving dialogue in the hands of uneducated performers: The lyrics in the work of the Yuan playwrights are good, but the dialogue is vulgar and profane and beneath the speech of the literati. This is no doubt because the performers in the Musical Studio themselves rst

109 My mother, the Taiwanese puppeteer Hsiao Chen Hsiu-hua, co-leader of the puppet troupe Hsiao His-hu, told me that she once oversaw a performance by a Taiwanese opera group. She briey outlined a plot structure, and the troupe entirely improvised the dialogue on stage. 110 Li Yu, Xianqing ouji, 7:3.55.

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chapter two composed the dialogue in skeletal form, and then ordered the literati ofcials to undertake what is called ‘lling in the lyrics’ (tianci ). The scholars felt it beneath them to change the performer’s words. Thus the story often makes no sense, and the language is incoherent. These plays do not resemble the plays of the Southern Drama, which emerged from a single hand [my emphasis].111

Wang Jide’s lament that the dialogue of Yuan drama was left to the rough tongue of performers betrays a literary bias in his implicit demand that plays “emerge from a single hand”—a position that excludes the contribution of performers. Wang’s essential disagreement with Yuan drama (at least in his own conception of it) is that the playwright was forced to collaborate with his artistic inferiors and could not exert thorough artistic control. A crucial detail is Wang’s use of the word “order” [ming], which implies that the literati were politically compelled to accept a collaborative arrangement, but did their best to maintain their artistic integrity and dignity by evading responsibility for the dialogue. Wang’s interpretation of the Yuan drama, which differs from that of Li in crucial respects, can be seen as a parable of failure that covertly advocates the autonomy and self-sufciency of the literati in keeping with the spirit of the Wanli period. Li Yu—writing in the early Qing period—shares Wang’s view that the dialogue should not be left to the hands of the performer, and makes even more explicit the issue of authorial intention: [Song] lyrics are able to convey sound, but not emotion. Those who wish the audience to grasp the story completely from beginning to end, to penetrate the hidden and the profound, must rely on dialogue. I would not mind sparing my own labor by granting the performer a degree of freedom, but among the performers there are both the clever and the foolish. Is there any guarantee that the performers who adapt a work will follow the intention of the author and not add feet to the painted snake?112

Li Yu shares not only Wang’s opinion but also his anxiety. This anxiety is perhaps exacerbated by Li’s unusual opinion that dialogue is even more important than song lyrics. Dialogue, he says, is the key to the fundamental meaning of the play, while lyrics seem to serve an ornamental function. Li Yu argued that the traditional dialogue should be

111 112

Wang Jide, Qulü, 4:3.148. Li Yu, Xianqing ouji, 7:3.55.

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improved, although, presumably, should not be altered so much that it becomes rareed: It has always been a custom of those who compose plays to focus only on writing lyrics and to overlook dialogue as a triviality. Typically, then, the lyrics are rened and the dialogue is vulgar. [. . .] I once said that the dialogue in drama is analogous to the annotations and commentaries of the scriptures in terms of language; to the roof of a house in terms of engineering; and to the veins of the body in terms of anatomy. [. . .] Thus [dialogue] must be weighed equally with lyrics. A play with great lyrics must likewise have great dialogue.113

Far from leaving the dialogue to the performers, then, the playwright must bring all of his skill to its composition. In so doing, he ensures his authorial intention even on the stage, and renders his work more suitable for publication and more appealing to a reading audience. The discrepancy between text and performance is thus closed, and the anxiety of the author is allayed. But this newfound artistic control brought with it new obligations, insisted critics like Li, who wished to strike a balance between artistic freedom and social responsibility, and to smooth over the sometimes bitter disagreements of the Ming period. Despite the protests of traditionalists, the dialogue in plays became more elaborate as the literati solidied their control over the artistic process during the late Ming period. This new elaborateness can be seen throughout Liushizhong qu, an anthology published by the house of Jigu Ge, which was owned by Mao Jin (1599–1659). Simple and sketchy speeches intended merely to forward the plot were replaced by intricate soliloquies and polished exchanges. In many cases older plays were revised, with the dialogue signicantly spruced up. This publication was clearly intended not as scripts for performance, but as reading material for the literati. The intention of this new drama is suggested by editions like Liushizhong qu, which were expensive and visually elegant, with clean fonts and generous spacing of characters. In the days when drama publications were primarily considered scripts for performance rather than material for reading, editions were more affordable and functional, reecting the expectation that they would be used as working copies in the theater. As traditionalists like He and Shen complained about the increasing renement of song lyrics, so later traditionalists like Ling Mengchu

113

Ibid., 7:3.51.

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complained about the increasing renement of dialogue. In his anthology of drama criticism Tanqu zazha, Ling writes: These days dialogues compete in richness just as lyrics compete in ornament. Even the casual question-and-answer in the prologue is now given in rened parallel couplets. [The members of the audience] are expected to be hermits who have memorized whole encyclopedias and scholars who are familiar with the style of examination essays! How can this be? And it is even more ridiculous that maids with painted faces and servants with beards and long legs command the language of poetry with breadth and profundity, and understand philosophy and history. When did every house have the maids of Kangcheng and the servants of Fanghui?114

Thus Ling combines the two primary criticisms of the literary approach to drama: it is inaccessible on the one hand and unrealistic on the other. To ensure that plays are sufciently straightforward for theatrical performance, Wang Jide proposes a simpler approach to dialogue (binbai). Wang writes in his drama criticism Qulü: ‘Scene-setting speeches’ [dingchang bai ] are usually written in ‘parallel couplets’ [Si-liu] and recited by performers when they rst enter the stage. ‘Conversational dialogue’ [duikou bai] is usually written in unstructured language for each character. [. . .] It is appropriate for the playwright to demonstrate a bit of talent when composing the ‘scene-setting speeches,’ but such speeches should not be overly profound or difcult. In the play Zixiao ji, all varieties of speech are rendered in [overly rened] parallel couplets. Unfortunately they are incomprehensible. In Pipa, the speech of the gatekeeper in the imperial court is written in the vernacular with only slight decoration. Every person can understand it. This is why [Pipa] remains popular even to this day.115

Again the assault on Tang Xianzu’s Zixiao ji (praised by Shuai Ji as a ‘book for the desk’) and the praise for Gao Ming’s Pipa ji (written during an era when plays were not published) imply that this theatrical crisis sprang from the tension between printing and theater. Bombard-

114 Ling Mengchu, Tanqu zazha, 4:259. Kangcheng was the courtesy name of the Han scholar Zheng Xuan. Liu Yiqing records an episode about the literary skill his maids have. See Shishuo xinyu, 2.46. It is difcult to identify which Fanghui is referred to here. As Kangcheng is Zheng’s courtesy name, Fanghui is also possibly a courtesy name. There were two literati with this courtesy name. The rst was Xi Xi, who lived during the Jin dynasty of the Six Dynasties; his biography is included in Jinshu, 67.1801–2. The second was He Zhu, who lived during the Song dynasty; his biography is included in Songshi, 443.13103. Neither biography illuminates this allusion. 115 Wang Jide, Qulü, 4:3.140–1.

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ing the audience with poetry not only in lyrics but also in speech runs the risk of overwhelming and bafing them. By demanding that elite playwrights keep parallel couplets simple and restrict themselves to vernacular language in their dialogue, critics like Wang hoped to make plays suitable for both reading and performance. During the late Ming period, then, drama was subjected to two movements that were seemingly opposed, but in fact were complementary in the pursuit of a balance between literature and performance. On the one hand there was the movement to simplify lyrics, and on the other hand there was the movement to elaborate the dialogue. The attempt in both cases was to render drama suitable for both the ‘banquet’ and the ‘desk.’ Under the terms of this compromise, lyrics must be poetic and musical, while dialogue must be intelligent and comprehensible. In Xianqing ouji, Li Yu prescribed the temperament necessary to fuse the elite and the popular, offering himself as an example: Friends have often said, “Dialogue is essentially oral, so all you need to do is write as you speak.” But the dialogue written by Liweng [i.e. Li Yu himself ] is like an essay in that each word has been carefully considered. Dialogue must be clear on paper, but no one much cares whether it can be recited uently. It is often clear in the printed edition [my emphasis], but confusing when played on the stage. How can it be that one’s ears are deaf, while one’s eyes are bright? It is because the author cares only waving his brush, and does not think in terms of other people. He must use his mouth as if he were a performer, and use his ears as if he were in the audience, and link his mind to his mouth. Thus he will know immediately whether his dialogue is easy to recite and pleasant to hear. This is the reason why it is easy to judge the quality [of a play]. Liweng, for example, holds his pen in his hand but his mouth recites from the stage. He makes his body the stage, while his spirit and soul circle [the theater]. He ponders the plot and he experiments with the music. When all comes right he sets it down—otherwise he puts aside his pen. This is why his plays are suitable for both reading and listening.116

Li’s choice of the term ‘printed edition’ (keben) makes clear that he attributes the cultural crisis to the burgeoning of drama publication. In his own immodest opinion, Li’s dialogue achieves the highest standard of drama composition—it is “suitable for both reading and listening.”117 116

Li Yu, Xianqing ouji, 7:3.54–5. Despite Li Yu’s view of his own language is easy and simple, Patrick Hanan disagrees with Li’s own assessment that “On the one hand, his insistence on comprehensibility—drama is a ‘universal instrument’ and language should be ‘like an old 117

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The quality of the language and the requirements of performance do not conict with each other, but gracefully conate. Figures like Wang Jide and Li Yu understood that they could not completely counteract the increasing dominance of Tang Xianzu and the literary school, and thus, cleverly, redened the meaning of literary excellence to encompass a consideration for performance. In the late Ming period and the early Qing period, the technical challenge of this aesthetic proved irresistible to the literati, and checked what might have otherwise become the complete divergence of literature and performance.

Efforts to Balance the Dual Roles of Drama As literature progressively dominated the drama culture of the late Ming period, the defenders of the theater made corresponding efforts to balance the demands of literature and performance. As we have seen, they insisted on the coordination of language and music and on the accessibility of language, but at the same time they admitted the need for fuller and richer dialogue. The conation of literature and performance came to represent the highest aesthetic standard, and playwrights—even Tang Xianzu, who attempted to train his own actors—tended to pursue some kind of compromise. After Tang died in 1616, there were few who disputed the ideal of a drama that reconciled literature and performance. Ruan Dacheng, who considered himself more successful than Tang as his plays were readily performed, is typical.118 This aesthetic standard, moreover, became the touchstone for drama criticism during the late Ming period. In the preface to his anthology of drama criticism Qupin, Qi Biaojia illustrates this phenomenon in comparing his own drama criticism with that of Lü Tiancheng: “Lü values music more than beautiful lyrics, while I equally value music and beautiful lyrics.”119 This criterion of criticism was not only used to evaluate plays, but further employed to evaluate the criticism

friend’—indicates a functional concept of language as a means of communication. On the other, his own practice—the extended similes, the parallelism, the adapted or wittily misapplied commonplaces, the array of stylistic devices—suggests the ideal of literariness.” The Invention of Li Yu, 52. 118 Ruan Dacheng, “Preface to Chundeng mi ji” (1633), in Chundeng mi ji, 4b. 119 Qi Biaojia, “Preface to Qupin,” in Yuanshan Tang qupin, 6:5.

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of plays as shown in Li Yu’s criticism of Jin Shengtan’s (1608–1661) commentaries of Xixiang ji: Shengtan’s commentary treats Xixiang as a plaything [bawan] of the literati rather than as a play acted [bannong] by performers. Shengtan grasps the ultimate meaning of words, but he must also consider the ultimate meaning of performance.120

In effect, Li Yu suggests that Jin Shengtan is a literary critic rather than a theatrical critic. Li’s use of the verb “bawan” (to ddle with an small object) in opposition to “bannong” (to act) suggests that in Jin’s conception the play is a thing to be held in the hand—in short, a book. For Li Yu, Jin’s commentaries are unsatisfactory as they highlight the literary rather than the theatrical value of Xixiang ji. This aesthetic standard has inuenced criticism all the way down to the twentieth century. The noted drama critic and collector Wu Mei (1884–1939), for example, praises Feng Menglong’s adaptations of both lyrics and dialogue as “embodying renement on the desktop as well as on the stage.”121 The desire to balance literature and performance led many critics, playwrights, and publishers to adapt freely the work of others. Even as they were seizing control of performance by stipulating stage and music directions, and by more fully developing dialogue, the literati playwrights, ironically, were losing control of their own texts. Authorial intention was sacriced to principles of partisan aesthetics. Where performers had previously altered dramatic texts to suit their needs, publishers and other literati were now up to the same thing. Tang Xianzu’s Mudan ting, for example, was adapted at least ves times during the late Ming period, rst by his chief philosophical rival Sheng Jing, whose version of Tang’s famous play, now lost, was titled Tongmeng ji.122 There followed a version by Lü Yusheng, which Tang warned players not to perform; a version by Zang Maoxun titled Huanhun ji (1618); a version by Feng Menglong titled Fengliu meng (published sometime after 1623); and a version by Xu Rixi ( jinshi 1622), whose forty-three scene

120

Li Yu, Xianqing ouji, 7:3.70. Wu Mei, “Xiqu bixu antou changshang liang shan qi mei,” in Wang Weimin, ed., Wu Mei xuqu lunwen ji, 107. 122 Xu Shuofang, “Tang Xianzu xiqu qiangdiao he ta de shidai,” in Xu Shuofang shuo xiqu, 109. 121

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adaptation is included in Liushizhong qu.123 Catherine Swatek observes that Zang Maoxun and Feng Menglong were driven by a concern for music, and more largely by a concern for performance; the same can be said for Lü and presumably for Shen.124 In a letter to the performer Luo Zhang’er, whom he tutored, Tang acknowledges that Lü’s adaptation is conducive to performance, but he refuses to consider it his own work and specically instructs Luo to ignore it: You must follow my original version of Mudan ting ji rather than the adaptation made by Lü. Even if only two words have been added or cut for the sake of popular performance, the play has come to mean something very different.125

In a letter to Ling Chucheng (courtesy name of Ling Mengchu) Tang pursues the same complaint. He compares his work to Wang Wei’s (699–759) painting Winter landscape, which depicted a banana tree. Later, an anonymous artist copied the painting, omitting the banana tree as inconsistent with the winter scene. Tang admits that the revised painting is a correct winter landscape—“Here winter is winter”—but he insists that “it is no longer Wang Wei’s Winter landscape.”126 The publisher Zang Maoxun printed a revised version of Tang’s full oeuvre in 1618, two years after Tang died. Zang’s version of Mudang ting takes more literary pains than Lü’s version, but it similarly emphasizes the requirements of performance. In his notes to the full edition, Zang admits his theatrical motivation: Linchuan [i.e. Tang] never belonged to the Wu School [Kunqu] and did not learn its music and melody [. . .]. In a casual manner, I have repeatedly cut and edited his four plays. The story must beautify the emotion and the lyrics must harmonize with the music. Thus the listeners will be delighted and the audience will forget its weariness.127

123 Zang included his adaptations of Tang’s four plays in Linchuan simeng, now in the collection of Taipei Palace Museum. Feng’s adaptation is included in Mohan Zhai dingben chuanqi and also in GBXQCK, 2nd series. Zhou Yude in his study titled “Linchuan simeng he Ming Qing wutai” discussed briey Zang, Feng, and Xu’s adaptations (97–107). 124 Catherine Swatek, “The Musically Grounded Adaptations of Zang Maoxun and Feng Menglong,” chapter two of Peony Pavilion Onstage, 25–67. 125 Tang Xianzu, “A Letter to the Actor from Yihuang Luo Zhang’er,” in Tang Xianzu ji, 49.1427. 126 Tang Xianzu, “A Respond to Ling Chucheng,” in Tang Xianzu ji, 47.1344. 127 Zang Maoxun, “Preface to Yuming Tang chuanqi” (1618), in Tang Xianzu, Tang Xianzu ji, 1547.

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This is to say that Tang’s work must be rendered more performable. Zang further testies to his motivation in the notes to his published version of Mudan ting: “I have carefully cut and edited [the plays] of Yuming Tang [i.e. Tang] so they more fully lend themselves to the method of actors and make for better banquet entertainment.”128 To this end, as Hirose Reiko and Catherine Swatek discuss, Zang cut the play from fty-ve to thirty scenes.129 Zang indicates in his notes to Mudan ting that in its original form the play was too long to sit well with performers.130 Hirose proposes that Zang simplied Tang’s language as a means of shortening the play; Zang’s comprehensive agenda, however, was to make the play a more appropriate performance piece.131 Tang’s locutions made for a longer play, but just as objectionably they were dense and difcult to follow. Zang’s performance-oriented editorial agenda had, of course, its critics among Tang’s supporters. Mao Yuanyi (. 1636), for example, was scathing in his criticism: [Zang Maoxun] of Zhiwei considered [Mudan ting] a desktop play that could not be performed on the stage. He dampened its brilliance and blunted its sharpness so that it suited mediocre actors and bumpkin listeners. It is a painful read! Rare events meet with pedestrian lyrics; rare lyrics meet with pedestrian melodies; rare melodies meet with pedestrian rhythms.132

Like his adaptation of Tang’s work, Zang’s adapation of Yuan drama was motivated by a concern for performability, but contemporary scholars have not generally come to this conclusion. According to Stephen West, Zang wanted to beautify the language of the traditional theater in order to satisfy the rened taste of his fellow late Ming literati.133 In her study Theaters of Desire, meanwhile, Patricia Sieber theorizes that Zang’s adaptation of Yuan drama was a politically motivated attempt to reproach the state-sanctioned Confucianist canon.134 Sieber writes: Unlike other editions of drama, including Li Kaixian’s, Zang did not disclose his editorial program. He proceeded by implication, producing 128

Zang Maoxun, adapted, Mudan ting, in Linchuan simeng, 2.57b. Hirose Reiko, “ZÔ Mojun ni yoru Botan tei Hankon ki no kaihen ni tsuite,” 71–86. Catherine Swatek, Peony Pavilion Onstage, 28–52. 130 Zang Maoxun, adapted, Mudan ting, in Linchuan simeng, 2.57b. 131 Hirose Reiko, “ZÔ Mojun ni yoru Botan tei Hankon ki no kaihen ni tsuite,” 71–86. 132 Mao Xiaotong, ed., Tang Xianzu yanjiu ziliao huibian, 852–55. Adapted from the translation by Catherine Swatek (Peony Pavilion Onstage, 65). 133 Stephen H. West, “Zang Maoxun’s Injustice to Dou E,” 283–303. 134 Patricia Sieber, Theaters of Desire, 101–22. 129

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chapter two an intricately contrived edition [of Yuan drama] that pretends to be “authentic” representation of Yuan literary practices and texts. Inspired by his disenchantment with the Ming political establishment, Zang pitted an imagined Yuan palace examination against the Ming court, in such a bold and subtle fashion that it amounted to a stroke of imaginative genius.135

A better explanation lies in the emphasis of Zang’s own theory of drama and in the tenor of the late Ming drama culture. As we have seen, Zang took a strong position in the aesthetic debates that roiled the late Ming drama culture, prizing performability over literary quality, much as did Shen Jing. It may be inferred that Zang was drawn to the Yuan drama not by a desire to beautify its language, as West holds, but by an appreciation for its simplicity of language, which predated the excessive literary renement that became so pervasive during the late Ming period. Zang was not hoping to beautify the Yuan drama—it was already upheld as a paragon by the late Ming literati—but to adapt it to Southern style of music that had come to dominate theatrical performance in the late Ming era. Sieber’s theory is provocative, but her assertion that Zang “did not disclose his editorial program” in his preface to Yuanqu xuan is contradicted by the text itself. The preface is exclusively and overtly concerned with issues of performance, and particularly with reconciling the Yuan drama with the Southern style of music.136 In the same preface, Zang repeats his assault on Tang Xianzu for failing to reconcile his rareed language with the traditional melodies of the stage.137 Zang’s impulse to adapt Yuan drama and his critique of Tang clearly dovetail, suggesting that he is motivated by a single overarching desire to ensure the performability of the culture’s canonical drama. The preface is not a merely neutral technical statement, then, but a carefully coded statement of ideological principle. Late Ming readers would have understood that Zang was taking sides in the chief debate of the era. Zang’s adaptation of Tang’s work was not the nal indignity suffered by the great playwright. The late Ming literati Feng Menglong adapted Mudang ting as well. According to Catherine Swatek, his version of

135 136 137

Ibid., 103. Zang Maoxun, “Preface to Yuanqu xuan” (dated 1616), in Yuanqu xuan, 3a–4b. Ibid., 7b–8a.

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the play, titled Fengliu meng, became the standard stage version during the Qing dynasty.138 In his preface to Mohan Zhai dingben chuanqi, an anthology of plays he edited and adapted, Feng states clearly that his editorial approach has been guided by a concern for performability.139 It is richly ironic that in the hands of its despised adapters Mudan ting became a favorite of the stage during and after the late Ming period, its popularity breeding ever more attempts at adaptation. Catherine Swatek’s study of the staging history of Mudan ting from the late sixteenth century to the end of the twentieth century can also be seen as a history of the play’s evolution as a more stage-friendly piece. Her study suggests the likelihood that Tang has been rolling in his grave for several hundred years.140 Tang, of course, far from the last playwright who suffered his work to be revised for the stage: the trend continued throughout the Qing period. The famous Qing playwright Hong Sheng (1645–1704) indicates in his preface to his play Changsheng dian that his highly literate creation was too long for performance and was thus truncated by ‘mischievous vulgarians’ (cangbei ). Hong’s friend Wu Shufu was so angry that he adapted the play himself, following the example set by Feng Menglong. He shortened the play from fty to twenty-eight scenes, but exercised enough literary sensitivity to win the approval of Hong.141 In his preface Hong capitulates to the inevitable, instructing that those desiring a shorter and simpler version of the play should “seek out Wu’s adaptation and not allow themselves to be misled by the hand of vulgarity.”142 This tendency of redaction explains why the drama of the late Ming period offers so many variants and so few denitive texts. Popular plays like Xixiang ji appeared in dozens of different versions, all of which

138 Catherine Swatek, Peony Pavilion on Stage, 244. Catherine Swatek also indicates an instance of the adaptation of Mudan ting included in Zhui baiqiu xinji inspired by Feng Menglong’s Fengliu meng (119). 139 Feng Menlong, “Preface” to Shuangxiong ji, in Mohan Zhai dingben chuanqi, vol. 1. 140 Swatek discusses the conventional performance of the scenes “Wandering in the Garden” and “Alarming Dream,” Peter Sellars’ avant-garde production, and Chen Shi-zheng’s eighteen-hour production of Mudan ting in her study Peony Pavilion Onstage, 158–241. 141 Catherine Swatek claims in Peony Pavilion Onstage that it was the difculty of the play that led Wu to adapt it (4). This claim seems dubious as Hong Sheng clearly indicates that Wu was motivated by disgust with previous adaptations. 142 Hong Sheng, “Changsheng dian liyan,” in Cai Yi, ed., ZGGDXQXBHB, 3:1579–80.

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included strategic revisions, making it impossible to identify an original source text or denitive edition. In the Qing period, the search for denitive texts became a preoccupation—indeed became synonymous with the scholarly project. This search continues to dene scholarship among traditional critics even today, especially in the elds of drama and ction. It is standard practice (though not necessarily logical practice) to accept the earliest available text or manuscript as denitive. In the case of Xixiang ji, for example, the 1498 Beijing edition is considered denitive, while the sixty editions published during the late Ming period are dismissed as corrupt. Writing in the 1970s, Tanaka Issei was the rst to see the sociological and historical importance of these ‘corrupt texts,’ for which he deserves a good deal of credit.143 He carefully examined slight variations in the language of the many editions of Xixiang ji and Pipa ji and came to the conclusion that these indicate a great deal about a publication’s intended readership and theatrical audience, and suggest certain regional characteristics of the publishing industry. He divided the dozens of editions into four groups based on the publishers’ localities: ‘Wu editions’ from Jiangsu, ‘Min editions’ from Fujian, ‘Jing editions’ from Nanjing, and ‘Hui editions’ from Anhui. Tanaka reasons that the Wu editions reect older theatrical traditions, as their language is simpler and more colloquial than that of their counterparts. He thus makes the Wu editions the baseline of his various comparisons, nding Min and Jing editions more rened in their language, and the Hui editions more uncouth.144 Tanaka further theorizes the relation between these regional editions and different theatrical traditions. In his view, the Wu editions, with their unadorned and colloquial language, are consistent with performance in village religious ceremonies; the Min and Jing editions, with their more rened language, are consistent with performance organized by landlord and gentry families; and the Hui editions, with their distinctly

143 Tanaka Issei, “JyÖgo roku sÏki o chÖshin tosuru KÔnan chihÔgeki no henshitsu ni tsuite,” 129–440. The Pipa ji scholar Huang Shizhong also indicates that the different editions should be seen as essential to the receptive history of the play. See Pipa ji yanjiu. The Korean Pipa ji specialist Kim Yöng-suk argues that the understanding of the evolution of different Pipa ji editions assists the search for a denitive edition of the play and claries the evolution of drama during the late Ming period. See Pipa ji banben liubian yanjiu, 2–3. 144 Tanaka Issei, “JyÖgo roku sÏki o chÖshin tosuru KÔnan chihÔgeki no henshitsu ni tsuite,” 182.

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uncouth language (profanity, sexual innuendo, etc.), are consistent with performance given in the market places. This theory has much to recommend it, but leaves many questions unanswered. It is not clear, for example, how different theatrical traditions came to relate to different printing centers. It is also not clear how Tanaka’s theories can used to explain the full gamut of theatrical practice. We might ask, for example, what editions the actors of Fujian used when performing in the marketplace? Did they use Min editions (associated with Fujian) or Hui editions (associated with the marketplace)? What editions did the actors of Anhui use when performing during religious ceremonies? Tanaka’s theories also ignore the physical and aesthetic characteristics of the publication, which tend to complicate his neat categories. Min editions, despite their rened language, were relatively cheap and crude productions, while the Hui editions, despite their uncouth language, were more elegantly bound, printed, and illustrated, and are now considered the masterpieces of illustrator’s art. Would a landlord have preferred the Min edition or the Hui edition? It seems to me that the answer is not as obvious as Tanaka suggests. The chief aw in Tanaka’s theory is that it all but overlooks chronology, comparing editions of different eras with no attention to the way in which drama publication developed during the late Ming period. Some of the geographical distinctions observed by Tanaka might better be interpreted as chronological or historical distinctions. I accept Tanaka’s premise that the discrepancies between editions are sociologically meaningful, but his own sociological interpretation is in large part unconvincing, and his assumption that all editions were intended for performance is dubious. The discrepancies between editions in terms of both textual content and physical appearance are best explained with reference to the cultural struggle between the partisans of reading and performance explored above. The evolving and sometimes anxious relationship between literature and theater explains (as we have seen) many of the peculiar phenomena of the late Ming drama culture: the heated debates about the style of dialogue and lyrics, the penchant for adaptation and revision. It also explains the sudden emergence of illustration as a primary component of nearly all drama publications and the proliferation of new styles of illustration. As books threatened to remove drama from the theater, illustration attempted to incorporate elements of the theater within books. Illustration could not reproduce the musical aspects of theater, but it could reproduce

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many of the visual aspects: stylized movement (ke-jie or shenduan), dance, costume, setting, and even the stage structure itself.145 Thus the book itself could be made to acknowledge performance as the ineradicable context of drama.146

145 For a discussion of how illustration borrowed visual elements from stage and theatrical gestures see Li-ling Hsiao, “Woodblock Prints and Theatre,” 133–184. 146 For a discussion of the way reading illustrated drama reproduces the experience of theater see chapter six of this study.

CHAPTER THREE

PERFORMANCE ILLUSTRATION

The term ‘performance’ means many different things.1 In this study the term refers specically to stage performance, while ‘performance illustration’ refers to illustration inspired by the stage or alluding to the stage. This chapter aims to present a detailed, comprehensive, and systematic account of the relation between stage and performance illustration during the Wanli period. There are four distinct theatrical characteristics pervading the performance illustration of the Wanli period: rst, the internal arrangement of space is inspired by stage design; second, gures are depicted in the posture of stylized theatrical gesture; third, the image is consistently oriented toward an imaginary audience, maintaining sightlines appropriate to the stage; and fourth, the image includes overt references to the stage structure and props.2 Most performance illustrations include all four of these characteristics, though some include fewer. The adoption of performance illustration, which introduces theatrical elements within the printed book, reects the era’s overwhelming interest in theater, and especially the illustrators’ inclination to participate in the struggle between the camps of literature and performance that so much dominated the cultural moment as discussed in chapter two. Performance illustration, indeed, was a spearhead in this struggle, the most signicant device by which performance was upheld as the essential context of drama. On this basis the ideological and moral inections of performance illustration cannot be overstated. This study attempts to resolve once and for all the dispute over whether the illustrations of the late Ming period allude to the stage. Among modern scholars of Chinese illustration, performance illustration is given only cursory attention, and in some cases the very idea of performance illustration is disputed. Wang Bomin, Ann McLaren, and Yao Dujuin passingly note elements of theatrical performance in

1 2

Sarah Fraser, Performing the Visual, 12, 159. Li-ling Hsiao, “Woodblock Prints and Theatre,” 133–184.

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traditional woodblock illustration—conventional theatrical props like draped tables (as shown in gures 3–2, 3–28, 3–32, 3–33, and 3–70, inspired by the draped table used as a prop in performance, as in gure 3–62), hanging curtains (as shown in gures 3–33, 3–64, and 3–70), weapons (as shown in gure 3–16), for example—but, having other areas of concern, they do not thoroughly explore the phenomenon or attempt to explain its signicance.3 Robert Hegel, however, questions this school of thought. Responding to Yao, who notes a theatrical inuence in the illustrations of the 1498 edition of Xixiang ji, Hegel argues that “Chinese printed play illustrations rarely re-create the appearance of the stage.”4 In Hegel’s view, the illustrations in the 1498 edition of Xixiang ji are essentially naturalistic, though crudely rendered. He holds that they depict scenes set in “appropriately convincing surroundings, whether within stylized structures or in natural settings adapted from the conventions of scroll paintings.”5 Speaking of illustrations generally, Hegel acknowledges that some images seem to depict the fumo addressing an audience (in traditional Chinese plays, the fumo, a male supporting actor, opens the play with a philosophical disquisition or plot summary), but he doubts any systematic or pervasive connection between the stage and drama illustration.6 Scholars of Chinese art on the other hand have been quick to detect elements of theatrical performance in painting. According to Sarah Fraser, the mural paintings found in caves 146 and 196 in Dunhuang, which portray the subjugation of demons, are closely related to the traditions of oral story-telling; she argues that “the setting of the doctrinal battle between RaudrÊksha and SÊriputra suggests a stage-like venue”; that the “six contests are arrayed between them like performances”; and that “the gures [. . .] are themselves assuming poses as if they were acrobats and actors on a stage captured in the midst of performance.”7 Richard Vinograd sees theatrical inuence in both of Chen Hongshou’s self-portraits (one painted in 1627 and one in 1635); the former shows “a mask like exaggeration” of expression while the latter features decorative coloring and “conscious posturing and manipulation 3 Wang Bomin, Zhongguo Banhua shi, 79. Anne McLaren, Chinese Popular Culture, 64–67. Yao Dajuin, “The Pleasure of Reading Drama,” 461–5. 4 Robert Hegel, Reading Illustrated Plays, 319. 5 Ibid., 319. Hegel elsewhere states that “play illustrations do not re-create the appearance of the stage” (325). 6 Ibid., 435. 7 Sarah Fraser, Performing the Visual, 166.

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in both the gures and nature.”8 Vinograd explains these eccentricities by noting that “Chen was an illustrator of popular dramas and cultural types in the wood-block medium [. . .].”9 Other scholars have been similarly detected a theatrical element in Chen’s painting. In his discussion of Chen’s 1651 painting album Yinju shiliu guan, for example, Kohara Hironobu remarks that the gures are “depicted as though they were entering a stage.”10 In a study of Chen’s illustrations to Xixiang ji published by Zhang Shenzhi in 1639,11 Xu Wenmei proposes that Chen’s work is characterized by conned spaces that resemble the space of a stage.12 In her doctoral dissertation “Authenticity in a New Key,” Tamara Heimarck Bentley posits ‘authenticity’ and ‘theatricality’ as the dual tendencies of Chen’s woodblock prints of the Shuihu heroes.13 In her doctoral dissertation “An Actor in Real Life,” Liu Shi-yee argues that Chen postures his gures in ways that echo conventional theatrical gestures.14 All of these scholars attempt to trace the interrelation between Chen’s career as a painter and his career as a drama illustrator, working on the reasonable assumption that drama illustration implies a broad exposure and receptivity to the inuence of performance. We might ask: “how could illustrators not have been inuenced by theater?” After all, they were immersed in the theatrical culture, living and breathing its traditions and aspirations.

Stage Settings Some scholars have noted that the depiction of theatrical props such as tables, curtains, drapery, etc. in illustrations is emblematic of the inuence of stage performance. Examining the drama illustration produced during the Wanli period, the feature of stage design most prominently appropriated by performance illustration is the valance (a border of drapery hanging under the roof of a stage, see gure 3–8 and gures 3–9 and 3–11) and ‘bian’e’ (a name board hanging above a door or under

8

Richard Vinograd, Boundaries of the Self, 31, 33. Ibid., 33. 10 Kohara Hironobu, “An Introductory Study of Cheng Hongshou,” 71. 11 Wang Shifu, Bei Xixiang miben, Zhang Shenzhi 1639 edition, 3. 12 Xu Wenmei, “Chen Hongshu Zhang Shenzhi zheng bei Xixiang miben banhua yanjiu,” 54–64. 13 Tamara Heimarck Bentley, “Authenticity in a New Key,” 185–229. 14 Liu Shi-yee, “An Actor in Real Life,” 73–90. 9

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the roof of a building, see gure 3–63). They both are often used in theater to decorate the stage, but used in performance illustration as a caption-space to announce the scene presented. The valance-type caption prominently displayed in a long strip cartouche—a drawn frame to be inscribed with words—across the top of the illustration resembles a stage valance without the pleated cloth, as in the illustrations in a 1581 Fuchun Tang edition of Yujue ji (gure 3–1). Examples of the long strip cartouche with the decorative pleated clothes are shown in illustrations in a 1589 Shide Tang edition of Baiyueting ji (gure 3–2), and in a Shide Tang edition of Qianjin ji.15 The valance-type cartouche in gure 3–2 features a bian’e (a rectangular cartouche), on which four characters are inscribed to announce the subject of the illustration, decorated with cloud ornament on both sides and with pleated clothes and ribbons underneath. These elements make the appearance of the valance-type cartouche in gure 3–2 analogous to those featured in gure 3–8 and gures 3–9 and 3–11, which are clearly depiction of stage in performance. The publisher of Shide Tang further simplied this mixed forms and adopted only the bian’e—type of cartouche with cloud ornament on both sides in most of the house’s illustrations as exemplied in a 1586 Shide Tang edition of Duanfa ji (gure 3–17). The connection of the valance—and bien’e-type cartouches with the stage is thus clear. Many illustrations produced by publishers in regions such as Nanjing, Jianyang and Haicheng bear these prominent features.16 These publishers, listed below, are primarily commercial publishing houses: Shide Tang, owned by Tang Cheng, was located in Nanjing.17 The house’s

15 For the illustration of the scene of the Hongmen banquet see Shen Cai, Qi chongding chuxiang zhushi Han Xin Qianjin ji tiping, Shide Tang Wanli edition, National Central Library, Taipei. 16 Lucille Jia has studied extensively the publishers in both Jianyang and Nanjing. See Printing for Prot; and “Of Three Mountains Street,” 107–151. 17 Zhou Xinhui notes in her essay “Zhongguo gudai xiqu banhua kaolue” that Shide Tang split from Fuchun Tang and became an independent publishing house around 1600 (10). But an anonymous playwright’s Duanfa ji in Kanda KiichirÔ’s collection was printed by Shide Tang in 1586. See Kanda KiichirÔ, ed., ChÖgoku gikyoku zenpon sanshu. Dazi guanban Xiyou ji in 1592, and Tangshu zhizhuan tongsu yanyi in 1593. Apparently Shide Tang printed its own publications long before this alleged split. Zhou Xinhui does not note where she derives her information, and there is an apparent mistake in her claim. Robert Hegel claims that both Shide Tang and Fuchun Tang were owned by Tang Fuchun: “. . . we know that Tang Fuchun himself managed both his namesake and Shide Tang.” See Reading Illustrated Fiction, 143. But the Shide Tang edition of Pipa ji bears the name Tang Cheng who is presumably the owner of the

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3–1. Liang Chenyu. Yujue ji. Jinling: Fuchun Tang, 1581. Reproduced from GBXQCK, 1st series, box 6, 5:2.1a. Shanghai: Shangwu yinshuguan, 1954.

3–2. Shi Hui. Baiyueting ji. Jinling: Shide Tang, 1589. Reproduced from GBXQCK, 1st series, box 1, 10:2.40b.

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edition of the novel Xiyou ji also includes performance illustrations that use the valance as a caption-space. The house’s extant drama publications are listed in the Appendix. Fuchun Tang, owned by Tang Fuchun (courtesy name Duixi), was located in Nanjing.18 The house’s extant drama publications are listed in the Appendix. Jinxian Tang was owned by the Zhan. Of relevance is the anthology of plays Fengyue jinnang, published in 1553.19 Yugeng Tang, owned by the Zhu, was located in Jianyang, Fujian. Of relevance is the play Lizhi ji, published in 1581.20 Qiaoshan Tang, owned by Liu Longtian, was located in Jianyang. Of relevance is the play Xixiang ji, published in 1592.21 Sanhuai Tang, owned by Wang Huiyun, was located in Jianyang. Of relevance is the anthology of plays Yuefu jinghua, published in 1600.22 Yu Siya was based in Jianyang. Of relevance is the anthology of plays Yushu ying edited by Liu Junxi, published in 1599.23 Li Bifeng and Chen Wohan were based in Haicheng, Fujian. Of relevance is the anthology of plays Mantian chun, published in 1604.24 Tingli was based in Fujian. Of relevance is the anthology of plays Yugu diaohuang edited by a Huang jushi from Jizhou, published in 1610.25 Liu Lingfu

house. I think these two publishing houses are closely related and their owners probably relatives, which would explain why their illustrations show a mutual inuence, but also subtle differences. Zhou Wu also identies Tang Cheng as the owner of the Shide Tang publishing house, and Tang Cheng and Tang Fuchun were brothers. See Zhou Wu, ed., Zhongguo banhua shi tulu, 637. 18 Robert Hegel thinks that ‘Duixi’ is a stream, near Fuchun Tang, in the famous Sanshanjie book market district of Nanjing (Reading Illustrated Fiction, 143). Lucille Jia interprets ‘duixi’ not as a proper noun, but as meaning literally ‘opposite the stream,’ possibly indicating “a location near the Inner Bridge facing the Qinhuai Canal.” (“Of Three Mountain Street,” 110). There are several plays printed by Fuchun Tang with the note “printed by Tang Duixi Fuchun Tang.” If ‘Duixi’ indicates location, then Tang Duixi should read “Tang of Duixi.” ‘Duixi’ is probably a courtesy name. Zhou Wu also notes that Tang Duixi is another name of Tang Fuchun. See Zhou Wu, ed., Zhongguo banhua shi tulu, 614. 19 A reproduction of the edition is included in Wang Qiugui, ed., Shanben xiqu congkan (here after cited as SBXQCK ), 4th series. 20 A reproduction of the edition is included in Mingben Chaozhou xiwen wuzhong. 21 A reproduction of the edition is included in GBXQCK, 1st series. 22 A reproduction of the edition is included in Wang Qiugui, ed., SBXQCK, 1st series. 23 A reproduction of the extant juan, one chapter, of the edition is included in Li Fuqing & Li Ping, ed., Haiwai guben wan Ming xiju xuanji sanzhong, 1–80. 24 For a detailed study of this edition see Piet van der Loon, The Classical Theatre and Art Song of South Fukien. 25 A reproduction of the edition is included in Wang Qiugui, ed., SBXQCK, 1st series.

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was based in Fujian. Of relevance is the anthology of plays Wanxiang xin.26 This type of illustration is also found in the anthology of plays Da Ming tianxia chun, published sometime during the Wanli period by an unknown house.27 As art historian Michael Sullivan indicates in his study The Three Perfections, “For over a thousand years, the three arts of painting, poetry and calligraphy have been intimately connected in the minds of cultivated Chinese [. . .].”28 This intimate connection has also attracted the attention of Robert Hegel, who observes in his study Reading Illustrated Fiction that “paintings were virtually labeled to suggest the intended meaning even when it is not made explicit.”29 What concerns Sullivan here is how pictorial image and writing have become an integrated whole, while Hegel is interested in how inscriptions in the margins of paintings serve to steer interpretations. Both scholars concentrate on longer inscriptions that not only occupy prominent space on the painting, but also circumscribe how the painting should be read. In general two kinds of inscription can be observed: one is the longer inscription written in either prose or poetry, the other is a simple label included to indicate who the gure is and/or the title of the picture. The concern here lies in the second type of descriptive labeling rather than in the interpretive inscriptions. The issues of interest are, rst, how the label of an illustration is displayed, and second, how the way it is displayed relates to other forms of art. In what may be the world’s earliest printed illustration—the frontispiece of the Jingang jing, dating from 868—long and thin cartouches are included to indicate that the scene is taking place in Qishuji Guduyuan or Jetavana Anâthapindikârâma, and that the historical personage Xuputi or Subhûti is listening to Buddha’s preaching of the Dharma (gure 3–3). These cartouches, small and of simple rectangular shape, are placed in a corner of the illustration directly above or next to the 26 A reproduction of the edition is included in Li Fuqing & Li Ping, ed., Haiwai guben wan Ming xiju xuanji sanzhong, 81–318. There are several non-drama publications that also include this feature: Dabei duizong published in 1600 by Cuiqing Tang, which was owned by the Yu family in Jianyang; Yang jiafu yanyi published during 1573–1620; Zhengbo zoujie zhuan published in 1603 by Jiali in Sichuan; Guwen zhengzong published in 1593 by Zheng Shaozhai in Anhui. 27 A reproduction of the edition is included in Li Fuqing & Li Ping, ed., Haiwai guben wan Ming xiju xuanji sanzhong, 319–644. 28 Michael Sullivan, The Three Perfections, 7. 29 Robert Hegel, Reading Illustrated Fiction, 317–8.

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3–3. Frontispiece of Diamond Sutra, from Dunhuang, 868. British Museum. Reproduced from Zhongguo meishu quanji: huihua bian, 20:2. Taipei: Jinxiu chubanshe, 1989.

3–4. Panel of a painted wooden screen, from the tomb of Sima Jinlong at Datong, Shanxi Province, 484. Height 81.5 cm. Datong City Museum, Shanxi, China. Reproduced from The Three Perfections, by Michael Sullivan, 21. New York: George Braziller, 1999, c. 1974.

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gure they indicate. Compared to the long and interpretive inscriptions written in beautiful calligraphy common to Chinese painting, these descriptive cartouches are less intrusive in both visual and textual terms. We can trace this tradition back to much earlier days. Cartouches of this type, for example, are seen on the panel of a painted wood screen excavated from a tomb dated 484 at Datong in Shanxi Province (gure 3–4).30 This practice was also adopted in the mural paintings inside of Dunhuang’s cave.31 And the tradition was continued in the illustrations of popular literature in later days, as for instance in the illustrations to the Sanguo zhi pinghua, printed by the Yu family in Fujian during 1321–1323. In these illustrations the title is given in a small cartouche either in the upper right or left corner of the painting. Some of the illustrations further include cartouches to indicate the names of the characters and the actions depicted in the scene (gure 3–5). Illustrators use these descriptive labels to make the pictorial images easily accessible to readers, who are able to recognize and contextualize the scenes even without reading the text, and especially so the stories concerning the “Three Kingdoms,” which were immensely popular and circulated widely through story-telling and theatrical performances. Similar cartouches are found in the fteen chantefables and the one play, Baitu ji, published by Yongshun Shutang in Beijing during the 1470s.32 The 1498 Hongzhi edition of Xixiang ji, published by the Yue family in Jintai, also includes cartouches giving the title of each illustration. But these are displayed differently from those cartouches we have discussed thus far: they appear in a column placed on the right side of the illustration, which is to say at what can be considered the beginning, moving from right to left as do Chinese texts and hand-scroll painting (gure 3–6).33 These run the length of the image and are equal in width to a single column of text. We see the same kind of arrangement in the

30

A color plate can be found in Sullivan’s book The Three Perfections, 21. See Sarah E. Fraser, Performing the Visual, 164. 32 See for example the illustration of the battle scene of ying sword against arrow included in Xue Rengui kuahai zhengdong, in Shanghai Wenwu Baoguan Weiyuanhui, ed., MCHSCCHCK, vol. 3, 15a. 33 A similar cartouche design appears in “Changchun zongshi qinghui tu”, published in 1305. An illustration is included in Takimoto Hiroyuki, ed., ChÖgoku kodai hanga ten, 91. The preface dated Xuande (1426–1435) Zhang Guangqi edition of Li Changqi’s Jiandeng yuhua also includes this form of cartouche. Reproduction of Jiandeng yuhua is included in Sanbun jiryaku, Sento yowa, Reikyoki. 31

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3–5. Quanxiang Sanguo zhi pinghua. Jian’an: the Yu family, 1321–23. Naikaku Bunko, Japan. Reproduced from Zhongguo gudian wenxue banhua xuanji, edited by Fu Xihua, 1:18–19. Shanghai: Renmin chubanshe, 1981.

3–6. Wang Shifu. Xixiang ji. Beijing: The Yue family, 1498. Reproduced from Zhongguo gudian wenxue banhua xuanji, edited by Fu Xihua, 1:48.

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1478 edition of Hua Guan Suo zhuan, published by Yongshun Shutang.34 In both cases this arrangement creates a sense that the illustration is introduced by its title and proceeds by a kind of implicit movement to the actual images, in a way reminiscent of hand-scroll painting, which starts with the title of the painting and unrolls from right to left, an association also observed by Robert Hegel.35 The narrow and horizontal band of illustration that runs above the text in both of these editions is similarly reminiscent.36 The illustrations in the 1498 edition of Xixiang ji even employ a particularly decorative cartouche to complement the beauty of the illustration, much as hand-scroll painting is elaborately decorative, and the illustrations sometimes extend across as many as seven pages, making the association with hand-scroll painting unmistakable.37 The kinds of cartouche demonstrated in gures 3–1, 3–2, and 3–17— featuring large characters and situated prominently atop the illustration—are far more unusual than other, less intrusive stylistic arrangements that are closely related to the painting tradition. As the illustrations in the Wanli edition of Li Zhuowu piping Sanguo zhi feature small characters in the upper corners, we know that this less intrusive manner was still popular during the Wanli period.38 We can thus infer that the decision to display the title of the illustration differently, as in gures 3–1, 3–2, and 3–17, represents the illustrators’ conscious decision to depart from tradition. It might be objected that there is a precedent for this prominent display of cartouches across the top of the illustration in, for example, the woodblock prints Simei tu (gures 3–7) and Yiyong Wu’an Wang wei.39 Both were printed in Pingyang in Shanxi Province in the Jin dynasty.40 Rather than narrating a plot, both

34 See for example the illustration of Guan Suo entering Sichuan included in Hua Guan Suo zhuan, in Shanghai Wenwu Baoguan Weiyuanhui, ed., MCHSCCHCK, 1:3.8a–b. 35 Robert Hegel, Reading Illustrated Fiction, 176. 36 Kurt Weitzmann discusses a similar attempt to recreate the scroll format in the book illustrations of Europe, Illustrations in Roll and Codex, 79. 37 An example of a six-page long illustration is shown in Robert Hegel’s Reading Illustrated Fiction, 178, gure 4.10. 38 See for example the illustration of Liu Bei’s rst visit to Zhu Geliang’s grass hut included in Luo Guanzhong, Li Zhuowu piping Sanguo zhi, 37.1a. 39 The picture is published in Takimoto Hiroyuki, ed., ChÖgoku kodai hanga ten, 89. 40 We can further see the same arrangement of cartouche on the title page of Quanxiang Wu Wang fa Zhou pinghua. The cartouche of the title page gives the publisher’s identity rather than the content of the illustration.

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3–7. Picture of Four Beauties. Pingyang: The Ji family, 1115–1232. Reproduced from ChÖgoku kodai hanga ten, edited by Takimoto Kiroyuki, 89. Tokyo: Machida shilitsu kokusai hanga bijutsukan, 1988.

pictures feature iconic images that resembles closer to the religious image to be hung on a wall or placed above a shrine. In addition to the horizontal cartouche, the Simei tu still employs the smaller and less intrusive cartouche located above each gure. An early Ming edition of Shilin guangji likewise incorporates two kinds of cartouche: one in the right-hand column, as in the 1498 edition of Xixiang ji, and one across the top of the illustration.41 This combination of different forms of cartouche suggests that the horizontal display is a new development, emergent during the 13th and 14th centuries. It would seem that the illustrator is not yet comfortable with the idea of using the horizontal cartouche exclusively. This horizontal display became the dominant form in book illustration during the Wanli period, which raises the question as to why this was 41 See for example the rst illustration included the category of human history in Shilin guangji. The rst illustration of the edition is reproduced in Takimoto Hiroyuki, ed., ChÖgoku kodai hanga ten, 99.

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the case. Fuchun Tang’s choice of valance-type cartouche and Shide Tang’s choice of bian’e-type cartouche for their drama illustrations were conscious and signicant, as suggested by the fact that they employed these cartouches consistently, and employed other types of cartouches for non-drama illustrations. The earliest extant illustrated book published by Fuchun Tang, Soushen ji, was published in 1573. Soushen ji is a novel rather than a drama, and does not feature any cartouche despite the stylistic similarity of its illustrations to the house’s drama illustrations printed during the 1580s.42 Lienü zhuan, an anthology of biographical pieces on virtuous women, was published by Fuchun Tang in 1587.43 This book includes many cartouches: each illustration features a horizontal cartouche and two-line couplet, one line inscribed to each side of the illustration.44 This arrangement has its roots in both the stage and in the domestic practice of menlian (calligraphic couplet hung next to the two sides of the door frame), but Fuchun Tang declined to employ this arrangement in his drama illustrations, presumably as a matter of consistency. These small, consistent differences between genres show that the publisher was extremely attentive and systematic in the arrangement of cartouches. Shide Tang was similarly attentive and systematic. Shide Tang’s drama illustrations consistently adopt the bian’e form of cartouche while the house’s novel illustrations adopt other forms. Both houses offer a consistent form of cartouche in their drama illustration—but, crucially, not in other types of illustration—in an ongoing allusion to some elements of the stage: specically, the valance and the bian’e. The arrangement of drama illustration is determined by the stage, then, while the arrangement of other types of illustration is not determined by an external model. The reality of the stage imposes consistency. The scholar Wang Bomin, at least, has argued in favor of the stage as a general inspiration in drama illustration, but his work does not touch on specics.45 In 1954 attention was called to a forgotten drama mural painted in 1324 in the Hall of King Mingying, in the Temple of Guangsheng in

42 The edition is now in the collection of HÔsa Bunko in Nagoya. An illustration of Queen Mother of the West of this edition is published in Ibid., 139. 43 The 1587 Fuchun Tang edition of Liu Xiang’s Xinjuan zengbu quanxiang pinglin gujin Lienü zhuan is currently in the collection of Beijing Library. 44 An example can be found in Takimoto Hiroyuki, ed., ChÖgoku kodai hanga ten, 135. 45 Wang Bomin, Zhongguo gudai banhua shi, 79.

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3–8. Mural painting in the Hall of King Mingying in the Temple of Guangsheng in Hongdong County in Shanxi Province, 1324. Reproduced from Zhongguo meishu quanji: huihua bian, 13:91. Taipei: Jinxiu chubanshe, 1989.

the Hongdong County of Shanxi Province (gure 3–8).46 Consecrated to King Mingying, a local water-god, the hall was originally built in 779 but destroyed at the end of the Jin Dynasty. Stone steles at the site indicate that the hall was rebuilt in 1234 and after more than forty years’ effort the reconstruction was nished in 1283. The temple, however, was again destroyed by earthquake on the night of the 17 September, 1303.47 Work began again in 1305 and reconstruction was completed in 1319.48 The decoration of the Hall likely began after this reconstruction was nished. The title of the mural painting—“Taihang sanyue Zhongdu Xiu zai ci zuo chang” (Taihang sanyue Zhongdu Xiu

46 Qi Yingtao, “Liangnian lai Shanxi sheng xin faxian de gu jianzhu,” 37–92. References to Guangsheng Si are to be found on pages 61 to 69, and to the Hall of King Mingying on pages 67 to 69. 47 Liao Ben, Song Yuan xiqu wenwu yu minsu, 215. 48 Ibid., 216.

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is Performing Here)—is displayed prominently on the top of the mural. This title tells us that the famous actress Zhongdu Xiu, who was active in the Taihang mountain area during the Yuan Dynasty, had performed at the temple.49 Thus the mural painting can be understood as a pictorial record of an actual performance. There are different opinions about what story is being staged in this pictorial record. Based on the costume and makeup of ve of the characters depicted, the modern scholar Liu Nianzi proposes two possibilities: that the mural shows the fourth scene of the Yuan play Dong Su Qin yijin huanxiang, by an anonymous playwright, or a scene from the story of the Eight Immortals who help people achieve transcendence.50 Another modern scholar Zhou Yibai disagrees with Liu Nianzi’s speculation and proposes that the mural shows a scene from the Yuan play Cui Fan Shu.51 Yet another scholar, Akamatsu Norihiko, proposes that the scene depicts the curtain call—the moment at the end of any performance when the actors line up to thank their audience, a ritual known in Chinese as xietai.52 As for the dragon and swordsman painted on the curtains behind the group of actors, scholar Liao Ben proposes that the images are inspired by the story of “The God Erlang,” who resided in Guankou and was believed to have killed a dragon. Liao argues for this interpretation on the grounds that King Mingying was himself literally a dragon.53 But this logic seems dubious insofar as a temple would be unlikely to depict the defeat of its patron. Scholar Isobe Akira, on the other hand, proposes in his study of the mural paintings in the Hall of King Mingying that the scene tells the story of the Tang Prime Minister Wei Zheng, who was also famous for decapitating a dragon.54 Having analyzed all of the murals inside the Hall of King Mingying, Isobe further proposes that as a group these paintings narrate the story of the lost Yuan drama

49 In accordance with the custom of the Yuan dynasty, Zhongdu Xiu is likely the stage name of an actress. Famous actresses were called ‘Xiu’ and were distinguished by the place in which they were active (hence ‘Zhongdu’). Other examples include Liangyuan Xiu (17), Xixia Xiu (31), Dadu Xiu (36), and Yanshan Xiu (39), as cited in Xia Tingzhi (born ca. 1316), Qinglou ji (1355), in ZGGDXQLZJC, vol. 2. For a discussion of this mural painting, see Liao Ben, Song Yuan xiqu wenwu yu minsu, 215–226. 50 Liu Nianzi, “Mingying Wang dian Yuandai xiju bihua diaocha zaji,” 66–85. 51 Zhou Yibai, “Yuandai bihua zhong de Yuan qu yanchu xingshi,” 29–31. 52 Akamutsu Norihiko, “Sansei chÖnanbu no gikyoku bunbutsu to sono kenkyÖ,” 155–171. 53 Liao Ben, Song Yuan xiqu wenwu yu minsu, 217. 54 Isobe Akira, “KÔshÔ ji MinÔ Å Ten no Gendai gikyoku hekiga no gadai ni tsuite,” 55.

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Liu Quan jingua, also taken up in the popular novel Xiyou ji.55 He argues that the mural depicts the performance of this play as a celebration of the reconstruction of the Hall of King Mingying.56 Based on the caption inscribed on the valance with pleated cloth, we know that the central gure among the actors, wearing a red ofcial robe and a black hat in the middle of the front row, is supposed to be Zhongdu Xiu herself.57 It was a common custom in the Yuan theater to display the name of the main actor or actress on the top of the stage in this manner, as suggested by a passage from the Yuan drama Lan Caihe. Lan Caihe—the play’s mo, or male protagonist—says: Musician Wang, please hang all the banners, curtains and costumes for me. (The jing says) I have hung them all. (The mo sings) To write the inscription on one wall and to hang the costumes on another. When those who come from far away see it will spread these words: “Inside the theater of the Liang Garden, the moni actor Lan Caihe performs.” I shall wait for these people to make my name known in the world.58

This passage suggests that the inscription on the valance, displayed above the stage, serves two purposes: to make the actors’ names known to the public, and to attract audiences with the name of a prominent actor. In one of the standard forms of the Yuan drama—zaju—the starring actor or actress sings all the songs in the play. The custom of using the name of the starring actor or actress, then, is an obvious device to promote the performance and to attract audiences. We can thus understand why displaying the name of the starring actor or actress became a convention on the stage. There is a famous variation on this custom in the Temple of the Wind and Rain God located on Gu Mountain in the Wanrong County in Shanxi Province. Here the name is engraved on a pillar that was once part of a stage destroyed during the Japanese invasion in the 20th century. The inscription, dated 1301, reads: “Yaodu Taihang sanyue ren Zhang Dehao zai ci zuo chang” (Zhang Dehao, an actor from Yaodu [now Pingyang County in Shanxi Province] in the Taihang region, performs here).59 55 The story of Liu Quan offering the melon to the hell is in chapter 11 of Xiyou ji. See Wu Chen’en, Li Zhuowu pingdian Xiyou ji, 11.137–140. 56 For a detailed discussion see Isobe Akira, “KÔshÔ ji MinÔ Å Ten no Gendai gikyoku hekiga no gadai ni tsuite,” 47–66. 57 Liu Nianzi, “Hongdong xian Mingying Wang Dian Yuan zaju bihua,” 117. 58 Han Zhong Li dutuo Lan Caihe, Maiwang Guan edition, 4.3b. A reproduction of the edition is included in Maiwang Guan chaojiao ben gujin zaju, in GBXQCK, 4th series. 59 The temple was destroyed during the Japanese invasion. The inscription is tran-

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3–9. Zhu Yu (attributed). Dengxi tu. Ming dynasty (1368–1644). Reproduced from Song Jin Yuan Xiqu Wenwu tulun, edited by Shanxi Shifan Daxue Xiqu Wenwu Yanjiusuo, 46. Taiyuan: Shanxi renmin chubanshe, 1987.

The custom of hanging an inscribed valance continued in the Ming dynasty, but the name of the main actor or actress was no longer the focus of the inscription. This change perhaps reects the fact that the dramatic content of Ming drama was more evenly apportioned among several actors. Dengxi tu—most likely a Ming painting, though often attributed to Zhu Yu in the Southern Song—depicts the celebration of the Lantern Festival and includes an image of a moving stage (gure 3–9).60 This stage is composed of ve wooden panels that serve as the rear wall; two screens that serve as the sidewalls; and an overhanging awning under which a valance hangs. The valance is inscribed with the caption: “An Jingshi gefan wu yuanti huixie” (In Emulation of the Exemplary Dance of the Capital and the Court style Farce). Thus emphasis on famous performers is replaced by an emphasis on genre, which is

scribed by Ding Ming, “Shanxi zhong nan bu de Song Yuan wutai,” 47–56. An ink rubbing of the inscription can be found in Shanxi Shifan Daxue Xiqu Yanjiusuo, ed., Song Jin Yuan xiqu wenwu tulun, 67, plate 160. 60 This painting is in a private collection in Hong Kong. It is attributed to the Southern Song court painter Zhu Yu but its style suggests that it is a Ming painting. For a discussion of this painting, see Liao Ben, Song Yuan xiqu wenwu yu minsu, 174–176. See also Zhou Huabin, “Nan Song Dengxi tu shuo,” 5–25.

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to say, an emphasis on the content of the play itself. The purpose here is not to investigate closely the evolution of this custom in Yuan and Ming drama, but to establish a connection between the conventions of the stage and the drama illustrations of the Ming period. It seems that the cartouches inscribed in the Fuchun Tang and Shide Tang illustrations, as exemplied in gures 3–1 and 3–2, correspond to the inscribed valance of the stage setting. Like the inscriptions on the valances, the inscriptions in the Fuchun Tang illustrations have varying numbers of words. But the inscriptions of the Shide Tang illustrations, in both plays and novels, are consistently limited to four characters, as shown in the illustrations in a 1589 edition of Baiyueting ji (gure 3–2), a 1586 edition of Duanfa ji (gure 3–17), and in a 1592 edition of Xiyou ji.61 The arrangement of the cartouche in the novel Xiyou ji is identical to that in the Fuchun Tang illustrations; but the cartouches in the illustrations of plays, such as those in Baiyueting ji, are rectangular in shape and feature cloud-shaped ornament on both sides.62 This rectangular shape with its four characters reminds us of the bian’e hung under the overhanging roof of a building, whether pavilion, hall, temple or stage. From the examples discussed above that the illustrators of Shide Tang sometimes added a motif of pleated cloth particular to stage decoration under the bian’e and the cloud ornaments (gure 3–2), we can infer that the illustrators who created the illustrations for this printing house were inspired by the setting of the stage. In addition to the cartouche in the form of the bian’e, the illustrations of some publishing houses feature structurally parallel poems appearing on each side of the image, as shown in the illustrations in a 1592 Qiaoshan Tang edition of Xixiang ji (gure 3–10). This feature is also adopted by non-drama illustrations such as a 1587 Fuchun Tang edition of Lienü zhuan,63 a 1593 Zheng Shaozhai edition of Guwen zhengzong

61 Shide Tang’s 1592 edition of Xiyou ji is in the collection of National Central Library, Taipei. A bian’e type of cartouche with four characters also appears in Guifan published by Baoshan Tang in 1596, a copy of this edition is in the collection of Koku litzu Kokukai Toshokan in Japan, and an example of its illustration is included in Takimoto Hiroyuki, ed., ChÖgoku kodai hanga ten, 136. 62 This type of decorative bian’e is also featured in Taiyin daquan published during the Zhengde era (1506–1521), in Zheng Zhenduo, ed., Zhongguo gudai banhua congkan, 1st series, 1:307–70. An illustration from this edition is also included in Takimoto Hiroyuki, ed., ChÖgoku kodai hanga ten, 103. 63 An illustration from this edition is included in Takimoto Hiroyuki, ed., ChÖgoku kodai hanga ten, 135.

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3–10. Wang Shifu. Xixiang ji. Jinling: Qiaoshan Tang, 1592. Reproduced from GBXQCK, 1st series, box 1, 2:1.1a.

3–11. Chalou tu. In Tangtu mingsheng tuhui, edited by HÔkyÔ, illustrated by Gyokuzan ShyÔyÖ, Kumagata Funki, and Higashino Minji, 4.3b–4a. Japan: 1805.

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published in Anhui,64 and a 1600 Cuiqing Tang edition of Dabei duizong published in Fujian.65 This arrangement seems to derive from the duilian (structurally parallel couplets, one line on each side of a door or stage) and the hengpi (a kind of horizontal bian’e or valance that complements the duilian). The duilian and hengpi together surround a door or stage on three sides, as for example shown in the illustration titled Chalou tu included in Tang tu mingsheng tuhui published in 1805 (gure 3–11).66 The high stage depicted in Chalou tu is overhung with an inscribed valance, while duilian are afxed to pillars at either side. A painting dating from the reign of Guangxu (1875–1908) shows a performance on a stage in a teahouse. The stage features duilian to each side, but lacks the hengpi (gure 3–12). This feature also appears in many illustrations, like those in Kong men rujiao liezhuan, published circa 1550;67 and Niulang Zhinü zhuan, published by Yu Chengzhang in 1592.68 This form is also widely adopted in illustrations for novels.69 From the discussion above, we are able to conclude that the cartouches displayed in the various illustrations published by the houses listed above, whether deriving from the inscribed valance, the bian’e or the duilian, are inspired by the stage or some other architectural setting

64

Guwen zhengzong features illustrations of famous literati such as Tao Qian, Du Fu, and Su Shi, which are published in Fu Xihua, Zhongguo gudian wenxue banhua xuanji, 250–2. 65 Dabei duizong features famous couplets and illustrations about historical gures such as Emperor Shizong of Tang, Four hermits of Shang Mountain, and Su Wu, which are published in Ibid., 75–7. 66 Other books contain this form of cartouche: Liu Xiang, Lienü zhuan (Fuchun Tang 1587 edition); Liu Xiang, Lienü zhuan (Yu Wentai 1591 edition), Qu Yikuang (Qizhen Zhai), Zhengbo zoujie zhuan ( Jiali 1603 edition); and Ji Zhenlun (Qinhuai moke), Yang jiafu yanyi (preface dated 1606, Tiande Tang edition). 67 The edition is now in the collection of Beijing Library. Two illustrations are published in Takimoto Hiroyuki, ed., ChÖgoku kodai hanga ten, 102. 68 The edition is now in the collection of Beijing Library. Two illustrations are published in Ibid., 126. 69 Novels that feature illustrations in the format of the ‘pictures-above-text’ include anonymous writer, Shuihu zhizhuan pinglin (Yu Xiangdou Shuangfeng Tang 1594 edition); Xiong Damu, Da Song zhongxing Yue wang zhuan (Santai Guan Wanli edition); Zhong Xing, Diwang yushi you Xia zhizhuan (Yu Jiyue Wanli edition); Zhong Xing, Diwang yushi Pangu zhi Tang Yu zhuan (Yu Jiyue Wanli edition); Luo Guanzhong, Xinqi jingben jiaozheng tongsu yanyi anjian Sanguo zhizhuan (Zheng Shirong 1611 edition); and Wu Huanchu, Tianfei chushen zhuan (Xiong Longfeng Wanli edition); and Yu Xiangdou, Huang Ming zhusi gong’an zhuan (Santai Guan Wanli edition). Novels that feature illustrations in the double half-folio format include Luo Guanzhong, Xinkan jiaozheng guben dazi yinshi Sanguo zhi tongsu yanyi (Zhou Yuejiao 1591 edition) and Sanshan daoren, Sanbao taijian Xiyang ji tongsu yanyi (1597 edition).

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3–12. Painting of a theatrical performance. Painted during Guangxu’s reign (1875–1908). Reproduced from Jingju shizhao, edited by Lu Qing et al., 22. Beijing: Yanshan chubanshe, 1990.

like the house or temple. Further examination of the cartouches, however, suggests the very specic inspiration of the stage. In these illustrations we nd that most of the cartouches in the form of the valance and bian’e are not under the roof and the duilian not surrounding the door frame, as they would be in actual life, but superimposed onto the illustration to frame the scene, as in the illustration of the 1581 edition of Yujue ji by Fuchun Tang (gure 3–1, valance-type), the illustration of the 1589 edition of Baiyueting ji by Shide Tang (gure 3–2, bien’e-type), and the illustration of the 1592 edition of Xixiang ji by Qiaoshan Tang (gure 3–10, duilian-type). Theses types of cartouche, then, are clearly offered as articial stylistic conventions of the illustration that stand outside of the scene depicted. One may question why the illustrator does not place the cartouche under the roof, as it would be in real life or on a real stage? We can answer this doubt in two points: on the one hand, the device is intended to invoke an association with theatrical performance by framing the scene as it would be framed by the stage, and by orienting the scene in a frontal direction even when the action itself is oriented at a more oblique angle as shown in gure 3–1; and on the other, the cartouche is placed above the roof in order to create a tension between the real and the unreal: naturalistic action goes forward within a stylistic framework. This tension is of course central to the Chinese philosophy of the stage. The superimposed cartouche is

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3–13. Mao’er xi. In Shenjiang shengjing tu, by Zunwen Ge zhuren, painted by Wu Youru, 1884. Reproduced from the reprinted 1884 edition. Taipei: Guangwen shuju, 1981.

thus a meta-stage-framing that denes each depicted scene as on stage rather than in daily environment. This type of meta-stage-framing cartouche was not specic to any one region. It was not only adopted by publishers in Nanjing such as Fuchun Tang and Shide Tang, but also by those in Fujian such as Qiaoshan Tang and Cuiqing Tang, and Anhui such as Zheng Shaozhai. As theater going was such a popular activity during the Wanli period, and books are easily transportable products, it hardly seems surprising that publishers in various regions simultaneously adopted stage devices in their drama illustrations. And these stage devices were not only used in drama illustrations, but also in the illustration of novels such as those listed in notes 66 and 69 in this chapter, and in the illustration of poetry volumes such as Tangshi guchui, published by Sanhui Tang in Jianyang of Fujian Province during the Wanli period.70 The illustrations of Fuchun Tang and Shide Tang suggest stage spaces by other means as well, as for example by placing gures in 70 An anthology of Tang poetry. Several illustrations from this edition are published in Fu Xihua, Zhongguo gudian wenxue banhua xuanji, 1:58–63.

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front of a screen, as exemplied in gures 3–1, 3–2 and 3–16. The analogy to actual performance is suggested in a stage photograph of a performance of the Peking Opera Chen Sanliang patang in gure 3–62 and a performance of Zhaoshi gu’er.71 In the two illustrations, the screen and the two walls of the edice form a three-sided stage conguration, with front and back stage clearly suggested, and passages for the entry and exit of actors. There are also very particular images of this kind of screen-dened stage space in the illustration entitled Mao’er xi, which was drawn during the Qing dynasty (gure 3–13); in an engraving on a possible Ming sarcophagus excavated in 1959 from the tomb of Pan Dechong in Yongle Gong in Ruicheng in Shanxi;72 and in an illustration of a puppet stage in a 1640 Min Qiji edition of Xixiang ji (gure 5–5). In this latter illustration, the space in which the puppets perform—in front of a painted screen with two open sides surrounded with railings—is suggested with particular clarity, giving an archetype for much of performance illustration. We can trace this convention further back to the illustrations found in the pinghua folk-tales published during the Yuan dynasty. The ve famous editions of pinghua published by the Yu family in Fujian from 1321 to 1323 contain illustrations in which the gures are presented in a similar screen-dened stage space. The illustration of Jing Ke’s attempt to assassinate the First Emperor of the Qin dynasty included in Qin bing liuguo pinghua, for example, depicts Jing chasing the emperor not through the imperial court, in keeping with the setting of the story, but upon a raised outdoor platform with a large screen to the rear (gure 3–14). If pinghua illustration only occasionally includes this kind of space, performance illustration consciously attempts to convey the image of the stage, often by the inclusion of the screen, but also, as discussed above, by references to the inscribed valance, the bian’e, and the duilian. The stage lends a consistency to the unfolding visual narrative, such that the illustrations become a parallel narrative structure in their own right. The pinghua illustrations show no such an attempt; in this instance, the stage scene is merely a familiar convention employed incidentally.

71 A photo of a performance of the Peking Opera Zhaoshi gu’er can be found in Lu Qing, Yang Zuyu, Hu Dongsheng, and Zhang Xiuling, ed., Jingju shizhao, 169. Ma Lianliang as Cheng Ying and Tan Yuanshou as Zhao Wu. 72 See Shanxi Shifan Daxue Xiqu Wenwu Yanjiusuo, ed., Song Jin Yuan xiqu wenwu tulun, 53.

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3–14. Qin bing liuguo pinghua. Jian’an: the Yu, 1321–23. Reproduced from Zhongguo gudian wenxue banhua xuanji, edited by Fu Xihua, 1:12–3.

Acting Gestures When on stage, actors gesture and declaim. The gures depicted in performance illustrations echo these poses and movements. Nanci xulu, a Ming history of southern drama, usually attributed to Xu Wei but attributed to the Ming playwright Lu Cai by scholars Luo Yuming and Dong Rulong,73 describes the gestures performed on the stage as ke: “Meeting, greeting, bowing, dancing, sitting, kneeling—all these movements of the body are given the name ke.”74 Drama texts printed during the Wanli period include stage instructions that give two different terms for these actions: ke and jie, which the author of Nanci xulu notes as interchangeable.75 These encompass gestures fundamental to

73 Luo Yuming and Dong Rulong, “Nanci xulu fei Xu Wei zuo,” 71–8. Their attribution of authorship is accepted by the Chinese drama scholar Piet van der Loon, The Classical Theatre and Art Song of South Fukien, 41. 74 Xu Wei, Nanci xulu, in Yang Jialuo, ed., Lidai shishi changbian er ji, 246. 75 Ibid., 246.

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the characteristic scenarios of the stage, such as kneeling (gui ke), crying (ku ke), holding cups (bazhan jie), bowing (bai jie), and serving wine ( jinjiu jie). Ke and jie are analogous to what are now called shenduan on the stage of the Peking Opera. As it deals primarily with the theatrical tradition in the late Ming period, this study employs the term ke-jie, the term most commonly used during the late Ming, rather than more widely recognized term shenduan to describe these acting gestures.76 This section will show that drama illustration depicts gures gesturing in the manner of the stage, and that these gestures fall within the traditional categories of ke-jie convention. Gestures of Entering (Shangchang jie) and Journeying on the Stage In traditional theaters of the present day, it is conventional for the performers to enter the stage from the right wing and to exit from the left wing. We see this rule for entering and exiting the stage in the puppet theater of contemporary Taiwan as well. There is usually a curtain on the right-hand side of the puppet stage bearing the direction ‘Enter the General’ (chujiang) and another curtain on the left side bearing the opposite direction ‘Exit the Minister’ (ruxiang).77 The puppets enter and depart the stage in strict accordance with these directions. These directions seem to have some precedent in the ancient theater of China. They are suggested, for example, by the mural in the Hall of King Mingying (gure 3–8). A character peeks from behind the right-hand curtain, as if he were timing his entry to the stage. In performance illustration, it is often very difcult to reconstruct from which side of the stage the characters enter, but in many cases gures are clustered on the right margin, as if they had just entered, and in the process of moving toward the left, as for example in the illustrations to a 1589 Shide Tang edition of Baiyueting ji (gure 3–2), a Guangqing Tang edition of Quande ji (gure 3–15), a 1586 Shide Tang edition of Duanfa ji

76 The traditional music used in the puppet theater in Taiwan still uses ke and jie: for example, a song sung at a sad scene is called ku ke, a puppet entering the stage is called shangchang jie. The information is derived from a puppeteer master Hsiao Shuiping who is the head of the group titled “Xiao Xihu” located in Taichung, and has been active as puppeteer around central Taiwan for more than fty years. Hsiao’s wife Hsiao Chen Hsiu-hua is famous as the best female puppeteer in central Taiwan. 77 The stages in the reconstructed Lin’s family garden located in Bangiao County in Taiwan still bears these nominations.

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3–15. Wang Zhideng. Quande ji. Jinling: Guangqing Tang, 1573–1619. Reproduced from GBXQCK, 2nd series, box 3, 7:1.12b–13a. Shanghai: Shangwu yinshuguan, 1955.

3–16. Lu Huafu. Shuangfeng qiming ji. Jinling: Shide Tang, 1573–1619. Reproduced from GBXQCK, 2nd series, box 4, 4:1.2a.

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(gure 3–17), and a Fuchun Tang edition of Herong ji (gure 3–20).78 A 1582 Gaoshi Shanfang edition of Mulian jiumu includes illustrations of the opening scenes in each of the play’s three acts. The rst of these illustrations depicts a male actor walking from the right margin of the stage towards the middle (gure 6–1). The other two illustrations (gures 6–2 and 6–3) depict characters progressively moving across the stage: in the second illustration, the character is in the middle of the stage, while in the third illustration the character is on the left of the stage. Each of these illustrations seems to symbolize the placement of the act within the play and represent the play’s general movement from start to nish in terms of the conventional movement from right to left. A Shide Tang edition of Shuangfeng qiming ji (gure 3–16) shows a conventionalized gesture of entry particular to the soldier in which the character leans into the stage with his weapon. This convention is still commonplace on the stage of the Peking Opera. This gesture of entry is not employed in this illustration insignicantly. Every moment and every scene during a performance has a focal point that is supposed to draw the attention of the audience. When there are many performers on the stage simultaneously, one or more of them will be at the center of the audience’s attention, while the others assume a subordinate relation. In illustrations, this center of attention is sometimes dictated by the text, but at other times decided by the illustrator. In this illustration, the illustrator chooses to make a lesser character, the adjutant to General Zhao, the focus of his illustration of the second scene. In the text, the Zhao brothers, sons of the general, discuss military strategy in their home after the Emperors Hui and Qin of Northern Song have been captured and transported to the north, when the adjutant enters having just returned from a military maneuver conducted by their father.79 In the illustration, the adjutant makes the soldier’s gesture of entry and he is pictured in the center foreground in a dramatic pose, while the brothers look on from the middle ground and clearly occupy the subordinate position (gure 3–16). The illustrator seems to use the image of the soldier as the key in his interpretation of the scene, playing cleverly on the caption of the illustration: “The Brothers Discuss the Military” (Xiongdi tan bing). The illustrator breaks the title into its three

78 A good example of the entering gesture is the illustration of “Xingfu leaving the Fort.” See Shi Hui, Baiyueting ji, Shide Tang 1589 edition, 2.2b. 79 Lu Huafu, Shuangfeng qiming ji, Shide Tang Wanli edition, 1.2b–3a.

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3–17. Duanfa ji. Jinling: Shide Tang, 1586. Reproduced from ChÖgoku gikyoku zenpon sanshu, edited by Kanda Kiichiro, 410. Kyoto: Shibun kaku, 1982.

components: ‘Xiongdi’ (brothers), ‘tan’ (gesture of telling and speaking) and ‘bing’ (soldiering). The two brothers fulll the reference to ‘xiongdi,’ while the brother speaking and gesticulating fullls the reference to ‘tan’ (the gesture of speaking is discussed below). The adjutant—a soldier, where the brothers are essentially literati—fullls the reference to ‘bing.’ This complicated word-play explains the illustrator’s otherwise strange shift in emphasis from the two brothers to the textually insignicant adjutant. This is a very likely picture on stage while the scene is performed. But the image of the adjutant takes on a metaphorical sense as well as a stage character: the ‘bing’ discussed by the brothers is not a specic soldier but a general military condition of the time the story takes on. This demonstrates the freedom of interpretation that illustrators often claimed for themselves, even while following the conventions of the stage and the description of the text. Illustrations depicting groups provide a clearer picture of what actors actually do once they have entered the stage, and particularly the pattern of their movement. An illustration included in a 1586 Shide Tang

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edition of Duanfa ji depicts three gures on a journey (gure 3–17). Although the illustrator places the scene in a natural environment rather than on a stage-space, the procession of the group is unusual. In the illustration, two females follow a third female on a road that runs through the foreground of the picture. The leading gure is turning toward the middle-ground of the picture and looking at the two females behind her, as if to encourage them to follow. Given the direction of the road, which continues straight, their pattern seems illogical, but grafting the illustration onto an imagined stage-space (so it might resemble the stage in gure 3–18),80 the three characters would be entering from the right and turning to the center of the stage, where presumably the action would begin. It seems that they are actually walking in a tight circle, as do actors on the stage as they attempt to simulate the movement of a long journey. We see a similar arrangement in the illustration titled “Meeting Lady Yang on the Road” (Lu feng Yang shi) in a Shide Tang edition of Shuangfeng qiming ji (gure 3–19) and in the illustration titled “Being on the Road” (Deng tu) in the Fuchun Tang edition of Tipao ji,81 which also shows a group walking amid nature in a circular route. The group likewise circles toward the middle of the stage, with the movement owing from the right-rear of the space. In both gures 3–17 and 3–19, the implied movement of the characters makes perfect sense once we understand that they are contextualized by stage space rather than a natural environment. In addition, these illustrations depict the natural environment as distinctly at, as if it were the kind of natural scene often painted on the screens or curtains that form the backdrop of the stage, as shown in gure 3–8, a drama mural painting in 1324, and gure 3–18, a photograph of Peking Opera taken during the early 20th century. The foreground through which the actors walk in gure 3–19 is bare of natural objects (rocks, trees, shrubbery) as it would be on the stage; the suggestion of a natural environment is entirely from the background. In these pictorial representations the stage or theater building is not shown. To draw an analogy with cinematic technique, the illustration in gures 3–17 and 3–19 is like a close-up shot, while the illustration

80 This photo was taken during a performance of the Peking Opera Yanmen Guan during the late 19th or early 20th century. The photo appears in Lu Qing, Yang Zuyu, Hu Dongsheng, and Zhang Xiuling, ed., Jingju shizhao, 15. 81 For the relevant illustration see Tipao ji, Fuchun Tang Wanli edition, 1.16b.

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3–18. Photo of a scene in the Peking Opera Shizi jingfeng, Shang Xiaoyun as Hu shi and Shang Changrong as the Bandit Jinyan bao. Reproduced from Jingju Shizhao, edited by Lu Qing et al., 141.

3–19. Lu Huafu. Shuangfeng qiming ji. Jinling: Shide Tang, 1573–1619. Reproduced from GBXQCK, 2nd series, box 4, 4:1.28b.

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3–20. Herong ji. Jinling: Fuchun Tang, 1573–1619. Reproduced from GBXQCK, 2nd series, box 1, 6:1.4a.

in gure 3–30 is like a longer-range shot. The former excludes much surrounding detail, while the latter includes a good deal. Keeping this in mind, we perceive that many illustrations that present characters seemingly against a backdrop of natural scenery actually present closeup depictions of the stage, with the perspective so tightly cropped that only a subtle suggestion of the stage remains. This type of illustration breaks the monotonous repetition of the stage structure—boring for both the illustrator and the viewer—and lets the ambitious illustrator try his hand at portraying nature even as he maintains the theatrical conventions of performance illustration. To return to our discussion of the stage journey, the illustration titled “Appreciating the Spring” (Shang chun) in a Fuchun Tang edition of Herong ji (gures 3–20) introduces another pattern of movement on the stage. The illustration shows three characters standing at odd angles to one another; the utter of the costumes suggests that the characters are moving in procession and gives an idea of their zigzag pattern. The movement seems to begin with an entry on the right side of the stage;

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proceed to the rear of the stage; and then turn toward the middle-front of the stage. The nal gure seems to be turning in yet an additional direction, toward the rear-left of the stage. The procession thus forms a right-to-left zigzag across the stage. This zigzag movement represents a second method of connoting a journey, when the journey is through a more conned space such as a garden. We can still see this ke-jie employed in traditional theaters. The more typical ke-jie of meeting involves two or more characters moving in separate circular patterns and suddenly coming upon one another. The illustration “Meeting Lady Yang on the Road” included in a Shide Tang edition of Shuangfeng qiming ji (gure 3–19) pictures the journey leading to the meeting, while the illustration in a Fuchun Tang edition of Baishe ji (gure 3–21) depicts the moment immediately before the meeting and that in Zixiao ji (gure 3–22) the moment of the meeting. In gure 3–19, the two male characters on the left are circling towards the rear while the female, a soldier, and a horse circle toward the front of the stage. These two groups of characters are apparently aligning for the moment of their accidental encounter on their journey. Figure 3–21 illustrates the two groups about to run into each other. The characters in each group talk to one another to suggest the unexpectedness of the upcoming event. In gure 3–22 the characters register their surprise, which is suggested by the male character, Li Shilang, swinging back his hand to indicate the sudden appearance of Huo Xiaoyu in her beauty. Gestures of Greeting and Speaking (Zuoyi ke or Gongshou jie) The most common of all gestures in performance illustrations is gongshou, the gesture of greeting also referred as zuoyi. This gesture is performed by joining the two hands, usually covered by sleeves, in front of the body at about the height of the chest as shown in an illustration in a 1581 edition of Yujue ji (gure 3–1), and in a photo of Peking Opera (gure 3–23).82 The conventionality of this gesture is suggested by the fact that it is described in Nanci xulu as a type of ke, and by its regular appearance in illustrations. It typically indicates not only a greeting,

82 Cecilia Zung describes this gesture as ‘The Addressing Sleeve’ (Pengxiu). The photo demonstrates a ke-jie characteristic of the Peking Opera. See Secrets of the Chinese Drama, 85.

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3–21. Zheng Guoxuan. Baishe ji. Jinling: Fuchun Tang, 1573–1619. Reproduced from GBXQCK, 1st series, box 5, 6:2.35b.

3–22. Tang Xianzu. Zixiao ji. Jinling: Fuchun Tang, 1573–1619. Reproduced from GBXQCK, 1st series, box 10, 2:3.15a.

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3–23. Photo of “The Addressing Sleeve.” Reproduced from Secrets of Chinese Drama, by Cecilia Zung, 85. New York: Arno Press, 1980, c. 1964.

3–24. Wang Tingna. Toutao ji. Xiuning: Huancui Tang, 1573–1619. Reproduced from GBXQCK, 2nd series, box 2, 8:2.13b–14a.

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but also an attitude of respect and deference. This gesture not only continues to appear on the stage, but can be observed in the daily life of modern China, and during the offering of Lunar New Year’s congratulations in Taiwan. It is impossible to say whether the stage convention derives from daily life, or whether the convention of daily life derives from the stage. Some illustrations indicate that this gesture not only signies the act of greeting, but is also employed to signify the act of reporting or addressing in conversation. In the illustration in a Huancui Tang edition of Toutao ji (gure 3–24), for instance, the bearded character sitting behind the table in front of the screen, as we know from the text of the play, is giving his thoughts, in this case singing, with the gongshou gesture specied in the stage direction.83 The gongshou gesture underscores his lead in the conversation. An illustration in Baiyueting ji also shows this sense of the gongshou gesture, performed by a female character as she narrates her family background and hopes while alone on the stage.84 The gongshou gesture is additionally employed by actors who temporarily have no action but must remain on stage; it is thus a kind of waiting gesture or gesture of suspension. Many illustrations thus show characters performing the gongshou gesture while standing stock-still and removed from the focus of the scene. For example, in an illustration from a 1608 Huancui Tang edition of Sanzhu ji three male characters assumes the gongshou gesture while standing still in front of the table while two characters conversing behind the table (gure 3–60). Another very common ke-jie convention is the speaking gesture: the rst and second ngers point while the other three ngers are bent into the palm, as in an illustration in a Guangqing Tang edition of Quande ji (gure 3–15) and in an illustration in a Shide Tang edition of Shuangfeng qiming ji (gure 3–16). This gesture is still very common in the traditional theater in modern China, Hong Kong, and Taiwan. In the illustrations published by both Fuchun Tang and Shide Tang this gesture occurs constantly. Gesture of Crying (Lei ke or Ku ke) The ke-jie convention that most obviously signies sadness is the gesture of crying or grieving. This gesture is performed by raising the two

83 84

Wang Tina, Toutao ji, Huancui Tang Wanli edition, 2.16a–b. For the illustration see Shi Hui, Baiyueting ji, Shide Tang 1589 edition, 1.13b.

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3–25. Herong ji. Jinling: Fuchun Tang, 1573–1619. Reproduced from GBXQCK, 2nd series, 6:2.22a.

3–26. Zhou Lüjng. Jinqian ji. Jinling: Jizhi Zhai, 1608. Reproduced from GBXQCK, 2nd series, box 3, 4:2.24a.

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hands, usually covered in sleeves, in front of the chin, and assuming a sad expression (achieved by knitting the eyebrows). Herong ji includes an illustration of the famous beauty Wang Zhaojun as she departs to marry the barbarian king; both the heroine and her mother are shown performing this gesture (gure 3–25). We can also see this ke-jie portrayed in illustrations in Hufu ji as mother and son meet and in a 1586 edition of Duanfa ji.85 In an illustration in a 1608 Jizhi Zhai edition of Jinqian ji (gure 3–26) three female gures are shown performing this gesture, one in the foreground, and two in front of the painted picture inside the illustration but with a variation: both look sad, but have only one hand raised in front of the chin. This same variation appears in an illustration in a Fuchun Tang edition of Mulian jiumu;86 in an illustration in a 1589 edition of Baiyueting ji;87 and in an illustration in a Weng Wenyuan edition of Tanhua ji in Hangzhou.88 In all of these cases the unraised hand either hangs below the waist or rests on the shoulder of another character. In general this ke-jie makes it easy to identify a sad scene in an illustration even if there is no title included, as for example in illustrations in a 1597 Wanhu Xuan (reproduced of Jiyi Tang) edition of Pipa ji (gure 3–27), in a 1608 Yangchun Tang edition of Wansha ji,89 and even in a Chongzhen edition of Mozhong ji.90 It might be argued that the hand gestures are incidental, and that the mood of the scene is conveyed by the expressions on the characters’ faces. The illustration included in Pipa ji (3–27) and two illustrations in a 1608 Jizhi Zhai edition of Liangjiang ji should answer this reservation. By examining the text we know that the former illustration depicts a departing scene despite that the female character is not featured with the sad expression suggested by the kneed brows. The latter two illustrations depict scenes in which, respectively, a female character is crying alone at night after

85 For the illustration of the meeting of mother and son see Zhang Fengyi, Hufu ji, Fuchun Tang Wanli edition, 2.8a. A good example of the crying gesture is the illustration of “Dewu Being Captured.” See Duanfa ji, Shide Tang 1586 edition, 1.15a. In Kanda KiichirÔ, ed., ChÖgoku gikyoku zenpon sanshu, 267. 86 For an illustration of religious mess for dead people see Zheng Zhizhen, Mulian jiumu, Fuchun Tang Wanli edition, 2:1.27b–28a. National Central Library, Taipei. 87 For the relevant illustration see Shi Hui, Baiyueting ji, 1.23a. 88 For a good example of the gesture see Tu Long, Tanhua ji, Weng Wenyuan edition, 1.13b.14a. 89 For a scene of departure see Liang Chenyu, Wansha ji, Yangchun Tang edition, 1.21b–22a. 90 For a scene of departure see Angfu, Mozhong ji, Chongzhen edition, 1.3b.

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3–27. Gao Ming. Pipa ji. Anhui: Wanhu Xuan, 1597. A facsimile of the Jiyi Tang edition. Reproduced from ChÖgoku kodai hanga ten, edited by Takimoto Hiroyuki, 109.

3–28. Zheng Zhiwen. Qiting ji. Jinling: Jizhi Zhai, 1603. Reproduced from GBXQCK, 2nd series, box 3, 9:1.18a.

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she has been captured and made a servant in the court, and a mother and daughter-in-law cry in a postal hostel,91 but as illustrated all of the characters’ sadness is conveyed by the hand gesture. The faces of all characters in the above illustrations are relatively expressionless. In an illustration in an edition of Pipa ji published by an unknown house, we see a similar arrangement in which characters who are described as crying in text are shown merely gesturing with their hands.92 In no case are tears ever shown, though they would be easy enough to depict as a few drops on the face. This again indicates the inspiration of the stage, for in traditional Chinese theater tears are not simulated. In an illustration in a 1603 Jizhi Zhai edition of Qiting ji we see a common variation on the crying gesture, in which the character’s back is turned (gure 3–28). In the text, the character is described as crying,93 but the sadness of the moment is indicated only by the hand gesture as seen from the rear. Sometimes the crying gesture is the key to an otherwise misleading illustration, as in an illustration in a Jizhi Zhai edition of Shuangyu ji (gure 3–29). One might easily mistake the illustration as depicting a joyful banquet in which two clownish characters sport with two females. But attention to the hand gesture of the leading female suggests a more complicated moment: amid the festivity the heroine is crying or grieving, as the text indicates. A modern reader is likely to misinterpret this image, but a cultured reader of the Wanli period would have known precisely what was intended. Another illustration in the same edition is similarly subtle. The illustration seems to depict a romantic tryst, but the heroine’s hand gesture brings the image into accord with the text. The heroine is in fact reporting her misfortune to the male character (gure 3–30).94 The Gesture of Serving Drinks (Bazhan jie or Jinjiu jie) As there are banquet scenes in most of the plays of the Wanli period, the gesture of serving drinks (bazhan jie) is one of the ke-jie conventions 91 For the illustrations of a female character crying and of the mother- and daughterin-laws crying in the hostel see Xu Qiao, Liangjiang ji, Jizhi Zhai 1608 edition, 2.16a and 2.27a. 92 For the illustration of departing see Gao Ming, Pipa ji, anonymous edition in Palace Museum, Taipei, 1.15b–16a. 93 Zheng Zhiwen, Qiting ji, Jizhi Zhai 1603 edition, 1.18b. 94 Shen Jing, Shuangyu ji, Jizhi Zhai Wanli edition, 2.23b.

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3–29. Shen Jing. Shuangyu ji. Jinling: Jizhi Zhai, 1573–1619. Reproduced from GBXQCK, 1st series, box 11, 1:1.29b.

3–30. Shen Jing. Shuangyu ji. Jinling: Jizhi Zhai, 1573–1619. Reproduced from GBXQCK, 1st series, box 11. 1:2.24a.

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performed frequently on the stage (gure 3–31).95 Among published plays with illustrations, it is very easy to nd images of characters serving drinks in cups on saucers, as shown in illustrations in a 1581 edition of Yujue ji (gure 3–1), in a 1582 edition of Mulian jiumu by Gaoshi Shanfang (gure 3–32), in a 1586 edition of Duanfa ji,96 in a 1589 edition of Baiyueting ji,97 and in an illustration in Toutao ji mentioned above (gure 3–24). In this simple gesture the character holds the cup before him or her with both hands in a respectful manner. In many illustrations we see a servant or maid holding a wine vessel standing either behind or near the character who is holding the cup, suggesting that the cup has just been lled. In illustrations in a 1606 Wanyue Xuan edition of Lanqiao yuchu ji,98 and in a Jizhi Zhai edition of Hongqu ji,99 we see the moment in which the vessel is about to be poured, just before the cup is lled. The character holding the cup (gure 3–1) strikes a natural and lifelike pose, even though on the stage. But some illustrators present their characters captured in distinctly theatrical gesture by turning the body slightly away from the servant and twisting gracefully to receive the drink, as depicted in the illustrations in a 1608 Jizhi Zhai edition of Liangjiang ji (gure 3–33), in a Shide Tang edition of Pipa ji (gure 3–34), and in a Fuchun Tang edition of Sangui lianfang ji.100 This twisting of the body is a highly stylized (and unnatural) gesture that clearly derives from the stage. A very complicated variation of this gesture appears in a series of editions of Pipa ji issued by different publishers. In the illustrations that accompany the play’s second scene, “Bojie Celebrates the Longevity of his Parents” (Bojie zhushou) a whole series of past and future movements is implied in a single image of the present. In a Shide Tang edition of Pipa ji (gure 3–35), the illustration shows the moment in which the female heroine Zhao Wuniang raises to her face her left hand, which is hidden in the drapery of her sleeve, and holds a cup 95 This photo shows a performance of Peking Opera Cimu lei given in the 1980s. See Lu Qing, Yang Zuyu, Hu Dongsheng, and Zhang Xiuling, Jingju shizhao, 198. 96 For an illustration of birthday celebration (1.2a) see Kanda KiichirÔ, ed., ChÖgoku gikyoku zenpon sanshu, 241. 97 For the illustration of a drinking scene see Shi Hui, Baiyueting ji, 2.17a. 98 For the illustration of the scene see Yang Zhijiong, Lanqiao yuchu ji, illustrated by Wang Qiaoyun, Wanyue Xuan 1606 edition, 1.45b–46a. 99 The illustration of the scene is published in Fu Xihua, Zhongguo gudian wenxue banhua xuanji, 1:214–5. 100 For the illustration of pouring wine see Sangui lianfang ji, Fuchun Tang Wanli edition, 1.1b.

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3–31. Photo of a scene in the Peking Opera Cimu lei given in 1980s. Reproduced from Jingju shizhao, edited by Lu Qing et al., 198.

3–32. Zheng Zhizhen. Mulian jiumu. Anhui: Gaoshi Shanfang, 1582, 1.2a. National Central Library, Taipei.

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3–33. Xu Qiao. Liangjiang ji. Jinling: Jizhi Zhai, 1608. Reproduced from GBXQCK, 2nd series, box 5, 2:1.5b.

3–34. Gao Ming. Pipa ji. Jinling: Shide Tang, 1573–1619. 1.22a. National Central Library, Taipei.

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on a saucer in her right hand, which she is about to pass to Cai Bojie, who extends his hands to receive it. If we examine the arrangement of this illustration closely, we notice that there is a cup on a saucer before Cai’s mother, but none before his father, and that there is a vessel only half included in the frame on the left-hand side. Based on these clues we can reconstruct the entire ow of action: after the mother has been served with wine, Wuniang takes another cup of wine from the table and walks to the center of the stage, then passes the cup to her husband who is waiting to receive it and bear it around the table to his father. This series of actions is composed of many characteristic stage gestures, but even more ambitiously the illustrator seems to be attempting to approximate as much as his medium allows the actual movement of the stage. In another edition of Pipa ji, we see this same technique applied to different moment in the same banquet scene. An illustration in a Zunsheng Guan edition of Pipa ji (gure 3–36) depicts a moment slightly later in the scene, when Cai Bojie is just touching the saucer. This moment is reproduced in the illustrations in a 1597 Wanhu Xuan edition (gure 3–37) and in a 1598 Jizhi Zhai edition (gure 3–38). There is an almost identical scene in the play Sishu ji. In an Airi Tang edition of this play, included in the anthology Baneng zoujin published in Fujian, an illustration captures a moment after both elders have been served with wine, and both young characters have returned again to the front of the stage (gure 3–39). In an illustration in a Qifeng Guan edition of the Nan Pipa ji (a southern version of the classic play) the series of movements depicted in all of these illustrations is concluded: having served wine to their elders, the two younger characters have retired to opposite sides of the stage (gure 3–40). In none of these illustrations does the action derive from the text, which includes no stage directions for the choreography of the banquet. All of these movements and gestures—highly conventionalized, as indicated by their constant repetition—derive entirely from the stage. The Gesture of Shyness (Xiu ke) The gesture of shyness was a commonplace of the Ming stage, and continues on the stage to this day, as we see in gure 3–41.101 In Pipa ji the dramatist Gao Ming describes his heroine Zhao Wuniang as a

101

This photo appears in Cecilia Zung, Secrets of the Chinese Drama, 78.

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3–35. Gao Ming. Pipa ji. Jinling: Shide Tang, 1573–1619. 1.2a. National Central Library, Taipei.

3–36. Gao Ming. Pipa ji. N.p.: Zunsheng Guan, 1573–1619. 1.3b–4a. National Palace Museum, Taipei, Taiwan, Republic of China.

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3–37. Gao Ming. Pipa ji. Xin’an: Wanhu Xuan, 1597. A facsimile of the Jiyi Tang edition. 1.1b–2a. HÔsa Bunko, Nagoya.

3–38. Gao Ming. Pipa ji. Jinling: Jizhi Zhai, 1598. 1.1b–2a. Kokuritsu KÔbunsho Kan, Tokyo.

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3–39. Sishu ji. In Baneng zoujin. Jianyang: Airi Tang, 1573–1619. Reproduced from ChÖgoku kodai hanga ten, edited by Takimoto Hiroyuki, 106. Tokyo: Machida shilitsu kokusai hanga bijutsukan, 1988.

3–40. Gao Ming. Nan Pipa ji. Anhui: Qifeng Guan, 1573–1619. 1.1b–2a. National Palace Museum, Taipei, Taiwan, Republic of China.

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recently married woman who is still shy and self-conscious in front of her husband and parents-in-law. Zhao Wuniang says as she is serving drinks: “Holding the cup, I feel shy,”102 a confession which gives very important insight into Zhao’s demeanor and personality. Any actress on the stage must convey the subtle suggestion that Zhao is a young and recently married wife. The illustrator, likewise, must present Zhao in this guise. In the Shide Tang illustration of the scene in which the longevity of Zhao’s parents-in-law is celebrated (gure 3–35), Zhao is shown performing the gesture of shyness, or what is known in the Peking Opera as ‘The Concealing Sleeve’ (zhexiu, as shown in gure 3–41):103 her left hand, obscured in her sleeve, is raised to her face (gure 3–35). In illustrations in other editions of Pipa ji this gesture appears as well (gures 3–36, 3–37, and 3–38). This repetition suggests the meaningful resonance of this gesture. We see this gesture again in an illustration in a 1640 Tianzhang Ge edition of Xixiang ji (gure 3–42). The female character, Cui Yingying, seems to be entering the stage-space from the left, with her right hand raised to cover her face with her sleeve, a gesture that resembles that of the female performer depicted on the stage in Mao’er xi (gure 3–13). The former illustration includes an inscription, translated by West and Idema as “Now blocked from view, now hidden, she threads the fragrant path” (zhe zhe yan yan chuang fang jing).104 But this line can be translated in a different way, entirely shifting its emphasis: “Covering herself, hiding herself, she threads the fragrant path.” The West and Idema translation suggests an almost enchanted quality in Yingying’s beauty—she appears and fades almost like a fairy, glimpsed eetingly through branches and trees. My own translation emphasizes her modesty and embarrassment at being abroad at night: “zhe zhe yan yan” implies a deliberate attempt to conceal questionable conduct, rather than the mere fact of being hidden from view. Yingying’s gesture indicates not only her shyness, but the modesty displayed by a well-bred female any time she nds herself in public space, even when alone. It was customary to cover the face in public or when meeting a stranger, as for instance in an illustration in a 1592 Qiaoshan Tang edition of Xixiang ji

102

Gao Ming, Pipa ji, Shide Tang Wanli edition, 1.3a. Cecilia Zung, Secrets of the Chinese Drama, 81. 104 Wang Shifu, The Moon and the Zither, translated by Stephen West, and Wilt Idema, 204. 103

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3–41. Photo of “The Concealing Sleeve,” demonstrated by Mai Lanfang. Reproduced from Secrets of Chinese Drama, by Cecilia Zung, 78.

3–42. Wang Shifu. Li Zhuowu xiansheng piping Xixiang ji. Xiling: Tianzhang Ge, 1640. picture 3b–4a. National Central Library, Taipei.

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(gure 3–10), and an illustration in Lanqiao yuchu ji, in both illustrations the heroine encounters a male and conceals her face behind a fan.105 Gesture of the Pratfall (Die ke), and General Frolicking Clowning scenes are very important in theatrical performance, containing not only amusing dialogue but constituting an ‘interlude of frolicking and jokes’ (chake dahun). The clowning scenes involve many actions on the stage, the most unfailingly amusing of which is when the clown falls on his behind, which he does often. In the texts of published plays, the verbal humor is obviously predominant, but the illustrations prove themselves useful in being able to convey a sense of the play’s physical humor. Many illustrations published during the Wanli period depict one of the characters falling on his behind, as in an illustration in the Shide Tang edition of Pipa ji (gure 3–43). This illustration depicts a group of servants playing in the garden; when a lady appears at the garden gate, one of the servants executes a pratfall while the others try to run and hide. The text offers many moments that might have been illustrated, but the illustrator naturally gravitates to the most lively and amusing. An almost identical scene is depicted in an edition of Pipa ji in the collection of Palace Museum, Taipei, but in this case two servants have already found hiding places behind the wall (gure 3–44). Another illustration in a Shide Tang edition of Pipa ji “The Degree Winner Going to the Banquet” (Zhuangyuan fuyan) shows a character falling on the way to the grand banquet held for the degree winners.106 This scene is also depicted in a Zunsheng Guan edition of Pipa ji.107 In these two illustrations, the gesture of the pratfall is the same. The character falls on his behind with one hand on the ground to support the upper body, and the other hand vainly reaching out for support, or held out to be helped up, as shown in the scene of “The Degree Winner Going to the Banquet” in both the Shide Tang and Zunsheng Guan editions of Pipa ji. Sometimes the free hand is used to fend off a beating as demonstrated in illustrations in a Shide

105 For the relevant illustration see Yang Zhijiong, Lanqiao yuchu ji, Wanyue Xuan 1606 edition, 1.53b–54a. 106 For the illustration see Gao Ming, Pipa ji, Shide Tang Wanli edition. National Central Library, Taipei. 107 For the illustration see Gao Ming, Pipa ji, Zunsheng Guan Wanli edition, 1.57b–58a.

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3–43. Gao Ming. Pipa ji. Jinling: Shide Tang, 1573–1619. 1.5b. National Central Library, Taipei.

3–44. Gao Ming. Pipa ji. N.p.: unknown publisher, 1573–1619. 1.5b–6a. National Palace Museum, Taipei, Taiwan, Republic of China.

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Tang edition of Huandai ji,108 and in a Fuchun Tang edition of Xunqin ji.109 The character responsible for all this frolicking and joking on the stage is the chou (clown), one of the ve major types of the classical Chinese stage. In addition to the pratfall, the chou has a wide array of funny and lively ke-jie with which to entertain the audience. In an illustration in Lanqiao yuchu ji, for example, a chou impersonates a female matchmaker to the delight of a wedding party, and indeed becomes the center of attention (gure 3–45). Other clownish performances are shown in an illustration in a Wenlin Ge edition of Qingpao ji,110 and in a Zunsheng Guan edition of Pipa ji.111 In a Weng Wenyuan edition of Tanhua ji (gure 3–46), the chou does a comic impersonation of a bird. There are many other types of frolicking scenes depicted in illustrations. A brief account of these will be given in order to suggest the extent to which illustrators were inspired by the stage. The scene in which Cai Bojie thinks of his far-away parents and wife while playing the zither is melancholy as given in the text of Pipa ji. But the illustrator of a Shide Tang edition packs the scene with many amusing details that show his zest for the comic aspects of the theater (gure 3–47). Cai Bojie plays the zither while his second wife stands quietly behind him and a servant holding a pot of burning incense chats with another servant, who is pointing at something off stage or drawing the other servant’s attention to the third one behind him. The illustration becomes slightly humorous in the gure of a third servant who sits at a table on the side of the stage: he has apparently dozed off and let fall two books while his master has been playing the zither, seemingly unmoved by his master’s pain. Given the number of characters on stage at once and the variety of their moods, the scene seems particularly inspired by the kind of larger-scale performance one might have seen not in a literati’s garden, but in a market-place, where a spectacle was often offered to attract the attention of large crowds.112

108 For the illustration of beating see Shen Cai, Huandai ji, Shide Tang Wanli edition, 1.5a. 109 The Fuchun Tang edition of Xunqin ji is in the collection of Beijing University Library. For the illustration of beating see Wang Ling, Xunqin ji, 2.19b. 110 For the relevant illustration see Qingpao ji, Wenlin Ge Wanli edition, 1.8a. 111 For the illustration of clownish performance see Gao Ming, Pipa ji, Zungsheng Guan edition, 1.41b–42a. 112 Li-ling Hsiao, “Woodblock Prints and Theatre,” 133–84.

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3–45. Yang Zhijiong. Lanqiao yuchu ji. N.p.: Wanyue Xuan, 1606. Reproduced from GBXQCK, 1st series 1, box 11, 5:2.44b–45a.

3–46. Tu Long. Tanhua ji. Hangzhou: Weng Wenyuan, 1573–1619. 1.7b–8a. National Central Library, Taipei.

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In addition to the many stage gestures depicted repetitively in illustrations, there are many stage gestures depicted only occasionally. Some of these appear only very infrequently, but are still observable on the contemporary stage and so identiable as dramatic gestures. An illustration in a 1599 Jizhi Zhai edition of Yuzan ji (gure 3–48), for example, depicts the play’s heroine with her body and arms arrayed as if she is both recoiling from something and drawn to it. One arm tentatively reaches, while the other tentatively resists, and the body moves toward its object even as it turns away. The heroine of the play—a nun113—is about to commit her romantic desire to paper. The same gesture is traditionally performed in Picking up a Jade Bracelet (Shi yuzhuo), a famous Peking Opera still performed to this day. When she spots a jade bracelet on the ground, the heroine of the opera performs this gesture to show both her illicit desire and her hesitation to possess it. In both cases, the gesture represents the conicting impulses in a crucial moment of moral decision. In a Fuchun Tang edition of Mulian jiumu (gure 3–49) there is a different but equally subtle gesture. The heroine, Liu, makes her way through the Guxi geng, a kind of purgatory for those who have sinned.114 Her posture is very unusual: she walks almost in a squatting position. This posture is used on the stage to indicate that a character is very short (as the midget Wu Dalang in the Peking Opera Wu shihui) or that a character is walking through a low passage. In this case the gesture indicates the difculty and labor of the path. In a Fuchun Tang edition of Hufu ji (gure 3–50) we see another rare gesture—specic to males—in which the character assumes an angry or defensive posture, his arms primed for action. This gesture also appears in an illustration in a Fuchun Tang edition of Jindiao ji.115 Here the hero of the play, 113 In the text, the heroine Chen Miaochang devotes herself to religious practice in an exclusively female Taoist temple (nü zhenguan), but she practices Buddhism. In consequence, some describe her as female Taoist (dao gu) and some describe her as a nun. In gure 3–48, however, the illustrator seems to present her neither as a Taoist nor a Buddhist nun, but as a married woman. In another illustration in the 1608 Jizhi Zhai edition of Xu Qiao’s Liangjiang ji, a female wears the similar hairstyle but with a decoration—a kind of headdress—characteristic of female Taoists (1.2b). This decoration also appears in an illustration in a Shide Tang edition of Pipa ji, which shows the heroine Zhao Wuniang after she has cut her hair to raise burial funds for her parents-in-law and embarked on her journey to the capital in the disguise of a female Taoist. It seems that the difference between the hairstyle of married women and that of the Taoist is on Ming stage was a matter of the headdress. 114 See Zheng Zhizhen, Mulian jiumu, Fuchun Tang Wanli edition, scene 4, chapter 3, 3.6b–7b. Copies of the edition are in the collections of Beijing Library & KyÔto Daigaku Bungakubu. 115 For the illustration see Jindiao ji, Fuchun Tang Wanli edition, 2.26b.

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3–47. Gao Ming. Pipa ji. Jinling: Shide Tang, 1573–1619. 2.2b. National Central Library, Taipei.

3–48. Gao Lian. Yuzan ji. Jinling: Jizhi Zhai, 1599. A facsimile of Guanhua Xuan 1598 edition. Reproduced from GBXQCK, 1st series, box 11, 6:2.10b–11a.

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3–49. Zheng Zhizhen. Mulian jiumu. Jinling: Fuchun Tang, 1573–1619. 3:1.7a. National Palace Museum, Taipei, Taiwan, Republic of China.

3–50. Zhang Fengyi. Hufu ji. Jinling: Fuchun Tang, 1573–1619. Reproduced from GBXQCK, 1st series, box 8, 3:2.27a.

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3–51. Photo from a performance of the Peking Opera Gucheng hui. Lin Shusen plays Guan Yu. Reproduced from Jingju shizhao, edited by Lu Qing et al., 76.

3–52. Xu Qiao. Liangjiang ji. Jinling: Jizhi Zhai, 1608. Reproduced from GBXQCK, 2nd series, box 5, 2:2.2b.

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Xue Rengui, is shown locked in a jia, a kind of stock or pillory, but manages the gesture nonetheless. This gesture is still used on the stage of Peking Opera, as demonstrated in a photograph of Gucheng hui (plate 3–51).116 Another gesture rare in illustrations but common on the contemporary stage is a kind of swooning brought on by a shock. The character sometimes falls into the arms of another character and is quickly lowered into a chair; the character sometimes takes the chair himself. A textbook example of this gesture is shown in an illustration in a 1608 edition of Liangjiang ji (gure 3–52). According to the description of the scene in the text, the male protagonist Fan Ruoshui swoons when he hears that his mother and wife have committed suicide.117 On the stage of the Peking Opera, this ke-jie—the seated gure, the gures providing support—is used when a character faints. The illustrator thus follows the stage precisely. Illustrators not only imitate the characteristic gestures of the actor, as discussed above, but also imitate by the conventional placement of the characters on the stage. In scene four of Pipa ji, for instance, Cai Bojie’s father coerces him to leave home to take the state exam against the wishes of both Cai Bojie and his mother, Mrs. Cai. An illustration in a Shide Tang edition shows Cai pleading not to leave, while his mother faces away from the clustered action (gure 3–53). This gesture is not specied in the stage directions. It is perhaps surprising in that Cai’s mother is presumably in a state of rage at her husband, and her temperament is extremely argumentative. She might be expected to behave more like the woman in an illustration in a 1606 edition of Lanqiao yuchu ji (gure 3–52), who angrily points at the male character as she scolds and curses him. Mrs. Cai is similarly depicted in illustrations of the same scene in other editions of Pipa ji such as that published by Zunsheng Guan (gure 3–55), and in another Ming edition issued by unknown publisher.118 In all three illustrations, Mrs. Cai has no part in the immediate action and might thus have been excluded from the illustration, but she is retained on the stage as the text does not indicate her exit and she still has lines later in the scene. This arrangement shows the illustrator’s loyalty to the text: he retains the mother

116 This photo shows a scene from the Peking Opera Gucheng hui. See Lu Qing, Yang Zuyu, Hu Dongsheng, and Zhang Xiuling, Jingju shizhao, 76. 117 Xu Qiao, Liangjiang ji, Jizhi Zhai 1608 edition, 2.1b–3a. 118 The relevant illustration is included in Gao Ming, Nan Pipa ji, anonymous edition, Palace Museum, Taipei.

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on the stage not for any dramatic reason, but simply because the stage directions have not indicated her removal. The gesture of turning her back indicates her anger without involving her in the action and thus contradicting the text. We can infer that all of these illustrators borrow the device of the turned back from the stage. It is noticeable even on the contemporary stage, as in the Peking Opera Wu shihui, in which the aged Mrs. Wang tries to encourage an adulterous union between Pan Jinlian and Ximen Qing. Pretending to be angry, Mrs. Wang sits in the corner and turns her back on the two protagonists, who thus have an opportunity to court. It is also common in actual performances for an actor to play more than one role, especially where the company is small. The practice continues today, and can be seen, at the very least, on traditional stages throughout Taiwan. Illustrations of the Wanli period subtly hint at this frequent necessity of the stage, as in an illustration of the banquet scene in Zixiao ji (gure 3–56).119 The court servant holding a pot and standing next to the far end of the table is dressed like a male, but is clearly being played by a female who has donned court robe and placed a cap over her styled hair. We know the female character in this illustration (gure 3–56) is supposed to be male because of her dress, but her distinctively female hairstyle is obvious when compared to the styles worn by the male character King Huo in the illustration. As we see in the same illustration, the dress of a female court servant next to the near end of the table is quite distinctive and obviously unlike what we see of the servant at the opposite end. This illustration thus makes a point of suggesting that a female character is momentarily lling a gap in the cast. In an illustration of celebrating the birthday of King Miaozhuang in a Fuchun Tang edition of Xiangshan ji,120 there is a similar instance of this theatrical make-shift in which a female character is shown doubling as a male servant. Again she is given away by her hairstyle, which is identical to the other female servants shown in the illustration. As illustrators do not suffer shortages of performers, the only explanation for these anomalies is the attempt to replicate precisely the look and feel of the Wanli stage.

119 There are many examples of this stage practice in the illustrations of the Wanli period. Other examples are to be found in the Fuchun Tang editions of Yingwu ji, Tipao ji, and Herong ji, and in a Shide Tang edition of Wu Shimei’s Jinghong ji. 120 For the illustration of the celebration see Xiangshan ji, Fuchun Tang Wanli edition, 1.4a.

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3–53. Gao Ming. Pipa ji. Jinling: Shide Tang, 1573–1619. 1.11b. National Central Library, Taipei.

3–54. Yang Zhijiong. Lanqiao yuchu ji. N.p.: Wanyue Xuan, 1606. Reproduced from GBXQCK, 1st series, box 11, 5:2.37b–38a.

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3–55. Gao Ming. Pipa ji. N.p.: Zunsheng Guan, 1573–1619. 1.17b–18a. National Palace Museum, Taipei, Taiwan, Republic of China.

3–56. Tang Xianzu. Zixiao ji. Jinling: Fuchun Tang, 1573–1619. Reproduced from GBXQCK, 1st series, box 10, 2:1.16a.

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As we have noted thus far, illustrators of the Wanli period tended to imitate the stage spaces of the theater, as well as the manner and movement of stage actors. The idea of the stage audience also informed their work, indicating how completely they were inuenced by the example of the theater, and suggesting their clear intention to recreate in print the fullness of the theatrical experience. In the above discussion of the gesture of serving drinks (bazhan jie), the illustrations cited consistently suggest a distinctive positioning of the depicted gures. An illustration in a Shide Tang edition of Pipa ji (gure 3–35), for example, depicts the scene in which Cai Bojie and his newly married wife are serving wine to Cai’s parents. The illustrator places the parents behind the table, and the young couple in front of the table. All four characters are facing forward, as they would on a stage. Even when the young people retire to the sides of the table, as they do in an illustration in an edition of Pipa ji published by Qifeng Guan (gure 3–40), they continue to face the front rather than turn to face their elders as would seem more natural and even more polite. We see the same arrangement in drama mural paintings, such as the mural excavated from a Yuan tomb in Wuling Village (gure 3–57). In this mural an elderly couple sits on a bench behind a table, and two young people stand on both sides of the table, facing to the front rather than to the elderly couple, again as would seem more natural and polite. Another example of a banquet scene in a 1582 edition of Mulian jiumu (gure 3–32) shows Luo Pu and a servant as they serve wine to Luo’s parents. They do not face the parents, but seem to be offering drinks to the empty space of the middle stage. This arrangement is particularly stylized and articial, having no relation to what might occur in daily life. The same stylized orientation recurs in illustrations in a Fuchun Tang edition of Sangui lianfang ji;121 in a 1608 Jizhi Zhai edition of Liangjiang ji (gure 3–33); in a Wenlin Ge edition of Qingpao ji;122 in a 1586 Shide Tang edition of Duanfa ji;123 in a 1603 Jizhi Zhai edition of Qiting ji;124 in a Fuchun 121

For the relevant illustration see Sangui lianfang ji, Fuchun Tang Wanli edition,

1.1b. 122

For the relevant illustration see Qingpao ji, Wenlin Ge Wanli edition, 1.8a. For the relevant illustration see Duanfa ji (1.2a), in Kanda KiichirÔ, ed., chÖgoku gikyoku senpon sanshu, 241. 124 For the relevant illustration see Zheng Zhiwen, Qiting ji, Jizhi Zhai 1603 edition, 1.2a. 123

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3–57. Mural painting from a tomb in Wuling Village in Xinjiang County in Shanxi Province, Yuan dynasty. Reproduced from Song Jin Yuan xiqu wenwu tulun, Shanxi Shifan Daxue Xiqu Wenwu Yanjiusuo, 51. Shanxi: Renmin chubanshe, 1987.

Tang edition of Tipao ji;125 in the mural painting in the Hall of King Mingying (gure 3–8); and in the illustration titled Mao’er xi (gure 3–13). In all of these illustrations, the illustrators seem to imagine an audience witnessing the depicted drama, and takes great pains, as would a playwright or choreographer, to ensure that the audience has a full view of the action. The illustrators thus consistently atten the action and orient it face forward. The young people serving drinks are not, as in life, performing for their elders, but for their audience, and the orientation of their bodies reects this. A representation of the typical banquet scene uninformed by an implicit audience, by way of contrast, might look something like the painting in Li Gonglin’s Xiaojing tu, in which the young people serving wine to their elders are seen from the side (gure 3–58).126 Or it might look like the illustration of a banquet scene in a 1435 edition of Jiaohong ji published by Jide Tang in Jinling (gure 3–59): here the elderly couple 125

For the relevant illustration see Tipao ji, Fuchun Tang Wanli edition, 1.2a. This set of illustrations are studied and reprinted in Richard Barnhart, Li Kunglin’s Classic of Filial Piety. 126

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3–58. Li Gongling. Xiaojing tu. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. Reproduced from Li Kung-ling’s Classic of Filial Piety, by Richard Barnhart, 120–1. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1993.

3–59. Liu Dui. Jiaohong ji. Jinling: Jide Tang, 1435. Reproduced from GBXQCK, 1st series, box 2, 10:10a.

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sits behind the table, while the young people and servants surround them, facing in all different directions. This composition suggests the banquet as something self-enclosed; the scene does not open or atten itself, as would such a scene on the stage, in order to accommodate the gaze of an audience seated front and center. There is a similarly naturalistic (as opposed to theatrical) representation in the illustration of a banquet scene in a 1498 edition of Xixiang ji: the gures conne their interaction to one another and make no effort to draw the participation of an imagined audience (gure 3–6). These pre-Wanli illustrations are more inuenced by the tradition of narrative painting than the conventions of theater, which was typical of illustrations before the Wanli period. The theatrical inuence is sometimes noticeable, but it is not until the Wanli period that it becomes dominant. In a banquet illustration in a 1608 Huancui Tang edition of Sanzhu ji (gure 3–60), we can see an arrangement in which a group of three gentlemen stands near one side of the table, while the servant holding a vessel faces the couple behind the table. This illustration does not focus on the group in front of the table but on the couple who talks and toast each other behind it, as we know from their animation and the fact that they seem to be the focus of the other characters’ attention. The couple squarely faces frontward as if addressing an audience, but the secondary characters are turned at an angle or turned away, so as not to distract the attention of the audience or confuse the focus of the scene. This too is a commonplace of the stage. In an illustration of a banquet scene in an edition of Xiuwen ji by an unknown publisher (gure 3–61), the old gentleman behind the table seems to converse with a young man facing him while others in front of the table stand quietly and face the audience at various angles. The focus of this performance is these two conversing characters, but the young man, very unusually, is facing away from the audience. Given these details it seems likely that this illustration dates from the late Wanli to the Chongzhen era, by which time illustrators had lost some of their passion for their stage. The illustration depicts a stage scene, but delity to the subtle conventions of the stage is no longer a priority. During the early Wanli period, this conversation would almost certainly have been conducted at front-center stage, as in an illustration in a 1589 edition of Baiyueting ji (gure 3–2), in order to accommodate an imagined audience and adhere to stage convention. The orientation of characters toward an imagined audience often seems the overriding consideration in performance illustration. In

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3–60. Wang Tingna. Sanzhu ji. Xiuning: Huancui Tang, 1608. Reproduced from GBXQCK, 2nd series, box 2, 7:2.30b–31a.

3–61. Tu Long. Xiuwen ji. N.p.: publisher unknown, Late Ming. Picture 1.1a. National Central Library, Taipei.

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many cases all of the characters are displayed frontally or semi-frontally, giving the illustration a highly stylized and articial quality, as in an illustration in a Shide Tang edition of Pipa ji (gure 3–35). It often seems that the characters are united only by their orientation to a common audience, each so focused frontward that they do not seem to be interacting among themselves. In a frolic scene in a Shide Tang edition of Pipa ji (gure 3–43), the servants hide from the lady who appears at the garden gate, concealing themselves behind the Taihu rock in the middle of the picture. Their hiding places are directly visible to the lady, but necessitated by the sight line of an imagined audience. Here again, realism is sacriced to stage convention. The same scene illustrated in the late Wanli period suggests the emergence of a new sensibility more informed by the garden than the theater (gure 3–44). Here the two servants are shown hiding behind a wall and are more convincingly hidden from the lady, but so too they are largely hidden from the sight-lines of an audience. Though both illustrations are set in gardens, the former illustration is essentially set on the stage, while the latter seems to take the reality of the garden more seriously. This tendency to orient the image toward an imagined audience is also evident in the representation of conversation. Instead of directing their comments to one another, the characters tend to direct them to the imagined audience. As described in scene four of Pipa ji, Cai Bojie pleads with his father not to force him to leave for the capital to take the public service exam. In a Shide Tang illustration, Cai is portrayed on his knees performing a reporting gesture (gongshou) as he begs his father to reconsider (gure 3–53). In this illustration Cai does not face his father but looks face-forward, as would an actor on the stage. Just such an arrangement is traditional in the Peking Opera Su San qijie, when Su San is accused of murdering her husband and is brought to trial. In the scene of the trial, Su San kneels as she would even in real life as a gesture of courtesy to the court, but instead of facing the ofcials as would be expected in a naturalistic representation, she turns her back to the ofcials and addresses her comments to the audience. The same gesture, in which the heroine kneels in court but is turned away from the judge, is shown in a photograph of a 20th century performance of the Peking Opera Chen Sanliang patang (gure 3–62).127 This photograph

127 The photo shows a scene from the Peking Opera Chen Sanliang patang performed in the 1980s. See Lu Qing, Yang Zuyu, Hu Dongsheng, and Zhang Xiuling, Jingju shizhao, 198.

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3–62. Photo from a performance of the Peking Opera Chen Sanliang patang given in 1980s. Reproduced from Jingju shizhao, edited by Lu Qing et al., 198.

suggests the long continuous theatrical tradition that the illustrators of the Wanli period were so careful to represent despite that one might question the Wanli theater is a different theatrical genre from the Peking Opera. We can see the same representation in which characters report or plead to audiences rather than to other characters on the stage in many illustrations, as for example in a 1582 edition of Mulian jiumu,128 in a Shide Tang edition of Pipa ji,129 in a Shide Tang edition of Yuhe ji,130 and in a Zunsheng Guan edition of Pipa ji.131 Although the character reporting or pleading is rendered only semi-frontally in some cases, as in an illustration in a 1582 Gaoshi Shanfang edition of Mulian jiumu

128 For the relevant illustration see Zheng Zhizhen, Mulian jiumu, Gaoshi Shanfang 1582 edition, 1.55b. 129 For the illustration of the prime minister lecturing his daughter see Gao Ming, Pipa ji, Shide Tang Wanli edition, 2.21b. 130 The relevant illustration is included in Mei Dingzuo’s Yuhe ji, Shide Tang Wanli edition, 1.37b. 131 The relevant illustration is included in Gao Ming, Pipa ji, Zunsheng Guan Wanli edition, 1.34b–35a.

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(gure 3–32) and in a Fuchun Tang edition of Fenjin ji,132 the imagined audience is never fully deprived of its view. The four characters in the Shide Tang illustration of Pipa ji (gure 3–53) are spatially divided, with Cai Bojie in the foreground, and the remaining characters in the middle ground. The least important character in the subordinate group, at least according to the text, is Cai’s mother, who has no part in the conversation. As discussed above, however, this particular illustration is interesting in that Cai’s mother sits with her back turned from the action. The otherwise insignicant character, then, assumes an important symbolic role even in her silence: by turning her back on the entire discussion she says as much as she might in a heated speech. In a Zunsheng Guan illustration (gure 3–55) of precisely the same scene, the four characters are represented not on one ‘full half-folio’ page but on two facing half-folio pages, and the spatial conguration of the illustration is transformed. The mother is now at the very center of the two facing pages illustration in recognition of her silent but morally crucial gesture, while the father and the neighbor are pushed to the margins of the two-page illustration in a kind of gurative exile. With this design, the illustrator’s moral interpretation of the scene is conveyed: in facing the mother backward and Cai forward—symbolically turning them away from the father and neighbor, who would split the family—the illustrator expresses his sympathy for the familial interests that they plead.133 Many more examples of the orientation toward an imagined audience could be cited from illustrations printed during the Wanli period, as in the illustrations in a Fuchun Tang edition of Tipao ji and in a Shide Tang edition of Shuangfeng qiming ji (gure 3–16).134 In their consistent arrangement of characters, these illustrations clearly demonstrate that the illustrators had in mind an imagined audience. This convention completes the performance illustration’s incorporation of theatrical conventions: not only stage-space and performers were kept in mind, but even the sight-lines of the audience. Where painting of this period

132 For the relevant illustration see Ye Liangbiao, Fenjin ji, Fuchun Tang Wanli edition, 2.2b. 133 Anne Burkus-Chasson argues that the folding of the recto-verso leaf is also signicant in the picture book Lingyan Ge by Liu Yuan. Liu manipulated the pages to “create tension in his representation of the historical gallery of portraits.” See “Visual Hermeneutics and the Act of Turning the Leaf,” in Cynthia Brokaw and Kai-wing Chow, ed., Printing and Book Culture in Late Imperial China, 371–416. 134 For the relevant illustration see Tipao ji, Fuchun Tang Wanli edition, 2.3a.

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constitutes its own self-enclosed world, performance illustration is always aware of a presence outside of itself.

Types of Theater We have discussed above the relationship between illustration and the stage in terms of space, gesture and audience; we must now turn to the issue of the theater itself. In the theatrical world of the late Ming period, there were different types of theaters for different occasions and these were popular among different classes of audience. Performances were given at temple fairs and festivals, before friends and family in gardens and at banquets, and for private enjoyment in the home.135 These developments were reected in the illustrations created for drama. Illustrations of this period provided images not only of the stage proper, but also of the many different stages that played important roles in the culture. These illustrations provide a marvelous chance to investigate closely the various forms of theaters that existed during the Wanli period. The illustration titled Chalou tu (gure 3–11) depicts an early Qing stage in an open market place, surrounded by a large audience watching the performance. The front and both sides of the stage are open and circumscribed by a low railing, while an elaborate roof is supported by four pillars. This three-side opened stage is on a high platform so the performance might be visible to a large audience. We can see a stage with an analogous structure depicted in an illustration in a Fuchun Tang edition of Zixiao ji (gure 6–7). The leaves and branches that brush against the stage suggest a high platform, which in turn suggests a large audience. This kind of high stage is often to be found in the illustrations of the Wanli period, as for example in a Shide Tang edition of Pipa ji (gure 3–34). In a 1581 edition of Yujue ji six of fourteen illustrationns show a high-platformed stage (gure 3–1). Illustrations in plays published by the Jizhi Zhai publishing house also depict many high-platform stages, as in a 1599 edition of Yuzan ji and in a 1608 edition of Liangjiang ji.136 In a 1601 edition of Hongfu ji, also published 135 In her study of the Ming theater, Wang Anqi discusses different types of theatrical spaces and the way these inuence the selection of plays to be staged. See Mingdai chuanqi zhi juchang jiqi yishu, 177–221. 136 For the relevant illustrations see Xu Qiao, Liangjiang ji, Jizhi Zhai 1608 edition, 1.2b.

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by Jizhi Zhai, three of ve depictions of the stage show high platforms. We can also see the high-platform stage in the illustrations in a 1590 edition of Guifan published in Shanxi,137 in editions of Sisheng yuan,138 and Zhuangyuan tukao,139 both issued by unknown publishers. Unlike the stage shown in the Fuchun Tang edition of Yujue ji (gure 3–1), with its three open sides, the stage shown in a Shide Tang edition of Pipa ji shows only one open side (gure 3–35). Stages of this type dating from as long ago as the Yuan dynasty can still be seen in Shanxi Province, and perhaps elsewhere in China as well (gure 3–63).140 Although it is impossible to determine, stages like the one shown in the Shide Tang edition of Pipa ji might have been raised, as a similar closed stage is represented in an illustration in a 1606 Wanyue Xuan edition of Lanqiao yuchu ji (gure 3–45): this at least suggests that the platform and the closed sides were not incompatible. On the other hand it might have been on ground level, like the closed stage shown in a Fuchun Tang edition of Hufu ji (gure 3–50). Though the stage depicted in Lanqiao yuchu ji is elevated as shown in gure 3–45, it is only elevated by a few steps (unlike the stage depicted in Chalou tu, which is clearly higher). The low platform stage can also be seen in a Guangqing Tang edition of Qisheng ji gure 3–64) and in a Shide Tang edition of Yuhe ji.141 Though only slightly elevated, the few steps in front of the stage are signicant in two senses. As shown in an illustration in Xiangshan ji (gure 6–10), the customary railing is broken by the stair and a channel of communication between the stage and audience is opened. In many cases the actor will actually leave the stage and declaim his lines from the stair, or entirely leave the stage structure. Illustrators often portray the stair being used like this, as shown in gures gure 3–64. A similar extension of the performance space is shown in one of a color print produced in Ninghe c. 1800 in which features a scene from the play Li Zicheng chengwan, Li Zicheng is seated on a stage and watches as his ministers, in theatrical makeup, perform with swords in front of the stage

137 Three illustrations from this edition are included in Fu Xihua, Zhongguo gudian wenxue banhua xuanji, 517–9. 138 Three illustrations from this edition are included in Ibid., 308–13. 139 For the relevant illustration see Ibid., 348. 140 This stage was built in 1345, and is located in front of the Dongyue Temple in Dongyang Village in Linfen County. See Liao Ben, Song Yuan xiqu wenwu yu minsu, color plate 54. 141 The relevant illustration is included in Mei Dingzuo, Yuhe ji, Shide Tang edition, 1.42b.

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3–63. Photo of a stage in the Temple of Dongyue in Dongyang Village in Linfen City of Shanxi Province, 1345. Taken by Wang Jianmin, reproduced from Song Yuan xiqu wenwu yu minsu, by Liao Ben, color plate 54 (between pages 200–202). Beijing: Wenhua meishu chubanshe, 1989.

3–64. Ji Zhenlun. Wuhou qisheng ji. Jinling: Guangqing Tang, 1573–1619. Reproduced from GBXQCK, 2nd series, box 5, 4:1b–2a.

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3–65. Li Zicheng chengwang, Ninghe in Hebe Province, mid-Qing. Reproduced from Zhongguo meishu quanji: huihua bian, 21:77. Taipei: Jinxiu chubanshe, 1989.

3–66. Mural painting from tomb no. 1 in the town of Baisha in Beiying County in Henan Province, Song dynasty. Reproduced from Song Yuan xiqu wenwu yu minsu, by Liao Ben, color plate 9 (between pages 40 and 41).

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(gure 3–65). We also see open-sided ground-level stages in an edition of Shuangyu ji (gure 3–30) and in a 1603 edition of Qiting ji,142 both published by Jizhi Zhai, and in a 1608 edition of Wansha ji published by Yangchun Tang in Wulin, Hangzhou.143 This form of ground level stage was apparently intended for a smaller audience that sat in a row in front of the stage. Based on the scenery in these illustrations, we understand that ground-level stages were more likely to be located in gardens where family and friends could watch the performance comfortably. In some instances, the front margins of the stage are draped with bundled curtains, as shown in gures gure 3–64 and 3–33. As in a modern theater, these curtains were presumably opened and closed to signal the start and nish of the play, and perhaps to mark an intermission. Curtains of this type appear in many illustrations, as in a 1606 edition of Lanqiao yuchu ji,144 in a 1608 Huancui Tang edition of Sanzhu ji,145 and in a 1608 edition of Linfan baojuan.146 The custom of hanging curtains is also related to stage setting. A mural painting showing a performance on a stage decorated with bundled curtains of just this type (gure 3–66) was found in a tomb dated 1099 and excavated in 1951 in the town of Baisha in Yu County, Henan Province.147 We can thus assume that hanging curtains in front of the stage was a common custom and that this custom dates to at least 1099 in the Northern Song dynasty. When Lan Caihe asks the musician Wang to “please hang all the banners, the valance, curtains and costumes for me” (as quoted above) he perhaps refers to just this type of curtain. The stages discussed thus far are situated on land, but many stages—both in actual life and in illustrations—are located in the middle of ponds, or directly face ponds, usually in the general setting of a garden. The audience sits on the opposite side of the water and

142 For the relevant illustration see Zheng Zhiwen, Qiting ji, Jizhi Zhai 1603 edition, 2.17b. 143 For the relevant illustration see Liang Chenyu, Wansha ji, Yangchun Tang 1606 edition, 2.28b–29a. 144 For the relevant illustration see Yang Zhijong, Lanqiao yuchu ji, Wanyue Xuan 1606 edition, 1.5b–6a. 145 For the relevant illustration see Wang Tingna, Huancui Tang yuefu Sanzhu ji, Huangcui Tang Wanli edition, 2.1b–2a. 146 Three illustrations to Linfan baojuan are included in Fu Xihua, Zhongguo gudian wenxue banhua xuanji, 529–31. 147 For a brief discussion of the mural see Liao Ben, Song Yuan xiqu wenwu yu minsu, 152–4.

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3–67. Zhuangyuan tukao. N.p.: unknown publisher, 1607. Reproduced from Zhongguo gudian wenxue banhua xuanji, edited by Fu Xihua, 1:355.

3–68. Wang Tingna. Toutao ji. Xiuning: Huancui Tang, 1573–1619. Reproduced from GBXQCK, 2nd series, box 2, 8:1.12b–13a.

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the stage becomes an attractive pavilion when not in use. In an illustration in Zhuangyuan tukao, for example, we see the rst-degree winner Weng Zhengchun on a stage surrounded by water (gure 3–67). The stage is connected to land only by a stone bridge. In an illustration in a Shide Tang edition of Pipa ji, Cai Bojie plays the zither on a stage facing a lily pond (gure 3–47). A stage similarly faces a lily pond in an illustration in Jinyin ji.148 There is an unusual stage surrounded not by a pond, but by a full-scale lake in a Huancui Tang edition of Toutao ji (gure 3–68). This illustration shows a performance taking place on stage while musicians perform on a boat to the side of the stage. The audience, which is not shown, must presumably watch the entertainment from their own boats or from land. In all of the above examples, the stage is a building or structure specially designated for performance (even when it doubles as a pavilion). The audience is formally cordoned off, invited to participate visually but not physically. There is a type of performance, however, that occurs without a formal stage, usually on a carpet, which can be set anywhere an audience might be found, but most usually is laid at a banquet or in a garden. This type of drama is called ‘carpet performance’ (zhanyu yanju) and was common during the Wanli period.149 In this case, the audience is less removed from the dramatic action, sometimes sitting only a foot or two from the actors. The audience typically forms a ring and surrounds the performance, as shown in an illustration in a 1644 edition of Jinping mei (gure 3–69).150 The drama publications of the Wanli era are full of such illustrations. We see this type of performance illustrated, for example, in a 1608 Jizhi Zhai edition of Liangjiang ji (gure 3–33); in a Huancui Tang edition of Toutao ji (gure 3–24); in a Chongzhen edition of Yipengxue (gure 1–1); in a Guangqing Tang edition of Quande ji (gure 3–70); in a Fuchun Tang edition of Yingwu ji;151 and the Ninghe color print (gure 3–65). Examples, indeed, are so numerous that any account can only provide a small representative sample. This type of illustration is particularly common because

148

For the relevant illustration see Jinyin ji, publisher unknown, Wanli, 2.11b–12a. About the popularity of the ‘carpet performance’ during the late Ming period, see Wang Anqi, Mingdai chuanqi zhi juchang jiqi yishu, 159–162. 150 The illustration depicts a scene in chapter 63 of a 1644 edition of Jinping mei, see Quanben Jinping mei cihua, 2:63.picture 2, between pages 1764 and 1765. At Li Ping’er’s funeral, in order to entertain those who come to mourn Ximen Qing hires a group to perform on the site of the funeral. The story performed is Yuhuan ji (63.9b–12b). 151 For the relevant illustration see Yingwu ji, Fuchun Tang Wanli edition, 2.8a. 149

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3–69. Lanling Xiaoxiao Sheng. Jinping mei. N.p.: publisher unknown, 1644. Reproduced from Quanben Jinping mei cihua. 2:63.picture 2 (between pages 1764 and 1765). Jiulong: Xianggang Taiping shuju, c. 1982, 1986.

3–70. Wang Zhideng. Quande ji. Jinling: Guangqing Tang, 1573–1619. Reproduced from GBXQCK, 2nd series, box 3, 7:2.25b–26a.

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‘carpet performance’ was a crucial part of the social life and leisure activities of both literati and rich merchants, just the people who were most likely to buy drama publications. This type of illustration can be divided into two categories: those in which the characters of the novel or play are represented as actors in a carpet performance (gure 3–70) and those in which the characters constitute an audience and watch a carpet performance (as in gures 1–1, 3–24, 3–33 and 3–69). In the latter case, the performance on the carpet is a drama within a drama. This kind of meta-performance, and particularly its temporal implications, will be discussed in a subsequent chapter. In summary, illustrations draw on the design and props of the stage in order to enhance their analogy to the world of actual theaters, and in so doing give a clearer picture of the development of theaters during the Wanli period. In this respect illustrations form an indispensable historical record, despite the fact that they are sometimes poorly rendered. The sheer quantity of these illustrations—even by comparison to paintings of the period—sets this record on very rm ground.

The Transformation of Performance Illustration Thus far, this study has tried to demonstrate the relationship between illustration and performance in the Wanli period, but objections might well be raised to the above arguments. One objection might be that the orientation to an imagined audience is contradicted by several counterexamples in which the characters face away from any conceivable audience (as in gures 3–1, 3–2). One might also object that many illustrations include objects—especially horses and boats—that had no place on the stage (as in gures 3–19 and 3–25). Rather than hastily admit the validity of these counterexamples, we should carefully consider them. Let’s consider the rst objection stated above that some characters are not oriented toward an imagined audience, with the implication that the relationship between illustration and theater has been overstated. The illustrator, like the dramatist, will turn some characters away from the audience, not because he is unconcerned with the audience, but because he is especially concerned that audience’s attention is properly focused. It should be noted that in no case are all of the characters turned away from the audience or presented at oblique angles. The illustrator uses the positioning of characters almost as a spotlight is used

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in a modern theater: not only to focus attention, but to rule out distraction. Regarding the second objection, one may question the assumption that there were only minimal props used in the Ming theater. A person used to contemporary Peking Opera might be inclined to doubt that real horses and boats have ever appeared on Chinese stages, as these objects are now unknown. In contemporary Peking Opera, a performer uses a whip to suggest that he is riding on a horse, and ke-jie conventions have evolved to suggest the act of mounting and dismounting. A photo taken in the early twentieth century provides a reminder that attempting to understand even early 20th century theater in terms of contemporary theater is dangerous. A photo of the Peking Opera Tan qinjia circa the late 19th century shows the actor Liu Gansan in the role Madam Hu; he is riding an actual pony (plate 3–71).152 It is not clear whether use of an actual pony during performances was unusual or common practice during the late Ming period. In his miscellany Yunjian jumu chao (preface dated 1593), Fan Lian records the use of live horses in a 1590 street performance apparently encompassing three or more different plays (Guafu zhengxi and Herong ji seem to be two of the plays): [. . .] In 1590, each town hired two or three hundred horses, and all performers wore bright coloured ofcial robes and leather boots. They wore ofcial hats on their heads, and they were fully decorated with gold pearls and green owers. The scene was reminiscent of the triumphant parade for the First Degree Winner [zhuangyuan]. Three pearl crops, worth more than one hundred taels, were used. They recruited thirty or forty prostitutes to dress up as those widows who conquer the west, and to play Zhaojun who journeys beyond the borders [. . .]153

It is not accidental that the three distinct scenes alluded to in the above passage all involve horse riding, presumably to make maximum use of the horses that had been hired. The use of real horses suggests that those

152 Liu Gansan was one of the thirteen most famous actors active during 1862–1908. These actors are represented by Shen Rongpu in a painting titled The Thirteen Best and Most Famous Actors during the Tongzhi and Guangxu Reigns (Tong Guang mingling shisan jue). The painting is reproduced in Jingju shizhao. In the painting, and also in the photo above, Liu Gansan appears in one of his most famous roles as Madam Hu. Liu Gansan was also famous in the earlier Daoguang and Xianfeng reigns (1821–1861). His name appears in an 1845 edition of Dumen jilue, as mentioned by Sun Chongtao and Xu Hongtu in their study of the history of Chinese performers. See Xiqu youling shi, 225. 153 Fan Lian, Yunjian jumu chao (preface dated 1593), in Biji xiaoshuo daguan series 6 (1983–4), 13:2.6b.

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3–71. Photo of a scene of the Peking Opera Tan qinjia, Liu Gansan as Madam Hu, early 20th century. Reproduced from Jingju shizhao, edited by Lu Qing et al., 14.

who organized these performances intended to bring a real naturalism into drama. According to Fan Lian, these performances took place outdoors, and “in order to protect from rain all the streets and bridges were covered with tarpaulin.”154 The tarpaulin also perhaps transformed the outdoor street scene into a stage-like space in which props like real horses could be more easily introduced. The 1590 performance informs us that real horses were used in special performances, but it is still not clear if real horses were used on the stage. It is possible, for example, that the photo of Liu Gansan upon a horse was posed for a studio photographer rather than taken in an actual performance. The photo does suggest, however, that performance sought (if only as an ideal) a thorough naturalism on the stage. Some scholars maintain that fairly realistic horses made from bamboo were regularly used on the Yuan and Ming stage, which again suggests an attempt to naturalism.155

154 155

Ibid., 13:2.6b. J. I. Crump discusses the use of the ‘bamboo horse’ (zhuma) as a prop in the

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Drama and reality were thus conated, and this conation implies that illustrators did not completely depart from the natural aspect of life even if they took theatrical performance as the frame of reference for their artistic creation. The awkward superimposition of the valance or bian’e on the otherwise naturalistic performance illustration suggests the tension between drama and reality, but it also shows the conation that the illustrators were comfortable incorporating into their work. Through this unusual pictorial device, the illustrators address the relation of the real and the unreal, the actual and the imaginary—a relation that is intrinsic to the Chinese art of drama and which captured the imagination of the literati during the late Ming period. Another photograph of the early 20th century Peking Opera—in this case Jinshan si—shows the performers in an actual boat (plate 3–72).156 Judging from the curtain hanging behind the performers—thick and heavy, like the kind of theatrical curtain that marked the rear of the stage—this photograph attempts to convey a stage scene even though it is quite possible that it was taken at a studio. Also in this tradition are certain folk dances, in which participants wear large but light mock boats around their waists. Given the evidence of this photograph and the folk dance, it is not difcult to believe that the boats depicted in Wanli illustrations derive from the actual practice of performances or stage. Other props—like actual rocks and trees, and painted backdrops showing buildings—appear to have been staples of the pre-contemporary stage, as photos of the early 20th century Peking Opera suggest (gure 3–18). As the modern stage became simpler, shenduan conventions become more subtle and abstract, and Peking Opera became an increasingly rareed entertainment.

Yuan theater, and he also offers a drawing of what he imagines this ‘bamboo horse’ looked like. See Chinese Theater in the Days of Kublai Khan, 109–114. Wang Anqi indicates that the ‘bamboo horse’ was also used as a prop on the Ming stage. Wang writes that she saw a performance of the play Zhaojun chusai given by a pihuang group around 1970 that featured the use of many ‘bamboo horses.’ The ‘bamboo horse’ was apparently a kind of hobby-horse made of bamboo strips, paper and cloth. It was strapped to the performer below the waist (Mingdai chuanqi zhi juchang jiqi yishu, 344–6). Piet van der Loon quotes the missionary François Valentijn’s description of a performance featuring hobby-horses in Ambon in February, 1711 (The Classical Theatre and Art Song of South Fukien, 29–30). 156 One of the actors in the photo is Mei Lanfang (1894–1961), who revised and performed many traditional plays during 1916–1919, one of which was Jinshan si. See Zhongguo da baike quanshu: xiqu quyi, 244–7.

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3–72. Photo of a scene in the Peking Opera Jinshan si, Mei Lanfang as Whitesnake and Zhu Guifang as Green-snake, early 20th century. Reproduced from Jingju shizhao, edited by Lu Qing et al., 44.

If real horses and boats were not used as props during the Wanli period, their appearance in illustrations perhaps suggests that the ke-jie conventions by which they were evoked on stage were too subtle to be conveyed easily in pictorial terms. The actual horse or boat in this case becomes an efcient way of depicting the text, rather than a rendition of the stage. This might suggest as well the limitations illustrators had to struggle against in their attempt to recreate theatrical performance in pictorial terms: they had to represent an essentially kinetic art in static terms, and they were limited by the contents of the stage. Illustrations could only include a few characters in xed poses, and the arrangement was subject to the perspective of the imagined audience. Illustrators of the Wanli period struggled against these limitations. By offering images in close-up (and thus eliminating the repetition of the framing stage space) and using the rear screen to suggest a variety of locales, illustrators tried to offer more visual variety while not deviating too far from the stage. This increasing effort to vary the stage setting represents an important transformation in the performance illustration of the Wanli period.

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The decline of performance illustration occurred gradually, as interest, under the inspiration of landscape painting, shifted to domestic scenes. The discussion of the banquet scenes above alludes to several pictorial versions of the banquet scene in Pipa ji, including those in the Shide Tang edition (gure 3–35), the Zunsheng Guan edition (gure 3–36), the 1597 Wanhu Xuan edition reproduced from Jiyi Tang (gure 3–37), and the 1598 edition published by Jizhi Zhai (gure 3–38), all of which share a similar design. The primary difference among them is that the illustration in the Shide Tang edition appears on a ‘full half-folio’ page, while the other three appear on two facing half-folio pages. The added domestic details of the latter three illustrations suggest the declining inuence of the stage and place them at a later date. The similarities between the illustrations suggest that the Shide Tang illustration was used as a template. The Shide Tang illustration is a typical stage-inspired illustration in which the actors are performing for their audience in a stage-space decorated with valance and bian’e (gure 3–35). In the later illustrations, the second folio page is used to extend the stage of the Shide Tang illustration amid a background of trees and walks. The second folio page thus gives the appearance that what seemed a stage is actually a house located in the garden. The extension to the ‘stage’ in the Zunsheng Guan edition somewhat retains the stage structure, but makes it seem a stage awkwardly protruding from a house (gure 3–36). The illustrator has apparently made an effort to enhance the variety of the image, but cannot quite incorporate the second folio page without undermining the balance and integrity of the stage space on the opposite page. We can observe that the stage in the Shide Tang edition is not on a high platform, but we cannot specify clearly if it is an indoor stage or outdoor stage with three sides closed. By adding the addition to the stage on the second folio page (or in cinematic terms widening the angle), the Zunsheng Guan illustration eliminates the ambiguity: it is a stage protruding from a house in a garden. The illustrations in the Wanhu Xuan edition (gure 3–37) and the Jizhi Zhai edition (gure 3–38) also extend the structure depicted in the Shide Tang edition, but give the impression of a house with an open living room rather than a protruding stage. The progression suggested by these four illustrations is from an open stage into a more or less domestic space, though the arrangement of gures in the Jizhi Zhai edition still suggests performance. The illustrations’ progression away from the simple stage of the Shide Tang edition can be traced as a step by step evolution, suggesting the order in which they were most likely

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published: Shide Tang, Zunsheng Guan, Wanhu Xuan, Jizhi Zhai, each building on a modication of its predecessor and incrementally leaving behind the example of the stage. Illustrations of the Wanli period followed a similar progression, from strict theatricality to increasingly subtle theatrical references. We may wonder whether these later illustrations should still be considered performance illustrations. An edition of Jinyin ji issued by an unknown publisher during the Wanli era includes an illustration of the opening scene that provides a chance to consider this question (gure 6–15). In Ming drama, it was conventional to begin a theatrical performance with the fumo outlining the plot to the audience. This conventional scene is called “fumo kaichang.” The illustration of this particular scene implies a close relation with theatrical performance. On the right folio of gure 6–15 we observe the fumo on an outdoor stage. But the illustrator adds an addition to the stage on the other folio of the illustration. The added portion of the structure includes a window panel, a partial view of a study, and another wall parallel to the wall of the stage in the right folio. This latter wall is thus transformed from the sidewall of a stage into a sidewall of a house, which overlooks the stage space. In light of this addition, the stage on the right half-folio is transformed into a suite of rooms. This addition seems awkward: the stage wall in the right half-folio is not structurally consistent with the panel of the window on the left, and the room/stage in which the character performs is misshapen by the attempt to enclose the space. It seems that the two half-folios of the illustration were not conceived as a whole, but that the left half-folio was added as a kind of afterthought. Given that the illustration is so clumsy and seems to have given so much trouble, we may wonder why the illustrator went to such lengths to modify the simple stage scene in the right half-folio. This elaborate effort was an attempt to lend the original stage scene an element of novelty. It perhaps struck the illustrator as clichéd on its own. Although the suggestion of the stage is undermined, the transformed illustration nonetheless belongs in the category of performance illustration: the illustration continues to represent a stage structure, though it is embedded in a larger domestic structure. This tendency suggests that strict performance illustration no longer satised customers, illustrators, and publishers. We also see included in some editions illustrations that seem to have very little to do with the stage. An illustration included in a Shide Tang edition of Qianjin ji, for example, shows Xiang Yu, who unsuccessfully contended for the throne

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before the Han dynasty, in the act of committing suicide by the River Wu (gure 3–73). The most famous story about Xiang Yu’s suicide is his offer of his own head to a punter, who might then exchange it for a large reward. The river is extremely important in this scene, because it implies that Xiang Yu is trapped and can go no farther. As the land ends, so his life ends. In order to show clearly the content in pictorial terms, the illustrator abandons the stage space and locates the scene in a natural environment, showing a river that vividly marks an impasse. The boat might have been represented by a prop on a stage, but the visual impact of the river would have been lost. The date of this illustration is unknown, but we can infer that it belongs to the later Wanli given the illustrator’s willingness to depart from the stage. Even so, the illustration is not entirely without a theatrical element. Xiang Yu strikes a theatrical pose, while the illustration features a title display in the tradition of the bian’e. We can see a similar phenomenon manifested in a 1581 Fuchun Tang edition of Yujue ji (gure 3–74), which also shows a river. The semi-frontal display of the two characters and the presence of the inscribed valance suggest that this illustration is still closely related to performance. This type of illustration features a non-stage space, but preserves some stage conventions, like a frontal arrangement, the presence of the bian’e, and certain ke-jie. It appears in a majority of the editions with performance illustration, but is almost always outnumbered by more conventional illustrations. By examining a number of dated editions, we are able to determine when performance illustration began to evolve beyond the conventions of the stage. An illustration in a 1586 edition Duanfa ji (as discussed above, gure 3–17) depicts a natural rather than stage setting, but the implied movement of the characters suggests a stage-like space against a painted background. Analogous illustrations from the 1580s and 1590s are plentiful. A change can be detected, however, when we compare a boat scene included in a 1599 edition of Yuzan ji published by Jizhi Zhai (gure 3–75) and a boat scene in 1608 editions of Jinqian ji (gures 3–76) and Liangjiang ji (gure 3–77), also published by Jizhi Zhai. Although the gures in the Yuzan ji illustration are depicted in a boat on a river, the ke-jie conventions are still obvious, and the audience is clearly being frontally addressed, while in the latter two illustrations the gures seem to be arranged in a completely naturalistic manner: they display no ke-jie conventions and take no notice of an imagined audience. The majority of the illustrations included in these two 1608 editions, however, are still primarily performance oriented. We can

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3–73. Shen Cai. Qianjin ji. Jinling: Shide Tang, 1573–1619, 4.4b. National Palace Museum, Taipei, Taiwan, Republic of China.

3–74. Liang Chenyu, Yujue ji. Jinling: Fuchun Tang, 1581. Reproduced from GBXQCK, 1st series, box 6, 5:1.13b.

3–75. Gao Lian, Yuzan ji. Jinling: Jizhi Zhai, 1599. A facsimile of Guanhua Xuan 1598 edition. Reproduced from GBXQCK, 1st series, box 11, 6:2.19b–20a.

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3–76. Zhou Lüjing, Jinqian ji. Jinling: Jizhi Zhai, 1608. Reproduced from GBXQCK, 2nd series, box 3, 4:2.2b.

3–77. Xu Qiao, Liangjiang ji. Jinling: Jizhi Zhai, 1608. Reproduced from GBXQCK, 2nd series, box 5, 2:1.10a.

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thus infer that by 1608 (between 1599 and 1608) illustrators had begun to adopt a style less dependent on the example of the stage, but still essentially inspired by the stage. Over the next few years performance illustration steadily lost its dominant position while a style more inuenced by landscape album painting quickly took over as briey discussed in chapter one. Even so, clear examples of performance illustration still occasionally appear in editions published during and after the late Wanli period.

CHAPTER FOUR

PERFORMANCE AS AN INTERACTION WITH THE PAST

Glancing over the illustrations discussed in chapter three, we are apt to exclaim at their beauty or dismiss them as conventional, but questions should arise as well: Why were performance illustrations included in the published plays? How do the performance illustrations relate to the text? Do performance illustrations inform our reading of the text—and how so? Why did publishers choose to adopt the inspiration from the stage? Do performance illustrations express opinions or inscribe readings of the plays they ornament? In scholar Rudolf Wagner’s words, “. . . anything that points toward an entrance into the subtext, even if it is the form of minute changes in the illustrations that often accompany the texts, may help in giving access to the realm” of drama.1 In our own reading experience illustrations often inspire more than aesthetic pleasure; so too illustrations inspired the readers of the Wanli period. The illustration not only shows how readers of the Wanli period read their published plays, but also introduces a new form of reading. And then, the new habits of reading in turn informs us of the social understanding of drama during that era; and how illustrations guide the reception of plays. This study attempts to investigate the contributions of performance illustrations to the drama culture of the Wanli period. As the performance illustrations are inspired by theatrical performances, we must investigate what kind of theatrical experience was so essential to the late Ming audience that they wanted to reproduce that specic experience through performance illustration in their reading. With this understanding serving as the foundation, we can then unfold the phenomenology of reading introduced by illustrations during the Wanli period. We must ask why the publishers, who oversaw every aspect of their publications, felt this to be important. What motivates the publishers in the attempt to recreate a theatrical-viewing experience in a literary context? Anne McLaren proposed that after the 1470s “illustrations are used for aesthetic and decorative appeal” (quoted in the previous chapter), but the attempt

1

Rudolf Wagner, The Contemporary Chinese Historical Drama, ix.

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to recreate the theatrical viewing experience cannot be explained in terms of visual pleasure. Late Ming publishers’ huge investment of effort and resources in performance illustration would seem vainly spent as the actual theater was readily accessible to the entire reading public. Wanli readers might just as well have given up reading and become theater-goers. If not theatrical-viewing pleasure, then, we must thus ask what Wanli publishers were attempting to offer their readers, and what drew readers to the offered reward? This chapter attempts to provide answers to this important question.

History and Drama In those drama publications of the Wanli period featuring performance illustrations, the surrounding text—either in the preface, post-face, prologue, or epilogue—tends to emphasize the play’s function as a historical document. The kinds of analogy between drama and history suggested by these publications fall within three categories: rst, drama as historical record and the playwright as historian; second, drama as overt commentary on historical event; and third, drama as didactic vehicle for the transmission of ‘exemplary names’ from past times. The coincidence of performance illustration and this historical bent in Wanli drama is not accidental. Though one might be able to nd counter-examples in the hundreds of plays and editions published during the Wanli period, such as Fuchun Tang edition of Yingwu ji,2 these aspects of Wanli drama are so often joined that we cannot dismiss the phenomena as less than signicant. It is worth our attention and effort to explain why this coincidence of tendencies existed. It seems that this conception of drama as history—in whatever sense—plays a very important role not only in the dramatic culture but also the blooming of performance illustration during the Wanli period. This section explores drama and history in their analogous role as a prelude to further discussion of the relation between performance illustration and the conception of drama as history.

2 In the prologue of Yingwu ji, the author argues against the search for historical records to be the source of play because he thinks theater is mainly for entertainment. Please see the quotation on pages 186–7 of this chapter.

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One stipulation should be made clear in advance: it would be beyond the bound of this study to discuss the development of historical drama as a genre. The term historical drama is very difcult to dene adequately, a problem constantly facing modern scholars who are interested in the genre of historical drama.3 In the 1950s and 1960s there was much debate in China about the nature of historical drama, and specically about whether ‘historical’ drama is historical in any sense or ctive. The modern playwright and historian Wu Han (1909–1969) sees historical drama as legitimate history, but insists that any play properly belonging to this genre must be loyal to historical truth. Those plays unfaithful to fact, such as Yangmen nüjiang or The Female General of the Yang,4 which departs from verisimilitude in its portrayal of the Yang family widows leading the Song army against the Tartars, should be called ‘gushi ju’ or ‘story drama’ rather than ‘lishi ju’ or ‘historical drama.’5 Wu Han’s position was attacked by several of his contemporaries. In 1962 Chinese scholar Wang Ziye published an essay titled “Lishi ju shi yishu, bu shi lishi” or “Historical Drama is Art Rather than History,” which, as the title makes very clear, disputes the idea of drama as history. In 1962 and 1963 the scholars Zhu Zhai and Li Xifan each published two articles in the journal Wenxue pinglun that attacked Wu Han and defended the notion of drama as ctive literature.6 The participants in this debate—on both sides of the question—shared basic assumptions about what distinguishes history and ction. History struggles to ascertain fact, while ction is essentially fabricated and shares none of history’s concerns.7

3 The denition of historical drama is also a problem for Western scholars when they try to classify Shakespeare’s plays. In the chapter titled “What are ‘Histories’?” in her book Shakespeare’s “Histories,” Lily B. Campbell discusses several different opinions. See Shakespeare’s “Histories,” 8–17. 4 In the early 1960s, The Chinese Beijing Opera Group adapted a Yangzhou local play Shi’er guafu zhengxi or The Twelve Widows Conquering the West into Yangmen nüjiang. See Chen Ruheng, “Yang jia jiang—cong minjian shuochang dao xiqu yanchu,” 72–79. 5 Wu Han, “Lun lishi ju,” 50–4; and “Lishi ju shi yishu ye shi lishi,” 38–42. 6 Li Xifan, “Shishi he xugou,” 18–25; and “Lishi ju wenti de shangque,” 44–63. Zhu Zhai, “Guanyu lishi ju wenti de zhengduan,” 1–11; and “Zaitan guanyu lishi ju wenti de zhengduan,” 53–69. 7 The same assumptions have continued to the 1980s when the issue of historical drama is brought up again and attracted another group of scholars participated in a similar debate. See Jiang Xingyu, “Lishi ju de lishi gan he shidai gan,” 19–25; Chen Guan, “Lishi ju de ‘shijian,’ ‘shijiao,’ ‘gediao,’ ji qita,” 26–32; Shu Yishun, “Lishi yu lishi ju,” 61–2; and An Kui, “Lishi zhenshi he xianshi yiyi de maodun,” 40–1.

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Cheng Yizhong, a scholar and participant in this debate, agreed that “historical drama is literary rather than historical,”8 but he added the important qualication that historical drama is historical in the sense that it reects something of the playwright and his era. He stresses, however, that historical drama is “neither history for history’s sake, nor reality for reality’s sake”9 but is for the sake of the present. With many others of his time he subscribed to the logic of the common proverb: ‘gu wei jin yong’ or ‘the past serves the present’10—an idea that seized the imagination of all those engaged in the debate about historical drama. Another scholar of this period Zhang Geng explicitly claimed this proverb to be the very ‘soul’ of historical drama.11 The idea of the past serving the present materializes as well in Rudolf Wagner’s The Contemporary Chinese Historical Drama, which argues that exploring the precedents of history is an indirect method of discussing contemporary problems: “History has always served in China as a depository of precedents in the light of which the present was discussed.”12 Historical drama is thus at least as much a comment on the periods about which it is ostensibly written as on the playwright’s own times. It seems that the genre of historical drama has attracted more attention in the late 20th century than during any previous era. Li Xifan remarks that “in the history of Chinese literature, it is very difcult indeed to nd such terms as historical novel and historical drama.”13 Li nds the closest approximation in the term ‘jiangshi’ or ‘narrative history,’ which derives from Ducheng jisheng (preface dated 1235). The term applies to oral storytelling that explicitly deals with historical matters of the state: the rise and fall of governments, wars, etc.14 Zhu Quan’s (d. 1448) Taihe zhengyin pu suggests twelve types of Yuan drama, but does not include the category of historical drama.15 Lü Tiancheng’s Qupin similarly suggests six types of Ming drama, but it, too, neglects historical drama.16 One explanation for the sudden interest in historical drama is that there was a sudden spurt of such plays written in the

8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16

Cheng Yizhong, “Shi lun gudai lishi ju,” 7. Cheng Yizhong, “Zai lun gudai lishi ju,” 2. Cheng Yizhong, “Shi lun gudai lishi ju,” 8. Zhang Gen, “Gu wei jin yong,” 1–8. Rudolf Wagner, The Contemporary Chinese Historical Drama, xi. Li Xifan, “Lishi ju wenti de shangque,” 6. Nai Deweng, Ducheng jisheng, 10a. Zhu Quan, Taihe zhengyin pu, 24. Lü Tiancheng, Qupin, 2.223.

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years just before the Cultural Revolution. Scholars of this period were less interested in the development of historical drama as a genre than in issues relating to their own contemporary drama. It is instructive to note that the attention given to historical drama in the abstract did not inform the academic study of traditional drama in works such as Chung-wen Shih’s The Golden Age of Chinese Drama: Yuan Zaju. Following Zhu Quan’s precedent, this study does not include historical drama in its classication of Yuan drama, though Shih acknowledges the importance of dynastic history in the creation of drama. Shih observes of these dynastic histories that their “remarkable narrative prose” was a “rich source of such themes as loyalty and righteousness, virtues praised by the Confucians and by historians.”17 Shih categorizes this type of play, however, as essentially Confucian and didactic rather than historical. As mentioned at the outset of this detour, this study intends to demonstrate the ways in which drama—not merely so-called “historical drama”—functions as history. The plays discussed in this chapter can be categorized as historical, but the evolution of historical drama as a genre is not the main concern here. Three main focuses concerning drama and history are explored below: rst, the dramatic culture of the Wanli era in the most general terms; second, the dramatic publications incorporating performance illustration; third, the interplay of history and historical consciousness in these plays and their illustrations.

History and Popularized History In a preface (dated 1494) to the 1522 edition of Sanguo zhi tongsu yanyi or The Popular Rendition of the History of the Three Kingdoms,18 Yongyu zi (identied as Jiang Daqi) outlines his conception of history.19 He understands ‘history’ to be synonymous with what we would now call historiography. History, then, is less what actually transpired, than the written record itself:20

17

Shih Chun-wen, The Golden Age of Chinese Drama: Yuan Tsa-chü, 17–8. David Rolston translates the title as A Popularization of the Chronicle of the Three Kingdoms in his edited book How to Read the Chinese Novel, 7, footnote 13, Anne McLaren’s translation of the term yanyi ‘elaborations’ (Chinese Popular Culture and Ming Chantefables, 33) does not t the cultural context for which this type of novel meant. 19 See “Chuban shuoming” to Luo Guanzhong’s Sanguo zhi tongsu yanyi, 1a. 20 Shelley Hsueh-lun Chang reads this preface in her book as a document showing “the novelist’s commitment to an authentic and judicious account of history was 18

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chapter four History is not solely a matter of recording the events of past dynasties. [History] wants to illuminate the ux of the past, to illuminate the good and evil of rulers and ofcials, to record the gains and losses of politics, to observe the fates of people, and to know the rise and fall of states and families. The change of season from cold to hot, disaster and fortune, praise and condemnation, benecence and conscation are all included in the historical record. History manifests righteousness . . . The Annals (Chunqiu) is the historical record of Lu. Confucius wrote such condensed history that a single word was sufcient to praise virtue or deprecate vice. With a single word, he was able to grasp the essence of what it means to be a ruler, an ofcial, a father and a son, and bequeath this apprehension of good and evil to later generations. [Confucius] wanted to persuade, teach, warn, and frighten his readers, and thus help them avoid repetition of the mistakes of history. History is the great law of ultimate justice that Confucius has established for tens of thousands of generations. It corresponds to the Heavenly principle, corrects human ethics, and makes disloyal ofcials and malefactors fear. This is why [Confucius] asked: “Is it true that people understand me only by The Annals? Is it true that people blame me for The Annals? I was compelled to [write it].” When he met King Hui of Liang, Mencius discussed benevolence and righteousness rather than gain. When he talked to the kings, [Mencius] always mentioned [the ancient sage kings] Yao, Shun, Yu, and Tang. When he answered the ofcials, he always spoke of Yi Yin, Fu Yue, the Duke of Zhou and Shao. From that time to the era of Zhuzi’s Gangmu, [history] was written in the same manner. How can it be believed that history records the events of past generations only?21

According to Yongyu zi, history is not primarily valuable in its documentary function; its essential worth lies in the historian’s capacity to extrapolate moral truths from the ux of events and compellingly embody these truths in words. In this fashion the lessons of the past are transmitted to posterity and social justice is served. This conception of history as a didactic exercise is rooted in the example of The Annals (Chunqiu) attributed to Confucius (BC 551–479) and has been informing the practice of historians ever since. (In the 20th century this conception persists, though it is qualied by ‘scientic’ conceptions of history imported from the West). In this sense, history is not about ‘facts’ per se, but ‘facts’ as they structure moral education. most sincere and genuine.” See History and Legend, 4. But I think this preface tells us more than that. 21 Yong Yuzi, “Preface to Sanguo zhi tongsu yanyi,” in Luo Guanzhong, Sanguo zhi tongsu yanyi, 1522 edition, preface 1a–2a, Palace Museum, Taipei.

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A similar idea has been periodically entertained in the West, although it has never achieved the dominance that it has had in China. Tudor historian Edward Halle epitomizes this strain in Western historiography. He describes historical writing as the . . . keye to enduce vertue, and represse vice. Thus memorie maketh menne ded many a thousande yere still to live as though thei wer present: Thus fame triumpheth upon death, and renoune upon Oblivion, all by reason of writyng and historie.22

As Shakespearean scholar Paula Pugliatti suggests, this conception of history and history writing informs, among other things, Shakespeare’s adaptation of past events in his historical plays. The analogous conception in China dominated the historical consciousness of not only Yongyu zi, but—with far greater repercussion—the imagination of Luo Guanzhong (. 1300–1400), the reputed author of Sanguo yanyi. Modern Chinese historians would likely take exception to the idea that Shakespearean drama or Sanguo yanyi is ‘historical’ in any legitimate sense, as the above-mentioned debate on historical drama suggests. They would have little sympathy, for example, with the contemporary Western tendency to interpret historiography as a kind of ction. Pugliatti suggests something of this tendency when, following Carlo Ginzberg, she describes historiography as “indirect, presumptive, circumstantial and based on a conjectural paradigm whose rigour is ineluctably exible and where intuition, although it does not guarantee objective reconstruction, plays a decisive role.”23 The distinction between historical truth and poetic truth has been blurred; history and ction are analogous insofar as they recount not the actual but the possible. In his recent publication titled From Historicity to Fictionality: The Chinese Poetics of Narrative, scholar Sheldon Hsiao-peng Lu locates in late Imperial China the shift from the conception of ction as history to the more modern conception of ction as imaginative exploration. Lu also follows the Western Renaissance tradition that assigns to the historian the quest for simple fact, and to the poet the quest for ‘verisimilitude,’ which, as Lu uses the word, indicates a kind of poetic truth bearing

22 23

Edward Halle, The Vnion of the Two Noble and Illustre Famelies of Lancastre & Yorke, ii. Paola Pugliatti, Shakespeare the Historian, 22.

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on but not strictly deriving from reality.24 The conuence of history and ction, however, is too complicated to be explained or understood by a pattern of a linear development from historicity to ctionality as the novel developed as a genre. The concern here does not lie in defending or subverting the distinction between literary genres, but in carefully investigating how writers and readers of the Wanli period understood the concept of history and how they determined what qualies as history. According to Yongyu zi, “historical texts are profound in their meaning. If they were not so, how could we claim that [history] is able to enlighten future generations?”25 Because of the profundity inherent in “Ofcial History,” its “meaning cannot be grasped by the masses” and thus the “events of past dynasties are gradually lost in transmission as time progresses.”26 On this basis Yongyu zi extols the novel, which makes ‘Ofcial History’ accessible to the masses: The text of Sanguo zhi tongsu yanyi is not profound, but nor is it vulgar. It records the truth, and is thus tantamount to history. Anybody who reads it can understand it. In this way it is like the so-called folk songs in the villages and lanes.27

The popularized version, however, is not only suitable for the less educated, but for all who “want to read it,” including the highest elite. The view of the novel as an all-accessible popularized history is also exemplied in an introduction to a 1522 edition of Sanguo yanyi, written by the publisher Xiuran zi (identied as Zhang Shangde):28 A guest asked me, “Former-Lord Liu, Cao Cao and Sun Quan each occupied a territory of the Han land and [together created] the Three Kingdoms. History has recorded the whole episode from beginning to end, and the story has long been transmitted. There is another work called The Popular Rendition of the History of the Three Kingdoms—isn’t it redundant?” I answered: “No. History records in great detail and in an ancient style; the meaning is profound and the signicance deep. Very few people without a good education and broad knowledge will be able

24 Paola Pugliatti has a clear discussion about “The Fictionalization of History and The Issue of Verisimilitude” in her book Shakespeare the Historian, 69–74. 25 Yongyu zi, “Preface to Sanguo zhi tongsu yanyi,” preface 2a. 26 Ibid., preface 2b. 27 Ibid., preface 3a. 28 “Chuban shuoming” to Luo Guanzhong, Sanguo zhi tongsu yanyi, a facsimile of the 1522 edition, 1a.

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to resist the feeling of exhaustion and sleepiness as they read. For this reason a dilettante has rewritten [the historical record] in more widely accessible language. He wants all the world’s people to know the event by listening to his story, to understand its meaning by knowing the event, and to feel deeply by grasping its meaning. [The people] do not need to think attentively to realize that orthodoxy should be upheld, the trespasser executed; the loyal, lial, chaste, and righteous imitated; the adulterous, greedy, adulatory, and attering should be extinguished. Right and Wrong are realized in [peoples’] minds and eyes. This work assists the moral teaching broadly and widely. How can you dismiss it as redundancy?” The guest raised his head and laughed loudly and said: “I see! If you are not trying to deceive me, this is a work that assists rather than subverts the Ofcial History.”29

Even though a modern scholar like Sun Kaidi (1898–1986) dismisses the events presented in Sanguo yanyi as factually baseless and ridiculous,30 it is very clear that Ming commentators like Yongyu zi and Xiuran zi took the novel’s account seriously indeed. According to Yongyu zi and Xiuran zi, popularized history fullls the important functions of making history accessible to the masses, disseminating historical knowledge, and supplementing the ‘Ofcial History.’ Popular forms also help preserve history from obliteration, as Yongyu zi points out in his preface: “[People] in a former dynasty created popular tales of unofcial history and let the blind recite them.”31 Although Yongyu zi deprecates the oral history of the Yuan dynasty as unofcial, and criticizes its language as vulgar, this statement demonstrates that he considered oral performance a legitimate means of preserving and disseminating knowledge of the past.32 Xiuran zi agrees that oral performance can fulll these important functions as long as the language and content is adequate, as he indicates in his introduction: The rise and fall [of dynasties], present and past, depends on the [will of ] Heaven. In [dynastic histories] people and events inspire [our] pity.

29 Xiuran zi, “Introduction to Sanguo zhi tongsu yanyi,” in Luo Guanzhong, Sanguo zhi tongsu yanyi, 1522 edition, introduction 1a–2a. 30 Sun Kaidi, “Sanguo zhi pinghua and Sanguo zhizhuan tongsu yanyi,” in Cangzhou ji, 1:111. 31 Yongyu zi, “Preface to Sanguo zhi tongsu yanyi,” preface 2b. 32 I share with Shelley Hsueh-lun Chang’s denition of the term ‘yeshi’ (the unofcial history) referring to “every sort of historical works that were not authorized by the government. In practice, however, yeh-shi chiey referred to private records; these are miscellaneous works related to people and events of past” (History and Legend, 8).

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chapter four If you wish to know the hardships of the people in the era of the Three Kingdoms, Please hear these chapters of the tale in its popular form.33

Xiuran zi asks his audience to ‘hear’ rather than to read the Sanguo zhi tongsu yanyi. Although the story is written and published in book form, the oral tradition surrounding this popular tale had not been entirely obliterated. Xiuran zi reminds his audience of this oral tradition perhaps to emphasize the story’s accessibility. In the study of Chinese popular ction, the relationship between oral performance and textual inscription is one of the most contentious of issues.34 The complexities inherent in this issue are indicated by Western literary scholar Evelyn Birge Vitz in her book Orality and Performance in Early French Romance: “. . . the oral is never purely oral, due to the presence of books . . . And no culture, however advanced, can be entirely written.”35 With some sophistication, Xiuran zi recognizes that his printed version is deeply indebted to and inextricably entangled in the oral tradition and that the popularized history is not devalued in oral form. Oral rendition of the story of the Three Kingdoms has been ongoing at least since the Northern Song era.36 This oral tradition served the entertainment of the people, as well as assisting their historical education, as Su Shi (1036–1101) records in Dongpo zhilin: Wang Peng once told me that when children misbehaved beyond the endurance of their families, they would be tossed some money and made to sit in a group and listen to old stories. When tales of the Three Kingdoms were told, and the children heard of Liu Bei’s defeat, they would frown and snivel. When they heard of Cao Cao’s defeat, they would exclaim for joy. This demonstrates that the respective legacies of gentlemen and petty malefactors will be unbroken even after hundreds of generations.37

33

Xiuran zi, “Introduction to Sanguo zhi tongsu yanyi,” introduction 2b. Anne McLaren, Chinese Popular Culture and Ming Chantefables, 34. 35 Evelyn Birge Vitz, Orality and Performance, x. 36 Various scholars have noted that the story of the heroes in the Three Kingdoms became the subject of popular entertainment as early as Sui and Tang times. Andrew Plaks writes in The Four Masterworks of the Ming Novel that “one of the earliest examples is a possible reference to a Sui period pageant known as “Liu Pei Crosses the T’an River on his Mount,” (368) recorded in Daye shiyi ji, and preserved in Taiping guangji, 226.2a. For further information about the oral story-telling on the Sanguo cycles, please consult Plaks’ discussion of Sanguo zhi yanyi in his The Four Masterworks of the Ming Novel, 361–495. He also lists several bibliographies related to this subject. 37 Su Shi, Dongpo zhilin, 1.8. 34

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From this passage modern critic Eugene Eoyang draws the conclusion that “when oral stories shape and mold the moral sensibility of an audience by re-creating events of the San-kuo chih, they perform the same role that Ssu-ma Ch’ien, the Han historian, saw for the Shi Chi, to ensure evil and exalt virtue.”38 From Su’s anecdote we know that people were exposed to the popularized history from an early age, and that this exposure played an important role in their moral development.

Drama as History The conception of the written novel and oral performance as forms of history is equally applicable to drama in its aspects of both performance and text. In Jiajing era, Gao Ru (active circa 1522–1567), a military ofcial, placed both historical plays and formal histories under the category of ‘History’ in his library catalog.39 In Zhang Fengyi’s (1550–1636) Qiefu ji, published by Chen Dalai (the publisher of Jizhi Zhai, active in early 17th century) during the Wanli period, the rst page includes the following authorial information: “Historical Biography [written] by Sima Zichang (Sima Qian) in the Han and revised by Zhang Boqi (Zhang Fengyi) in the Ming.”40 This statement seems to suggest that the play is only a revised version of the original historical work of Sima Qian (BC 145–86), and the playwright is only transmitting the story by adapting the historical biography of Shiji. Zhang Fengyi reiterates this debt at the end of the play when he comments that his “revision entirely relied on the pen of the Grand Historian (Sima Qian),”41 which can also be interpreted to mean that his “revision entirely relied on the pen of a historian,” meaning in the latter case himself in the role of historian. Both readings suggest that Zhang Fengyi sees himself as engaged in historical writing. In the poem that concludes the play, Zhang expresses the hope that his play is faithful to the work of Sima Qian, even if it is popularly understood as drama:

38 Eugene Eoyang, “A Taste for Apricots: Approaches to Chinese Fiction,” in Andrew H. Plaks, ed., Chinese Narrative, 54. 39 Guo Ru, Baichuan shuzhi, juan 7–11. Quoted in Katherine Carlitz, “Printing as Performance,” 273. 40 Zhang Fengyi, Qiefu ji, 1.1a. 41 Ibid., 2.33b.

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chapter four The heroine saves [the state of ] Zhao in token of the kindness shown her, The scions of the king return and save [the state of ] Liang. If you attend to the drama as did Gongjin [Zhou Yu], You will know that my lyrics follow the example of Zichang.42

Both the publisher and the playwright, then, conceive Qiefu ji as a work of history. And this interpretation was by no means idiosyncratic during the Wanli era. As far back as the early 15th century, playwrights—as for example the Ming prince Zhu Youdun—claimed to be transcribing historical truth. Zhu Youdun wrote in a 1409 preface to his own play Li Yaxian huajiu Qujiang chi: I have followed the old trace, but devised new tunes, and created a play in praise of [Li Wa’s] conduct. I have drawn on books [Qingsuo gaoyi and Luo Ye jiwen] for facts about Li Wa. These facts I have transcribed in full above.43

We can identify many additional examples of Wanli plays that explicitly adapted material culled from historical records. Some playwrights combed through historical records in search of inspiration for their dramatic works, as for example the playwright Yao Maoliang. He confesses his motivation for historical research in the prologue to his play Shuangzhong ji: My learning is rooted in the literati tradition of my family. It is my will to be successful as the eagle ies. My life, however, has been beset by mishaps. I was a failure in my examinations and therefore bought a mountain eld in which to plant herbs. The apricots grew ripe in the springtime and the water in the Orange Well was fragrant. When I was alone I would reect upon the past and over again contemplate my inner-heart. Nothing expressed my innermost feelings more than biographies, which I would investigate in pursuit of the loyal and the good. I accidentally happened on the story of Suiyang [Zhang Xun], which made me miserable and sad. I thus set the whole story to music from beginning to end. The Story of the Double Loyalty will endure forever, and its virtues will survive even the most severe ice and frost.44

42

Ibid., 2.33b. The full Chinese text of the preface can be found in Glen Dudbridge’s The Tale of Li Wa, 87; and Wu Yuhua edited Zhongguo gudai xiqu xuba ji, 38–9. Zhu Youdun included the text of the short version of “Li Wa zhuan” from Lo Ye’s Zuiweng tanlu right after this preface when he had his own plays published during the Xuande era. A discussion of the preface is included in W. L. Idema’s study titled “Shih Chun-pao’s and Chu Yutun’s Chu-Chiang-Ch’ih, 217–265. 44 Yao Maoliang, Shuangzhong ji, 1.1b–2a. 43

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In his dramatic recreation of history, Yao Maoliang not only transmits what had been preserved in the historical record, but hopes his own work will assume something of the eternality of his source material. This attitude, equally evident in the thought of Zhang Fengyi and Yao Maoliang, reects a traditional Chinese conception of literary production initiated by Confucius’ dictum: “I transmit rather than create.”45 This notion came to govern the philosophy of creative writing for all subsequent generations and helped create a tightly woven literary tradition in traditional China. The popularity and accessibility of drama made it an attractive form to writers who wanted to disseminate historical values. The same considerations made drama an appealing and powerful form in the age of Shakespeare, as Pugliatti observes: “Shakespeare’s plays spread knowledge of that age via what was the most effective, popular and intrinsically historical of representational media.”46 The enthusiasm for historical drama in late 16th and early 17th century England is preserved in a now-obsolete denition of “history” cited in the Oxford English Dictionary: “A story represented dramatically, a drama.”47 It was rst cited by Shakespeare himself in 1596; it was last cited in 1877. Xu Qiao (a juren in 1591)—writing under the pen name Tonghe Shanren—in the preface to his play Liangjiang ji (published in 1608), and Meng Chengshun (ca. 1600–ca. 1648) in the preface to Zhenwen ji both attest to drama’s efcacy as a disseminative medium. Xu Qiao expresses the thought in these words: I am not fond of writing drama. I occasionally write one or two plays merely to illuminate the past and admonish the future, but I do not wish to be known for my prosody. As it has been hot this summer, I closed my door and chanced to read the biography of Fan Shuqing in the History of Song. Shuqing was a singular gentleman of my county, so much so that the county ofcials suppressed information about this unusual person. In consequence the local citizens do not know much about his experiences. I have therefore taken the opportunity to illuminate his story in the form of drama.48

45

Confucius, Lunyu, in Zhu Xi, annotated, Sishu jizhu, 4.1a. Paola Pugliatti, Shakespeare the Historian, 6. 47 The Compact Oxford English Dictionary, Second edition, 771. 48 Xu Qiao, “Preface to Liangjiang ji,” in Xu Qiao, Liangjiang ji, Jizhi Zhai 1608 edition, preface 1a. 46

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And Meng Chengshun writes in 1643: . . . The legend [of Zhang Yuniang] is so unusual that if it were not accompanied by music it would never nd a wide audience and would go unbelieved. I thus write a play to disseminate the story.49

Xu Qiao and Meng Chengshun, then, conceive themselves as historical biographers who employ the dramatic form only for the convenience of the audience; they seem satised, however, that drama and history are analogous vehicles provided one does not become carried away by versication. Liang Chenyu shares Xu and Meng’s understanding, as he indicates in the prologue to the 1608 edition of his play Wansha ji: “Behold a new play about the present and past called Wansha, which is otherwise titled the Wu Yue chunqiu [Annals of Wu and Yue].”50 Liang understands his new drama as equivalent in all but name to the 3rd century historical work on which it is based; however different in form and style, the two works are essentially identical.51 Conceiving Wansha ji as true history is further endorsed by its Ming reader. A commentator to the Yiyun Ge edition of Wansha ji emphasizes: “This work [embodies] true matters, do not see it as a play.”52 This understanding is equally demonstrated by a writer who was active during the midMing era Wen Lin (1445–1499), who writes in his miscellany Langya manchao: “Throughout the world [the people who] dramatize (zaju) the story of the orphan Zhao as written in the Shiji see their drama as the Shiji itself.”53 This mindset is to some extent illuminated by Milman Parry and Albert Lord’s research on Yugoslavia’s epic singers. They note that the singers emphasize that they “sing the song exactly as they 49

Meng Chengshun, Zhenwen ji, Chongzhen edition, preface 1b. Liang Chenyu, Wansha ji, Yangchun Tang 1608 edition, 1.1a. 51 The legitimacy of Wuyue chunqiu as a historical book has been questioned by scholars who think that it should be seen as a novel rather a truly recorded history. For instance: the compilers of Siku quanshu think that some events recorded in Wuyue chunqiu, such as “trying the sword by a virgin,” “an old man transformed into an ape,” etc., are close to the talk of novelists, and, thus, propose to see it as unofcial miscellaneous notes written during Han and Jin. See Yong Rong and others, Siku quanshu zongmu tiyao, 66.2. Modern scholars Chen Zhongfan (1888–1982)—“Lun Wuyue chunqiu wei Han Jin jian de shuobu ji qi zai yishu shang de chengjiu,” 14–34—and Mao Dun (1896–1981)—“Guanyu lishi he lishi ju,” 41–44—think Wuyue chuqiu should be seen as a novel rather than a history book. However, Wuyue chunqiu has been quoted by history books and commentaries to history books, including Shiji and Hanshu, as a record of historical truth. No matter how disloyal to history the content Wuyue chunqiu is, in Liang Chenyu’s mind, it is a record of historical truth. 52 Liang Chenyu, Yiyun Ge Wansha ji, Ming edition, 2.63b. 53 Wen Lin, Langya manchao, in Tao Ting, ed., Xu Shuofu, 1:755. 50

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heard it,” and thus whatever stylistic idiosyncrasies they brought into their live performance the essential aspects of the story remain intact. The Yugoslavian singer, like the Chinese dramatist, is devoted to “the preservation of tradition by the constant re-creation of it . . . a true story well and truly retold.”54 The conation of drama and history furthermore inuenced the Wanli reader’s conception of drama and of his own activity as a reader. The idea that reading drama is essentially the same as reading history is best demonstrated by an anonymous Ming commentator on Pipa ji, who praises the play as deserving the highest rank because “the Grand Historian himself emerges from its pages.”55 ‘The Grand Historian’ was the appellation adopted by Sima Qian. This commentator, then, perceives the play as presenting historical narrative of a very high order. The commentator Canggeng zi similarly appraised the play Liaodu geng written by Wu Bing (?–ca. 1647, pen name Canhua Zhuren) in the Chongzhen era: “The author of this play has contributed no less than [the author of ] The Annals (Chunqiu).”56 The Annals set a standard of achievement for drama, and comparison between the great work and works of the stage became the vogue during the Ming era. The conation of drama and history was largely behind this vogue. The famous Yuan drama Xixiang ji, for example, was regularly called chunqiu.57 In his miscellany Jupo congyu, Shan Yu (a jinshi in 1439) notes that “Xixiang ji is often called chunqiu.”58 Li Kaixian records a visit by Yin Shizhi (. 1500–1600) to a bookstore in which he found a copy of Xixiang ji titled Cui’s Annals (Cuishi chunqiu),59 which is modeled upon Lü Buwei’s (d. BC 235) famous book titled Lüshi chunqiu but Cui is the subject of the book rather than its author. Writer Cheng Juyuan (active circa 1580) wrote a preface to a 1580 edition of Xixiang ji published by Xu Shifan (active during late sixteenth century) and titled it as “Preface to Cuishi chunqiu.”60 And Qi Biaojia mentions in his critical survey of drama Yuanshan Tang

54

Albert B. Lord, The Singer of Tales, 28–9. Gao Ming, Pipa ji, a Ming edition, 2.1a. Palace Museum, Taipei. 56 Wu Bing, Liaodu geng, Chongzhen edition, 2.64a. 57 Li Kaixian, Cinue, in ZGGDXQLZJC, 3:271. 58 Shan Yu, Jupo congyu, 1b, in Tao Ting, ed., Xu Shuofu, 1:874. 59 Li Kaixian, Cinue, in ZGGDXQLZJC, 3:271. 60 Cheng Juyuan, “Preface to Cuishi chunqiu” (dated 1580), originally included in Xu Shifan edition of Chongke Yuan ben tiping yinshi Xixiang ji. Quoted from Wu Yuhua, Zhongguo gudai xiqu xuba ji, 76. 55

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jupin a play titled Cuishi chunqiu buzhuan or The Supplementary Biography of the Cui’s Annals, which clearly continues the story of Xixiang ji. The conation of drama and history is not peculiar to the drama culture of the late Ming period, but continued through the Qing era. In a 1653 preface to Li Yu’s famous play Qingzhong pu, Wu Weiye (1609–1671) praised the work as meriting the status of “Ofcial History:” . . . all events [recounted by the play] are according to fact, and the language is elegant and graceful. Although it is a drama, it deserves to be seen as Ofcial History.61

Modern scholars have found it perplexing that writers and readers in the late Ming period trusted so completely in the identity of drama and history given the obvious discrepancies between these two modes of narrative. The publisher Chen Dalai’s preface to the play Jinqian ji (published in 1608) provides a clue to this conundrum: “Jinqian ji sets down from beginning to end the story of Mei liu and his wife. How can this play be nothing more than the talk of the wind and moon, and the stuff of laughter!”62 The conception is also characteristic of Xu Qiao, as noted above. Both Chen and Xu seem to imply that historical truth invariably transcends its ctive context. The vehicle of drama is thus irrelevant to historical integrity as long as the story is factually rendered, and the dramatization of an individual life—as in the Liangjiang ji—is indistinguishable from historical biography. It is for this reason that in the late Ming period ‘drama’ (chuanqi) was often called ‘biography’ (zhuanji ). The etymological similarity between the two words implies their cognate status. Discussing Western drama, scholar Herbert Lindenberger uses the term “biographical play” to denote the type of play whose central direction “is the illumination and vindication of some famous historical personality.”63 The term ‘biographical play,’ however, seems less apt in description of traditional Chinese plays, as it does not connote the pervasive sense that this type of play is more fundamentally biographical than dramatic. The term ‘dramatized biography’ would be more to the point. Hong Jiuchou’s 1634 preface to the play Sanshe ji illuminates this aspect of the Chinese dramatic culture:

61 Wu Weiye, “Preface to Qingzhong pu” (dated 1653), in Li Yu, Qingzhong pu chuangqi, Shunzhi edition, preface 5a. 62 Chen Dalai, “Preface,” in Zhou Lüjing, Jinqian ji, Jizhi Zhai Wanli edition, preface 1a. 63 Herbert Lindenberger, Historical Drama, 121.

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[Dramatized] biographies [zhuanji] are composed to convince those of the present and transmit [stories] to those of the future. Some of these [dramatized biographies] relate the stories of individuals, while some relate the unfolding of historical events. The efcacy with which these [dramatized biographies] are transmitted depends on the harmoniousness of the musical accompaniment and the successful coupling of melodies and lyrics, which in turn depends on the composer’s ability to arrange a score.64

The discourse of Ming dramatic culture abounds with references that suggestively conate drama and ‘biography’ (zhuanji ). In the poem that concludes his play Wulun quanbei ji, Qiu Rui comments on his own work, taking for granted its biographical aspect: “This kind of [dramatized] biography is rare throughout the generations.”65 In the prologue to his Shuangzhong ji, Yao Maoliang indicates that he wrote the play on the basis of his researches in historical biography. In the rst scene, the fumo inquires of the performers offstage (houfang zidi) what the play will entail, and receives the answer: “[We are going to] perform Shuangzhong ji, [a play set in] the Tang dynasty.” The fumo responds: “So then, it is to be this [dramatized] biography!”66 In some cases, playwrights use the term zhuan rather than zhuanji to characterize their work, as in the poem that concludes the play Jindiao ji: “Jindiao is a supremely distinguished [dramatized] biography/The beauty of its lyrics will uphold its name for ten thousand generations.”67 Shen Shouxian’s (active during 1506–1521 Zhengde reign) play Sanyuan ji concludes with an almost identical ourish: “This new [dramatized] biography which I have composed will be famed for thousands of generations/Its fragrant name will be known to the people after ten thousand years.”68 Examples of similar rhetoric abound in the drama literature of the Wanli period. This conception of drama was so pervasive during the Wanli period that it inevitably provoked a reaction. In the prologue to the play Yingwu ji, an anonymous author disavows historical investigation as the legitimate object of drama: Drama has a long history, but the various types of performance are all pitiable. They are simply a matter of pure entertainment. Why is it

64 65 66 67 68

Hong Jiuchou, “Preface to Sanshe ji” (dated 1634), in Qicang, Sanshe ji, preface 1a. Qiu Rui, Wulun quanbei ji, Shide Tang Wanli edition, 4.39b. Yao Maoliang, Shuangzhong ji, Fuchun Tang Wanli edition, 1.2a. Anonymous, Jindiao ji, Fuchun Tang Wanli edition, 4.27a. Shen Shouxian, Sanyuan ji, Fuchun Tang Wanli edition, 2.31a.

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chapter four necessary that drama have a basis in actual events? Life is short and the scenery is endless. Enjoy your time and do not fritter pointlessly.69

This opposition is shared by Xie Zhaozhe (1567–1624) who complains of the historical bent in his miscellany Wu za zu. He repudiates the aesthetic underpinning of both Zhaoshi gu’er or The Orphan of the Zhao and Wansha ji. When a contemporary novel includes even a snippet of factually baseless narrative, people deride it as absurd. In recently written plays (zaju) such as Wansha ji, Qingshan ji, Yiru gu’er ji, and so forth, playwrights have felt the need to verify every jot in the ofcial history. If the dates do not correspond, and the names are not identical, they do not dare to write them. Given this tendency, it is perfectly sufcient to read historical biography. Why should we bother with plays?70

This skeptical viewpoint suggests that the culture encompassed at least some awareness of the discrepancies between history and drama as narrative genres. Even the most committed defenders of dramatized biography were aware that these two modes of narrative—drama and history—follow their own rules and conventions. We must ponder how these historically-minded literati could so completely conate these modes and yet be so mindful of their distinct character. The conation of drama and history was justied on several different grounds, all of which suggest, pace Xie Zhaozhe, that the primary concern was not delity to historical fact, but the didactic implication of fact however reconstructed or interpreted. Different stories based on the same historical event were considered equally legitimate testimony; there was no impulse to privilege or dismiss narrative by the criterion of factual accuracy. What we would now consider ctional narrative—novels, plays, lyrics—was no less admissible than history proper. It was not necessarily assumed—as we now tend to assume—that ction distorts historical reality. Historical knowledge, then, was represented by the sum total of these variants, despite the fact that these variants often contradicted one another. This view derives from a tradition, dating to at least the mid-seventh century.71 The compilers of the “Suishu jingji zhi” or “Suishu Bibliography”—Zhangsun Wuji (?–659) and others—held that “jingji” or “books” emerged only after the ofcial

69 70 71

Yingwu ji, Fuchun Tang Wanli edition, 1.1a. Xie Zhouzhe, Wu za zu, 15.36b. Suishu (The History of Sui) was completed and submitted to the throne in 656.

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position of “Shiguan” (Historiographer)72 was established in ancient times: “Once the position of Historiographer was established, the ‘book’ then arose.”73 The historiographical enterprise set the precedent for all literary production. The compilers insist, then, that books necessarily enshrine historical knowledge and that all books deserve to be called jingji that literally means ‘canonical texts.’ In the preface to his 1552 novel Da Song zhongxing yanyi or The Popular Rendition of the Restoration of the Song Dynasty, Fujian publisher and novelist Xiong Damu (. mid-sixteenth century) articulates the notion that ction is constitutive of historical reality. Some say that the novel ought not be entangled with the ofcial history. I am very taken by this position, but it must also be said that the unofcial history compensates for omissions in the ofcial history. If a book only records obvious and well-known events, it cannot be considered to function as unofcial history. The story of Xi zi (Xi Shi) may be taken as an example. In the literature of the past, [Xi Shi] has often been mentioned, but the stories about her vary signicantly. Wu Yue chunqiu records that Xi zi was killed in the destruction of Wu. Thus it seems that Xi zi was dead by the time Wu was overthrown. But a poem written between the Tang and Song dynasties reads: “One day [Xi zi] returned to the old capital, [/] She adorned herself and sought the river Ruoye [/] Amazed [by her beauty] the birds plunged into the net of the pines [/] Shamed [by her beauty] the sh sank beneath the lotus owers.” Thus it seems that Xi zi returned to Kuaiji [after the destruction of Wu]. Then again, Du Mu wrote in a poem: “Xi zi went to [the capital] Gusu,/Following Chiyi [Fan Li]74 in a boat.” It is Xi zi who followed [Fan] Li with her own free will. In Dongpo’s [Su Shi] poem about Fan Li, however, we read: “Who was banished to Gusu where the deer roam, [/] The more pitiable fate in that she succumbed to Mr. Fan.” Thus it seems that Fan Li abducted Xi zi, rather than that [Xi zi] followed [Fan] of her own free will. From these examples we can infer that there is nothing unusual in discrepancies between history and novels.75

As he states elsewhere in his preface, Xiong Damu based his novel in equal parts on a now forgotten novel called Wumu wang jingzhong lu

72

Translation of Charles O. Hucker, A Dictionary of Ofcial Titles in Imperial China,

426. 73

Zhangsun Wuji and others, “Suishu Bibliography,” in Suishu, 32.904. After the destruction of Wu, Fan Li took Chiyi zipi as his courtesy name to show his regret for causing the Wu general Wu Zixu (d. BC 522) to be killed. See Sima Qian, Shiji, 41.1752. 75 “Preface to Wumu wang yanyi” (1552), in Xiong Damu, Da Song zhongxing yanyi, Qingjiang Tang edition, 49–53. 74

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or Records of Yue Fei’s Loyalty and on a historical biography of Yue Fei (1103–1141) extracted from Tongjian gangmu or Outlines of a Comprehensive History. He specically notes that the history and the novel agree in some instances, and disagree in others. He thus incorporated both in order to give a complete picture. If some saw drama as accurately representative of historical reality, others recognized a tendency to distort. This distortion, however, did not necessarily argue against the conation of drama and history, as it was often interpreted as a critical device by which the author commented on a historical gure or event. The post-face of a Chongzhen edition of the play Mozhong ji typies this view: [The content] of this work is an almost completely factual record of the Eunuch Wei. There may be some ctional decoration here and there to bring the beginning and end into line, but any invention merely expresses the world’s anger.76

Yet another position held that drama is essentially ctive, but even this viewpoint was not entirely antithetical to the conation of drama and history. For even if fabrication was more prevalent than fact, dramatic narrative might embody an emotional truth. This conception by no means undermined the conation of history and drama, but it became the basis of an aesthetic more sweeping than any supposed by the partisans of dramatized biography.

Theatrical Performance and the Repetition of History Any attempt to come to terms with the drama culture of the Wanli period—and in particular the conation of drama and history as discussed above—must address the issue of performance. Theater, as Paola Pugliatti notes, “as a medium is a specially suitable channel for conveying an impression of truth . . . In performance, historical plays provide a peculiar historical experience, entirely different from the one provided by the reading of history books.”77 There is the additional point 76 “Postface to Mozhong ji,” in Anfu, Xinjuan Wei jian Mozhong ji, Chongzhen edition, table of content 2a. 77 Paola Pugliatti, Shakespeare the Historian, 60. In Pugliatti’s studying of Shakspeare’s historical plays, she includes a chapter “The Contribution of the Theatrical Medium” to discuss in what aspects that live performance adds on the idea of drama as history, and dramatist as historian. (60–68).

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that performance similarly provides an experience completely different from that of reading written plays. Pugliatti stresses that “in many ways, writing for the theater helped Shakespeare to authenticate his historical ctions.”78 Performance enhances the feeling that events are unfolding in the here and now, even if the events staged are drawn from ancient history; and the events recapitulated before the eyes are simultaneously and collectively experienced by the people in the theatre. As in the Elizabethan stage culture, this perception of theater can be found in the context of Chinese dramatic culture.79 In the prologue to his play Qiefu ji, Zhang Fengyi clearly asserts the same idea. He particularly emphasizes the way history is not only recapitulated, but actually repeated on the stage:80 The white heads who know me are on guard, And the prodigies behind red doors laugh and admonish. Hats and stars gather To watch again from the seats The ancient trace of history.81

According to Zhang Fengyi, what the audiences see in the theatre is not acting, but history itself brought back to life in all its actuality. Performance lays history before the eyes of the contemporary audience, or in Pugliatti’s words, “What the staging of an event produces is a strong, though implicit, sanction of the truth of the acts performed before our eyes.”82 When Herbert Lindenberger discusses Schiller’s Wallenstein, he comes to the same conclusion: “It succeeds at the same time in making us feel that real history—with its endeavor, its questioning into the cause and nature of great events—is being enacted before us.”83 In his anthology of drama criticism, Li Yu likewise highlights the experience of watching the plays that inscribes history: “[To put on]

78

Ibid., p. 60. Tina Lu’s discussion of Kong Shangren’s play Taohua shan also singles out the blurring of reality and performance. See Persons, Roles, and Minds, 199–238. Joe Riley’s study titled Chinese Theatre and the Actor in Performance is completely inspired by the perception of theater as reality. 80 I choose the term ‘repetition’ rather than follow what both Lindenberger and Pugliatti have chosen ‘reenactment,’ is because I want to stress that it is the history repeated on the stage which is closer to what the late Ming writers and readers had perceived, rather than the history being re-acted. 81 Zhang Fengyi, Qiefu ji, Jizhi Zhai Wanli edition, in Kanda KiichirÔ, ed., ChÖgoku gikyoku zenpon sanshu, 1.1a. 82 Paola Pugliatti, Shakespeare the Historian, 60–1. 83 Herbert Lindenberger, Historical Drama, 76. 79

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a performance of old plays is like watching an antiquity. The wonder of it is that those who are born later generations can face the former dynasties with their eyes.”84 The essential function of theatre to both Zhang Fengyi and Li Yu is that performance brings the past to the present. In the West, Shakespeare himself requests his audience in the prologue to Henry VIII to “think” in their mind that what they “see” on the stage is the real history: . . . think ye see The very persons of our noble story As they were living; think you see them great, And followed with the general throng and sweat Of thousand friends . . . (Henry VIII, 1.0.25–9)85

In Shakespeare’s request, witnessing through eyes and imagination in mind must work together to transform a theatrical performance into a historical reality. What underlies this request is the perception of theatrical performance as a medium for history to be brought before the eyes. In China, the idea of theatrical performance as the repetition of history is not unique to Zhang Fengyi, but was widely shared by his contemporaries. In the prologue to his play Dacheng ji, Huanyu Xiansheng Gong (active circa early seventeenth century) echoes the Shakespeare’s statement in the prologue of Henry VIII: Dacheng ji relates [Confucius’] travels through various states, As if [we] are witness to the Ancient Sage’s very complexion.86

In the cases of both Dacheng ji and Henry VIII, the audience is, in Pugliatti’s words, “called on to play an important role: thanks to the simultaneity and immediacy of the events represented, the spectators attain the status of eyewitnesses.”87 The term “qin jian” (literary means “to witness in person”) not only underscores the experience of eye witnessing but also emphasizes that the act of witnessing is conducted “in person,” while the term “ru” (as if ) suggests an imaginative space for a creative audience.

84

Li Yu, Xianqing ouji, 7:4.78. William Shakespeare, Henry VIII, in B. Blakemore Evans, ed., The Riverside Shakespeare, 981. 86 Huanyu Xiansheng Gong, Dacheng ji, Wanli edition, 1.1b. 87 Paola Pugliatti, Shakespeare the Historian, 62. 85

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The idea that the audience eyewitnesses a historical event on stage was explored by the playwright Xu Wei in his dramatic work Kuang gushi Yuyang sannong or Three Variations on the Yuyang Tune by the Mad Drummer, which is included in Xu’s famous dramatic collection Sisheng yuan or The Four Cries of the Gibbon. Xu’s play adapts the biography of the Han-era scholar Mi Heng (173–198) in the Hou Hanshu.88 According to the biography, a talented but arrogant twenty-four-year-old man named Mi Heng visited the capital city of Xu which was effectively ruled by the Prime Minister Cao Cao (155–220). Kong Rong (153–208), one of the literary leaders of the time, recommended Mi to Cao several times in appreciation of the young man’s talent. Mi, however, was disgusted by Cao’s ambitious seizure of power, and openly disparaged him. Cao was resentful but did not want to risk damaging his own reputation by killing Mi. He thus summoned the young man, an expert drummer, to be one of the performers at a party, a humiliating role for the proud scholar. Failing to arrive in uniform like the other performers and asked to change, Mi stripped his clothes in full view of the assembled guests. Cao laughed and said: “I had intended to humiliate Heng, but Heng insults me instead.”89 After this shocking display, Mi’s patron, Kong Rong, repudiated him, and Mi consented to apologize to Cao. Cao was content with this resolution and patiently waited in the palace for Mi to arrive and make his apologies. When Mi appeared at the gate, however, he beat sticks on the ground and cast execrations at Cao.90 Xu Wei’s play Kuang gushi is set in Hell where the souls of Mi and Cao have been sent after perishing from the terrestrial world. The judge of the Fifth Court of Hell, Cha You (literally “Investigate the Secret”), regrets that he did not witness Mi’s performance at the banquet: “I perpetually repent that I was not a witness.”91 Judge Cha mischievously lauds Mi’s performance as a “marvelous spectacle of the cosmos toyed with like a puppet.”92 Actors were commonly described as ‘kuilei ’ or ‘puppets’ during the late Ming, as in the ‘kuilei paichang’ or ‘performance of puppets’ mentioned in the prologue to the anonymous play Shengxian ji.93 Cha thus implies that Mi has overturned the 88

Fan Ye, “The Biography of Mi Heng,” in Hou Hanshu, 80.2652–2658. Ibid., 80.2655. 90 Ibid., 80.2656. 91 Xu Wei, Sisheng yuan, 1.2b, in Xu Wenchang sanji, 4:1700. 92 Ibid., 1.2a (4:1699). 93 Shengxian ji, Fuchun Tang Wanli edition, 1.1a. Kuilei is also referred to people as Su Hanying declares in Mengjing ji: “all human beings are puppets.” See Huangliang ji, Jizhi Zhai Wanli edition, 2.29a. 89

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normal relations of power: the actor usually controlled like a puppet here controls the world as if it were his own puppet. In Hell Judge Cha restages the scene of Mi’s deance, casting the souls of Mi and Cao in their respective earthly roles, complete with appropriate costume, to the entertainment of the jailers and the congregation of damned souls. In the reenacted event, history is repeated before the eyes, as Judge Cha stresses in the Kuang gushi: I, a humble ofcial, audaciously plead with you, sir [Mi], to resume temporarily your old manner, along with Cao Cao, whom I will dress once again in his former costume, in order that the ancient banquet scene of condemnation might be performed. I can thus fulll my long-standing wish [to witness this scene].94

A play like Kuang gushi is self-reexive in the ontological status of theater. It is a play about play, or a performance about performance. In the post-Modernist term, it is a meta-theatrical or meta-performance play, which emphasizes its quality in self-reection rather than a ‘selfknowledge’ of its articiality as a medium. In this self-reection, Kuang gushi shows that the central philosophy of Chinese drama is to see theater as reality rather than as illusion. The analogous self-reexive exploration of the paradox in interpenetrating reality and illusion is featured prominently in the plays of Luigi Pirandello.95 Pirandello and the reality/illusion theme, as indicated by scholar Anthony Abbott, “are almost synonymous, so much so that the unwary reader is apt to be trapped into thinking that it is his foremost concern, almost his only concern.”96 The paradox of reality and illusion has also become an interest of the post-Modernist playwrights such as Peter Weiss, Jean Genet, Peter Handke, and Tom Stoppard,97 and novelists such as Jorge Luis Borges, John Barth, and Thomas Pynchon, whose interests lie in the writing of plays about plays and novels about novels.98 As Anthony Abbott indicates in his study of reality and illusion in modern Western drama that all of the above mentioned post-Modern playwrights “use radical techniques to force the audience to reconsider its own view of

94

Xu Wei, Sisheng yuan, 1.2b (4:1700). For the investigations of Pirandello’s plays on the issue of reality and illusion, see Roger Oliver, Dreams of Passion. See also Anthony Abbott, “Luigi Pirandello,” chapter 7 in Anthony Abbot, The Vital Lie, 71–86. 96 Ibid., 71. 97 For a discussion of all three playwrights, see Anthony Abbot’s chapter “Theater as Reality/Reality as Theater” in his book The Vital Lie, 200–213. 98 Ibid., 200. 95

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what is real, to break down barriers between conscious and the unconscious, theater and reality, acting, performing and living.”99 In Kuang gushi, Xu Wei arranges a further interesting detail that suggests the role of the individual actor’s performance in bringing reality to the stage. Xu assigns the souls of Mi Heng and Cao Cao to play their historical embodiments, which suggests that those on stage are not performers but the incarnations of the souls of real historical gures. The passage that leads actors to enter the stage proper is called ‘Guimen dao’ or ‘Path through the Door of Ghost’ echoes this view as what emerge through the passage are not the performers but the incarnations of the souls of the dramatis persona. Those on stage who fail to embody the reality of history should be condemned and punished as the soul of Cao Cao is constantly threatened with ve hundred lashes if he does not play his historical self well. This plot device shows that Xu is very aware that those performers who fail to capture the real historical personality will impair the realization of historical reality on the stage. An incompetent performer will always introduce the reality of the present into the historical frame and thus undermine the conation of time. In the anthology of essays on dramatic music Yuefu chuansheng, Xu Dachun similarly emphasizes the importance of the individual actor’s performance in recreating historical reality on stage: The performer must rst step into the character’s shoes and imitate the character’s personality and manner as if the character himself speaks. Only then will posture and mien assume the air of reality. Thus the audience will understand and enjoy as if they encounter the character in person, and they will forget that what they observe is a drama.100

The highest achievement of the performers, then, is to transport the audience from the present to the past. The conation of time as a dramatic ideal thus sets the highest demand on performers. From the above examples, we can infer that the conception of theatrical performance as the repetition of history is not uncommon. This idea that history can be repeated before the eyes of latter-day audiences is a key philosophical premise of Wanli-era drama culture. Performance thus assumes a crucial pedagogic signicance as the most sensually immediate and direct conduit to historical truth. Under these conditions drama could not easily be dismissed or deprecated, as Hong

99 100

Ibid., 212–3. Xu Dachun, Yuefu chuansheng (preface dated 1744), 4:174.

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Wenke notes in an entry titled “Chuanqi zhi sheng” or “The Flourishing of Drama” in his miscellany Yukui jingu: The secret plans and exceptional schemes of heroic and dashing personages are of such wonder that they will dazzle thousands of generations. The Grand Historian recorded them in detail. But how is it possible for all the world’s people to be sufciently learned? How many people can take up a book and read? Common men and women are easily confused and uncomprehending. Scholars and writers of our dynasty have composed plays such as Wansha, Hongfu, Qiefu, and Toubi. These offer songs of tragedy—open-hearted, heroic, vigorous. They present men exceptional and overshadowing in their careers and heroines of the most unusual insight. Wrought as drama and performed in the theatre, they cause events from past times to materialize before the very eyes of the audience. All who possess blood and breath will be inspired. [Drama] is truly a means of moving the human heart, and is thus rightly considered invaluable. To watch a play, and merely laugh at its puppetry of noise and costume, one must be made of wood and stone.101

Hong Wenke emphasizes in this passage that those heroic events recorded in history books can be ‘du’ (seen or witnessed) by those who are literate, while the performances recapitulate historical events that can be witnessed by those who are illiterate. Here the experience of reading and the experience of watching are completely conated. In Hong’s conception, theatrical performance and books bear the same function: they both materialize the past in the present, and as heroic action is brought to life, the audience is inspired by the example of past ages. The emergence of the past (gu) in the present ( jin) creates a sense of temporal conation, as Pan Zhiheng (1556–1622) declares in a preface to his critical anthology Qinhuai jupin: How profound it is! How profound it is! People are late-born by thousands of generations, yet [by means of performance] rove thousands of generations into the past. The old trace [of history] appears of a sudden, and the extinguished shadow is illuminated in the overlapping light [of past and present].102

The conation of past and present occurs in a mysterious moment when the oldest times suddenly re-materialize before the eyes of the present.

101

Hong Wenke, Yukui jingu, 4a–b, in Tao Ting, ed., Xu Shuofu, 1:707. Pan Zhiheng, “Preface to Qinhuai jupin,” 1.1b, in Tao Ting, ed., Xu Shuofu, 2:1966. 102

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The boundaries between past and present dissolve at the moment when the historical event is staged, and thus enhance the truthfulness of the staged history as playwright Shao Can (active during 1465–1505 Chenghua and Hongzhi reigns) testies in the prologue to his play Wulun zhuan Xiangnang ji: “Present is past, and illusion is real.”103 Such is the mystery of this moment that a writer like Pan was at a loss to explain its psychology and could only exclaim that “How profound it is!” The imputation of “overlap” implies, moreover, that performance not only presents the past to the present, but also the present to the past; in the moment of overlap, presumably, the two temporal realms are equally inter-penetrative and transitively accessible. In both Hong Wenke and Pan Zhiheng’s view, the resuscitation of the past, rather than the provision of entertainment, is the justifying function of theatrical performance. Thus many Wanli readers were unconcerned with drama’s delity to historical fact; in the brief moment of performance, drama becomes synonymous with historical fact. Fidelity is a condition of representation. In the conation of past and present, performance transcends representation and achieves identity.

103

Shao Can, Xiangnang ji, Jizhi Zhai Wanli edition, 1.1a.

CHAPTER FIVE

IMAGE AS AN INTERACTION WITH THE PAST

Several conceptions that touch upon the drama culture of the Wanli period have been presented: rst, drama as history; second, performance as the repetition of history; third, the conation of past and present through performance. Within this frame of reference, we also discussed the playwright Huanyu Xiansheng Gong’s statement that his play “Dacheng ji relates the travels of Confucius through various countries,” and that his play offers a chance to “witness the ancient Sage’s very complexion” (see quotation in chapter four). The author’s statement makes sense in the context of a culture that perceives performance as history brought before the eyes. But when the play was published as a monograph during the Wanli period and was read out of the theatrical context, Huanyu Xiansheng Gong’s claim lost something of its intuitive force. Theatrical experience, after all, is very different from reading. Although in both cases the reader’s imagination performs the essential transformation of art into a historical repetition, as Shakespeare indicates in his prologue to Henry V,1 performance and reading encourage this imaginative act in different ways. Performance depends on the interaction of the audience and the stage, while reading depends on the interaction of the reader and the page. At least in part, pictorial images are included in printed texts to bridge this difference and bring the experience of reading within the more evocative experience of the theater. The publishers during the Wanli period thus included performance illustrations inspired by theater to compensate the absence of a live performance. Operating within the context of this printing culture, the publisher of Dacheng ji likewise included performance illustration to replicate the theatrical experience and to support the author’s claim that his play presents the ancient Sage’s “very complexion.” Illustration replicates much of the experience of performance, but it is distinct from the reality of theater in obvious senses. We thus should ask under what kind of cultural conditions illustration is successful

1

Shakespeare, Henry V, in The Oxford Shakespeare, 91–4.

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in replicating theatrical experience. Illustrations are intended to fulll exactly the role Huanyu Xiansheng Gong claimed for his play: to manifest the past in the present. This strategy is not accidental or haphazard, but self-conscious and rooted in cultural precedent. In scholar Judith Zeitlin’s description, “painting had long symbolized the blurring of the boundaries between the real and the unreal.”2 The ‘blurring of boundaries’ permits the conation of past and present no less than the real and unreal.

Painting, Performance Illustration, and Reality The ‘blurring of boundaries’ between the real and unreal was a pronounced tendency in the traditional discourse of art, as the Song scholar Hong Mai (1123–1202) notes in his miscellany Rongzhai suibi: Beholders of the lovely vistas in this world inevitably pronounce them to be ‘like paintings,’ and so people have said, “The scenery is like a painting,” “Scenery is Heaven unrolling a painting,” or “My body is in a painting.” Wondrously skillful paintings that connoisseurs sigh over endlessly, on the other hand, are always deemed ‘utterly real.’ . . . Treating the real as unreal and treating the unreal as real are equally misguided positions. But so many things in life are of this sort . . .3

The emphasis of Hong Mai’s language—“inevitably,” “always”—suggests how pervasive he considered this tendency toward ‘blurred boundaries.’ Although believing this tendency to be misguided, Hong Mai could only sigh and relent, as it was too common to resist. Some three hundred years later, the writer Lang Ying (b. 1487) similarly observed this tendency, taking it up in his short essay titled “On the Real and the Unreal of Landscape” (Shanshui zhenjia): I once laughed at people who praise a landscape painting as “utterly real,” and praise a real landscape as “like a painting,” and thus fail to recognize which is true and which is false. But last night, I read in Du Fu’s poem “To Be Inscribed on The Painting of the Shu Path,” the assertion that “The mountains between China and the barbarians are unbroken. The rivers between the regions of Wu and Shu are continuous.” This too treats a painting as real. I then read this in Zeng Jifu’s poem: “Wei Yan’s trees are on the sheer cliff and a light rain falls on Guo Xi’s mountain.”

2 3

Judith Zeitlin, Historian of the Strange, 190. Hong Mai, Rongzhai suibi, 1.214.

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chapter five Doesn’t [Zeng] also treat a real scene like a painting? On this basis, if the present is laughable, so too is the past.4

Lang Ying notes that his contemporaries’ tendency to conate real and painted landscapes is actually precedented in great poets like Du Fu (712–770) and Zeng Ji (1084–1166). The nal sentence in the passage—“Gu jin xu ke xiao”—is extremely difcult to render in English. As he cannot conceive of casting any aspersion on Du Fu and Zeng Ji, Lang Ying admits that his original view (“I once laughed [. . .]”) was ignorant. Unlike Hong Mai who could only throw up his hands, Lang Ying grasps that he has stumbled onto an important and longstanding tradition. Yang Shen (1488–1559) had none of the scruples of his contemporary Lang Ying and took the conation of art and reality as perfectly reasonable. In 1499, at the age of twelve, Yang Shen overheard a question addressed to his two uncles, Ruihong and Longya: “People claim that beautiful scenery is like painting and ne painting is like scenery. Which is true?” Yang Shen interrupted this exchange and answered the question himself by reciting a long poem by Yuan Zhen (779–831). One of his uncles then asked him to express this idea in verse of his own. Yang Shen responded: If the landscape catches one’s heart Then the real is like a painting. If a painting is from a skillful hand Then the painting is like the real.5

Even at the age of twelve, Yang Shen fully grasped the meaning of this cultural tendency to ‘blurred boundaries,’ and understood, unlike Hong Mai and Lang Ying, that it embodies a meaningful aesthetic truth. Yang Shen’s equation of landscape with painting is taken a step farther by Li Yu, who deliberately created a device to blur the distinction. He built a fan-shaped window opposite a rock in his garden as a framing device in the attempt to convert real life into art. Li describes rst glancing out the window: “As I sat there and watched, the window became a picture instead of a window and the rock a rock in a landscape painting instead of the rock behind my room.”6

4 5 6

Lang Ying, Qixiu leigao, 15.219. Yang Shen, Huapin, 1.1a. Patrick Hanan, The Invention of Li Yu, 69.

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In the three examples of Hong Mai, Lang Ying and Yang Shen, the issue of ‘blurred boundaries’ is expressed in very similar terms. This language appears again and again in literary composition and artistic criticism even down to the present.7 It might be said that the terms of this discussion are only hyperbolic gures of speech, that whatever Yang Shen says of the painting’s reality, he is less describing his actual experience of painting, than indulging in a philosophical gesture, or merely exercising his cleverness. Yet there are many instances where the actual experience of painting seems to underlie and motivate this rhetoric. According to Zhang Yanyuan’s (active c. 862) Lidai minghua ji—China’s rst comprehensive historical account of the artistic tradition, written during the Tang Dynasty—the painter Zong Bing (375–443), active during the Southern and Northern Dynasties, felt this ‘blurring of boundaries’ in the most practical experiential sense. When Zong became old and ill he could no longer travel among the mountains, so he painted the walls of his house with mountains, in order to “empty his mind and contemplate the Way, and to recline and wander among them.”8 Zong’s language suggests that the distinction between the real and unreal is irrelevant: in either case, his journey could go forward. The implication of this story—that the real and unreal are transmutable—became the conceptual foundation of a long tradition in Chinese landscape painting called the ‘woyou’ (reclining and wandering) tradition in which the painted landscape becomes a space of voyage: the viewer enters the painting and goes on a journey through the embedded world. The late Ming critic He Liangjun took this ability to journey in the world of the painting as the standard of true connoisseurship: Long ago Zongwen [Zong Bing] said: “Both age and illness have come, I am afraid that it is difcult to tour all the famous mountains.” He thus painted all the Five Peaks and the celebrated mountains in his room, and said: “These are only for the purpose of purifying my mind and contemplating the Way, and voyaging among as I recline.” He further said: “I take up and play the zither, and I want to make all the mountains reverberate.” It must be like this before we can say one knows painting. However, does anyone like [Zong] now exist?9

7 Even in the 20th century Deng Shi was bothered by the ambiguity between the aesthetic and the actual. See Tanyi lu, in Meishu congshu, 5a. 8 Zhang Yanyuan, Lidai minghua ji, 6.78. in Huashi congshu, 1:83. 9 He Liangjun, Siyou Zhai congshuo, 28.257.

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‘Woyou’ thus set an ideal of connoisseurship that has been upheld by Chinese artists and critics ever since; this tradition entirely informs the rhetoric used by Hong Mai, Lang Ying and Yang Shen in the passages quoted above. In this tradition initiated by Zong Bing, the painting frames a reality in its own right. Imagination is the vault by which this reality is entered, but the word ‘imagination’ is perhaps misleading insofar as it implies the construction of a false reality. In this case imagination opens the door to reality itself. In many cases, this experience of the painting as real or seemingly real is attested by observers on the painting itself, as in the famous bibliophile Chen Zhensun’s (active . mid-thirteenth century) inscription on Zhang Xian’s (courtesy name Sanying, 990–1078) painting entitled The Picture of Ten Recitations (Shiyong tu). Chen was inspired to compose an inscription when he rst saw the painting in 1250, but he did not actually add the inscription until 1256. The phrase cited as so pervasive by Hong Mai (“My body is in a painting”) is almost precisely repeated by Chen: I have heard of Zhang Sanying all my life. Who but the aged man knows about the ten recitations? His life coincided with a hundred years of peace And was as long as that of the old ones. Famous worthies were described in his ne essays, And fabulous activities were conveyed in his rened paintings. Distantly [ I] contemplate those ourishing times and regret that I was born late. [ I feel] just as if my body is in the painting.10

Through the medium of Zhang Xian’s artistry, Chen felt he was able to participate, at least mentally, in the glories of the past. Chen was so enthusiastic about this opened door that he not only recorded his feelings, but six years later borrowed the painting from its owner Zhou Shuming in order to repeat the experience. He apparently managed to do so, because on the occasion of this second viewing he inscribed the poem he had written six years earlier. Chen’s experience suggests that blurring of boundaries is not a matter of momentary inspiration or mood, but somehow systematically follows from the painting (at least when viewed by a ‘connoisseur’). 10 The painting was in the collection of the Emperor Qianlong. The inscription is recorded in the catalogue of his painting and calligraphy collection Siqu baoji xubian, 28.1512 lower.

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The conception implicit in the rhetoric of both Hong Mai and Chen Zhensun is also notable in the work of the late Ming art critic Lu Andao (1517–?). In an inscription to Wen Boren’s (1502–1575) painting The Picture of West Dongting Mountain (Xi Dongting shan tu) Lu Andao avows that he feels himself physically present amid the scenery of the Dongting area, traditionally called Xiaoxiang. The sail with a high mast appears a shadow In the vast misty water. The autumn denudes the color of trees, And the tangerines emanate fragrance. I want to take a boat And tour among the farthest shores. Suddenly, I suspect my body is in Xiaoxiang.11

Though Chen Zhensun and Lu Andao use slightly different rhetoric—Chen feeling himself immersed in the painting, Lu in a physical reality—they both experience the blurring of boundaries that denes the ‘woyou’ tradition. In the literature of the late Ming era, this conation of art and reality was a common conceit. It is notable in poetry like Yuan Hongdao’s “Watching the old monk Yuejiang moving a Bo tree in the Temple of Fahua” (Fahua An kan Yuejiang lao na yi boshu);12 in aesthetic theory like Dong Qichang’s (1555–1636) Huayan13 and Huachan Shi suibi;14 and in art criticism like Wang Zhideng’s (1535–1612) inscription (1587) on Chen Chun’s (1483–1544) ower painting in the album titled Yanqing huimei.15 The late Ming painter Mo Shilong (?–1587) self-consciously worked to achieve this kind of conation. His painting Painting Landscape (Hua shanshui ) was conceived as a gift for his friend Xu Wenqing. As Mo’s inscription relates, Xu Wenqing, “like Zong Bing,” was fond of touring; Mo offers his painting not as a painting, but as an actual landscape that would ll his study with the “pure sound” of nature.16 In the above cases, the conation of art and reality is essentially verbal, but the conception is equally manifested in pictorial terms. In

11 Lu Andao’s poem is inscribed on the painting and transcribed in Gugong shuhua tulu, 8:94. 12 Yuan Hongdao, “Qiyan jueju,” in Yuan Zhonglang quanji, 10. 13 Dong Qichang, Huayan, 10b–11a. 14 Dong Qichang, Huachan Shi suibi, 4.5a, in Biji xiaoshuo daguan 6 (1983–4), 11:131. 15 Shiqu baoji xubian, 10.534, a. 16 Ibid., 9.1066, a.

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Chinese painting the motif of the double-screen (chongping) serves as the best example of how the abstract concept of conated realities is concretized in pictorial terms. The screen is intended to hold the imagination within a consistent eld of suggestion and facilitate the process of ‘woyou.’ The genre of double-screen painting, invented by Zhou Wenju (born c. 917), active during the Southern Tang Dynasty, consists of a painting of at least two separate screens mounted one in front of the other or placed next to each other. In the double-screen painting, the painter nds an efcient physical device to represent the social and psychological dynamic that denes the ‘woyou’ tradition. The screen presents scenery within its frame, just as the real world presents scenery within the frame of our eld of vision. The size and surrounding shape of the screen (in many cases three sided) tends to immerse the viewer (or at least the connoisseur) to such an extent of vividness that its artice begins to seem irrelevant. But the painter’s representation of two screens forces on his audience the meaning of the screen in its own right, and ensures that it is not overlooked as a merely naturalistic detail. The fact that Zhou Wenju is so celebrated for his use of the double screen motif implies that it was not a simple derivation from actual household practice. We see an interesting instance of the double-screen motif in a painting called Heyue or A Court Concert usually attributed to Zhou Wenju (gure 5–1). This painting, according to Wu Hung in The Double Screen, “in all likelihood,” is a Ming copy of a possibly Song or pre-Song original.17 It shows a gentleman seated on a bench watching a musical performance as his family and servants attend to him. To his rear, there is a double-layer of three-sided screens, the smaller in front of the larger. The smaller screen appears to be afxed to the bench as a kind of decorative backing. A painting titled The Night Banquet of Han Xizai (Han Xizai yeyan tu) by Gu Hongzhong, a contemporary of Zhou Wenju, shows a similarly backed bench (gure 5–2). The repetition of this image suggests that the screen is indeed afxed to the bench, and that this type of bench was to some degree common. If the smaller, inner screen is part of a highly decorative bench, the mystery of its function is solved. The larger, outer screen, however, remains to be explained. Again a comparison of the two paintings is instructive. Both paintings show a gentleman enjoying a musical performance:

17

Wu Hung, The Double Screen, 74.

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5–1. Unknown Artist, attributed to Zhou Wenju. A Court Concert (Heyue tu) or Femail Musicians Playing Before the Emperor. Ming dynasty (1368– 1644), early 15th century. Handscroll, ink and color on silk. 41.9u184.2 cm. Buckingham Endowment Fund, 1950.1370 Overall. Reproduction, The Art Institute of Chicago, C20198.

Zhou Wenju’s painting is set outdoors, while Gu Hongzhong’s painting is set indoors. It is a crucial clue that the larger screen only appears in the painting of the outdoor scene. We might guess that the larger screen was intended to provide privacy or protection from the wind. But such a concert would likely be held in the imperial gardens where privacy was not an issue, while a marquee would better provide protection from the elements, assuming such a concert would even take place in unpleasant weather. The answer would seem aesthetic rather than practical. The explanation must look to the idea of ‘woyou.’ In the painting, the musical performance is clearly being given amid a rough winter landscape. The surrounding trees are large and bare that echo nothing of the delicacy of the performance, and seem unlikely to please a delicate sensibility. The large screen, in contrast, depicts a scene of gardens thick with plum trees. We can infer that this screen is intended to transform the bleak environment and create the proper atmosphere in which to enjoy the music. That is to say the larger screen is provided so the emperor can escape into this more congenial reality and the experience of the concert might be even more exquisite. The screen thus supplants nature itself. The smaller screen cannot function as convincingly as the larger, perhaps because of its size and because its attachment to the bench reminds the viewer of the scene’s artice. Thus the painter includes the larger screen as a logical prop in the painted scene. This ontological equivalency between the screen and nature is very overtly suggested by a painting titled Enjoying the Antiques (Wangu tu) by the 15th- and 16th-century painter Du Jin (gure 5–3). In this superbly executed painting, a scene of garden foliage segues without any real disruption into scenes painted on two different screens. The painting is so seamless that it seems to deny any basis for distinguishing between nature and art.

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5–2. Gu Hongzhong (after). The Night Banquet of Han Xizai (Han Xizai yeyan tu). Ink and color on silk. 28.7u335.5 cm. Palace Museum, Beijing. Reproduced from Zhongguo meishu quanji: huihua bian. 2:128. Taipei: Jinxiu, 1989.

5–3. Du Jin. Enjoying the Antiques (Wangu tu). Ink and color on silk. 126.1u187 cm. National Palace Museum, Taipei, Taiwan, Republic of China.

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The painters’ intention is to provide pictorializations of a person experiencing the blurring of boundaries between art and reality, an image of ‘woyou’ in process. The rough landscape is deliberately invoked to suggest the compensatory function of the screen: reality in this case considered inadequate, art serves as an alternate reality. This interpretation accounts for the screen, but becomes a strong interpretation only in light of a tradition in both literature and art that perceives the screen in this fashion, as a reality in its own right. There are many poems and paintings, for example, that more explicitly articulate the screen’s status as an alternate reality. The poem, for example, “Zou Garden” (Zou Yuan) by the late Ming literatus Wang Siren (1575–1646), which sings the praises of a garden on the estate of the Zou family, begins with the line: “The screen painting surrounds the winding pathways.”18 This line embodies something of the arrangements we see in the above two paintings: the screen entirely veils reality as in Zhou Wenju’s painting, while it structures a winding pathway as in Du Jin’s painting. Wang Siren metaphorizes the natural scenery as a screen, suggesting an analogy between art and reality. Each can be considered in terms of the other, as they are essentially analogous. The screen also metaphorizes real scenery in a poem by Li Bai (699–762) titled “A Ballad to the Clear Stream” (Qingxi xing): The Clear Stream puries my mind, It differs from other rivers in the color of its water. May I ask if the bottom of the Xin’an River Can be seen as clearly as this? Men walk within the mirror, And birds y in the screen. The monkeys cry as the evening nears Bringing empty grief to the son who wanders far away.19

The reality of the birds is suggested by their inclusion among men and monkeys, which are given as straightforwardly actual, and by the description of them as actively in ight. Yet the birds are framed in a screen, suggesting their artice. The context of the poem leaves the status of the birds ambiguous; the screen thus seems to embody both art and reality. As in Wang Siren’s poem, the screen implies an essential analogy between art and reality: each expressible in terms of the other.

18 19

Wang Siren, Bi Yuan nicun, Tianqi edition, 66a. Li Bai, Li Taibai quanji, 8.449–50.

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In his description, Li Bai seems to appreciate the beautiful scenery of Qingxi as a distant admirer, while Yuan Hongdao undoubtedly perceives himself as part of the screen scenery in one of his “Poems of Living on a Boat” (Zhouju shi). Having purchased a boat, Yuan Hongdao describes his life on the water in the following fashion: “I make my home upon the green dyed silk/I am a person within a screen painting.”20 In Yuan’s perception, the reality of the scenery—the river, the boat, and the person—is perfectly consistent with the idea that it is framed within a screen. Yuan Hongdao’s description of himself within a screen painting validates Hong Mai’s observation that such conceits were common. The Tang poet Bai Juyi similarly adopts this conceit in his poem “Occasional Nap” (Oumian), likening himself to an ancient sage painted on a screen: Placing a cup on my writing-desk, Resting my head on my arm in front of the brazier, I love to meditate about matters in my old age. Feeling lazy, I often take a casual nap. My wife asks me to take off my black hat, And the maid spreads the blue afghan for me. This is a scene on a screen. Why bother to paint the ancient sages?21

These scenes from Bai Juyi’s life approximate the ideality of life as painted on a screen, becoming indistinguishable from the screen’s artice. The question, “Why bother to paint the ancient sages,” is inspired by the fact that life itself has become art. This poem shows the attempt to replicate the screen image in real life. In this attempt the past is recreated in the present, and the screen not only blurs the boundaries between the real and the unreal, but also represents a transcendence of time. As the screen merges with reality, so the past merges with the present. If Zhou Wenju and Du Jin’s paintings embodied one reality, a screen that inscribes an image of another screen would embody multiple realities. One such painting An Emperor of the Southern Tang Dynasty Playing Chess (Houzhu quanqi tu)—usually attributed to Zhou Wenju—is particularly interesting to consider because it attempts to pictorialize

20 21

Yuan Hongdao, Yuan Hongdao ji qianjiao, 28.909. Bai Juyi, Bai Juyi quanji, 25.562–3.

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5–4. Zhou Wenju (after). Emperor Houzhu of the Southern Tang Playing Chess (Houzhu guanqi tu). 11th century. Ink and color on paper. 31.3u50 cm. Freer Gallery of Art.

the poem “Occasional Nap” by Bai Juyi (gure 5–4).22 The poem thus provides a verbal map of the painting’s intentions. We can be sure of the relation between the painting and the poem because the 14th century literatus Lu Youren (active c. 1330) noted in Yanbei zazhi (preface dated 1334) that he once saw a copy of the painting at the house of Lou Xuan and that Bai Juyi’s poem was inscribed on the screen.23 Taking this poem as his starting point, Zhou Wenju’s painting embeds two screens. Innermost is a three-panel screen showing a landscape. Embedding this is a large one-panel screen showing Bai Juyi about to take his rest as the maid spreads the afghan. Complicating matters, Zhou Wenju’s painting was itself initially mounted on a screen according to an inscription on the painting left by the 19th-century book collector Lu

22 The painting is held by the Freer Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C. The curator, Thomas Lawton, maintains that it was painted during the 11th century—Chinese Figure Painting, 34. This conclusion suggests that the Zhou Wenju’s painting is lost and this is a copy of the original. There is another copy in Beijing Palace Museum; the curator claims that it predates the Freer Gallery version; but in terms of artistic quality the Beijing version is weaker. 23 Lu Youren, Yanbei zazhi, 1.14a, in Biji xiaoshuo daguan 5 (1983), 10:329.

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Xinyuan (1834–1894).24 This arrangement of multiple screens attempts to substantiate Bai Juyi’s assertion that life is a “scene on a screen” by consciously disorienting the viewer and bafing the sense of a privileged reality.25 With the boundaries between art and reality blurred, alternate realities become viable. This disorientation is evident in an account of a painting like Zhou Wenju’s given by the 11th-century prime minister and literatus Wang Anshi (1021–1086). Faced with the complicated play of imbedded images, Wang records his puzzlement in the poem “Viewing the Paintings and Calligraphy in the Three Halls at Jiang Linji’s invitation” ( Jiang Linji yao guan Sanguan shuhua): I have no idea who these people might be. Two gentlemen play chess and the rest observe. The dart-receiving vase is trimmed in gold. On the color screen is painted a sick man, While behind him a woman bears clothes. In front of the bed, a red carpet and a brazier. Upon the bed, an afghan is laid by two girls. Surrounding the bed, a painted screen gives the shape of misty mountains. Of all the paintings triple-stacked in the hall, This piece is particularly intricate and singular in its meaning. What is real and what unreal in the depiction of this work? If matters in the world are thus, we can only sigh.26

Wang Anshi is perplexed by the double-screen motif for the same reason that Hong Mai is troubled by certain rhetorical habits: both suggest the blurred boundaries between the real and the unreal. In the nal line of the poem, Wang recognizes that the dynamics of the painting apply equally to life; inspiring recognition, of course, is the whole point of the painting, and indeed the whole point of the genre. Being a man of practical political affairs and a Confucianist, Wang is disconcerted by this recognition and expresses his woe with a sigh. For others like Zong Bing and Bai Juyi, who fall within the more mystical hermitic tradition, the realization that human life is implicated in art’s 24 Inscription by Lu Xinyuan, in Suzuki Kei ed., Comprehensive Illustrated Catalog of Chinese Paintings, 1:191. 25 Wu Hung in his study The Double Screen also proposes that the double-screen motif in this painting is a device to confuse the beholder who “unconsciously . . . has accepted the artist’s rhetoric to view the gures and objects depicted in front of the screen as part of the real world” (84). 26 Wang Anshi, Wang Wengong wenji, in Yang Jialuo, ed., Zhongguo xueshu mingzhu, 50.561.

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bafing play of realities opened the door to a much-sought liberation from the supercial commonsense of society. In Wang Anshi’s perception, the motif of double screen is not a device used self-referentially to indicate the materiality of the painting itself, as Wu Hung suggests in his study The Double Screen, but a device, in both the artistic and literary traditions, that incarnates the conation of the real and the unreal as understood in aesthetic theory. The ambiguity of the real and the unreal is intrinsic rather than accidental in this complicated usage of the double or triple screen motif and the literary metaphor of the screen itself. This succession of embedded realities renders different temporal frames as synchronous and subverts the notion of a privileged present. The chronological aspect of time is thus transcended. As Bai Juyi suggests in his poem that his life is a scene on a screen, so the painting uses the double-screen motif to make a similar suggestion about the chess players: their life is also a scene on a screen, in this case literally. The structure of the outer layer of the painting thus expresses the poetic allusion implicit in the inner layer. The double screens represent two different time frames that coexist on the same surface and interact with each other, and bring the viewer of the double-screen painting within an implied scheme of embedded realities—hence the persistent sense of ontological disorientation among the painting’s critics, as if unsure that their own reality is privileged. This double-screen motif thus conates both space (the real and the unreal) and time (the past, the present, and the future), and allows viewers to transcend their historical moment, becoming synchronous with the past. A similar conation is implied by a color illustration of a puppet stage in a 1640 edition of Xixiang ji published by Min Qiji in Zhejiang Province (gure 5–5).27 The illustration from the 1640 edition is a bit unusual. Most drama illustrations published during the Chongzhen era lack any framing device as the characters appear in the environment of daily life discussed in chapter two. The illustration from the 1640 edition elaborately frames a scene from the play on a puppet stage split into a front stage and an oddly visible backstage. The play’s characters—Hongniang, the maidservant of the female protagonist Yingying,

27 For the discussion of the illustrations included in this edition, see Dawn Ho Delbanco, “The Romance of the Western Chamber Min Qiji’s album in Cologne,” 12–23; Kobayashi Hiromitsu, “Mindai hanga no seida,” 32–50; and Wu Hung, The Double Screen, 243–259.

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5–5. Min Qiji. The nineteenth illustration of Xixiang ji. Color print. Wuxing: Min Qiji, 1640. Museum für Ostasiatische, Köln. Inv.-No. R61,2 [no. 19]. Photo: Rheinisches Bildarchiv, Köln, Germany.

5–6. Picture of Puppet Show (Kuilei tu). In Sancai tuhui, edited by Wang Qi. A facsimile of 1609 edition, 140a. Shanghai: Guji chubanshe, 1988.

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and Zheng Heng, Yingying’s ancé—appear as puppets manipulated by two puppeteers standing behind a screen. This illustration seems to go out of its way to reveal the puppeteers, as if to emphasize the fact that the puppets are being manipulated. Usually, of course, the back stage is carefully hidden to maintain the illusion that the puppet world is self-sufcient and autonomous. This more conventional arrangement is shown in an illustration that accompanies the entry on puppetry in the encyclopedia Sancai tuhui or Pictorial Compendium of the Three Powers, published during the Wanli period (gure 5–6). If the puppet stage included in Sancai tuhui is a truthful visual record of a Wanli-era puppet performance—as there is every reason to believe—then the stage in the Min Qiji edition is unusual, depicting not one but two layers of reality: the puppets’ and the puppeteers’. This illustration seems to emphasize deliberately the manipulation of the puppets in order to suggest a pattern of embedded realities. As the puppets are framed by the boundaries of the screen, so the puppeteers are framed by the boundaries of the larger stage structure. Both of these frames, moreover, seem to represent entire worlds. The screen shows the dening elements of sea, land, and sun, while the stage signies the natural world by the oral motif shown against the sky-blue hue of the canvas roof, by the cloud pattern across the entablature, and by the peculiar shape of the stage structure itself, which seems to allude to the traditional Chinese conception of earth as square and heaven as a kind of rounded canopy. This cosmology is exemplied by the saying, ‘Round heaven, square earth’ (tianyuan difang), and by the line from Xu Wei’s 16th-century poem “Painting Inscription for Visitors from Hangzhou” (Wei Hang ren tihua), in which Heaven is described as a “spread canopy.” The implication is that worlds are embedded within worlds, realities within realities, an implication furthered by the consideration that the worlds dened by the screen and the stage structure are embedded in our own world, the world of the audience. An innite regression of such embedded realities is suggested by the images of eternity that both center and border the illustration. In the center of the screen is an image of penglai (immortal island), an ideal realm beyond the temporal realm of human life. On such islands the immortals dwell, cultivating their spirit. This kind of island, indicated by the queer craggy shape of the mountain top, is an ancient motif in Chinese art, especially notable in the decoration of bronze mirrors and boshan incense burners, both of which are associated with the

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quest for immortality. Surrounding the stage structure is a border of empty space, which symbolizes eternity by eliminating all indications of limit. The pattern of the illustration thus moves inward toward eternity (represented by the immortal island) and outward toward eternity (represented by empty space). The design of the railing at the foot of the stage seals this theme by inscribing the repeated gure of the wan, a Buddhist symbol of eternity that resembles a Nazi swastika in reverse direction. All of these details suggest an innite regression of embedded realities, all of which are analogous as links in a kind of chain. This pattern of embedded reality destabilizes any notion of a single absolute or privileged reality, and calls into question the status of our own reality. Our own world, as the illustration would have us consider, may not constitute the universe, but may be a link in the chain of worlds that constitutes the universe. The overt association of both the puppet screen and puppeteer’s stage with our own world suggests as much. This elaborate metaphysical conception very neatly explains an otherwise mysterious detail that any interpretation of the illustration must account for. The six puppets depicted in the illustration represent the major characters of Xixiang ji, with only Madam Cui, Yingying’s mother, unacknowledged. As a strict follower of Confucianism, Madame Cui would likely disapprove of the illustration’s otherworldly speculations and of its implicit criticism of Confucianist orthodoxy, which insists on a more down-to-earth conception of reality, taking the given world as nal. The artist presumably omitted Madame Cui as unsympathetic to the spirit of the illustration. The implicit criticism of Orthodox Confucianism is further afrmed by the choice of the oral motif against the blue canvas. The motif of the ower—most likely a tree peony—alludes to Tang Xianzu’s famous play The Peony Pavilion, which upholds the concept of ‘qing,’ or sincere emotion, which was employed to attack the Orthodox Confucianists’ superciality and hypocrisy during the late Ming period. If the illustration suggests a structure of multiple embedded realities, it likewise suggests that these realities are permeable and uid rather than inviolate. Offstage puppets are usually hung from the bar that we see to the left rear of the stage; this way they remain hidden from the audience and within reach. In the illustration, however, the four offstage puppets hang from the left rafter of the stage roof, where they are neither hidden nor within reach. This odd departure from actual practice is meant to suggest that the puppets are neither squarely in the world dened by the screen nor squarely in the world dened by the

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stage, but straddle an ambiguous middle ground. The puppets bridge the front stage and the backstage, and seem to open a channel of communication, inuence, and passage between the puppet reality and puppeteer reality. The placement of the puppeteers’ hands, meanwhile, establishes clear interpenetration between the two worlds. As mentioned above, puppeteers usually take great pains to remain hidden and thus preserve the illusion that their show represents a self-sufcient and autonomous reality. In this case, however, the puppeteers seem almost intentionally to superimpose their hands over the puppet screen. This subverts the integrity of the puppet reality and afrms the open channel between the two realities suggested by the four hanging puppets. At the same time, this superimposition emphasizes that the puppet’s reality is embedded in some reality beyond it. The placement of the musician and the drum also reafrms the theme of communication and penetration between the musician’s reality and the puppeteers’ reality. Placing the musician on a platform beyond the stage emphasizes that the puppeteers’ reality, no less than that of the puppets, is embedded in a larger frame beyond it. What’s more, the puppeteer’s performance is controlled by the tempo and the rhythm of the music, just as the puppets are controlled by the puppeteers. Thus the separation of the musician from the puppeteers’ world subverts the illusion that the puppeteers are autonomous and self-sufcient. Wu Hung offers a very different interpretation of this illustration in his study The Double Screen, presenting it as an example of a ‘metapicture.’ Wu describes the ‘metapicture’ as an image containing another image, a picture that stages the ‘self knowledge’ of pictures.28 In keeping with Wu’s conception of the ‘metapicture:’ the stage structure is at once an image-bearer that frames the puppet screen and an image that is framed by the illustration itself. The illustration is thus an instance of the double-screen motif that is the subject of Wu’s book. The illustration is an interesting and unusual instance of the double-screen motif, but Wu is preoccupied with issues of reality and representation specic to Western art history and philosophy. Wu considers the motif of the double screen an aesthetic device by which a painting acknowledges itself as an instance of the very artice that it embeds. This kind of self-reference is indeed explored in Western ‘metapictures’ like René Magritte’s The Human Condition, but the Chinese version of the

28

Wu Hung, The Double Screen, 237.

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‘metapicture’ has an entirely different philosophical agenda. The intellectual culture of the late Ming period did not entail this Western urge to confess the illusion of art. Quite the opposite, in fact, late Ming culture tended to see artistic representation as an embodiment not of illusion but of reality. In his discussion of this Xixiang ji illustration, Wu Hung himself reverts to a similar conception, describing the puppets as controlled by “two performers who hover over the screen like two giants from outer space.”29 It indicates an almost unconscious recognition of the metaphysical issues at stake. The notion of “two giants from outer space” has more to recommend it than the notion of aesthetic self-reference, at least from a traditional Chinese perspective. It at least equates the puppet with the human world, and grasps the principle of embedded realities. Wu Hung cannot quite suppress the very Chinese notion that our own stage is crossed by invisible puppet strings. The screen in the illustration of the 1640 edition of Xixiang ji has functions analogous to the screen in performance illustration, as discussed in chapter three. In performance illustration, the screen is an indispensable part of the composition, not only dening the space of a stage but transforming the space into a naturalistic location, like a garden, a street, or a natural setting. The screen lends the scene variety and particularity, where the stage would otherwise be merely generic, and assists the imagination in the attempt to picture the stage world as real. This function is evident in performance illustrations like those in Duanfa ji (gure 3–17), in Shuangfeng qiming ji (gure 3–19), and in Zixiao ji (gure 3–22). In these cases, the performers are shown before the naturalistic scenery of the screen and the audience is expected to perceive the stage transformed into a real world unto itself. The artice of the stage—in terms of both the screen and the performer—is transcended. In this sense, there is a conation of the real and the unreal, just as described in the poetry of Li Bai, Yuan Hongdao or Wang Siren, as quoted above. If the screened stage enacts the conation of the real and the unreal, the use of puppets in the Min Qiji puppet stage would seem to obstruct this dynamic, as the puppets themselves seem irredeemably articial. As puppets are made of wood and clearly controlled by human agency, it is particularly difcult to overlook or imagine away their inanimate condition. Moreover, the clear foregrounding of the puppet stage over

29

Ibid., p. 259.

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against the reality of the puppeteer’s world is the constant reminder of the stage’s artice. On the other hand—seen from the reverse perspective—the puppet lends an air of reality to the world of the puppeteers, on the implicit assumption that any world that contextualizes a ctive world must itself be real. The puppeteers are revealed—in opposition to actual practice, then and now—in order to suggest this complicated interplay of the real and the unreal. It becomes an oversimplication to say that the stage is less real than the backstage world of the puppeteers; reality and unreality is ambiguous, and this ambiguity by implication encompasses the world of the reader. The illustration is further complicated by the oral design of the stage roof, which seems itself to be a kind of screen, and create a naturalistic background over against the stage-like blankness of the illustration’s ultimate frame. The oral motif of the roof, indeed, is perfectly consistent with the typical nature designs of both household and dramatic screens. The roof thus seems to serve the same function with regard to the puppeteers that the screen serves with regard to the puppets. Wu Hung is correct in thinking that the entire stage is a ction, but this overlooks the ontological nuances of this ction. It is indeed a ction, but a more complicated ction than Wu seems to acknowledge. This conation of the real and the unreal within the context of the puppet show is not a trick or eccentricity of this particular illustration, but is grounded in an established body of thought that draws an analogy between the puppet and the human being. Again, the point is to subvert the sense that our reality is privileged and to assert our own puppet-like embeddedness in some larger frame. The analogy between the human and the puppet is most clearly reected in the tradition of ‘esh puppetry’ (rou kuilei), in which children dressed as puppets act on an oversized puppet stage, mimicking as closely as possible the slightly stiff and mechanical movement of puppets. We see this also in the Nanguan xi (Southern Musical Theater) in Taiwan, in which adult actors likewise mimic the characteristic movement of puppets. In both cases, there is an attempt to make overt an implicit sense of the analogy between the puppet’s reality and our own. This implicit sense is inscribed throughout Chinese literature and drama. In his vignette “What I Saw Yesterday” (Zuo jian), for example, the 16th-century playwright Xu Wei tells of meeting a puppeteer who has dismantled his puppets for use as rewood. Xu is horried by this act of butchery perpetrated against what he considers animate beings. He tells the dismantled puppets: “How can [the puppeteer] forget that your virtue

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and hard work have fed him for these past twenty springs.”30 The puppeteer defends his actions, but addresses himself to the puppets, which seems to concede Xu’s point. The puppeteer says: Even when you were puppets, I considered you no more than rewood. You had no idea that I thought this way. If I wanted you to sing, you would raise your horn; if I wanted you to dance, you would rise on your toes. If I were angry, your lips would shut; if I were happy, your lips would open. Pulled and controlled by me, you were as me. You yourself did not understand this, and now you scandalize my intention to [use you as] rewood.31

Even as he insists on the inanimate condition of the puppets, the puppeteer falls into self-contradiction by treating them as if they were animate, with ideas and expectations of their own. Moreover, the defensiveness of the puppeteer betrays his anxiety that the puppets are real and hence protected by the moral laws governing the human world, in which case he has committed a criminal act. The line “er ji ru wo zi”—translated as “you were as me”—is crucially ambiguous: it implies that the puppets were a mere physical extension of the puppeteer, but also that the puppets were themselves fully endowed beings analogous to the puppeteer. In the view held by Xu Wei and implicitly by the puppeteer himself, the relation between the puppet and the human worlds cannot be reduced to a simple dichotomy of the real and the unreal, or the actual and the ctive. The analogy between the puppet and the human being is notable also in another piece by Xu Wei, the four-line poem “Painting Inscription for Visitors from Hangzhou,” which was originally inscribed on a painting of a puppet stage. The poem reads: The puppets in front of the curtain are not real, Though painted in the semblance of my neighbors and their neighbors. I go on to think of Heaven as a place where a canopy is spread. Who is not a character upon a stage!32

If the vignette equates the puppet and the human on the basis of their equivalent reality, the poem equates them on the ground of their equivalent unreality. There is no paradox here, as reality is relative. All worlds are real relative to the worlds they embed and unreal relative

30 31 32

Xu Wei, Xu Wenchang sanji, Shang Rui 1600 edition, 4.29a. Ibid., 4.29a. Ibid., 11.43a–b.

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to the worlds by which they are embedded. The human world is the artice of some deeper, hidden reality, as the puppet world is the artice of the human world. Human beings and puppets are thus essentially analogous, each controlled by strings they do not perceive or understand. The analogy between the puppet world and the human world is also evident in drama, and spectacularly so in the zaju-style play Zhen kuilei or The Real Puppet, written during the Wanli era. Authorship is not certain, but the play is most often attributed to the 16th-century playwright Wang Heng (1564–1607), the son of the famous Prime Minister Wang Xijue (1534–1610), the brother of the celebrated female Taoist Tanyang zi (died in 1580).33 In the play, the protagonist, Du Yan (978–1057), a retired prime minister, attends a performance in which actors appear in the guise of puppets. He ends up in a dispute with local villagers in the audience as to which folk-tale is being acted. Each of the several stories included in the performance ends with the audience interrupting to ask what story is being acted, thus breaking down the distinction between the actors and the audience. (Stage direction: a musician backstage plays the ute, the wai is dressed as a young ofcial and leads the drunken prime minister onto the stage, the ofcial kneels and remonstrates with the prime minister, the prime minister becomes angry and exits the stage.) (The audience asks) What story is this? (The actors answer) This is a story about the Prime Minister of Han drinking in the Secretariat Hall.34

The play, then, includes a performance (the puppet/actors) within a performance (the audience/actors). When the play is staged, presumably, the mock ‘audience’ is at the back of the stage, so as not to obscure

33 In Guqu zayan, Shen Defu (1578–1642) attributes the play to Wang Heng (3:214). But in Yuanshan Tang jupin, Qi Biaojia (1602–1645) attributes the play to Chen Jiru (1558–1639), who reputedly wrote it while he was a guest in the home of Wang Heng (4:143). As Shen Defu was a contemporary of both Wang Heng and Chen Jiru, his attribution is perhaps more credible. A Wanli edition of Zhen Kuikei held in Naikaku Bunko in Japan does not indicate its author, while the Sheng Ming zaju edition printed in 1629 indicates that it was written by an unknown gure from Lüye Tang (1a, 6:3139). But according to Fu Xihua in Ming dai zaju quanmu, the Xijiang ji edition printed by Meng Chengshun in 1633 notes that it is written by Wang Heng as a birthday present for Mr. Wang Jingshi (129). It seems that the authorship fell into obscurity soon after the play was written. 34 Wang Heng, Zhen kuilei, 4a–b. The same edition of the play is also included in Yang Jialuo, ed., Quan Ming zaju, vol. 6.

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the view of the real audience; illustrations of this type of performance within a performance usually suggest this stage arrangement as, for example, the illustration from Yipengxue (gure 1–1). As the actors and the audience members engage in this discussion, the boundary between the stage and the oor is erased, and the boundary between the real and the unreal is blurred. Further blurring these boundaries, imperial messengers interrupt the play to deliver two royal edicts to Du Yan. As he can only receive these edicts while wearing the robes of the prime minister, Du Yan borrows a puppet costume version of the robes from the actors, thus guratively becoming not only an actor but a puppet. The playwright Wang Heng is entirely conscious of the ambiguity he has orchestrated, as he discloses in the very last words of the play, sung in chorus: Those who act straddle the real and the unreal. Who among the spectators is real, who unreal?35

This concluding remark leaves little doubt as to the play’s philosophic intent. Like Zhou Wenju’s painting of the emperor watching the chess game, the play consciously attempts to disorient the viewer and bafe the sense of a privileged reality. With everyday certainties thrown into question, the viewer becomes open to the idea of his own ‘unreality.’ The relationship between the stage and the audience embodied in this play, furthermore, is a useful model for understanding the less overt dynamics of the Min Qiji illustration. In both cases, the instability holding between the multiple embedded realities of the ctive world, implies an analogous instability holding between all realities, including the seemingly ‘real’ world of the viewer and whatever exists beyond it. Indeed, it seems that these embedded realities are intended to destabilize the assumption that the ‘real’ world—the viewer’s world, our world— represents a privileged reality. In this respect, Zhen kuilei and the Min Qiji illustration are analogous to Zhou Wenju’s double-screen painting of the chess game: two realities and temporal frames exist simultaneously in the play, in the illustration, and in the painting, respectively, while the audience becomes implicated in the pattern of embedded reality. To follow Wu Hung and posit the screen and the puppet stage as merely formal devices, as images that self-consciously indicate their

35

Wang Heng, Zhen kuilei, 11a.

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own status as images, is to miss the grand philosophy of life that the artists subtly but with great complexity intended to suggest. On the basis of this ontological ambiguity, the ‘puppet’ (kuilei, which also denotes actors) became during the late Ming period one of the most pervasive metaphors for humans, ‘puppet theater’ (kuilei juchang)36 one of the most pervasive metaphors for the human world, and drama one of the most pervasive metaphors for human life.37 In his preface to a 1616 edition of Xixiang ji, the publisher He Bi adopts a conception remarkably analogous to the conception of embedded realities that displayed in the paintings, illustrations, and plays discussed above, commenting on the aesthetic and the actual, respectively: “This is an unreal drama, while our drama is real,” the interesting point being that our ‘reality’ is essentially ‘dramatic.’ And further: “This is a small theater, but the theater we occupy is large.”38 The Min Qiji illustration of the puppet performance thus invites its audiences to contemplate their own life, by offering an implicit metaphor for their own life (gure 5–5). Even the more naturalistic illustration in Sancai tuhui shares something of this metaphorical suggestion, placing the puppet theater within the frame of a human-scale theater rather in a garden, or a wild, or a market place, as would have been more likely in actual fact (gure 5–6). The puppet theater is portable, after all, for the purposes of being transported to temporary locations. The illustration, it will be noticed, echoes He Bi’s conception of a small theater within a larger theater—and this larger theater, by implication, itself a small theater in some yet larger theater. Though utilizing entirely different designs, the illustrators of the Min Qiji edition of Xixiang ji and the Wanli edition of Sancai tuhui, then, posit very similar philosophies of life. All of this material helps us to make sense of the illustration from the 1640 edition of Xixiang ji by establishing a wider cultural precedent for it and couching its seeming peculiarities as part of a formal tradition. Like these plays, paintings, and poems, the illustration includes a screen that is to be understood as real on the basis of an analogy to a larger frame (the stage structure) that in turn is to be understood as real on the basis of an analogy to the larger frame—our own human world. In

36 Xie, Zhaozhe, Wu za zu, Li Weizhen 1608 edition, 15.38b. Zhang Dafu, Meihua caotang ji, 1.5b. 37 Xie Zhaozhe, Wu za zu, 15.36b–37a. 38 He Bi, “Prefece to Xixiang ji” (1616), in Cai Yi, ed., ZGGDXQXBHB, 2:641.

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the same way, the puppets are to be understood as real on the basis of an analogy to the puppeteers who are in turn to be understood as real on the basis of an analogy to ourselves. The illustration would establish this pattern of embeddedness so compellingly that we must question the status of our own reality. The assumption that the ‘real’ world—our world—represents a privileged reality is destabilized. Perhaps we too are just as much actors as audience, our performance framed by some reality we do not comprehend. In this assault on everyday assumptions the illustration can be seen as part of the Neo-Confucianist movement of the late Ming period. In keeping with Neo-Confucianism, the illustration accepts that limitations are imposed on human autonomy and self-sufciency, but it conceives these limitations as following from a universal order rather than from an arbitrary ethical code. The human condition is not altered, but it is elevated by the possibility of a more sublime resignation. One might object that paintings, or puppet stages, or illustrations—whatever the case may be, and whatever ontological complexities involved—are ultimately exactly what they seem from a commonsense perspective: not reality, but highly suggestive art. The late Ming playwright Tu Long ( jinshi in 1577) answers this skepticism in a 1598 preface to his own play Tanhua ji, arguing not for the reality of art, but for the unreality of the world. Art, in this case, is not real, but it is no less real than anything else: The ten thousand karmas of the world are unreal, and the drama is the unreal within the unreal. If one is enlightened by the unreal within the unreal [drama] and by this brought to an understanding that the myriad karmas are unreal, then drama is not injurious, but benecial. If one construes as real the unreality of the myriad karmas, one suffers the injury of being born into a life of mundane suffering. If one construes as real the unreal within the unreal [drama], one suffers again the overowing sadness and the seduction of desire. People do not understand that the mundane world is only a big theater, and that birth and age, illness and death, are only separation and reunion, sadness and happiness, played out in this big theater.39

Whether the stage is ‘real’ or unreal, Tu Long indicates that what is at stake is not the status of the theater but the status of human life, for the one thing Tu clearly afrms is that any dichotomy between the

39

Tu Long, “Preface to Tanhua ji,” in Tanhua ji, Tianhui Lou edition, 2a–2b.

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actual and aesthetic is false, and that each reects the fundamental nature of things. What’s true for the puppet, is true for the man. Tu sees these ‘blurred boundaries’ between the actual and the aesthetic as an opportunity to free oneself from false dichotomies and to come to terms with this unity of being. To succeed or fail in this understanding is to succeed or fail in life. The essential quality in human beings, then, is a kind of a creative imagination that allows one to transcend the perspective of common sense, as Tu indicates: All the images of the sages and worthies are composed of clay and wood [i.e. are statues]. If one sees the sages and worthies in the clay and wood, then the clay and wood are the sages and worthies. [. . .] If one sees those on stage as the sages and worthies, then those on stage are the sages and worthies.40

Tu Long urges a creative vision by which statues and actors become real, and to see otherwise is profane.41 The ‘blurring of boundaries’ is not merely a dynamic of art, but a movement beyond the illusion of everyday life, an intimation of hidden truth.

The Relation of Woodblock Prints and Painting The Min Qiji illustration of the puppet stage and Zhou Wenju’s doublescreen painting of the chess game are distinguished in two ways. Most obviously, illustrations are mass-produced, while every painting is unique. So too illustration is rendered through the medium of the printing block, while painting is rendered through the more subtle and expressive medium of brush and ink. This expressiveness is suggested, for example, by Tang Dai (1673–?) in an essay in Huishi fawei: People in the past composed their painting such that the movement of the brush is yang, and the stillness of the ink is yin. To encompass the ether with the brush is yang. To emit color with ink is yin. Experiencing yin and yang allows one to use brush and ink. Thus, when any painting is completed, whether as large as the arrangement of mountains and valleys, or as small as trees, rocks, sand, and water, nothing is not rened and perfect, lively and touching.42

40 41 42

Ibid., 2:2b. Ibid., 2:2b. Tang Dai, Huishi fawei, in Meishu congshu, 1.5.1, 14b–15a.

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The difference between illustration and painting was noticed by Zheng Yingtai (active . early seventeenth century) of Puyang, who questioned the equivalence of the two mediums in “The Evaluation of the Paintings in Yunyu” (Yunyu Huapin), a preface to Qinglou yunyu printed in 1616: The current [printed] catalogues with paintings of famous artists that I have read are deled and useless volumes, and I feel sorry for those famous artists. Alas! How can paintings be printed?43 The thought inspires the brush, and the ink is controlled by ethereal forces. Only the Creator is able to mold objects with ethereal force and ll the universe, and only painters can endow images with spirit. When the Heaven moves and the spirit comes, [the painters] can enclose the universe inside a foot long frame. If even those painters who set their minds to imitating and copying [famous artists] have neglected and lost the spirit, how can prints equal paintings?44

While recognizing the difference between illustration and painting, it is obvious that Zheng Yingtai’s critique functions only as a prelude to his acclaim of Zhang Mengzheng, the compiler of Qinglou yunyu, who transcends the limitations of illustration as a genre, and somehow manages to raise illustration to the level of painting. Zheng argues that Zhang Mengzheng’s illustration embodies the methods and techniques of the best painters of the Tang, Jin, Song, and Yuan dynasties, and that his landscapes are comparable with the work of the painters.45 Though skeptical of illustration in general, Zheng implies that the deciency lies with the common run of illustrators, and not with illustration as an artistic medium. In the hands of Zhang, illustration is elevated to the artistry of painting. Zheng Yingtai’s critique of illustration might well be understood as a kind of hyperbole deployed to laud all the more extravagantly the work of Zhang. The notion implicit in Zheng’s essay—that illustration is not necessarily inferior to painting—was in fact common. The Ming scholar Yang Shen, for example, writes in his Huapin, an anthology of painting criticism:

43 ‘Printed’ is a translation of pu, which denotes a kind of book containing images or musical scripts. In this context, Zheng Yingtai used the word to connote the type of books containing printed images, and emphasize that these images are printed rather than painted. 44 Zheng Yingtai, “The Evaluation of the Paintings in Yunyu,” 1a, in Zhang Mengzheng, ed., Qinglou yunyu, 1616 edition, in Zhongguo gudai banhua congkan, 2nd series, 4:19. 45 Ibid., 1b.

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The Shu monk Chu An painted landscapes on fans. He placed the Terrace of Gusu or the Pavilion of King Teng on his fans. The thousands of mountains and ten thousand waters are all in front of the eyes. The blocks now used to print fans in the Shu area are the legacy of Chu An’s fan painting.46

Chu An’s skill as a landscape painter makes his painted fans a locus of the blurred boundaries between the real and the unreal, and Yang Shen’s comment suggests that the latter-day printing blocks, and presumably the printed fans themselves, are an attempt to replicate the dynamic of Chu An’s painted fans—to bring the scenery before the eyes. In Yang’s argument, the fans illustrated with printing blocks continue a tradition begun with painting; the turn toward illustration seems irrelevant to the continuation of the tradition, implying at least a potential artistic equivalency between illustration and painting. As both Zheng and Yang imply, illustration is not necessarily inferior to painting, though as a genre, perhaps, it must struggle to overcome the expressive limitations of the woodblock. In Yang’s comment, the distinction between the painted and printed fans is not given any signicant consideration, even with relation to the blurred boundaries between the real and the unreal, which is the highest artistic objective. This conception of illustration as a locus of blurred boundaries was common in the late Ming period, as demonstrated in the criticism of many publications famous for their woodblock illustrations. Hainei qiguan, an anthology of landscape illustrations published in 1610 by Yibai Tang, inspired three literati—Chen Deyuan, Ge Yinliang, and Fang Shanxian—to exclaim at the conation of the aesthetic and the actual in different prefaces to the edition. Chen Deyuan writes that the illustrator’s “brush tip miniaturizes all phenomena,” and that the illustrations are “one-foot frames that encompass one thousand peaks, and make seemingly visible red cliffs and green walls, and make ostensibly audible the cries of gibbons and cranes.”47 In praising Yang Erceng (active c. 1610s), the compiler of Hainei qiguan, Ge Yinliang writes: [Yang] investigates the division and union of the universe, chooses the profound and singular mountains and waters, explores the danger and safety of the paths, scrutinizes the rise and fall of the past and present,

46

Yang Shen, Huapin, 1.10a. Chen Deyuan, “Introduction to Hainei qiguan,” 2a, in Yang Erceng, ed., Hainei qiguan, Yibai Tang 1610 edition, in Zhongguo gudai banhua congkan, 2nd series, 8:3. 47

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chapter five and miniaturizes all so that one can voyage while sitting at one’s desk. In one glance, these singular views are in front of the eyes, thus without setting one’s feet on mountain layers and cliffs one’s body will be as if among the red cliffs and green walls.48

The distinction between painted and illustrated scenery does not occur to these two preface writers, nor does the fact of print reproduction alter their comments. Comparing Zong Bing and Yang Erceng in his preface, Chen Deyuan indicates that the essential distinction between illustration and painting has nothing to do with aesthetic quality, but with the social consideration that a painting is for individual enjoyment, while the same illustration can be enjoyed by many people: Long ago Zong Shaowen [Zong Bing] sighed to himself that his footprints had not yet been left among the famous mountains. He thus painted [the mountains] on his four walls and reclined while he voyaged among them. He often played zither and let the mountains reverberate. It is Yang Erceng’s intention to imitate this ancient gure. While Zong’s entertainment was only for his own eyes, Yang extended [his mountain voyage] to those who share the same interest. Although they had the same enterprise, their scopes were completely different.49

What distinguishes illustration and painting is not artistic technique or quality, but accessibility and circulation. This reproducibility not only does not interfere with the audience’s perception of the blurred boundaries between the real and the unreal, but allows more beholders to experience and share the same perception. In this sense, each reproduced copy is unique to its own audience, a circumstance analogous to photography as described by David Freedberg in his study The Power of Images: It is not mortal because it is reproductive and reproducible. It is alive, present, and real. [. . .] Because of the fact of reproduction, every image has become reality and is a witness of what is, what has been, and therefore of what will always remain.50

In Freedberg’s argument, the reproduced photograph is by no means less meaningful for being a reproduction. On the contrary each photograph is perceived individually and becomes unique in its given context.

48 49 50

Ibid., 2b–3a (8:10–11). Ibid., 2b–3a (8:4–5). David Freedberg, The Power of Images, 440.

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The possibility of realizing actual experience in the aesthetic realm is a prized aspect of the painting tradition, as it makes unnecessary the hardship of travel. In his preface—dated 1610, where the other two prefaces are dateless—Fang Shanxian (active during early seventeenth century) writes that Hainei qiguan allows “those who voyage as they recline (or arm-chair travelers) to be spared the hardship of vehicles and horses and witness the scenery within the grip of their hands, and to extend their inner feelings beyond pictures without going out of doors.”51 The same opinion appears again in Dong Qichang’s comment on Picture of Xiaoxiang (Xiaoxiang tu), allegedly painted by Dong Yuan (?–962). After he compared the real scenery with the painting, Dong Qichang offered his comments in terms of the conation of realities: “It allows people once again to be travelers to the Xiang River without moving their feet.”52 Fang and Dong respectively viewed illustrations and paintings in the same terms suggests that the two artistic genres were comparable or even interchangeable in their functions. This view was also expressed by Tang Guoshi in his “Preface to Maps” (Dili tuxu) in Sancai tuhui, edited by Wang Qi and published during the Wanli period. Tang writes that without illustrations “those who voyage while reclining as did Shaowen [Zong Bing] would suffer from confusion.”53 Illustration, then, is equal to painting as a springboard to the kind of ‘touring’ practiced by Zong Bing. The equivalency between illustration and painting extends also to the exercise of magical powers that the common people of the late Ming period believed to be inherent in certain images, providing protection from harm or inicting harm as the case may be. The issue of totemic magic is broad and complex, but for our purposes it sufces to say that images were considered equally potent whether represented in the medium of illustration or painting. In his miscellany Shuying, Zhou Lianggong (1612–1672) indicates this equivalency: It is said that to hang paintings of water in the house can prevent re, and thus most of the walls of the old temples are painted with the image of water. The rear wall of the Buddha Hall in the Temple of Taiping in Changzhou was painted with the image of water by Xu You. During the war, the other houses of the temple were burned down but this hall alone survives and stands erect. Some said that it was saved by the power of

51 52 53

Fang Shanxian, “Foreword to Hainei qiguan” (dated 1610), 2a (8:15). Dong Qichang, Huayan, 10b–11a. Tang Guoshi, “Preface to Maps,” in Wang Qi, ed., Sancai tuhui, 2a.

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chapter five the painted water. A rear wall of the Temple of Bocai in Zhaozhou was painted with the image of water by Wu Daozi. The temple has survived even to this day. People in our region of Liang, both nobles and commoners, like to hang prints of water made from the woodblocks produced in Zhaozhou. To look at the walls, there is no family without painted water. After the River Bian ooded, people took the painted water as an inauspicious image [. . .]54

Although Zhou Lianggong goes on to state that he himself attributes no magical power to the image of water, the above quotation indicates that he was in an extreme minority. In the view of the people in the Liang region, a printed image bears the same function as a painted image even in terms of magical power. The magic power of the printed image is not lessened by mass production, but allows more people to benet (or to suffer) from the power of the image. This tendency to conate the function of illustrations and paintings—whether aesthetic or magic—is repeatedly exhibited in prefaces and post-faces to publications renowned for their illustrations, as for example in Xingtian Jushi’s 1633 preface to Shizhu Zhai shuhua pu 55 and in Zhang Wanxuan’s 1648 preface to Taiping shanshui tuhua, illustrated by Xiao Yuncong.56 During the late Ming period, moreover, there was the tendency to locate illustration and painting in the same pictorial tradition. Many illustrated editions—such as Gushi huapu (rst printed in 1604, then revised and reprinted in 1613), Shizhu Zhai shuhua pu, Shiyu huapu (printed in 1612), Tangshi huapu (printed during the Wanli period), Sancai tuhui, Hainei qiguan—include prefaces and post-faces that clearly suggest that relation between illustration and painting, often using the same terms, tu or hua, to describe both media. The implication is that these two media jointly and equally constitute the pictorial tradition. In a 1604 preface to Gushi huapu, Zhu Zhifan ( jinshi in 1595) writes that one of illustration’s most important functions is to preserve the content of paintings given the possibility that the original paintings may some day be lost. [. . .] If [paintings] are not collected in the form of catalogues by those skilled in this art, [paintings] will not only be scattered and without organization, but also will be lost easily during transmission.57

54

Zhou Lianggong, Shuying, 4.97–8. Hu Zhengyan, Shizhu Zhai shuhua pu, 2b–3a. 56 Xiao Yuncong, Taiping shanshui tuhua, in Zhongguo gudai banhua congkan, 2nd series, 8:2–3. 57 Gu Bing, Gushi huapu, 331. 55

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Zhu thus implies that illustration, to the extent that it may serve as an adequate substitute, fullls the essential functions of painting. What is experienced through the medium of paintings can also be legitimately experienced through the medium of illustration.

The Encounter in Images with Figures from the Past Both illustration and painting allow the beholder of painting and the reader of illustrated books to conate their own reality and the reality represented, but just as importantly to conate their own time and the time represented. Kang Bofu suggests as much in his 1580 preface to the anthology of art criticism Huimiao: Whenever I come across [a painting that] clutches my heart, it makes me feel like forgetting about sleep and food, and overlooking winter and summer. I can almost encounter in my mind the famous people and celebrated locations of the past hundred or thousand years, and esteem them with my own eyes.58

Painting not only allows Kang Bofu to lose consciousness of his own particular moment and circumstance, but calls to mind—as almost an alternate reality—the circumstances of the past. This personal encounter of both places and gures is made possible by the depiction of images that blur the boundaries between the real and the unreal. As He Liangjun considered the ability to voyage through the space of painting to be an indication of true connoisseurship, so the ability to voyage through the time of painting is considered a similar measure of connoisseurship. The Northern Song artist and calligrapher Mi Fu’s (1051–1107) distinction between a dilettante and a connoisseur has been very inuential and has been quoted frequently by later Chinese critics, even to this day: The dilettante and the connoisseur belong to two ranks insofar as the connoisseur is entirely devoted to art. He reads broadly in the eld and thus obtains knowledge; sometimes he himself knows how to paint. Thus his own art collection is rened. Some people in recent generations [collect art] not because they love art but because they have money. They

58 Kang Bofu, “Preface to Huimiao,” preface 1b, in Mao Yixiang, Huimiao, in Beijing Tushuguan guji zhenben congkan, 78:161.

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chapter five hope to show their taste, so they rely on the recommendations of others. These are what we call dilettantes.59

The distinction between a dilettante and a connoisseur is further elaborated by the Yuan Dynasty art historian Tang Hou (active c. 1291–1328), who describes the difference in his work on painting theory Hualun: Yuanzhang [courtesy name of Mi Fu] said that a dilettante and a connoisseur belong to two ranks. [People] who have money and desire fame and esteem, but collect art only by listening to hearsay are what we call dilettantes. Connoisseurs, however, are bright and intelligent; they read transmitted records; some can paint; and they understand the meaning of painting. Whenever they obtain a painting, they treasure and appreciate it all day as if they are facing the men of old times; and they will not be distracted even in the midst of entertainment.60

Tang Hou largely repeats the terms of Mi Fu’s distinction, but he adds a crucial emphasis in the phrase “as if they were facing the men of old times,” which suggests that the connoisseur is so engrossed in the experience of art that he undergoes a kind of temporal dislocation, much as he undergoes a kind of spatial dislocation in the description of Hong Mai and Chen Zhensun. Tang’s elaboration was very inuential and was quoted repeatedly by art critics during the late Ming period, including Mao Yixiang in his Huimiao,61 the dramatist Gao Lian (active during the Wanli period) in his miscellany Yanxian qingshang qian,62 and the publisher Mao Jin in his Haiyue zhilin.63 It is signicant that none of these art critics quote the original passage from Mi Fu, of which they would certainly have been aware, but instead quote the passage as amended by Tang Hou, implying that Tang’s emphasis on temporal dislocation was particularly compelling. This conation of time through image had been an important conception at least since the Southern Song period and the work of Chen Zhensun, but in the Ming period it became a preoccupation, pervading discussions of art, drama (as discussed in chapter four), garden design, and the experience of reading (to be discussed in chapter six), as part of the period’s obsession with reclaiming the past.

59 60 61 62 63

Mi Fu, Huashi, in Meishu congshu, 2.9.1, 13a–b. Tang Hou, Hualun, in Meishu congshu, 3.7.1, 3b. Mao Yixiang, Huimiao (preface dated 1580), 4a–b, (78:163). Gao Lian, Yanxian qingshang qian, in Meishu congshu, 3.10.2, 41a. Mao Jin, Haiyue zhilin, 15b, in Biji xiaoshuo daguan 7 (1983), vol. 14.

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Images not only afford a general passage into earlier times, but allow—or seem to allow—personal interaction with historical gures. When the beholder is particularly imaginative and attuned to a historical painting, the boundary between the real and the unreal becomes blurred, and the beholder seems to meet the historical gure in some ambiguous realm that is both real and unreal. The barrier of time is thus temporarily lifted, and direct spiritual communication with the virtuous ancients becomes possible—a highly desirable form of transcendence, as it was believed that the ancients were the greatest sages and could confer the deepest wisdom. The late Ming art critic Jiang Shaoshu (The Minister of Works in Nanjing in 1642) furnishes an example in his account of the painting The Picture of the Virtuous Gentleman (Gaoshi tu) by the Emperor Huizong of the Northern Song dynasty: The Picture of the Virtuous Gentleman Wei Xian was copied by the Emperor Huizong. A calligraphic inscription in narrow-gold style by His Majesty prefaces [the picture]. In my encounter with the depicted gentleman, the whiskers and eyebrows are alive as if I am actually conducting a conversation with a virtuous ancient.64

This kind of a-temporal encounter is vividly described in an anecdote about the founding emperor of the Ming Dynasty, Taizu, who conducted a conversation with a statuette of Emperor Shizu of the Yuan dynasty. In his Qixiu leigao, Lang Ying describes the encounter this way: After our [Emperor] Taizu took possession of the empire, he built a temple in which to offer sacrice to the emperors and kings of past dynasties. The sculpting of the statues was easy to complete from Fuxi downward, but not so the statue of [the Emperor] Shizu of the Yuan. The face [of the statute] was repeatedly soiled by tears. The sculptor repaired it over and over again, but his work was undone overnight. Emperor Taizu heard of this and went to the temple. [Taizu] pointed with his nger at the statue and said: “Stupid barbarian! It can be said that you alien people were lucky to enter and control China. Yet I do not discard you now because you were also the master of an age. I now own the world by a Heavenly mandate and have the support of the people. I do not harm or kill your offspring, but drive them back to the north. In this fashion I show benevolence toward your vanquished dynasty. What do you have to regret? Cry no more.” The sculptor reported the next morning that [the statute of ] Shizhu’s face cried no more tears.65

64 65

Jiang Shaoshu, Yunshi Zhai bitan, 2.3b, in Biji xiaoshuo daguan 7 (1983), vol. 14. Lang Ying, Qixiu leigao, 7.121.

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Taizu’s reprimand implies that he perceived the sculpted image as the historic gure Yuan Shizu himself, a perception accepted at face value by Lang Ying. In the meeting of the past and present emperors the otherwise impenetrable gulf of time is transcended. The chance not only to confront the past, but to engage in a dialogue with the virtuous ancients, and learn from their example, tempted the painter Xu Wei to search through painting for ideal companions from the past. On a painting of plum blossoms Xu Wei inscribed a brief poem indicating this motivation: Who delineates the Lonely Mountain of cranes and branches? Under the window in the early spring I casually inscribe the poem. It happens that the scenery this morning is similar [to my painting]. It is I who search for him in the time of snow.66

For Xu Wei, a painting is not primarily an artistic creation, nor an expression of his personal feelings, but a medium allowing the painter to meet the most desired ancient sages. In this case, Xu Wei seeks the famous hermit in the Northern Song dynasty Lin Bu (courtesy name Hejing, 957–1028), who planted plum trees about his home on The Lonely Mountain (Gu Shan), and declared himself married to the plum tree, and father to the cranes.67 The search for the ancient hermit suggests Xu Wei’s urge to follow Lin’s example of moral purity. In many cases, then, painting comes alive as a function of the moral desire of the beholder to learn directly from the virtuous ancients. As images enable this moral inspiration, they were considered virtuous. In addition to the ancient sages and kings, painters themselves were companions to be sought through the medium of their own painting, likewise in hope of moral enlightenment. Tang Yin indicates this pursuit in a poem inscribed on the painting The Autumn Color on the River Pavilion ( Jiangting qiuse) by the Yuan painter Ni Zan (1301–1374), who was renowned for his moral purity: Now Ni the stubborn has been gone for a hundred years. The familiar mountains and tall trees are among the mist. I open a scroll and survey the painting near a sunlit window. I can dimly see the ancient virtuous one among the faint ink.68

66

Xu Wei, Xu Wenchang wenji, supplementary, 1.5a, in Xu Wenchang sanji, 12.5a. Tian Rucheng, Xihu youlan zhi, in Wulin zhanggu congbian, Jiahui Tang of the Ding family 1897 edition, 22:1.6a–b. 68 Tang Yin, Tang Bohu xiansheng waibian xuke, 5.5b–6a. 67

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Tang Yin here declares that he sees the painter Ni Zan himself, despite the fact that Ni Zan’s paintings include no gures. What Tang Yin had seen was not the image of the painter but the personality embodied in the images of nature, which seemed to resurrect the painter himself. In most versions of the conation of time through image, the image enters the beholder’s world, but in some cases this dynamic works in reverse: the beholder enters the aesthetic world, and himself becomes a kind of imaged gure. In the above poem, Tang Yin seeks Ni Zan in the latter’s own painting; in the following poem, an inscription on Tang Yin’s painting A Person in the Ancient Pine-water Walled Pavilion Waiting for his Visitor (Gu song-shui bi ge zhong ren dai ke guo), the author, Xu Wei, imagines himself depicted in the painting. As he looks on the painting—which shows Tang seated in a ‘water pavilion’—he modestly casts himself in the role of a nearby sh: Tang Bohu [Tang Yin], a provincial graduate from Nanjing, Even his doodles, big and small, are classic. Who is this that sits in the pine-water walled pavilion? When one speaks of the swimming sh, should direct to me.69

Here the ambiguous space in which the actual and the aesthetic usually meet is claried as the space of the painting: Xu enters the painting entirely on its own terms. In this case there is not so much a conation of the past and present, as an obliteration of all temporal frames in the timeless image of the painting. Unlike Tang Yin’s description of temporal transcendence, which seems temporary and laborious insofar as the beholder has to struggle constantly to overcome his own reality, Xu implies an effortless entry into a timeless world that immediately becomes his own. Xu conceives time not as something to be transcended, but as something to be erased altogether. In another inscription to Painting of Snowscape (“Ti hua xuejing”), Xu expresses the desire to “jump into the painting and end there,”70 which epitomizes his general conception. This conception was shared by another late Ming art critic, Li Rihua, who in a poem titled “Small Scene” (Xiaojing) describes meeting the Tang poet Du Fu face to face in a painting: The ice and snow strengthen my bones. The mist and clouds generate charm by themselves.

69 70

Xu Wei, Xu Wenchang wenji, supplementary, in Xu Wenchang sanji, 1.4a (12.4a). Xu Wei, Xi Wenchang sanji, 6.43a–b.

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chapter five Mr. Du Lingweng from the past That I face right in the middle of the innite waves.71

It is interesting that in both Xu Wei and Li Rihua’s poems, the beholders seem to shed their personalities and their bodies, and enter into the imaginative scheme of the painting. Thus we see in the late Ming three ways of transcending time through image: Jiang Shaoshu represents a more traditional type in which the painted image emerges from the painting into an ambiguous temporal frame it shares with the beholder, while Xu Wei enters the painting and himself becomes an image. Li Rihua goes a step further, imagining not only a transcendence of time, but a transcendence of form (whether image or body), and a pure union of spirits. Li Rihua, then, imagines a space that is neither aesthetic nor actual: a timeless and formless realm of the mind. “The innite waves” of Li’s poem—without form or boundary or temporal location—represent this realm. In the conceptions offered by Jiang, Xu and Li, there is an expanding imaginative freedom by which one interacts with the past. In Jiang’s conception, it is necessary to engage the image of a historical gure in order to transcend time. In Xu’s conception, it is only necessary to be imaginatively inspired by something in the painting associated with the historical gure, like the plum blossom. In Li’s case the act of imagination is autonomous, requiring no inspiration from the image. The painting is merely a space for the projection of the imagination and does not dene the imagination’s boundaries. As the past is omnipresent in painting, it is also immanent in illustration, which was generally considered an analogous genre. Zhu Tianran (active during mid-fteenth century), a distant member of the imperial family, wrote in a 1498 preface to Lidai guren xiangzan, which portraits and recounts the lives of the ancient sages, that he wonders if his contemplation of the ancients were only a dream. Zhu answers his own question by asserting that in literature and history the minds of the ancients are revealed in utter clarity, as if they were actually present. He goes on to assert that in pictures the images of the ancients are equally revealed.72 Zhu viewed words and images as serving complementary

71

Li Rihua, Zhulan xu Huasheng, in Meishu congshu, 2.2.3, 10b. Zhu Tianran, “Preface to Lidai guren xiangzan,” in Lidai guren xianzan, 1498 edition, in Zhongguo gudai banhua congkan, 1st series, 1:395. Zheng Zhenduo indicates in his own postface that this edition was printed in 1475, but he fails to explain how Zhu’s 1498 preface could be included in a 1475 edition. In the reproduction included in Zhongguo gudai banhua congkan, only the date of the preface appears. 72

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roles, assisting the reader to understand both the inner thoughts and outer manner of the ancients. The implication is that by some combination of words and images the totality of the past can be uncovered and brought within the present. Words alone, however, are not sufcient to convey this totality. Hence the necessity not only for painting, but for illustration, which has a much larger audience. It seems natural that people are curious to know what historical gures look like, as Wu Jiamo ( jinshi in 1607) indicates in his 1589 preface to Kong sheng jiayu tu, which he edited: I obtained an edition [of Jiayu transcribed by Wang Wenke Gong]. I interpreted its meaning and contemplated freely the encounters of aristocrats and ofcials, and the voyages of the disciples of the Sages. It seemed that I had achieved something with my mind and my eyes, but I regretted for years that I was not able to witness their exemplary manners.73

Wu Jiamo had created mental images as he read (“with my mind and my eyes”), but those images were not sufciently actualized to satisfy his desire to enter into the reality of the past. He wishes to see not only with his mind’s eye, but with the eye itself. Wu Jiamo’s desire was not unusual, as the unknown publisher of Jiayu observes in his notes to the edition edited by Wu Jiamo: “From the Emperor, aristocrats, and ofcials [to those] who are young as children, distant as the four barbarians, humble as merchants, stupid as women, all desire to witness the manner of the Sage.”74 Consistent with this observation, the publisher chose for the frontispiece of Jiayu a portrait of Confucius that he considered ‘the most real’ (zui zhen) and thus was most likely to fulll the desire of his readers.75 As he writes in his preface, Wu’s desire to witness the “exemplary manners” of the ancients was eventually fullled by viewing the Pictures of the Sages’ Life (Sheng ji tu), a collection of pictures—it is not clear whether these were paintings, illustrations, or rubbings—obtained by his mentor Yang gong in “Confucius’ hometown” in 1587 and passed on to him. Wu Jiamo saw in these pictures the life of the Sage, and felt that “the experiences of the various marquises and ofcials, and the voyages of the disciples in those days, are fully illuminated.”76 Wu 73 Wu Jiamo, “Preface to Kongzi jiayu tu,” in Kong sheng jiayu tu, 1589 edition, in Zhongguo gudai banhua congkan, 2nd series, 9:1a. 74 “Publishing Notes to Jiayu tu,” 1a, in Wu Jiaomo, ed., Kong sheng jiayu tu. 75 Wu Jiamo, “Publishing Notes to Jiayu tu,” 1a. 76 Ibid., 1b.

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implies that this ‘illumination’ is not merely a matter of comprehension, but a matter of transcendent personal experience, as if the Sages were actually present: I was moved and amazed that even if unable to sit in his classroom to hear attentively the cough of the Sage, or unable to near his home in Lu to pay homage to the Sage, those scholars and gentlemen who were born after Confucius merely read his surviving books and witness his traces, what the Sage taught and exemplied during his years, and all is received as if face to face, and inherited in person.77

Words alone cannot create this sense of personal communion, but words and images together can approximate the reality of the past. A reader knows the Sage’s manners and appearance through images, and his mind through words. As Wu Jiamo says, “pictures and words must be joined, only then will the speech and movement of the Sage be complete.”78 Underlying Wu Jiamo’s desire to resurrect the past is a moral objective: with the sages and ancients brought more immediately before the present, their moral teaching becomes all the more compelling. This moral mission was taken very seriously by Ju Yingkui who compiled and published Ruishi liangying in 1637. He included in the volume his own illustrations so that readers “not only recite and follow the ne speech and rened deeds but also greet [the worthies] as if they were in the same hall,” as indicated in a 1637 preface by Zhu Tongfen.79 The words carry the morality of the worthies while the images not only show readers exemplary manners but also function to bring the worthies alive as mentors whose presence sets a moral tone and provides guidance.

The Encounter with the Figures from the Past in Drama Illustration During the Ming period, as discussed above, painting and illustration were widely conceived as analogous, and both could accommodate the conation of past and present through the blurred boundaries between the real and the unreal. Drama illustration—as specically distinct 77

Ibid., 1b–2a. Ibid., 2a. 79 Jin Zhong and Ju Yingkui, ed., Ruishi Liangying, in Zhongguo gudai banhua congkan, 2nd series, 9:1b–2a. 78

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from other forms of illustration—was considered in the same fashion as well. For example, Lu Rui in a preface to the Yan Ge edition of Xixiang ji published by Li Gaochen expresses the blurred boundaries between the aesthetic and the real: “Those [Li Gaochen] portraits in the illustrations are exactly as if they were physically present in the West Chamber.”80 Although illustration is a very abundant phenomenon in the late Ming printing and drama culture, comment like Lu’s that relates directly to illustration is very rare. In the late Ming, we can nd many examples concerning the conation of time through a play, but the commentators usually do not distinguish between the play as performed and as published/illustrated. Moreover, in most cases, references to a play or an edition usually commend it in general, but do not mention illustrations specically, though these are almost always included in the published edition, and are clearly a consideration in judging the quality of an edition. In a prologue to Dacheng ji, for example, Huangyu Xiansheng Gong claims that his play “relates [Confucius’] travel through various countries/As if [we] are witness to the Ancient Sage’s very complexion” (quoted in chapter four). In the context of the Wanli print culture, with its new emphasis on published plays, almost all of which were illustrated, it is unclear whether ‘Dacheng ji’ refers to the play exclusively in its acted form, or also encompasses the play in its written/illustrated form. Given the analogy between painting and illustration, then, it is helpful in our investigation of the conation of time to consider paintings of drama gures or scenes, and extend any insight to drama illustration. One such painting is Tang Yin’s portrait of Yingying, now in the private collection of Hou Zhenshang Zhai in Taipei (gure 5–7).81

80

Lu Rui, “Preface to Xixiang,” in Wu Yuhua, ed., Zhongguo gudai xiqu xuba ji, 174. The content of the complete collection of Hou Zhengshang Zhai is given in Suzuki Kei, Comprehensive Illustrated Catalog of Chinese Paintings, 2:II-2–13. The painting features Tang Yin’s signature, but no seal. The signature does not match the signature on the portrait of Ban jieyu painted by Tang Yin. The painting bears an inscription indicating that Tang Yin copied the painting from another painting by Wang Duo, who in turn copied the painting from Chen Juzhong, who in turn copied the painting from a Tang dynasty portrait. We can nd two painters named Wang Duo in Chinese painting history: one died in 884, long before Chen Juzhong’s time; and one was active from 1592 to 1652 almost seventy years after Tang Yin (1470–1523). Neither can be the Wang Duo mentioned in this inscription: one is too old to have copied Chen Juzhong, and the latter is too young to have been copied by Tang Yin. Assuming that Tang Yin would not have made such a mistake, and that there was no other Wang Duo now forgotten, the painting would seem to be a forgery. 81

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5–7. Tang Yin (attributed). Portrait of Yingying. Hou Zhenshang Zhai collection. Reproduced from Comprehensive Illustrated Catalog of Chinese Paintings, Vol. 2: Southeast Asian and European Collections, edited by Suzuki Kei, II-2, S 1-008. Tokyo: University of Tokyo Press, 1982.

Yingying is the heroine in one of China’s most famous short stories, Yingying zhuan by Yuan Zhen, but Tang Yin’s painting seems to derive explicitly from the representation of Yingying in Wang Shifu’s classic drama Xixiang ji. It is likely that the painting is a forgery, but the two poems inscribed on the painting are included in Tang Yin’s collected work, and thus presumably authentic.82 Although the actual painting mentioned in the two poems is apparently lost, the poems indicate that Tang Yin’s original inspiration was the stage, and specically Wang Shifu’s zaju version of Yingying’s story. This is revealed when Yingying and her maid Hongniang visit Zhang Gong at night, and knock on his door:

82 These two poems appear in the collected works of Tang Yin, Tang bohu xiangsheng waibian xuke, but in slightly different form. The second poem on the left-hand side of the painting is divided into two poems in Tang’s work (8.3a–b). These two poems are also collected in Tang Bohu shici gefu quanji, 113.

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By the light of a slanting moon, [Yingying] goes to her love assignation. The candle is out and in the shade of the wall The lady knocks on the door.83

The knocking on the door is clearly indicated in a stage direction in Wang Shifu’s version, but is not specied in any other version, suggesting that Tang Yin had Wang Shifu’s version in mind as he wrote his poem and painted his portrait of Yingying.84 This subtle allusion to Wang Shifu’s play would likely have recognized by his audience, and would have implied Yingying’s status as a dramatis persona. As Wu Hung writes in The Double Screen, inscription “inevitably changes the painting’s context and reading.”85 In this case, the inscribed poem invokes the theater, reinforcing the long-standing association between Yingying and the stage. Xu Wei describes Tang Yin’s original portrait of Yingying in the poem “Tang Bohu Paints Lady Cui” (Tang Bohu hua Cui shi): It seems as though I am meeting that person waiting for the moon. I do not know the date this evening. The drifting clouds were always dispersed in those years of the past. The foreign powder transmits emptily the beauty of her half face. It is difcult not to have an aged complexion after marriage. She who was copied in the painting must also have become aged. Hutou [Tang Bohu] was also a womanizer. He specically presents a beauty to move the common people.86

“This person” obviously refers to Yingying.87 The verb “encounter” (xiangfeng, literally means “to meet each other”) implies a kind of ontological ambiguity: he “encounters” Yingying as an image, but he also

83

Tang Yin, Tang Bohu xiansheng waibian xuke, 8.3a–4b. Wang Shifu, Xin jiaozhu guben Xixiang ji, 4.3b. 85 Wu Hung, The Double Screen, 45. 86 Xu Wei, Xu Wenchang sanji, 7.47a. 87 ‘Daiyue shen’ (this person waiting for the moon) is a phrase drawn from Yuan Zhen’s short story Yingying zhuan (The Story of Yingying). In the short story, the phrase (“Xixiang daiyue shen”) appears in a poem sent by Yingying to her lover Zhang Gong. The poem is adopted by both Dong jieyuan and Wang Shifu in their versions of the story about Yingying and Zhang Gong—Xixiang ji zhugong diao and Xixiang ji respectively. Subsequently the term ‘waiting for the moon in the west chamber’ has become a standard allusion to the story and to the heroine Yingying. In his poem “Stele for the Late Lord” (Xian gong bei), Zhao Bingwen (1159–1232) writes: “[ The Lord] also searched for [the person who wrote] the poem about waiting for the moon in the west chamber.” In this case, the allusion to Yingying is unmistakable, and she symbolizes the ideal companion desired by a man. 84

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5–8. Chen Juzhong (attributed). Portrait of Yingying. In Xixiang zalu, edited by Gu Xuanwei, 1.1a. N.p.: Zhongfang shuzhai, 1569.

5–9. Tang Yin (attributed). Portrait of Yingying. In Xixiang ji kao, Wanli. Reproduced from Zhongguo gudian wenxue banhua xuanji, edited by Fu Xihua, 1:338.

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“seems” ( fangfu) to encounter her as an actual person. Xu Wei indicates something of the temporal transcendence in the second line of the poem—“I do not know the date this evening”—which suggests the collapse of the normal temporal order. In the actual world time passes (as signied by the line “The drifting clouds were always dispersed in those years of the past”) but in the painting Xu nds a timeless realm in which Yingying is perennially young, as signied by the lines: “It is difcult not to have an aged complexion after marriage. / She who was copied in the painting should also have become aged.” Yingying is a ctional character, but it has generally been thought that she was based on an actual historical gure. Whether an actual person or ctional character, however, Yingying is a gure of the Tang period, and any encounter with her implies a transcendence of time. There survive two illustrations of Yingying attributed to Tang Yin, included respectively in Xixiang zalu edited by Gu Xuanwei and published in 1569 by Zhongfang Shuzhai (gure 5–8) and Xixiang ji kao published during the Wanli period (gure 5–9), both of which are drama publications offering yet further versions of Yingying’s story. The publishers use these illustrations to invoke the more famous painting by Tang Yin, and provide an experience for their readers analogous to viewing the painting itself. Presumably this experience includes the conation of time noted by Xu Wei in his poem. A gure from the past might make itself present through the medium of illustration just as through painting. Through the medium of drama illustration the characters of the stage are brought to life as well, but, like Yingying in Tang Yin’s portraits, they are brought to life as dramatis personae rather than as simply personae. Rather than the aesthetic becoming actual, the representation of performance becomes actual performance, recreating the experience of the theater. As discussed in chapter four, the experience of the theater itself represents a transcendence of time, as historical gures are resurrected through stage performance, and become immediately present to those in sympathy with performance. Drama illustration, then, repeats this dynamic on the page: the illustrated gure brings to life a dramatis persona who in turn brings to life a historical gure. Performance illustration thus replicates theatrical experience on paper. This replication of theatrical experience in performance illustration attempts to respond to the limitations of drama publication. With the rise of mass-produced and widely-circulated drama publications during the Wanli period, the drama publication ceased to be merely a script

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to accompany performance, and became a form of popular literature in its own right. Performance illustration represents an attempt on the part of the drama culture to resist the ascendance of drama as a purely literary genre. Drama illustration attempts to restore drama to the context of performance and recreate the experience of the theater for even the solitary reader. Drama illustration also renders this experience vastly more accessible. This accessibility is due to the potentially continuous recourse to a publication as opposed to the only occasional recourse to the theater, and also to the permanence of the publication as opposed to the evanescence of any given performance. This accessibility was cited in an endnote by the publisher of a 1498 edition of Xixiang ji as one of the main motivations for publishing an illustrated version of the play: Only when the text is authentic and correct, and the lyrics are resonant with the picture, should [a drama text] circulate in small alleys, in the country, and among families, and be recited by people and performed on stage. But nowadays the publishing market is chaotic and books contain mistakes. Although they are intended to be quality publications, they are extremely inconvenient for people to read. This is against the ancient model. My publishing house scrupulously followed the format of canonical books in its version of text and pictures as it revised and edited this nest edition in large characters, and matched lyrics to pictures so by obtaining this book the leisured and reposing tourists who lodge in guesthouses and travel in boats are allowed to sing [i.e. read] with understanding of the entire work and entertain their heart and mind. [ I] have had it engraved, printed, and published so that it is easy to read for people everywhere.88

The publisher emphasizes that illustrations are included in an attempt to provide the average reader with an accessible, high-quality text. The publisher twice stresses the “resonance” between the lyrics and the pictures, which he perceives as integral to the idea of a quality of text, especially a text designed for light reading. Illustrated editions provided not only a more accessible experience than the theater, but also a more accessible experience than non-illustrated books, as the illustrations assist the understanding and the imagination. As the publisher notes, illustrated editions thus made excellent reading not only in the study, but in situations where perfect concentration was not always possible, as

88

Wang Shifu, Xixiang ji, The Yue family 1498 edition, 2.161b.

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when traveling. This is not to say that illustrated editions were lowbrow: leisure reading—reading for relaxation and enjoyment—was a crucial part of the literati lifestyle and ethic. In the literati’s view, reading should be enlightening and profound, but at the same time diverting and pleasurable, so that the heart as well as the mind is in the activity. Not only were ne illustrated editions of the kind advocated by the publisher of the 1498 edition more accessible to a contemporary audience, but their artistry and craftsmanship made them more likely to be preserved and disseminate their message among subsequent generations, thus bettering both lesser editions and performance. Huanyu Xiansheng Gong’s statement that Dacheng ji tells of Confucius’ “travels through various states, as if [we] are witness to the Ancient Sage’s very complexion,” not only suggests that history materializes upon the stage, but, insofar as Dacheng ji refers to the play in written form, also upon the page of published drama. This witnessing of historical reality occurs in the reader’s imagination, but the crystallization of this reality can be fostered by actual visual images included in the printed publication. On this basis, publishers of the Wanli era routinely included performance illustrations in their editions of drama. In his 1613 post-face to the illustrated Xiangxue Ju edition of Wang Shifu’s play Xixiang ji, Zhu Chaoding emphasizes the experience of the past in the medium of published plays: This is truly a ne edition of Xixiang [ ji ]! It is published to enhance the popularity of the play. [People born] one hundred generations from now can thus enjoyably admire the trace of the past.89

Here drama publication not only provides the present a chance to interact with the past, but also draws the future into the interactive dynamic; the conation here is not two-fold but three-fold. The synchronic dissemination of drama publication through space enabled more readers in the Wanli period to interact with the past, and its diachronic transmission through time brings past, present, and future into intimate unity. Every reading is thus a process that constantly constitutes a new interaction of the past, present, and future. This is what the Wanli playwrights meant by the adage: “Every time [a play] is performed, it is newly created.”90

89 Zhu Chaoding, “Postface to Xin jiaozhu guben Xixiang ji,” in Wang Shifu, Xixiang ji, 1614 Xiangxue Ju edition, postface 4a. 90 Examples of plays including this adage: Tipao ji, Fuchun Tang Wanli edition, 1.1b;

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Illustration that allows the reader to conate time also inuenced the rhetoric of drama criticism. Commentators of drama in the late Ming period commonly used ‘hua’ (which means painting, picture, or to paint) as a metaphor in their comments on the text. Plays were often described as “like a picture,” or “a scene in a picture,” and with phrases like “every description in the play is like a picture.”91 In many cases, a play is compared to a picture and the act of writing is compared to the act of painting. The former comparison, for example, is made in Shen Jifei’s praise of Mudan ting by Tang Xianzu: Linchuan’s play Mudan ting is not a work of drama but of painting. Lacking red and blue, his play is what red and blue cannot paint. This is not a picture but reality. He does not cry or laugh, but there is the sound of crying and laughing.92

In this passage we can see a clear progression of thoughts in Shen’s perception of the dynamic relationship between drama, picture, and reality. The text becomes a picture, but a self-transcending picture that itself becomes real. The playwright thus presents not only a play, but a picture, and ultimately reality itself. The boundaries between the real and the unreal in the dramatic text are thus blurred, and the interaction with the past through this form of ‘animated’ text is thus made possible, at least when the play is set in the past. On the basis of this dynamic, the playwright considers himself as a painter as demonstrated in the self-assessment of Lu Cai. Lü Tiancheng recorded and could not agree more with Lu’s self evaluation in Qupin that Lu “often self acclaims that ‘the God gifted red and blue hands paint the tens of thousands of emotions of the world.’”93 Not only the self perception, playwright has also often been considered a painter as well, as indicated in Ye Zhou’s (. 1595–1624) commentary94 included at the end of scene ten in the Rongyu Tang edition of Xixiang ji:

Baipao ji, Fuchun Tang Wanli edition, 1.1a; Yanzhi ji, Wenlin Ge Wanli edition, 1.1a. 91 A commentary excerpted from the Rongyu Tang edition of Xixiang ji quoted by Denda Akira, “Min kan Gen zÔeki Seisho ki moku roku,” 38. 92 Shen Jifei, “Inscription of Mudan,” in the appendix of Tang Xianzu, Tang Xianzu ji, 1540. 93 Lü Tiancheng, Qupin, 6:2.231. 94 The proper title of the Rongyu Tang edition of Xixiang ji is Li Zhuowu xiansheng piping Xixiang ji. According to Zhou Lianggong in Shuying, however, all the commentary attributed to Li was actually by Ye Zhou (active in late 16th and early 17th century). See Shuying, 1.7–8.

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I once said that Wu Daozi and Gu Hutou [courtesy name of Gu Kaizhi] could only paint things with forms and images. As for the emotional state of love sickness, which is formless and imageless, [the author of ] Xixiang ji pictures it as if it has a tangible reality. It seems to jump [from the page].95

Like Shen Jifei, Ye Zhou considers that there are some things that cannot be painted “in red and blue” (as Shen would have it), but the playwright can picture these formless elements of the world in the medium of the text. This conception is in keeping with a signicant train of thought in the poetic tradition, as signied by the dictum that ‘shi zhong you hua’ (painting within poetry) and the reverse dictum ‘hua zhong you shi’ (poetry within painting). What this conation conceals is an implicit ambition to elevate painting to the level of poetry. After the Southern Song dynasty this was especially the goal of the literati, who wanted to trade on their reputations as poets to establish their painting as superior to the work of professional and court artists. Just as a good painting contains poetry, so, according to this tradition, a good poem contains a painting, or at least a visual component. The relationship between painting and poetry is mirrored in the relationship between drama illustration and the drama text. Commentators of the late Ming period, for example, frequently evaluate the text in terms of ‘hua,’ as quoted above. In terms that echo Shen Jifei’s praise for Mudan ting, Ye Zhou praises Xixiang ji as a picture tending to transcend itself and become real. In the commentary that ends scene eight, Ye Zhou asserts that “every description in the play is like a picture.” In the commentary that ends scene ten, he compares Wang Shifu to the painters Wu Daozi and Gu Kaizhi (quoted above). In the commentary that ends scene eleven, this train of thought culminates in a vision of transcended time as the dramatis personae are brought to life by the writer/painter of Xixiang ji: “To write/picture this scene of the two characters—the shy demeanor of Yingying and the timid manner of Zhang Gong—is to make them seen for thousands of years.”96 In this writing/picturing dynamic, words embody images that in turn effect the conation of the past and present. Despite his questioning of the results of those who “desire to match images to tunes” as being improper and interfered

95 96

Denda Akira, “Min kan Gen zÔeki Seisho ki moku roku,” 38. Ibid., p. 38.

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with each other,97 Fu Haoli in his 1587 preface to Zhici lu edited by Li Tianlin, states clearly that the perception of writing as painting was a recent trends popular among his contemporaries who write (cao gu zhi shi ).98 Although few late Ming commentators discussed the subject of drama illustration, illustration is incorporated in this dynamic, indistinguishable from the idea of painting in the late Ming discourse. The illustration mediates between the text and the reader, making the conation of time possible in the context of drama publications. Thus drama publication effectively replicates the theatrical experience that was so prized during the late Ming period, making of this experience something more personal and private, and bringing it within the control of the individual.

97 Fu Haoli, “Preface to Zhici lu,” in Guoli Zhongyang Tushuguan, ed., Guoli Zhongyang Tushuguan shanben xuba jilu, jibu, v. 6:153. 98 Ibid., 6:153.

CHAPTER SIX

READING AS AN INTERACTION WITH THE PAST

Performance illustration, as discussed in chapter three, attempts to recreate the mis-en-scène of theatrical performance. This type of illustration tends to be interspersed throughout the text. The illustration may either precede or follow the textual passage describing the scene it depicts (and sometimes depicts only very obliquely). The Jizhi Zhai edition of Qiting ji by Zheng Zhiwen (a jinshi in 1610), published in 1603, is a case in point: six illustrations precede and six follow the relevant text. In this edition the illustrations depict the action very closely and in consequence it is easy to identify the corresponding juncture in the text. What is more, the illustrations and the corresponding text appear contiguously: some illustrations and their corresponding text are displayed on facing pages; and others, in fact, are engraved on the same printing block, which, given the folded page binding format, resulted in their placement on overleaf pages. Other performance illustrations less obviously correspond to specic junctures in the text. These illustrations often correspond to scenes—in the sense of conventional structural subdivisions. They attempt to epitomize or encapsulate the spirit of scenes, but are not strictly faithful to details described in the text. In these instances it is often difcult to identify the detailed illustration’s narrative context. In Liangjiang ji, published by Jizhi Zhai in 1608, most of its illustrations, for example, suggest thematic generalizations about the scene rather than specic aspects of the plot. In Scene III of Liangjiang ji—titled “Banquet in the Inner Court”—the illustration (gure 3–33) depicts the main characters drinking and watching a dancing girl in an entirely generic fashion. In Scene IV—titled “Military Training on the Water”—the illustration (gure 3–77) depicts naval maneuvers only in the most general sense; no attempt is made to represent specic textual detail. The illustrations attempt to evoke the texture of the scene rather than interrogate details. In both approaches to illustration—those that portray specic textual detail and those that summarize scenes—pictures and text interplay and interact with each other. The dramatic text, then, is overlaid with theatrical elements, and it can be considered a substitute for actual per-

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formance as the image is perceived to be real, as discussed in chapter ve. This arrangement indicates that the publisher attempts to impose the visual elements of the theater on the experience of reading. Scholar Glen Dudbridge observes in his The Hsi-yu chi: A Study of Antecedents to the Sixteenth-Century Chinese Novel that storytelling in oral form is different from that in written form. He notes that novelists must face the “problem of how to compensate for the lively presence of a performer now absent from their written page.”1 The same problem must be confronted in the case of drama publication: the immediacy and excitement of live performance must also be compensated for and conveyed. Performance illustration is thus employed to bridge the gap between published text and live performance. This chapter attempts to show how reading replicates theatrical experience through the introduction and the layout of performance illustration.

Reading as a Theatrical Experience Appearing on single half-folio pages interspersed every few pages, performance illustration invokes the theatrical experience only periodically. It might seem that performance illustration fails in the attempt to recreate the theatrical experience, as it reminds readers of the theatrical context occasionally rather than constantly and is thus less like the experience of actually being in theater than it might be. But the ‘writing/picturing’ dynamic discussed in chapter ve offers a possible explanation for these gaps in the sequence of illustrations. It is possible that the ‘writing/picturing’ dynamic—which suggests the interchangeability of words and images—de-emphasized the need for a constant presentation of images, as words themselves embody pictures. In this case it is probably not coincidental that the ‘writing/picturing’ dynamic emerged more or less simultaneously with the new layout of drama illustrations: the former helps account for the latter. The ‘writing/picturing’ dynamic suggests that the writer is the agent of words and through words the agent of images. It emphasizes that the translation of words into images is determined in the initial act of

1 Glen Dudbridge, The Hsi-yu chi, 10. Dudbridge’s discussion of the discrepancy between oral performance and written text in this book also helps me to remind myself constantly that my study is focused on publication rather than live performance.

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writing. The illustrator and the reader thus merely fulll the intentions of the writer. This viewpoint is illustrated in certain comments made by Ye Zhou about Xixiang ji. He says, for example, that “To write/picture this scene of the two characters—the shy demeanor of Yingying and the timid manner of Zhang Gong—is to make them seen for thousands of years” (as quoted in chapter ve). By “write/picture” Ye means to indicate the literary act, yet he gures the literary work as a visual artifact, as suggested by the crucial word “seen” ( jian). The implication is that the words themselves inscribe implicit pictures. Elsewhere in the same commentary, Ye writes: “As for the emotional state of lovesickness, which is formless and imageless, [the author] of Xixiang ji pictures it as if it has a tangible reality” (as quoted in chapter ve). Again, the literary work is gured as a visual artifact, in this case ‘picturing’ lovesickness. The canvas upon which these literary pictures appear is the mind of the reader. The writer understands this and works to control the visual composition just like a painter. The question then arises, why are illustrations necessary at all? The best answer is that the mind of the reader, unlike a physical surface, is never merely passive, but brings its own ideas to bear on the work of the author. Literati and publishers/illustrators of the period worried over this fact, seeing it as a potential source of disorder and breakdown within the cultural tradition. In the drama publications of the Wanli period, illustrations serve to regulate and curb the imagination of the reader, but are given only sporadically in order not to stie the imagination altogether. In his miscellany Siyou Zhai congshuo, He Liangjun elaborates on the imaginative guidance provided by illustrations, emphasizing their function as a moral control: I have seen a book titled An Investigation of the Three Ritual [Scriptures] Through Pictures. Items such as chariots, headdresses, ceremonial gowns, painted gowns, and garments worn while making offerings have implications for the laws and regulations of the court. If later generations make them guided only by descriptions in books, how can they form a correct impression of these objects? Pictures preserve the true form of the ceremony. Following the example of pictures, mistakes can be avoided.2

Although the creation of mental images is a private activity, it has, as the above quotation suggests, public implications, and thus must be governed by right principles. In this particular case pictorial images

2

He Liangjun, Siyou Zhai congshuo, 255.

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constitute a kind of public intervention in the imaginative act, by which the dominant moral or social order is upheld. The aspect of public intervention and control is particularly meaningful in the publisher/illustrator’s effort to replicate theatrical experience with performance illustration. Generally speaking, theater-going is a public activity, while reading is a personal and private pastime. In the theater the imagination is more rmly led, while readers create mental images according to personal experience and preference. Although pictorial and theatrical convention may unconsciously intrude on the reader’s mental creation, especially in cases where the reader has often been to the theater and is imbued with its conventions, the imaginative process is nonetheless very personal. Understanding that the reader’s creation of mental images is an expression of freedom, a question as to the propriety or appropriateness of the imagined complex is likely to arise. In a “general note” ( fanli ) to the play Lanqiao yuchu ji, printed by Wanyue Xuan in 1606, the publisher suggests that the play’s illustrations are intended to guide the imagination to an appropriate conception of the dramatis personae, as well as provide a practical example to the performer: “Each scene of this dramatized-biography includes pictorial images so that the characters can be dressed up accordingly.”3 The publisher of Wanyue Xuan, like He Liangjun, holds that pictorial images set proper imaginative boundaries and thus ensure that the text is not wildly misconstrued. Given this public intervention, reading does not merely entail a simple relation between reader and author, but a many-sided relation that includes the illustrator and the printer. This multiplication of perspectives and interpretations is analogous to the experience of the theater, in which, likewise, the text is heavily mediated. This intersection of perspectives brings reading more squarely within the public domain, and narrows its difference with the experience of theater. It was thus important to include illustrations, but just as important not to include too many and thus allow the imagination to become lazy or passive, for the imagination (properly guided) was understood to bring the writer’s picture to life and was thus indispensable. This conception of the imagination is suggested by the publisher Zhou Xun, whose 1554 preface to Cipin or Evaluation of Lyric-poetry by Yang Shen offers a standard by which lyric poems might be ranked: “Those

3

Yang Zhijiong, Lanqiao yuchu ji, Wanyue Xuan 1616 edition, fanli 1b.

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lyrics, once composed and read, that seem to allow one to encounter events in person and that touch the emotions belong in the category of the divine.”4 The comment is signicant in its emphasis on ‘reading,’ implying that the lyric is not intrinsically ‘divine,’ but becomes so through the participation of the reader. The lyric is thus a collaboration between writer (“composed”) and reader (“read”). It is also signicant in its suggestion that literary quality is a function of this collaboration, that the best literature inspires the reader to conate realities. This suggests another rationale for the inclusion of illustrations. The publisher/illustrator himself being a reader, the illustration testies to the capacity of the literary to inspire images. Illustration is a kind of assertion that a book belongs to the highest category and in this sense acts as almost an advertising appeal to potential readers. In general, the reader assumes a new importance in the culture of Wanli drama publication. He is no longer the passive recipient of words and images, but is implicitly expected to engage the text with his own imagination. The participation of the reader brings the text, the illustration, and the imagination together as a whole. Ideally, these elements become fused in a new reality in which the laws of everyday reality are suspended, making possible a conation of past, present, and future. This conation depends on the reader engaging in a two-fold act of imagination: rst, he must collaborate with the writer in the creation of mental images, and second, must locate himself in the reality of his mental creation. Just as illustration is generally intended to ensure that the imagination of the reader does not wander from the accepted order of the cultural tradition, as He Liangjun indicates, performance illustration is intended to ensure that the imagination does not wander from the idea of theatrical performance and that the imagined images accord with the conventions of the theater in terms of costume, staging, movement, and so forth. This was a reaction to the tendency during the late Ming period to divorce text and performance under the inuence of the literati culture and the theory stated by Tang Xianzu that “Plays are books for the desk rather than songs for the banquet” (quoted in chapter two). The attempt was to reconcile the idea of drama as both reading material and performance script, and to replicate the experience of the theater in the experience of reading, on the grounds that

4 Zhou Xun, “Preface to Cipin,” in Guoli Zhongyang Tushuguan, ed., Guoli Zhongyang tushuguan shanben xuba jilu: jibu, 7:442.

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drama is distinguished as a genre by performance, as Li Yu indicates in his miscellany when he says that “lyrics are composed exclusively for the stage” (quoted in chapter two). Publishers, in turn, helped replicate the theatrical performance for readers not only by incorporating illustrations but by laying them in specic ways, that repeat the conventions of the stage—for example the opening prologue (kaichang or jiamen) typical among chuanqi drama of the Ming period. During the Wanli period, theatrical performances typically opened with a prologue involving singing, dancing, and recitation performed by the mo or fumo, theatrical role types popular during the Yuan and Ming periods. There is an analogous theatrical experience in the Elizabethan theater of England. In Henry VIII the audience is encouraged to imagine those they are about to encounter as the “very persons” of the history (quoted in chapter four). In the Chinese counterpart to the Shakespearian prologue, the mo or fumo usually provides the audience with a brief outline of the story about to be staged; asks the audience to enter the imaginative world of the play as if it were real, as in Dacheng ji and Qiefu ji (both quoted in chapter ve); and give some idea of the playwright’s philosophy of drama. Wilt L. Idema identies the particulars of this convention in his study of the kaichang in “The Wen-Ching Yüan-Yang Hui and the Chia-Men of Yüan-Ming Ch’uan-Ch’i:” The only actor to appear in the chia-men is the ( fu)-mo. He opens by reciting a tz’u-poem (very rarely two tz’u poems), usually reecting on the transience of human life and the need to enjoy it while one may, and/or detailing how the author pored over old histories and came to write his play. Next he asks the people backstage which play they are going to do, and after their answer he announces he will expound its general meaning and proceeds to do so by reciting another tz’u-poem that provides an outline of the plot, which is followed by a four line poem that also gives a laconic summary of the play.5

The convention of the kaichang is one of the ancient traditions of the chuanqi stage. It is indicated in the earliest extant chuanqi drama: the three plays preserved in the compendium Yongle dadian (1408) compiled during the reign of the Yongle Emperor (1403–1424), which suggests that the convention is very old indeed. Zhang Xie zhuangyuan, the earliest of these

5

Wilt Idema, “The Wen-Ching Yuan-Yang Hui,” 96–7.

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three plays according to scholar Qian Nanyang,6 explicitly indicates a particularly long and elaborate kaichang: in addition to announcing the story outline, the stage directions indicate clearly that the mo must recite, sing and dance. A late instance of this kind of explicit stage direction occurs in a 1477 edition of Baitu ji. Though most performances include singing and dancing in the opening, these are not usually indicated in the stage directions of later plays. The reason for these unusual directions is most likely that the conventions of the kaichang had yet to be xed before the Ming Dynasty. As these conventions slowly became xed, explicit stage directions became unnecessary. Idema suggests these explanations in his study of the kaichang: As the opening scene is so highly conventional the dialogue between the ( fu)-mo and the people backstage is often not written out but indicated by the stage direction “Question and answer as usual” in many cases even this simple stage-direction and the conventional opening tz’u-poem(s) are omitted, with the result that only the nal tz’u-poem with its summary and the concluding four-line poem are provided.7

The elimination of these stage directions might also have been motivated by the desire to give the fumo more freedom, especially as theatrical technique gradually improved during the Ming period. The detailed stage directions, such as those included in Zhang Xie zhuangyuan and Baitu ji, would only infringe a freer and more spontaneous performance. Some scholars nd the differing degrees of elaboration specied in stage directions to be signicant. In his study of the kaichang of Ming and Qing drama, Xu Fuming, for instance, proposes that both Zhang Xie zhuangyuan and Baitu ji, with their stage directions for elaborate opening scenes, are ‘wutai ben,’ or ‘stage editions,’ and those plays with less elaborate stage scenes are ‘wenxue ben,’ or ‘literature editions.’8 This argument is premised on an understanding of drama’s dual role as script and literature and assumes that this distinction is reected in the form of publication. Xu’s argument not only oversimplies but also distorts the issue of the dual roles of drama. In general (as discussed in chapter two) Wanli playwrights, publishers, and readers were conscious of the dual roles of drama publication, but tried to reconcile the two elements rather than emphasize the distinction. They wanted

6 7 8

Qian Nanyang, annotated, Yongle dadian xiwen sanzhong jiaozhu, preface 1. Wilt Idema, “The Wen-Ching Yuan-Yang Hui,” 97. Xu Fuming, “Shilun Ming Qing chuanqi fumo kaichang,” 144.

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drama publication to serve as both script and literature and would have been unlikely to endorse Xu’s distinction between the ‘wutai ben’ and ‘wenxue ben.’ Xu’s assumption that the ‘wenxue ben’ was not intended for performance is also questionable: as suggested above, the lack of explicit stage directions may have simply resulted from a common understanding of what was expected on stage and recognition of the fumo’s competence to improvise. A publisher’s note to a 1616 edition of Lanqiao yuchu ji even states that the illustrations are specically included to guide performers (as quoted above). In Xu Fuming’s category, this play would be a ‘wenxue ben’ based on the less elaborate kaichang, but Xu has not taken into account the publisher’s expressed intention for the edition. In the drama publications of the Wanli period, the theatrical convention of the kaichang is incorporated through the medium of illustration. Of the sixty or seventy extant Wanli plays that include performance illustration, about nine show an illustration of the fumo performing the kaichang on a stage, suggesting a meaningful pattern. This illustration was often printed on the very rst page of the volume. When a reader opened a play, he often encountered not words, but the image of a fumo, which lent the experience of the reading a theatrical embodiment. The reader is not meant merely to read the opening scene, but to animate mentally the persona of the fumo. The illustration helps the mind in this direction, but also restrains it from wandering too far from convention. An elaborate example of this conventional layout is Xinbian Mulian jiumu quanshan xiwen, a three-volume play published in 1582 by the publisher and playwright Zheng Zhizhen, who also owned the publishing house Gaoshi Shanfang. This edition includes illustrations of the fumo not only at the beginning of the play, but at the beginning of each juan or volume (rst volume: gure 6–1, second volume: gure 6–2, third volume: gure 6–3). This layout is true to the play, which is to be performed over three nights and includes a different kaichang for each night. This is suggested in the rst of the three kaichang, in which characters on the stage converse with characters backstage. The former pose a question as to what play is going to be staged and the latter answer, “We are going to perform the virtue-persuading play about Mulian, who saves her mother by practicing lial piety. The play is divided into rst, second, and third juan. Tonight we are going to perform the rst juan.”9 That the three juan of the play are intended to be performed over

9

Zheng Zhizhen, Mulian jiumu, Gaoshi Shanfang edition, 1.1b.

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6–1. “Opening Scene” of vol. 1. In Mulian jiumu, by Zheng Zhizhen, 1:1.1a. Anhui: Gaoshi Shanfang, 1582. National Palace Museum, Taipei, Taiwan, Republic of China.

6–2. “Opening Scene” of vol. 2. In Mulian jiumu, by Zheng Zhizhen, 2:1.1a. Anhui: Gaoshi Shanfang, 1582. National Palace Museum, Taipei, Taiwan, Republic of China.

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6–3. “Opening Scene” of vol. 3. In Mulian jiumu, by Zheng Zhizhen, 3:1.1a. Anhui: Gaoshi Shanfang, 1582. National Palace Museum, Taipei, Taiwan, Republic of China.

6–4. “Title Page” of vol. 2. In Mulian jiumu, by Zheng Zhizhen, 2: title page. Anhui: Gaoshi Shanfang, 1582. National Palace Museum, Taipei, Taiwan, Republic of China.

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6–5. “Opening Scene.” In Xunqin ji, by Wang Ling. Jinling: Fuchun Tang, 1573–1619. Reproduced from GBXQCK, 1st series, box 3, 4:1.1a.

6–6. “Opening Scene.” In Yuchai ji. Jinling: Fuchun Tang, 1573–1619. Reproduced from GBXQCK, 1st series, box 5, 4:1.1a.

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6–7. “Opening Scene.” In Zixiao ji, by Tang Xianzu. Jinling: Fuchun Tang, 1573–1619. Reproduced from GBXQCK, 1st series, box 8, 6:1.1a.

6–8. “Opening Scene.” In Fenjin ji, by Ye Liangbiao. Jinling: Fuchun Tang, 1573–1619. Reproduced from GBXQCK, 1st series, box 7, 9:1.1a.

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6–9. “Opening Scene.” In Shuangzhong ji, by Yao Maoliang. Jinling: Fuchun Tang, 1573–1619. Reproduced from GBXQCK, 1st series, box 4, 3:1.1a.

6–10. “Opening Scene.” In Xiangshan ji. Jinling: Fuchun Tang, 1573–1619. Reproduced from GBXQCK, 2nd series, box 1, 3:1.1b.

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6–11. “Opening Scene.” In Baishe ji, by Zheng Guoxuan. Jinling: Fuchun Tang, 1573–1619. Reproduced from GBXQCK, 1st series, box 5, 3:1.1a.

6–12. “Opening Scene.” In Baitu ji. Beijing: Yongshun shutang, 1470s. Reproduced from Ming Chenhua shuochang cihua congkan, edited by Shanghai Wenwu Baoguan Weiyuanhui, 12:1.1a. Beijing: Wenwu, 1979.

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6–13. “Opening Scene.” In Lijing ji. Jian’an: Yu Xin’an, 1566. Reproduced from Sanbun jiryaku, Sento yowa, Reikyoki, 1.1a. Tenri: Tenri Daigaku Shuppanbu, 1980.

6–14. “Opening Scene.” In Lizhi ji, by Li Dongyue. N.p.: Yugeng tang, 1581. Reproduced from Mingben Chaozhou xiwen wuzhong, 1.1a. Guangzhou: Guangdong Renmin chubanshe, 1985.

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6–15. “Opening Scene.” In Jinyin ji, by Su Fuzhi. Jinling: Jizhi Zhai, 1573–1619. Reproduced from GBXQCK, 1st series, box 3, 7:1.1b–2a.

6–16. “Opening Scene.” In Chundeng mi ji, by Ruan Dacheng. N.p.: Yonghuai Tang, 1633. Reproduced from GBXQCK, 2nd series, box 9, 6:1.1a.

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three nights is also attested by Qi Biaojia Yuanshan Tang qupin: “[Mulian jiumu] has one hundred and nine scenes that are to be performed for three nights.”10 The playwright most likely specied a kaichang on each night for the practical purpose of reminding the audience of the full story outline and of orienting any new members of the audience. The three illustrations of the kaichang, then, are a realistic replication of the theatrical performance. Following the example of both text and performance, the three images of the fumo introduce the reader to each of the juan, divided in this case into volumes. In addition to including an illustration of the fumo at the beginning of the second volume, Zheng includes an illustration of a scene not included in the text, but conventional in theatrical performance and commonly known as ‘Tiao Jiaguan’ or ‘The Dance of Promotion’ (gure 6–4). Beginning a performance with this scene is a theatrical practice that persists even to this day and can still be seen constantly in the traditional theaters of Taiwan. It is a ritual dance executed by an actor wearing a white mask and holding several layers of cloth on which are inscribed phrases such as “Tianguan cifu” or “Blessings from the Heavenly Ofcial” and “Yipin dangchao” or “The First Rank at Court.” Through this ritual dance, blessings from the Heavenly Ofcials—the gods in heaven, as likened to the bureaucratic hierarchy of the political state—are conferred on the theater and its local sponsors. ‘Promotion’ is a bureaucratic metaphor for general well-being and advancement in the world. The inclusion of an illustration showing this ritual dance, even though it is not suggested in the text, indicates that Zheng Zhizhen was self-consciously anxious to replicate the experience of theater in his drama publication through illustration. As he is the author as well as the publisher of the play—and most likely gave instruction to his illustrator, assuming that he himself did not render the art—we can see a very careful and consistent program. In plain text, the play is clearly a script, but as a full published volume it is intended to approximate to the script as performed. Illustrations of the kaichang can also be found in many publications printed by the publishing house Fuchun Tang, which specialized in plays with performance illustration.

10

Qi Biaojia, YuanshanTang qupin, 114.

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At least seven of the thirty-four extant plays published by Fuchun Tang include an illustration of kaichang.11 These are Xunqin ji (gure 6–5); Yuchai ji (gure 6–6); Zixiao ji (gure 6–7); Fenjin ji (gure 6–8); Shuangzhong ji (gure 6–9); Xiangshan ji (gure 6–10); Baishe ji (gure 6–11). Like the illustrations of the kaichang included in the 1582 edition of Mulian jiumu, these illustrations are located on the very rst page of the publication, with the exception of the illustration of the opening scene in Xiangshan ji, which appears following the text of the kaichang. Again, what the readers rst encounter in their reading is the image of the fumo on stage. Like Zheng Zhizhen, the publisher of Fuchun Tang attempted to incorporate the theatrical experience into reading. Including an illustration of the kaichang at the start of the book, however, was not an invention of Gaoshi Shanfang and Fuchun Tang. This practice can be traced further back to Xinbian Liu Zhiyuan quanxiang Baitu ji, printed in 1477 by Yongshun Shutang in Beijing, but, unfortunately, the lower half of the illustration is damaged (gure 6–12). The case of Baitu ji shows that the attempt to incorporate theatrical conventions in drama publications was initiated, if not common, at least as early as the 15th century despite the fact that the other two important illustrated drama publications of the period—the 1435 edition of Jiaohong ji published by Jide Tang in Jinling and the 1498 edition of Xixiang ji published by the Yue family in Beijing—do not include such illustrations. This practice continued in the 16th century, and by the end of the 16th century it had become popular in drama publications. The 1566 edition of Lijing ji includes an illustration on each page, but the rst illustration shows a mo engaged in the kaichang (gure 6–13). A similar illustration appears in a different play, Lizhi ji, published in 1581, which follows the story line of Lijing ji (gure 6–14). Although the captions displayed on both sides of the latter illustration indicate that the gure is the play’s male protagonist Chen Boqing, the layout and arrangement of the illustration subtly suggest the mo. There are three suggestive elements: the illustration appears on the rst page, the male character appears alone, and the entire illustration is placed directly above the text of the mo’s opening speech. The illustration thus downplays its own theatrical implication, indicating a transitional

11 Idema has listed most of the plays with illustrations to the rst scene “Opening by Fumo” (Fumo kaichang) in note 46 in his 1981 essay “The Wen-Ching Yuan-Yang Hui,” 104–5.

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moment between narrative illustration and performance illustration. The illustration’s use of the pictures-above-text layout suggests that the illustrator had a strong inclination to follow the tradition of narrative illustration and again suggests a transitional moment. The same can be said of Lijing ji, but despite the similar layout—each page including an illustration above the corresponding text—the illustrations show a slight variation: the image is not placed at the top of the page but rather amid the text. This layout gives an impression of the continuous narration of the hand-scroll tradition, but presented sequentially in a series of framed pictures, which recalls the closed proscenium of the theater. Again, there is the suggestion of transition from the painting to the theatrical tradition as the primary source of inuence. The above variation in layout and new use of theatrical conventions suggest that illustration had successfully consolidated both narrative function and theatrical experience, but the latter would become increasingly dominant from the mid-16th century onward. In both pre-Wanli and Wanli eras, illustrations of the kaichang bear certain similarities, as they are all inspired by theatrical performance. Every one of these illustrations depicts a male character (presumably the fumo) clad in gown and cap on a stage, which includes some combination of railing, screen, chair, and valance-type of caption. The caption is usually placed above the stage scene in a strip that is clearly part of the illustration but not part of the depicted stage. In more rare cases the caption seems to be part of the stage proper, as part of the valance or proscenium. These similarities demonstrate the stage conventions discussed in chapter three. Following the ke-jie conventions of the stage, the fumo in these illustrations is depicted in characteristic gestures of the stage. As these illustrations capture a frozen moment, the ke-jie is even more apparent than it would be in actual theater, when it blends with much other singing, dancing and movement. As the Chinese stage is highly conventionalized and stylized, the knowledgeable late Ming reader would have been able to contextualize such a moment and imagine a whole range of motion—both what comes before and after. The representation of the ke-jie thus lends a dynamic element to the still illustration and introduces something of the temporal ow of live theater. The late Ming reader might have been able even to reconstruct the ow of entire scenes. The ke-jie can also convey a great deal about the character, as they are specic to certain role types, and these role types are themselves extremely familiar in their range of dramatic and emotional possibilities. A single ke-jie, then, can locate a character very

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precisely within the spectrum of dramatis personae. The illustrations of the fumo presented by Gaoshi Shanfang and Fuchun Tang not only help readers transform text into imagined performance, but also offer latter-day scholars of Chinese theater clues as to what kind of ke-jie conventions were employed by the fumo in the opening scene. The fact that we can reconstruct something of the Wanli theater based on these illustrations, even though we have never attended an actual performance, suggests how much regular theater-goers of the Wanli era might have been able to reconstruct. They would have had no trouble transforming the still image into a lively performance. The illustrations included in Gaoshi Shanfang and Fuchun Tang publications indicate that the fumo recites, gestures, and dances all at once, rather than stands stock-still. From these illustrations, we can infer that at least two sets of ke-jie conventions were employed in the kaichang in the Wanli theater: one set suited a literati type of fumo who moved more languidly and slowly, and a clownish fumo who was more active and exuberant. The rst type is shown in the illustrations that open the rst two volumes of the 1582 edition of Mulian jiumu (gure 6–1, 6–2), and in the illustration to the opening scene of Xunqin ji (gure 6–5). The two illustrations in Mulian jiumu exhibit a similarly rened fumo performing a characteristic ke-jie in which one arm is raised and the other held across the body, while the head is turned away from the raised hand—perhaps a gesture of narration. But the two illustrations are slightly different; in the second illustration (gure 6–2) the fumo appears to be more energetic, as he seems to swing his right hand across his body quickly enough that his long sleeve no longer drops. This small detail suggests the subtly differing interpretations of different actors or perhaps of the publishers/illustrators themselves. The illustration of the fumo in Xunqin ji engages in a similar but reversed ke-jie: the right hand points upward, while the left hand holds a foldable fan across the body and the head is turned away from the raised hand. These illustrations, moreover, capture part of a continuous movement on stage which becomes clear when the illustrations are juxtaposed as a series: the fumo in gure 6–1 seems to have entered the stage according to the conventional entrance from the right (discussed in chapter two); he continues to the front center of the stage in gure 6–2, then he moves to the back center of the stage in gure 6–5. In the rst two illustrations the back heel is lifted and the toes pointed in the direction of movement. In the third illustration the fumo seems to be standing still, his heels planted, suggesting that this is the nal stage in a continuous

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movement. This continuous movement is conducted as a slow stroll, which lends an air of leisure and self-control, and suggests a literati type as opposed to a clownish type. The clownish fumo is shown in the illustration that opens the third volume of Mulian jiumu (gure 6–3), and in illustrations that open Yuchai ji (gure 6–6), Zixiao ji (gure 6–7), Fenjin ji (gure 6–8), a copy possibly after the Yuchai ji version as the details are much more blurred in this illustration), and Shuangzhong ji (gure 6–9). The fumos in these four illustrations are conducting a dancing step that falls somewhere between walking and running as both hands swing back and forth. The pace and movement of this ke-jie convention is much faster and livelier than that of the literati type. In the illustration included in Mulian jiumu, it is especially clear that the fumo dances on the toes of one foot and the heel of the other, as if kicking out with one foot. This detail is less obvious in the illustration in Yuchai ji though still suggested, but this fumo dances with his back towards the audience while the fumo in Mulian jiumu faces the audience. Although the fumo in the illustration to Fenjin ji (gure 6–8) stands evenly on both feet rather than performs a dancing step, it is almost completely identical to the illustration in Yuchai ji, and most likely a copy based on the fact that it has less ornamentation and is less well rendered. The fumo in the illustration in Zixiao ji manifests another variation of the same ke-jie convention (gure 6–7): one hand points upward, but the other swings backward rather than across the body. These four variations on the same ke-jie are themselves in keeping with the theatrical experience, as actors themselves work just these types of subtle differences in interpretation. As with illustrations of the literati type fumo, the illustrations of the clownish fumo suggest motion through the space of the stage. The fumo depicted in Yuchai ji (gure 6–6), for example, is apparently dancing from the front to the back of the stage, as suggested by the two belts ying behind his skirt. This movement is presented as part of a larger continuous movement suggested by the chair, which is placed in his path; in all likelihood he is about to sit down. If we juxtapose the four illustrations included in Mulian jiumu (gure 6–3), Yuchai ji (gure 6–6), Zixiao ji (gure 6–7) and Shuangzhong ji (gure 6–9), we can infer the full unfolding of this ke-jie on the stage. The fumo begins at the front of the stage (gure 6–7), or sometimes he will dance to the stairs, if there is one in front of the stage as shown in gures 6–9; moved to the side of the stage (gure 6–3); and then proceeds toward the chair in the middle of the stage (gure 6–6) with the likely intention of taking

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a seat. This reconstruction of the full motion suggests that the clownish version of the kaichang utilized a good deal of stage space, which is what you would expect. Clowning, after all, is usually a matter of broad, exaggerated, dramatic movement. The desired effect is vitality rather than contemplation or elegance. Even in those illustrations that depict a more domestic rather than theatrical context (as discussed in chapter two), like those in Jinyin ji (gure 6–15), the fumo is depicted performing ke-jie. Although the fumo in Jinyin ji performs in a room adjacent to a garden courtyard, his gesture is almost identical to that of the fumo in both Xiangshan ji (gure 6–11) and Baishe ji (gure 6–12), though these illustrations clearly depict a stage space. In all three illustrations, the fumos are engaged in a backward step, as indicated by the ow-lines of the sleeves and belts. One hand is by the side of the body, and one held across the body. The suggestion of a slow and more dignied motion suggests that these fumos are of the literati type. The illustration in Jinyin ji creates an association with domesticity that suggests the beginning of a trend to conceive drama as analogous to daily life, but the illustration still has close afnities with stage performance. An illustration in a Chongzhen edition of Chundeng mi (gure 6–16), on the other hand, suggests nothing of stage performance, and represents the culmination of the trend marked in Jinyin ji. The scene indicates nothing of the physical stage, while the prologue to the play (from which the caption of the illustration is drawn) indicates that the mo is the author Ruan Dacheng himself; the hint is given in the line, “I am in the Yonghuai Studio, amid hundreds of owers,” which alludes to Ruan’s own studio.12 The specication is signicant in that it afrms the mo as not a random actor, and thus breaks with tradition. Finally, there is no sense that the gure is performing a ke-jie; the character seems to be merely standing in thought, an immobility that is inconsistent with the traditions of the stage. The gure is less a mo in the true sense than a literatus fullling the mo’s traditional function. The illustration in Chundeng mi is the only representation of the kaichang to be found in the style of landscape illustration, making it a rare example, though it may well be that other examples have been lost. The scarcity of such illustrations is due to the fact the landscape-style illustrators were interested in breaking the association between play and theater and thus tended to ignore the kaichang altogether.

12

Ruan Dacheng, Chundeng mi ji, Yonghuai Tang 1633 edition, 1.1a.

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In addition to their differing degree of theatricality, the illustration in Jinyin ji and the illustrations in books published by Fuchun Tang differ in the latter’s omission of the caption displayed customarily on the top of the illustration. In his study Illustration, J. Hillis Miller argues that it is impossible for a picture to “t into a narration” without a label.13 Robert Hegel adopts Miller’s point in his discussion of illustrations included in ction published in Late Imperial China: . . . seemingly the potentially subversive effect of some unguided, hence uncontrolled, meaning being derived from a picture enforced the labeling of every visual image, wherever it appeared in relation to the text.14

Hegel continues that for this reason paintings and book illustrations “were virtually always labeled to suggest the intended meaning even when it is not made explicit.”15 This phenomenon may be observable in illustrated ction, but it is not always so in drama publications. A number of plays published during the Wanli period do not include labels or captions on their illustrations, so the illustrations in Mulian jiumu and Jinyin ji cannot be considered exceptional. A clue to this absence of captions is inadvertently given in Hegel’s discussion of illustrated ctions, and in particular in his discussion of the relation between the theatrical experience and habits of reading: Chinese theater audiences were accustomed to seeing similar visual images repeated; these repeated images took the form of character types that resembled each other in physical features. That the pictures in printed libretti should also consist largely of conventional elements would in no way have been seen as surprising or inappropriate.16

The Wanli readers’ familiarity with these same repeated stock elements of Chinese theater made the use of captions in drama illustration redundant: readers understood the precise nature of the images that were presented to them. Fiction had no such body of convention to draw on, and thus ction illustrations had to be more overt in their allusions. The absence of such captions in drama illustrations suggests that a deep familiarity with drama was widespread in the Wanli era to the extent that the usual Chinese anxieties about Hegel’s ‘uncontrolled’ reception were relaxed. 13 14 15 16

Hillis Miller, Illustration, 63. Robert Hegel, Reading the Illustrated Fiction, 317. Ibid., 317–8. Ibid., 312.

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6–17. “Opening Scene.” In Guanyuan ji, by Zhang Fengyi. Jinling: Fuchun Tang, 1573–1619. Reproduced from GBXQCK, 1st series, box 7, 2:1.1a.

6–18. “Opening Scene.” In Shiyi ji. Jinling: Fuchun Tang, 1573–1619. Reproduced from GBXQCK, 1st series, box 5, 2:1.1a.

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This familiarity with the conventions possibly helps to explain another rare phenomenon of Wanli drama publications: what seems to be caption without a corresponding image. In this case the caption is simply inserted at the top of the page, above the text, in a box that resembles that traditional bian’e. The publisher Fuchun Tang provides two examples, the only examples of such a layout that I have encountered: one appears on the rst page of the play Guanyuan ji (gure 6–17) and the other on the rst of the play Shiyi ji (gure 6–18). The former caption reads “Performance of the Opening Scene” (Fuyan jiamen) while the latter caption is illegible except for the last two characters, which read “opening scene” ( jiamen). Normally, readers would expect to see images appear under this bian’e-type caption, but these two pages are without images as if the image can be left entirely to the imagination of the reader. It may be that the publishers felt that the caption alone was enough to trigger an association with all the conventions of the theater and specically the image of the fumo performing the kaichang. With or without an image, then, the reading is introduced by the fumo. The conventionality and familiarity of the kaichang in theater explains not only these imageless captions, but also the fact that many illustrators entirely ignore the opening scene and depict scenes from the main body of the play instead. The kaichang, in particular, does not need to be laboriously illustrated because its elements are so predictable and the reader’s mental image could be expected to follow orthodox lines. In consequence, most publishers chose to illustrate instead the scene that initiates the main story: scene II in Ming play; but Act I, scene I in the western convention, as opposed to the prologue. The most common such scene in chuanqi plays is depiction of the protagonist’s family engaged in happy and harmonious domestic activities, and especially the banquet to celebrate the longevity of the elder generation (qingshou), though the scene is still not as conventionalized or common as the kaichang. If the banquet scene is not conventional enough to be ignored, it is common enough to be frequently illustrated and recurs far more frequently in illustration than the kaichang. The banquet scene is not only a convenient way to introduce the protagonist and his/her families, but even more important to show the protagonist’s lial virtue. The pictorial presentation of the banquet scene always centers on the younger generation serving drinks or food to the older generation, an action that symbolizes their obedience and respect, and their sense of responsibility. From our discussion of the ke-jie conventions of serving drinks in chapter three, we know that the banquet scene, like the kaichang, was performed with

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certain ke-jie that were familiar to theater-goers during the Wanli period and could be imagined by cultured readers. Although the kaichang and the banquet scene were probably the most conventional of all scenes, the typical Wanli printed play was highly conventionalized throughout. This explains the fact that in the Wanli period, unlike earlier periods, illustrations were interspersed every few pages rather than given on every page. It was still felt that the imagination required structure, but much of this structure was provided by theatrical conventions and cultured readers’ familiarity with these. Performance illustrations thus functioned more as a reminder of this theatrical context than as a constant guideline. The Fuchun Tang edition of Xunqin ji, for instance, includes an illustration about every three to four double-folio pages. The illustrations in the rst volume, for example, appear on pages 1a, 4b, 8a, 12b, 16a, 19b, and 21a. Illustrations in the second appear at similar intervals. Other publishers of plays with performance illustrations, like Shide Tang, Huancui Tang, and Jizhi Zhai, follow a similar pattern, though the interval is variable to an extent. In the second volume of the Fuchun Tang edition of Sangui lianfang ji, for example, illustrations appear with very strict regularity—every eight folio pages (1b, 8b, 16b, and 24b). As these intervals suggest, performance illustrations were not intended to depict the story of the play as fully as the pinghua illustrations that appear on every page, but were intended to activate and guide the imagination toward a recreation of theatrical experience. Again, the imagination was both encouraged and restricted. It is an interesting detail that publishers/illustrators of editions featuring performance illustrations often chose to illustrate more marginal scenes and ignore scenes that were the more important. In Xunqin ji, for example, the publisher/illustrator of Fuchun Tang did not illustrate the crucial scenes in which the hero Zhou Yu and his family background are introduced (scene two), and in which all the family’s misfortune begins (scene three), but depicted the less important scene four in keeping with his scheme of placing illustrations every four pages. This suggests that the content of illustrations was less important than their regularity. The point was not to highlight the most important moments of the play, but to consistently remind the reader that the story has a theatrical basis. In this sense all performance illustrations were of equal importance, no matter what they happened to depict. In some cases, illustrations do not correspond to the surrounding text, but depict scenes elsewhere in the text, as in the fth illustration in Xunqin ji, which appears in scene

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seven but depicts action from scene ve, while the fourth illustration appears in and depicts scene six. The orders of the image and text are confused. Again, this indicates that maintaining the appearance of illustrations at regular intervals was the highest priority, an even higher priority than synchronizing the images with the text, or than synchronizing the captions with the text. In some cases, the illustrator’s interpretation of scene contradicts both the text and the caption, as the illustration of the tenth scene in the Fuchun Tang edition of Herong ji (gure 6–19). The caption “The Jade-Emperor Decrees the Bestowal of the Zither” (Yuhuang jiangzhi ci yaoqin) suggests a divine intervention on behalf of the heroine, which is consistent with the text’s statement that the god Gold-Star Taibai carries out the Jade-emperor’s decree. The illustration, however, shows the zither being delivered to the heroine Wang Zhaojun by a mortal servant girl, and suggests no element of divine intervention.

6–19. “Zither from the Jade Emperor.” In Herong ji. Jinling: Fuchun Tang, 1573–1619. Reproduced from GBXQCK, 2nd series, box 1, 7:2.25b.

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The representation of gods in illustration is usually suggested by a cloud-shaped halo that surrounds the divine gure and is very common. The illustrator’s decision to depart from the text and ignore the divine element in the scene thus suggests how little he was concerned about representing the story accurately. On the other hand, he is very careful to depict gures performing theatrical ke-jie. This illustration highlights the essential function of illustration in general, which was not to narrate the story but to remind the reader to imagine the story in a theatrical context. In the case of the illustration from Herong ji it may even be that the illustrator has not carefully read the play or read the play at all. The caption suggests that the zither was delivered but does not specify the deliverer; only the text species that the zither is delivered by Gold-Star Taibai. It seems likely, then, that the illustration may be an imaginative interpretation of the caption made in ignorance of the text. Through performance illustration, publishers were able to exert a form of control over the reader by imposing a theatrical context on the imagination. Some publishers, however, seem to have attempted to free rather than restrict the reader’s imagination. The Jinling publishing house Wenlin Ge, for example, printed its drama publications with double-folio illustrations printed on two facing pages, but some of these double half-folio pages were left completely blank. Of the twenty-two extant plays published by this house,17 at least seven feature blank pages.18 The number of blank pages per play varies between three and seven ‘double half-folios.’ Signicantly, the blank pages, like the illustrations in other editions, appear at regular intervals such as that the blank pages of Shuanghong ji are placed in 1.2b–3a, 1.15b–16a, 1.24b–25a, 2.2b–3a, 2.14b–15a, 2.22b–23a. As this is a consistent phenomenon, and the continuity of the text is not interrupted, it is clear that these blank pages were not printing mistakes, but a completely intentional aspect of the publication. It might be theorized that these blank double-folio pages were laid out to accommodate illustrations, but nancial problems

17 Du Xinfu in Mingdai banke zonglu lists the titles of twenty-one plays published by Wenlin Ge (1.11a–b). The one title that is not listed by Du is Chongjiao gu Jingchai ji, now in the collection of Beijing Library and Jinan City Library. For a full list of Wenlin Ge’s extant drama publications see the Appendix. 18 The thirteen publications published by Wenlin Ge I have examined are Yulan ji, Yuan Wenzheng Huanhun ji, Yuntai ji, Gao Wenju Zhenzhu ji, Zhou Wangyun Zhongxiao ji, Shuanghong ji, Chisong ji, Jiaopa ji, Qingpao ji, Yanzhi ji, Yixie ji, Simei ji, and Gucheng ji (for the bibliographic details see the Appendix. The rst seven publications of the list feature blank pages.

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or some inefciency prevented the illustrations from being included. Once again, the consistency of the phenomenon suggests intention rather than accident. Even assuming this kind of accident, however, the blank pages easily could have been eliminated. In actual printing practice, Chinese books are formed by printing a folio with a single block and folding the folio in half. In the publications of Wenlin Ge, the instances of the blank double half-folio pages are due to the printer using only half of a block. The publisher could have easily avoided the two blank half-folio pages by combining the two half-blocks and printing a single folio of text. In addition to eliminating the blank pages, this would have saved paper. Wenlin Ge’s use of these blank pages is analogous to Fuchun Tang’s use of captions without images. In both cases, the publishers are reluctant to impose on the imagination of the reader. It might be asked why Wenlin Ge bothered with the blank page at all. The answer is likely that he wanted to leave space for the reader to project his own imagination onto the page. Wenlin Ge accepted the idea that the reading experience is bound up with the idea of the image, but apparently felt the reader could be trusted to devise images for himself. To publish a volume that merely included text would have been to deny the importance of the image. Wenlin Ge was not alone in this practice, which we can also observe in the plays published by Guangqing Tang owned by Tang Zhenwu in Jinling.19

Reading and the Conation of Time The combination of drama text and performance illustration, like performance itself, brings history into the present (as discussed in chapters four and ve). Thus the conation of reality and time experienced by the theater-goers is also possible for the reader. This crucial element of the reading experience is suggested by Qi Biaojia in his anthology of drama criticism Yuanshan Tang jupin. Qi writes of the play Yiyong cijin by Zhu Youdun: “It is not only that the righteous valour of Lord Guan appears to materialize after a thousand years, but even the ruse foisted by A Man [Cao Cao] on the hero materializes right before one.”20 Although Qi’s use of the term “right before one” (dangchang) might be

19 The extant juan of Xiaoguang ji published by Guangqing Tang also features ve blank double-half-folios. See Xu Fuzuo, Xiaoguang ji, Beijing Library. 20 Qi Biaojia, Yuanshan Tang jupin, 6:147.

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understood to refer to the stage, but the term can also mean a page or passage in a book, or a particular physical location where one reads. This comment, then, applies to the experience of both reading and performance. Qi Biaojia’s comment on Fu luochang, another play by Zhu Youdun, makes an even more explicit point about the conation of reality and the experience of reading: Every sentence [in the play] scolds. When the scolding is brilliant, one does not perceive it as mere words. One actually sees the characters, Jin’er for example, cry and laugh on the pages. And it seems to the reader that their bodies are actually on the stage.21

As discussed in chapter four, events on the stage are themselves subject to an imaginative transformation and become actual in the mind of the sensitive viewer. The reader of a book, then, is removed from this complete actualization, but it is possible nonetheless. The book becomes performance and the performance becomes reality. Given this conception of reading, Huanyu Xiansheng Gong’s statement that his play Dacheng ji affords the chance to “witness the ancient Sage’s very complexion” applies equally to a theatrical audience (as discussed in chapter four) and a reader. Both the theater and the book make possible the conation of past and present. Many readers from the late Ming period, like Huanyu Xiansheng Gong, experienced the conation of time through their reading of published plays. The playwright and publisher Chen Yujiao (1544–1611) notes this experience in a 1589 post-face to a collection of plays Gu mingjia zaju: I read the plays and [felt] a thousand years of the Jin and Tang dynasties, and the Song dynasty in Bianjing all played out before my eyes, and there likewise seem [before my eyes] the happy, cheering business of emperors and ofcials.22

Chen Yujiao suggests that the gap between past and present was bridged in his experience of reading, and the actuality of emperors and ofcials could be resurrected from the printed page. An anonymous commentary to the play Bai Minzhong Chu Meixiang in the anthology Gu zaju makes a similar declaration to that of Chen Yujiao: “On opening the volume,

21 22

Ibid., 6:140–1. Chen Yujiao, “Postface,” in Cai Yi, ed., ZGGDXQXBHB, 1:422.

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I confront the sages.”23 This conation of time, as the tone of Chen Yujiao’s comments suggests, was not only a desirable phenomenon of painting and illustration (as discussed in chapter ve), but a desirable phenomenon of reading. A preface to Xuan gujin Nan Bei ju, attributed to Xu Wei, argues that the best literary medium for the conation of time is drama ( just as it is an excellent medium when rendered as performance): The moment one is born into the world, one becomes a historian of qing [emotion]. Gathering sand as play and pinching leaves to staunch tears is the beginning of qing. After a lifetime of having been involved in situations and dealt with business, allaying sadness and exciting happiness, one is inspired to compose distinguished and beautiful poetry and prose, lamentation [sao] and rhapsody. These works inspire people to read so happily that their faces spread in smile, so angrily that their eyes pop wide-open, and so sadly that their noses sniff. It is as if they sit face to face with the [historical] gures and discuss court stories24 and laugh or lament amid a time a hundred or a thousand years past. There is no secret to creating a work like this. The more closely qing is delineated, the more easily it moves people, and the more endurable it is transmitted through the ages. The drama of the South and North is the most obvious case in point.25

As the concept of the ‘historian of qing’ was relatively unknown among Xu Wei’s generation but very popular among the generations came after, it seems likely that Xu Wei is not the author of this passage. It was probably forged by the publisher some time during the Chongzhen period after Xu Wei was promoted as an authority in the eld of drama by Yuan Hongdao and Wang Jide. Whoever he may have been, the writer of this preface emphasizes that drama, among all the literary genres, best allows the reader to experience the conation of time. The elevation of drama over other literary genres in terms of the conation of time is not particular to this preface writer but is also notable in the writings of the playwright and publisher Meng Chengshun. As Meng writes in his preface to Gujin mingju hexuan:

23

Bai Minzhong Chu Meixiang, in Wang Jide, ed., Gu zaju, Guqu Zhai Wanli edition,

7a. 24 The term ‘hui chen’ (dusting) here refers to the book titled “Hui chen lu” by Wang Mingqing in the Song, which is about the history and stories of the Song court. I thus translate the term as “discussing the court stories” rather than “dusting.” 25 Xu Wei, “Preface to Xuan nanbei ji,” in Cai Yi, ed., ZGGDXQXBHB, 1:67.

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chapter six Poetry was transformed into lyric and lyric was transformed into drama. The lower the genre became, the more difcult it was to master. Zang Jinshu [courtesy name of Maoxun] of Wuxing has given a perfect explanation of drama’s difculties: rst, it is difcult to create a perfect correspondence between emotion and lyric; second, it is difcult to devise tightly-woven and fast-paced plots; third, it is difcult to compose harmonious tunes. [But Zang adds that] these difculties are nothing compared to the difculties that face anyone who would be an all-around master of the theater [danghang jia]. The wonder of both poetry and lyric depends on conveying emotion and delineating scenery. But what emotion and scenery have been created are nothing but the changing forms of mist, cloud, owers, and birds, and the distinct reactions of sadness, delight, anger, and happiness. The situation is exhausted in front of the eyes, and the sympathetic reection is only aroused by accident. Those who have mastered the skill can all do as much. As for the wonder of drama, it depends on embodying the good and the bad, the noble and the humble, partings and reunions, the living and the dead, of both the past and the present. It creates form according to matter and endows image according to object. It is rendered sometimes in serious language and sometimes in jesting language. The gu, mo, jing, and dan must unify all puppets on one stage and gather together the matters of a thousand years. When [a character] laughs, there is laughter; when cries, there are tears; when delights, there is life; when sighs, there is breath. If not the work of an author who places his body amid the speech and action of hundreds of beings and things [wu], and relates his heart to the seven exuberant emotions, how can drama be mastered! When I compose poetry and lyrics, I follow my own will and stop when the words have exhausted my intention. When I compose drama, however, I must be now a man, now a woman, now a song, an emperor, a servant, a concubine, a hired worker, a gentleman scholar.26

From the above passage we can infer the reason why Meng perceives drama as a more accomplished genre than poetry and lyric in terms of the conation of time (“The gu, mo, jing, and dan…gather together the matters of a thousand years”). In Meng’s conception, a poem or a lyric merely reects the personality and emotion of the poet, while drama requires a universal empathy and understanding. Even if the poet has achieved ‘The Conation of Emotion and Scenery’ (qing jing jiao rong)—the ideal of Chinese poetry—the matter conveyed by any single work is relatively limited. Drama, however, multiplies the achievement of poetry and lyric by potentially encompassing every aspect of life

26 Meng Chengshun, “Preface to Gujin mingju hexuan” (1633), in Cai Yi, ed., ZGGDXQXBHB, 1:198.

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and history in a single work. These aspects are not merely wooden, but are animated by the imagination of the playwright, who must become each and every one of his own characters. This variety and copiousness makes drama more difcult to write, according to Meng, but more profound and interesting to behold. Even so, Meng categorizes drama as a low-brow genre insofar as it emerged from a popular art and continues to cater to the masses. This was less an aesthetic judgment than a sociological observation. In the passage beginning “When a character laughs . . .,” Meng describes the conation of reality and time in operation. The aesthetic becomes the actual, as described in chapters four and ve. Hearing actual laughter, seeing actual tears, feeling actual breath, readers are transported into a different reality and often into a different historical era. The ideal of poetry is ‘The Conation of Emotion and Scenery’ (as in Li Bai’s famous lines “Jutou wang mingyue/Ditou si guxiang” or “Raising my head to see the moon/Lowering my head to contemplate my hometown”) but this conation is about the emotion and scenery experienced and reported by the poet. The reader is merely an observer of this conation, which is felt exclusively by the poet. Drama, on the other hand, allows the reader to be a participant. The conation of time is experienced by the reader as a personal occurrence. Thus, according to Meng, drama is a more powerful genre than poetry and lyric. In order to accomplish the goals of copiousness and empathy, a playwright must delineate his plots and characters as does a painter, an analogy drawn by Meng in a passage that immediately follows the above passage: This is similar to a painter who paints a horse. When [a painter] paints a horse, what he has seen is nothing but a horse. When one sees that [the painter] has learnt to be a horse, it seems as if his muscles, body, and bone structure are that of a horse. Then the horse that [the painter] paints will be a true horse. Those who learn performance without locating themselves on the stage will never know how to act, and likewise, those who do not become the characters in a play will not know how to compose drama. This is the reason why drama is more difcult than poetry and lyric.27

For Meng, ‘reality’ is the ultimate standard for both painting and drama. The ‘reality’ presented in the play and reenacted upon stage, however,

27

Ibid., 1:198–9.

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is not limited to formal likeness but encompasses all the aspects of life, including appearance, the language, action, emotion, and spirit. The complete transformation of the performer and the playwright into the dramatis personae in all of these aspects is the key to the success of drama in competing with poetry and lyric. The author’s imaginative identication with the characters is inscribed in the text and rediscovered by the actor, as Cheng Yuwen indicates in his preface to Sheng Ming zaju sanshi zhong: Those between Heaven and earth who understand the foolish and the worthy, who deny nobility and humility, longevity and death, man and woman, Chinese and barbarian—as long as there is one thing worth transmitting and a single matter worth recording—will elucidate the old story in a book so that the dead trace can be brought back to life on the stage. Who is real and who unreal? Both will always be manifested in the six role-types [wai, mo, jing, chou, sheng, dan] on any given night in any given year [. . .] This is all made possible by men of talent and poets, who perform a good deed in giving us such a playful drama, and reincarnate themselves to be those who preach the dharma.28

Here the ideas of the truthful performance and the conation of reality and the stage are suggested just as in Meng’s preface. But Cheng is careful to attribute the resurrection of history to the playwright, with the performer having only the secondary role of enacting the ‘trace’ left by the playwright. Publishers/illustrators are readers of a special sort, and illustration reects their understanding of what they read. Lu Rui suggests as much when he praises the publisher/illustrator Li Gaochen (courtesy name of Li Tingmo, owner of the publishing house Yan Ge): “His illustrated portrait is as if physically present in the ‘West Chamber’ and there is no need to wait for an insightful reader.”29 The portrait referred in this passage was published in 1630 and is still available to us today (gure 6–20).30 The quote clearly implies that the illustrator equals to an insightful reader and ‘insightful reading’ is the basis for the conation of time and reality. The actual reader—as opposed to the publisher, illustrator, and performer—is thus able to effect this cona-

28 Cheng Yuwen, “Preface to Sheng Ming zaju,” in Cai Yi, ed., ZGGDXQXBHB, 1:189. 29 Lu Rui, “Preface to Xixiang,” included in The Chongzhen Yan Ge Edition of Xu Wenchang piping Xixiang ji, in Cai Yi, ZGGDXQXBHB, 1:173–4. 30 This portrait is copied by Min Qiji in his printed color illustrations to Xixiang ji.

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6–20. Portrait of Yingying. In Xixiang ji, by Wang Shifu. N.p.: Yan Ge, 1630. Reproduced from Zhongguo meishu quanji: huihua bian, 20:125.

tion for himself. ‘Insightful reading’ implies not merely careful attention to the text, but an imaginative engagement with the text. The entire cultural construct of drama is built on this idea: by insightful reading the performer resurrects the historical gure on the stage (as discussed in chapter four); by insightful reading the publisher/illustrator resurrects the historical gure in performance illustration (as discussed in chapter ve); by insightful reading the reader resurrects the historical gure on an imaginary stage that becomes real (as discussed in this chapter). The drama publication with performance illustration thus encompasses three different types of performance, executed respectively by the actor (taking the publication as a script), the publisher/illustrator, and the reader. The playwright orchestrates this complex reception by embodying in his play a reality that can be extrapolated in different ways. Those playwrights who embody the most concentrated reality provide for the most intense extrapolation and are naturally considered the best writers. In his preface to Gujin mingju hexuan, quoted above, Meng Chengshun writes that the highest achievement is to become an ‘all-around master’ (danghang jia): one who is equally skillful at plot construction, musical lyrics, and poetry, and who presents his work in a direct and emotionally immediate style. The term is borrowed from

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Zang Maoxun, who distinguishes between two major categories of quality playwright in his 1616 preface to his anthology of Yuan drama Yuanqu xuan, published by himself: In the eld of drama there are playwrights who are renowned [ming jia] and then there are those who are masters [hang jia]. Those who are renowned enter and exit the bureau of music [poetry]. Their literary style is amboyant. Even so those who are knowledgeable and broadly learned are able to write with excellence. Those who are masters, on the other hand, are in accordance with what they are representing and embody it in its completeness, as if they stand in the shoes [of their characters] to the extent that they almost forget [that their characters] are ctive. [The plays of a master] make one so jubilant that the whiskers open, so angry that one grasps one’s own wrist, so sad that one hides one’s tears, and so admiring that one’s face will y. Only a performance like that given by the actor Meng can match up to this. Therefore, the best drama is called the master.31

This last allusion is to the Zhanguo-period actor Meng, who played the part of the deceased prime minister Sun Shu’ao with such skill that the audience believed that Sun had been brought back to life.32 The playwright attempts to achieve something similar. Those who succeed qualify, by Zang’s denition, as ‘all-round masters.’ The master is not only a good writer, but he must also be a good actor, identifying completely with his characters and living their lives. In this sense when the playwright writes, he is actually performing the story rather than merely rendering it in words. Only when the author transforms himself as a performer—achieves the intense role-playing of Meng—can the past be brought before the eyes through his work. This concept that a playwright ‘performs’ is suggested in the playwright Tang Xianzu’s preface to Zhang Taihe’s play Hongfu ji, in which he uses the verb “yan” (perform) rather than “zuo” (compose):33 Hongfu has been performed [i.e. rewritten] three times [my emphasis]: once by Jinzhai waihan in a version that is vulgar and marginal; once by Lingran jushi (Zhang Fengyi) in a version that is brief and at. Now

31 Zang Maoxun, “Preface to Yuanqu xuan” (1616), in Yuanqu xuan, 1616 Diaochong Guan edition, preface. 4b–5b. National Central Library, Taipei. 32 See Sima Qian, Shiji, 66.3201–2. 33 The use of ‘yan’ rather than ‘zuo’ also appears in Qi Biaojia’s comment on Ye Xianzu’s Sanyi chengyin in Yuanshan Tang jupin (6:159), and in Zhu Guozhen’s discussion of Liang Chenyu’s Hongxian zaju in Yongchuang xiao pin (preface dated 1619), in Biji xiaoshuo daguan 6 (1983), 13:18.8a.

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there is a version by Pingshan [Zhang Taihe] that does not follow the style of its two predecessors but is able to incorporate the strength of the two earlier plays.34

Tang Xianzu clearly uses the term “sanyan”35 (performed three times) to mean rewritten three times, as all three of the mentioned gures are playwrights rather than actors. He thus suggests the conceptual afnity between literary composition and performance. In this case, performers, publishers, and readers merely follow the footsteps of the playwrights. A playwright presents a performance in words, while the performers actualize the playwright’s performance on the stage; the publisher/illustrator in turn represents it in the book form, and the reader enacts it in his mind. In the late Ming period, the highest achievement of a playwright is to compose plays that are suitable to both performance and reading, and the criterion of this success is that the work must inspire readers to conate the past and the present. In his career as a drama publisher, for example, Zang Maoxun concentrated his energy on editing and printing plays that, in his opinion, were not suitable for performance though very good in their way, such as those by Tang Xianzu. In Zang’s opinion, as quoted above, only those playwrights who achieve the union of literature and performance can be considered ‘masters,’ while those like Tang Xianzu, while very talented, can only be considered ‘renowned.’ It is interesting that Tang Xianzu is now considered the greatest playwright of the Ming period. His rise to preeminence (beginning in the 17th century) is closely linked with the rise of the idea that printed plays are primarily literary works rather than theatrical scripts. In his late Ming preface to Tang’s famous work Mudan ting, the drama critic Shen Jifei suggests this changing conception. He esteems Tang Xianzu for the way his plays conate time, but his admiration is given to the metaphors of painting (closely allied to poetry) rather than drama: It is not necessary to copy the gures and events of hundreds of years ago with the brush and ink. Any such work, however, must result from the necessity of describing the scenery and the emotion. And such a work can inspire belief in the doubtful and doubt in the believing, can bring to life the dead and kill the live, can disentangle bracelets and paint on a tip [of a knife]. Generations hundreds of years hence will seemingly be

34

This passage is quoted in Qi Biaojia, Yuanshan Tang qupin, 6:49. Qi Biaojia in his comment on Li Panyin’s Du Liu Cui also refers to the three versions by Wang Shifu, Xu Wei, and Li as “sanyan.” Yuanshan Tang jupin, 6:177. 35

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chapter six able to perceive the exuberant eyes and eyebrows of those love-desiring ladies, those contemplative gentlemen, those old people, and those stupid folk, as they emerge from printing blocks [i.e. books]. With the exception of Linchuan [Tang Xianzu], no [writer] can achieve this. Linchuan’s play Mudan ting is not a work of drama but of painting. Lacking red and blue, his play is what red and blue cannot paint. This is not a picture but reality. He does not cry or laugh, but there is the sound of crying and laughing.36

Shen Jifei’s assertion that the conation of time must result from the “scene and the emotion” suggests the idea of ‘Conation of Scenery and Emotion,’ which was the ruling idea of Chinese poetic theory. The phrase suggests that Shen was thinking about Tang in terms of poetic conventions rather than dramatic conventions. It was natural, then, that the dramatic deciencies observed by Zang seemed less signicant to Shen. The two critics were holding Tang to completely different standards. If there was widespread disagreement about the best way to effect the conation of time—whether through performance-oriented works or poetically-oriented works—there was complete agreement that the conation of time should be the goal of all dramatists. The infamous late Ming playwright Ruan Dacheng was especially conscious of this goal, suggesting the playwrights worked with it in mind and that it was not merely a conceit of publishers and critics. In his commentary on his own play Shuang jinbang ji published by himself, Ruan writes: “Sima Zichang [Sima Qian] was good at delineating the real, and was able to present whiskers, eyebrows, and emotions from thousands of years in the past. I declare that this play is similar.”37 Thus Ruan both proudly stakes his claim as the inheritor of Sima Qian’s ability to effect the conation of time and implicitly ranks himself above Tang Xianzu, whose works demonstrate exquisite literary skill but provide nothing of the transcendent dynamic that is the ultimate achievement in writing plays. As both performance and drama publications were understood to inspire the conation of time, some drama critics in the late Ming period conceived performing and reading as analogous. (As discussed

36 Shen Jifei, “Inscription to Mudan,” in the appendix of Tang Xianzu, Tang Xianzu ji, 1540–1. 37 Ruan Dacheng, Shuang jinbang ji, Yonghui Tang edition, 2.46a.

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above, writing was another analogue). Wang Siren, for example, wrote in a preface to Xixiang ji printed in the Chongzhen era: Books of chuanqi [‘transmitting the singular,’ i.e. drama publications] are like the world’s spectacular views. If the matter were not singular, it would not be recorded [. . .] If the singular is transmitted, but the lyrics does not equal to this singularity, transmission will not be achieved. [Lyrics] must delineate scenery and represent emotion. During the moment of leisure and delight, whenever one performs [zou, i.e. reads] a word, one almost wishes to arouse the bones of the dead right on the spot and bring every one of them back to life before the eyes without any regret.38

Wang Siren most obviously reveals the analogy between reading and performing in his use of the verb zou. This verb usually describes the act of playing a musical instrument, but here refers to the act of reading. As the emphasis on ‘scenery’ and ‘emotion’ suggests, Wang considers the play an essentially literary entity, but it incorporates elements of the theatrical experience. Wang’s comments seem also to suggest that the direct interaction between the playwright and the reader can be readily experienced at all times, unlike theatrical performance. This is the subtle implication of the phrase “whenever one plays a word,” which emphasizes the freedom of the reader to exercise his imagination. As the publisher, performer and reader equally and similarly interact with the playwright, they have equivalent status. Performers present their reading in theatrical performance, the publishers in illustration, and the readers privately in their own minds. In terms of the conation of time, reading can thus substitute for performance and even illustration. This conception again suggests a partial explanation for the decline in the idea of drama publications as scripts for performance. ‘Insightful reading,’ in Lu Rui’s phrase, makes performance superuous. Drama publication, as distinct from theatrical performance, allows the reader to enjoy performance whenever and wherever the inclination strikes him. In a publisher’s note to a 1498 edition of Xixiang ji printed by the Yue family in Jintai, this advantage is clearly suggested. The publisher claims to have “matched lyrics to illustrations so by obtaining this book the leisured and reposing tourists who lodge in guesthouses and travel in boats are allowed to sing [i.e. read] with understanding of the entire work and entertain their heart and mind. [I] have had 38 Wang Siren, “Preface to Heping Bei Xixiang,” in San xiansheng heping Yuan ben Bei Xixiang, a Ming edition, 1a–1b. Palace Museum, Taipei.

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it engraved, printed and published so that it will be easy to read for people everywhere” (quoted in chapter ve). In his 1459 preface to Xi Hu zhuzhi ci edited by Yang Weizhen, He Wei emphasizes the literary text as both a portable, personal article and a locus of the conation of time. This combination of virtues means that the imagination is freed from its dependence on the structures of the theater. He envisions his publication inducing a conation of time even in remote and unlikely spots: Is it not a happy moment when writers and ink mavens, traveling on a lake, take some drink and beat on the mast as they sing these few songs in face of the peaks on both shores and spiritually encounter past worthies among the innite waves and mists?39

He suggests that the encounter with “past worthies” takes place in the reader’s mind, as implied in the words “encounter spiritually,” but also in the words “innite waves and mists” (yu yanbo haomiao jian). This phrase refers to the physical conditions of the lake, but also and more importantly to a mystical realm of the mind where the past recurs. The waves and the mist suggest the mind in a state of mystical reception, as they imply a kind of wavering eternity. This mysterious environment reminds us of Li Rihua’s encounter with Du Fu amid the innite waves of a painting, as discussed in chapter four. The two comments suggest the analogy between reading and painting. The priority given to the conation of time not only inuenced the attendant manifestations of the late Ming drama culture (publishing, performance, illustration), but also inuenced the plays themselves. The pursuit of historical accuracy (i.e. identity between the past and the representation of the past) became less dominant as the idea of representing the past subtly gave way to the idea of reviving the past. The past did not have to be accurately represented because it could be presented. Yugu Laoren describes this shift in emphasis clearly in his preface to the anthology of drama scenes, Cilin yixiang, edited by Xu Yu and published by Zhao Bangxian. The preface is dated 1623, the same year the edition was published:

39 He Wei, “Preface to Xi Hu zhuzhi ci,” in Guoli Zhongyang Tushugan, ed., Guoli Zhongyang tushuguan shanben xuba jilu: jibu, 7:197.

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The contemporary dramas composed by those [‘famous lords and leisured literati’] do not collect facts but only aim at resembling the spirit. Hearing such a [drama], even the brave hero would loiter, and people given to sorrow would let fall their tears. This is because the voice and music of a generation indeed traverses back and forth over hundreds and thousands of years.40

This passage suggests that the conation of time is not inspired by historical facts (“not collected” by the playwright) but the spirit embodied in those facts, which arouses sympathetic reaction in the audience or reader. Not merely the work, but the “voice and music of a generation”—the animate reality of the generation—presents itself to future generations or recapitulates the distant past before the present generation, conating the past and present. This interaction is not merely a ghostly interaction but a mingling of tangible reality, as the editor Zhang Jishi suggests in his postface to his compilation of the poetic anthologies of both Kang Hai and Wang Jiusi, Er Taishi yuefu lianbi: One thousand years ago the wine cup was ignored as cold ash, but one thousand years later it is taken up to cool the body that burns with hot blood. Thus, not only I witness the people from the past singing and dancing, but they too greet me with tears and words.41

The past is not an abstraction of the imagination, but an actuality rendered by the imagination. This ontological equivalence between past and present is indicated by the passing or sharing of the cup, which implies that the two temporal frames share the same physical reality and space. In the implicit image of the passage, the past and present sit and drink together, with a strong suggestion of a contextualizing banquet. “Singing and dancing” (shi ge qie wu) is a phrase explicitly drawn from the traditions of performance, and the combination of singing, dancing and drinking clearly suggests the banquet performance (as both poets Kang and Wang are also playwrights, this association is not surprising). This suggestion is heightened by the verb “witness” ( jian), which suggests the perspective of the dramatic audience as it is caught up in the reality of a performance. The arrival at reality is indicated by the phrase “greet me” that suggests that the artice of the stage has broken down and that the audience and performers have 40 Yugu laoren, “Preface to Cilin yixiang,” in Xu Yu, ed., Cilin yixiang, Tianqi edition. 41 Zhang Jishi, “Postface to Er Taishi yuefu lianbi,” in Guoli Zhongyang Tushuguan, ed., Guoli Zhongyang tushuguan shanben xuba jilu: jibu, 7:459.

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entered into the kind of personal interchange that characterizes daily life. The implicit image, then, recalls not only the conventional banquet scene of the Ming drama in which the old and young generations share refreshments, but the custom of ‘carpet performance’ as discussed in chapter three (i.e. the past performs for the present). Whatever the precise nature of the implicit image, the conation of time is subtly gured in terms of drama, which is consistent with the Ming idea that drama is the essential vehicle for the revival of the past. It is revealing that the conventions of drama should be subtly invoked in a description of poetry. This shows the preeminence of drama as a genre, at least in terms of the conation of time. The passage also subtly registers the didactic nature of the conation of time, as the cold cup of the past tempers or moderates the youthful re of the present. The desire to experience this mature wisdom of the past (symbolized by the cooled wine) was at the heart of the desire to conate past and present, as discussed in chapter ve. Discussing the poets Bao Zhao (c. 414–466) and Du Mu (803–852) in his study Remembrances, Stephen Owen maintains that memory is a crucial conduit to the past, but that it “can never pass the barrier to reach it [the past]. Unable to conquer and/or seize the past, they would interpret it, but they nd there the same barrier and veil that holds them away.”42 This may be an apt description of earlier times, but it does not apply to the Ming period, when it was considered very much possible to ‘pass the barrier.’ Indeed, the past was considered eternally present in drama, performance, and illustration, accessible to anyone with imagination.

42

Stephen Owen, Remembrances, 65.

CONCLUSION

THE ROLE OF THE PUBLISHER

A prominent school of thought holds that the inclusion of illustration in the publications of the late Ming period was motivated by economic considerations. The argument is simple: illustration made books more attractive and therefore increased their retail value.1 Presumably the increased production cost was more than recouped. It is useful to keep in mind the ever-important role of economics, but it will be argued here that it is also advisable to investigate in other directions. Publishers surely had an interest in making money, but they seem to have had an equal desire to play a role in the formation of culture and elevate themselves as literary gures in their own right. Publishers, in short, were not merely businessmen, but men of artistic temperament engaged in business, and they must be understood in this light. One way that publishers attempted to win a place in the culture was to stamp themselves on the text through the process of editing, commenting, and annotating (Patricia Sieber’s study Theaters of Desire makes all the salient points in this regard).2 In the Wanli period, especially, publishers seized on illustration as another means of shaping both the text and the reception of the text. There is not much evidence that elucidates the relationship between publishers and illustrators, but the moral and philosophical coherence of most publications suggests a single organizing sensibility. At the very least, publishers exerted a certain amount of control over illustration in their mere power to choose their illustrators. They may also have given specic instructions as to style and content. The desire to become literary participants is itself sufcient to explain the inclusion of illustration, irrespective of economic considerations. This is to say, it is more than conceivable that publishers included illustration at a nancial loss.

1 For a discussion about the cost to produce books and the price of books during the late Ming see Kai-wing Chow, Publishing, Culture, and Power, chapter one, 19–56. 2 Particularly the discussion of Zang Maoxun in chapter two and Wang Jide in chapter three. See Patricia Sieber, Theaters of Desire, 83–161.

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In their attempt to make themselves cultural participants, the publishers were distinctly successful, wielding enormous and varied power in the eld of cultural production that mattered most. In the case of drama publication, publishers wielded this power in a consistent and systematic fashion, choosing sides in the late Ming debate as to whether drama publications were essentially performance scripts or reading material, and shaping their publications in support of their position. Many publishers, like many literati, strenuously attempted to maintain the interrelationship of literature and performance. Uncomfortable with the idea of upsetting the traditions of Chinese drama culture, these publishers did everything possible to advocate the importance and primacy of performance, such as providing musical notation (dianban) and keys to pronunciation ( yinshi ). These editorial additions suggest the text’s status as a performance script, and dovetail with the concerns of traditionalists who emphasized the importance of both music and pronunciation. In most cases, as well, publishers used larger fonts and more generous spacing to make the lyrics more legible. This too suggests an emphasis on performance, as performers tended to follow the lyrics closely, while largely improvising the dialogue. Those publishers who saw the printed play as literature, on the other hand, tended to favor landscape illustration over performance illustration (as demonstrated in Ling Mengchu’s edition of Xixiang ji ) and made a hallmark of marginal commentaries, critical prefaces, and publisher’s introductions ( fanli ).3 Publishers did some of this writing themselves, but for the most part exerted control through hiring decisions and specic instructions to contributors. These editorial additions suggest the literary status of drama publication, as such commentaries have no place in performance. The extent to which publishers imposed themselves on the text is demonstrated by a comparison of works in manuscript and published form. The famous manuscript of Pipa ji transcribed by Lu Yidian, for example, bears only one noteworthy feature: the lyrics and the dialogue are rendered in different-sized characters.4 Lu may have incorporated this feature on his own, or he may have retained it from some earlier manuscript. The Side Tang edition of the play published during the 3 Ling Mengchu, “Fanli,” in Xixiang ji, published by Ling Mengchu, in Cai Yi, ed., ZGGDXQXBHB, 2:678. 4 In the postface to his 1674 manuscript copy of Yuanben Cai Bojie Pipa ji, Lu Yidian notes that he worked from an illustrated edition printed in 1548 (post-face 1a–2a).

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early Wanli period likewise renders the lyrics and dialogue in differently sized characters, but also interleaves the text with illustrations, annotates historical allusions, and gives the pronunciation of words, sometimes in the margin above the text and sometimes between the lines of the text. The text is no longer ‘pure’ but checkered by the touch of the publisher. This alters the experience of the reader in no small degree. The reader’s attention does not rest exclusively on the text, but is tugged in several directions, potentially at once. The 1610 edition of the play published by Rongyu Tang goes even farther, not only including illustrations and annotations, but also highly opinionated critical commentaries and interlinear marks (dots and circles) that emphasize the importance of specic passages or phrases (a device also found in many Christian Bibles). In some cases, the commentator will even indicate passages that ought to be excised, writing “Cut!” (shan) in the margin. In most cases, annotation and commentary are placed at the top of the page, but they are sometimes interlinear in what seems a deliberate attempt to intrude on the reading experience and seize the attention of the reader. The publishers used these devices not only to impose themselves on the text and ultimately insinuate themselves into the tradition of Chinese literature, but, more practically, to establish a consistent style that would make their work easily recognizable and attract a loyal clientele. In today’s terms, they attempted to create a ‘brand.’ The Nanjing publishing house Fuchun Tang, for example, surrounded its publications on four sides of every page with ornamented columns (hualan) and printed its name down the banxin of each folio (the banxin is the fold of a folio page). The house’s drama publications also feature illustrations in a consistent style so that an educated eye could spot them in a conventional anthology with no difculties. The same consistency also appears in Shide Tang’s drama publications. Thus the publishing house is identiable to the reader even before the book is opened. The plays printed by the Jinling publishing house Jizhi Zhai, on the other hand, are facsimiles of transcriptions made in the handwriting of the owner Chen Dalai. The result is a consistent yet personal character style, where most publishing houses utilized either multiple styles (due to different transcribers) or standardized characters (Ming ti). The plays printed by the Hangzhou publishing house Rongyu Tang bear titles that follow a consistent formula, as in Mr. Li Zhuowu Comments on Pipa ji (Li Zhuowu xiansheng piping Pipa ji). Even where they were actually written by Ye Zhou, the commentaries are attributed to Li Zhi as a matter of

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house consistency. In all of these ways, the publisher competes with the author as the dominant voice within the publication. It is telling in this regard that most drama editions published during the Wanli period omit the name of the author, but do indicate the name of the publisher, editor, annotator, and commentator. Even when an author is well known—and might conceivably attract readers—no mention is made. The Jinling publishing house Fuchun Tang indicates in most of its publications only its own name, or the name of the chief publisher Tang Fuchun (courtesy name Tang Duixi). In its thirty-eight extant drama publications, Fuchun Tang only indicates the authors of two plays (Ye Liangbiao of Fenjin ji and Sima Qian of Guanyuan ji ) and the editors of a few plays (Zheng Guoxuan of Baishe ji, Zhang Fengyi of Guanyuan ji and Zhufa ji, and Wang Ling of Xunqin ji ). It is interesting that the publisher Tang Fuchun cites the ancient historian Sima Qian as the author of Guanyuan ji, calling him the ‘biographer’ (xizhuan), a title usually given to the author proper. The actual playwright, Zhang Fengyi, meanwhile, is cited as the ‘editor’ ( yingua). This suggests the ambiguous conception of authorship that prevailed during the Wanli period: authorship was not exclusively credited to the person who composed the text, but diffused over a network—sometimes a cross-dynastic network—of collaborators. Patricia Sieber calls this “reproductive authorship,” and comments: “Rather than mechanically duplicating the past, such reproductive acts of reading-writing allowed for the individual imagination to authoritatively assert itself in the name of a plausibly simulated historical authenticity.”5 Under these circumstances, the publisher’s efforts to appropriate the text were both credible and viable. It might be objected that publishers’ self-elevation was a matter of self-attery, and the attribution of self-authorship not likely to be taken seriously. But many prefaces written during the late Ming period likewise attribute authorship to the publisher rather than the original playwright. In his preface to the Zhang Shenzhi edition of Xixiang ji published in 1639, the famous painter and illustrator Chen Hongshou, for example, credits authorship to the publisher Zhang, while failing to mention the original playwright Wang Shifu. It might be imagined that Chen wished to atter Zhang, who was, at least temporarily, his employer. However much power exerted by the publisher, however, the

5

Patricia Sieber, Theaters of Desire, 170.

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preface writer, being a conscientious man of letters, was not likely to write anything he did not actually believe. And even if attery was a motive, it is profoundly signicant that this form of attery was possible and omnipresent during the Wanli period. Chen, clearly, was working within socially and intellectually acceptable parameters.6 Authorship encompasses not only playwright, editor, and publisher, but even the commentator of the text. The most famous case is Jin Shengtan, a commentator of Xixiang ji, who called his edition as “Shengtan’s Xixiang ji.”7 Publishers like Sijian Tang and Rongyu Tang went so far as to attribute publications exclusively to their alleged commentators, Chen Jiru and Li Zhi, respectively. At least in part, these publishing houses attempted to appropriate the reputation of these two famous late Ming scholars to attract customers, but the prominence accorded these commentators also suggests a conception of their real importance as elucidators of profound and hidden meaning embodied in the text. It was widely held that without such elucidation the book would remain as good as closed to the average reader. Thus the commentator was believed to serve a function as important as that of the author himself. Without the author, there is no text; but without the commentator, the text is opaque. The collaboration of both is necessary if anything other than supercial meaning is to be conveyed. This dynamic suggests that the late Ming culture was very conscious of the text as an ongoing collaboration among numerous parties. In this sense, the sixty editions of Xixiang ji produced in the late Ming period are not corrupted editions of the play, but sixty collaborative versions of the story titled Xixiang ji, each version being unique to the mix of its multiple creators. In this cultural environment, the literati playwrights lost control of their own work and suffered a diminution in prestige. A countermovement naturally ensued in which the literati attempted to regain both their control and their status. Some literati playwrights like Chen Yujiao, Meng Chengshun, Feng Menglong, and Ruan Dacheng began to publish and comment on their own plays, thus reappropriating all aspects of ‘authorship.’ Some literati playwright/publishers, like Feng Menglong and Ruan Dacheng, included very clear stage instructions 6 Chen Hongshou, “Preface,” in Wang Shifu, Xixiang miben, Zhang Shenzhi 1639 edition, in GBXQCK, 1st series. 7 For a detail discussion about this issue, see Patricia Sieber, Theaters of Desire, 147–161, and 168–174.

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for performers and thus, like more traditional publishers, attempted to have a hand in the world of theatre. Ruan Dacheng, who was possibly the most control-hungry of all literati, went a step farther and trained his own performing troupe to perform his own plays according to his own precise specications. Even more unusually, the opening illustration in Ruan’s play Chundeng mi depicts the fumo and bears a caption drawn from the play’s prologue “Yonghuai Tang deep among hundreds of owers,” which alludes to the studio name of Ruan himself (gure 6–16). If indeed the illustration is a portrait of himself, Ruan inserts even his own image in the imagination of the reader, and guratively retains the prerogative of guidance traditionally delegated to the fumo. Like no other literati before or after, then, Ruan seized control over every phase of his work, from conception to nal reception, both on stage and off stage. Ruan’s zealous control can partially be explained as a reaction to the encroachment of the publishers, who seemed dauntlessly bent on containing the entire culture—past and present—within their books. These books have triumphed over the bereavements of time: they survive to this day and allow the past to be eternally present.

APPENDIX

DRAMA PUBLICATIONS OF FUCHUN TANG, GUANGQING TANG, JIZHI ZHAI, SHIDE TANG, AND WENLIN GE DURING THE WANLI PERIOD Fuchun Tang 富春堂

(Baipao ji) Xinke chuxiang yinzhu Xue Rengui kuahai zhengdong Baipao ji, 新刻出像音注薛 仁貴跨海征東白袍記 by anonymous playwright, Beijing University Library, in GBXQCK, 1st series. (Baishe ji) Xinke chuxiang yinzhu Liu Hanqing Baishe ji, 新刻出像音注劉漢卿白蛇記 by Zheng Guoxuan, 鄭國軒 Beijing University Library, in GBXQCK, 1st series. (Baitu ji) Xinke chuxiang yinzhu zengbu Liu Zhiyuan Baitu ji, 新刻出像音注增補劉智遠白 兔記 by anonymous playwright, Beijing Library, in GBXQCK, 1st series. (Caolu ji) Xinke chuxiang yinzhu Liu Xuande sangu Caolu ji, 新刻出像音注劉玄德三顧草廬 記 by anonymous playwright, Beijing University Library, in GBXQCK, 1st series. (Dongchuang ji) Xinke chuxiang yinzhu Yue Fei polu Dongchuang ji, 新刻出像音注岳 飛破虜 東窗記 by Zhou Li, 周禮 Beijing University Library, in GBXQCK, 1st series. (Fenjin ji) Xinke chuxiang yinzhu Guan Bao Fenjin ji, 新刻出像音注管鮑分金記 by Ye Liangbiao, 葉良表 Beijing University Library & Zhejiang Provincial Library, in GBXQCK, 1st series. (Guanyuan ji) Xinkan yinzhu chuxiang Qi shizi Guanyuan ji, 新刊音注出像齊世子灌園記 by Zhang Fengyi 張鳳翼 Beijing University Library, in GBXQCK, 1st series. (Herong ji) Xinke chuxiang yinzhu Wang Zhaojun chusai Herong ji, 新刻出像音注王昭君出 塞和戎記 by anonymous playwright, in GBXQCK, 2nd series. (Huandai ji) Xinke chuxiang yinzhu hualan Pei Du Xiangshan Huandai ji, 新刻出像音注花 欄裴度香山還帶記 by Shen Cai, 沈采 Palace Museum, Taipei. (Hufu ji) Xinke chuxiang yinzhu Hua jiangjun Hufu ji, 新刻出像音注花將軍虎符記 by Zhang Fengyi, 張鳳翼 Beijing Library, in GBXQCK, 1st series. ( Jindiao ji) Xinke chuxiang yinzhu Xue Pingliao Jindiao ji, 新刻出像音注薛平遼金貂記 by anonymous playwright, Beijing University Library, in GBXQCK, 1st series. (Mudan ting) Xinke Mudan ting Huanhun ji, 新刻牡丹亭還魂記 by Tang Xianzu, 湯顯祖 Chongzhen edition, Zheng Zhenduo collection. (Mulian jiumu) Xinke chuxiang yinzhu quanshan Mulian jiumu xingxiao xiwen, 新刻出像音注 勸善目連救母行孝戲文 by Zheng Zhizhen, 鄭之珍 Beijing Library & KyÔto Daigaku Bungakubu. 京都大學文學部 (Pipa ji) Jiaozi zhushi quanzheng Cai Bojie, 校梓注釋圈証蔡伯喈 by Gao Ming, 高明 annotated, Liu Hongyi, 劉弘毅 1577 edition, Baoding City Library. (Poyao ji) Xinke chuxiang yinzhu Lü Mengzheng Poyao ji, 新刻出像音註呂蒙正破窯記 by anonymous playwright, Palace Museum, Taipei. (Qianjin ji) Xinke chuxiang yinzhu hualan Han Xin Qianjin ji, 新刻出像音注花欄韓信千金 記 by Shen Cai, 沈采 Beijing Library, in GBXQCK, 1st series. (Qinglou ji) Xinke chuxiang yinzhu Song Jiang Shuihu Qinglou ji 新刻出像音注宋江水滸青 樓記 in Xiuke yanju shizhong 繡刻演劇十種 (Qinxin ji) Xinke chuxiang yinzhu Sima Xiangru Qinxin ji, 新刻出像音注司馬相如琴心記 by Sun You, 孫柚 Beijing University Library & Kokuritsu KÔbunsho Kan, 國立公 文書館 selected in Zhongguo banhua shi tulu, p. 635.

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(Sangui lianfang ji) Xinbian quanxiang Sangui lianfang ji, 新編全像三桂聯芳記 by anonymous playwright, private collectors Wu and Du, in GBXQCK, 2nd series. (Sanyuan ji) Xinke chuxiang yinzhu Shang Luo Sanyuan ji, 新刻出像音注商輅三元記 by Shen Shouxian, 沈受先 in GBXQCK, 1st series. (Shengxian ji) Xinke chuxiang yinzhu Han Xiangzi jiudu Wengong Shengxian ji, 新刻出像音注 韓湘子九度文公昇仙記 by anonymous playwright, Beijing University Library, in GBXQCK, 1st series. (Shiyi ji) Xinkan yinzhu chuxiang Han Peng Shiyi ji, 新刊音注出像韓朋十義記 by anonymous playwright, Shanghai Library, in GBXQCK, 1st series. (Shuangzhong ji) Xinke chuxiang yinzhu Tangchao Zhang Xun Xu Yuan Shuangzhong ji, 新刻出 像音註唐朝張巡許遠雙忠記 by Yao Maoliang, 姚茂良 Beijing & Shanghai Library, in GBXQCK, 1st series. (Tipao ji) Xinke chuxiang yinzhu Fan Zhui Tipao ji, 新刻出像音注范睢綈袍記 by anonymous playwright, Shanghai Library of Historical Document, in GBXQCK, 2nd series. (Wansha ji) Chongke chuxiang Wansha ji, 重刻出像浣紗記 by Liang Chenyu, 梁辰魚 Beijing Library & KyÔto Daigaku Bungakubu, selected in ChÖgoku kodai hanga ten, p. 116. (Xiangshan ji) Xinke chuxiang yinzhu Guanshiyin xiuxing Xiangshan ji, 新刻出像音注觀世音 修行香山記 by anonymous playwright, in GBXQCK, 2nd series. (Xixiang ji) Xinke chuxiang yinzhu Li Rihua Xixiang ji 新刻出像音注李日華西廂記 by Li Rihua, 李日華 Fu Xihua collection, in GBXQCK, 1st series. (Xixiang ji) Xinke chuxiang yinzhu hualan nandiao Xixiang ji, 新刻出像音注花欄南調 西廂 記, by Cui Shipei 崔時佩 & Li Rihua, 李日華 selected in Zhongguo banhua shi tulu, p. 619. (Xunqin ji) Xinjuan tuxiang yinzhu Zhou Yu jiaozi Xunqin ji, 新鐫圖像音注周羽教子尋親記 by Wang Ling, 王錂 Beijing University library, in GBXQCK, 1st series. (Yingwu ji) Xinke chuxiang yinzhu Su Ying huanghou Yingwu ji, 新刻出像音注蘇英皇后鸚鵡 記 by anonymous playwright, Zheng Zhenduo collection, in GBXQCK, 1st series. (Yuchai ji) Xinke chuxiang yinzhu He Wenxiu Yuchai ji 新刻出像音注何文秀玉釵記, by Xinyi shanren, 心一山人 Zheng Zhenduo collection, in GBXQCK, 1st series. (Yueli ji) Xinke chuxiang yinzhu Jiang Shi Yueli ji, 新刻出像音注姜詩躍鯉記 by Chen Pizhai, 陳羆齋 Shanghai Library, in GBXQCK, 1st series. (Yuhuan ji) Xinke chuxiang yinzhu Tang Wei Gao Yuhuan ji, 新刻出像音注唐韋皋玉環記 attributed to Yang Rousheng, 楊柔勝 Palace Museum, Taipei. (Yujue ji) Xinke chuxiang zhushi Wang Shang zhongjie Kuiling Miao Yujue ji 新刻出像 註釋王 商忠節癸靈廟玉玦記, by Zheng Ruoyong, 鄭若庸 1581 edition, Beijing University library, in GBXQCK, 1st serious. (Zhaoshi gu’er) Xinke jiaozheng quanxiang yinzhu Zhaoshi gu’er ji, 新刻校正全相音注趙氏 孤兒記 by anonymous playwright, KyÔto Daigaku Bungakubu, selected in ChÖgoku kodai hanga ten, p. 112. (Zhufa ji) Xinke chuxiang yinzhu dianban Xu Xiaoke xiaoyi Zhufa ji, 新刻出像音註點板徐孝 克孝義祝髮記 by Zhang Fengyi, 張鳳翼 Beijing Library, in GBXQCK, 1st series. (Zixiao ji) Xinke chuxiang dianban yinzhu Li Shilang Zixiao ji, 新刻出像點板音注李十郎紫 蕭記 by Tang Xianzu, 湯顯祖 Beijing Library, in GBXQCK, 1st series. Xiuke yanju shizhong, 繡刻演劇十種 edited by Yuyu Tang in the early Qing, Nanjing Library. Titles include: Qinglou ji, Hufu ji, Baipao ji, Yingwu ji, Zixiao ji, Yuhuan ji, Qianjin ji, Guanyuan ji, Huandai ji, Baishe ji. Guangqing Tang 廣慶堂 Bayi shuangbei ji, 八義雙盃記 corrected by Ji Zhenlun, 紀振倫 in GBXQCK, 2nd series. Dong Fangshuo Toutao ji, 東方朔偷桃記 by Wu Dexiu, 吳德修 in GBXQCK, 2nd series.

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(Nanke meng) Juan xinke chuxiang Nanke meng, 鐫新刻出像南柯夢 by Tang Xianzu, selected in Zhongguo banhua shi tulu. (Quande ji) Xinbian quanxiang dianban Dou Yujun Quande ji, 新編全像點板竇禹鈞 全德記 by Wang Zhideng, 王稚登 Beijing Library, in GBXQCK, 2nd series. Wu Hou qisheng ji, 武侯七勝記 corrected by Ji Zhenlun, 紀振倫 in GBXQCK, 2nd series. (Xiaoguang ji) Xinke chuxiang dianban Xiaoguang ji, 新刻出相點板宵光記 by Xu Fuzuo, 徐復祚 Beijing Library. (Xihu ji) Xinke quanxiang dianban Xihu ji, 新刻全像點板西湖記 corrected by Ji Zhenlun, 紀振倫 Beijing Library, in GBXQCK, 2nd series 2. Jizhi Zhai 繼志齋 Hongfu ji, 紅拂記 by Zhang Fengyi, 張鳳翼 1601 edition, Beijing & Shanghai Libraries, selected in Zhongguo banhua shi tulu. (Hongqu ji) Chongjiao shiwuduan qiaohe Hongqu ji, 重校十無端巧合紅渠記 by Shen Jing, 沈璟 illustrated, He Long, 何龍 engraved, Liu Dade, 劉大德 Beijing Library, in GBXQCK, 3rd series. ( Jingchai ji) Chongjiao Jingchai ji, 重校荊釵記 by Ke Danqiu, 柯丹邱 in Zhongguo banhua shi tulu. ( Jinqian ji) Chongjiao Jinqian ji, 重校錦箋記 by Zhou Lüjing, 周履靖 1608 edition, Beijing Library, in GBXQCK, 2nd series. ( Jinyin ji) Chongjiao Jinyin ji, 重校金印記 by Su Fuzhi, 蘇復之 Beijing Library, in GBXQCK, 1st series. (Liangjiang ji) Chongjao Liangjiang ji, 重校量江記 by Xu Qiao, 徐翹 1608 edition, Beijing Library, in GBXQCK, 2nd series. (Maijian ji) Chongjiao Maijian ji, 重校埋劍記 by Shen Jing, 沈璟 Beijing University Library, in GBXQCK, 1st series. (Mengjing ji) Huangliang Mengjing ji, 黃樑夢境記 by Su Hanying, 蘇漢英 Beijing Library, in GBXQCK, 1st series. (Pipa ji) Chongjiao Pipa ji, 重校琵琶記 by Gao Ming, 1598 edition, in Beijing Library & Kokuritsu KÔbunsho Kan, selected in ChÖgoku kodai hanga ten, p. 109. Qianjin ji, 千金記 by Shen Cai, 沈采 illustrated by Qiu Ying, 仇英 selected in Zhongguo gudian wenxue banhua xuanji, pp. 192–7. (Qiefu ji) Juan chongjiao chuxiang dianban Qiefu ji 鐫重校出像點板竊符記, by Zhang Fengyi, Kanda KiichirÔ. 神田喜一郎 collection, in ChÖgoku gikyoku zenpon sanshu. 中 國戲曲善本三種 (Qiting ji) Chongjiao Qiting ji, 重校旗亭記 by Zheng Zhiwen, 鄭之文 1599 edition, in GBXQCK, 2nd series. (Shuangyu ji) Chongjiao Shuangyu ji, 重校雙魚記 by Shen Jing, 沈璟 Beijing Library, in GBXQCK, 1st series. (Tihong ji) Chongjiao Han furen Tihong ji, 重校韓夫人題紅記 by Wang Jide, 王驥德 Beijing Library, in GBXQCK, 2nd series. (Toubi ji) Chongjiao Ban Zhongsheng Toubi ji, 重校班仲升投筆記 by Qiu Rui, 丘睿 Beijing Library. (Xiangnang ji) Chongjiao Wulun zhuan Xiangnang ji, 重校五倫傳香囊記 by Shao Can, 邵璨 Beijing Library, in GBXQCK, 1st series. (Yixia ji) Chongjiao Yixia ji, 重校義俠記 by Shen Jing, 沈璟 Beijing University Library, in GBXQCK, 1st series. Yuan Ming zaju, 元明雜劇, Beijing Library, 5 extant plays: Xinjuan Tang Minghuang qiuye Wutong yu zaju, 新鐫唐明皇秋夜梧桐雨雜劇 by Bai Pu. 白樸

302

appendix

Xinjuan banye leihong Jianfu bei zaju, 新鐫半夜雷轟薦福碑雜劇 by Ma Zhiyuan, 馬致遠 selected in Zhongguo banhua shi tulu. Xinjuan Li Taibai pipei Jinqian ji, 新鐫李太白匹配金錢記 by Qiao Ji. 喬吉 Xinjuan Tieguai Li du Jintong Yunü zaju, 新鐫鐵拐李度金童玉女 by Jia Zhongming, 賈仲明 Xinjuan Du Zimei youchun zaju, 新鐫杜子美遊春雜劇 by Wang Jiusi. 王九思 (Yuhe ji) Chongjao Yuhe ji, 重校玉合記 by Mei Dingzuo, 梅鼎祚 Beijing Library. (Yuzan ji) Chongjiao Yuzan ji, 重校玉簪記 by Gao Lian, 高濂 1599 reprint of the 1598 Guanhua Xuan 觀化軒 edition, in GBXQCK, 1st series. (Zhufa ji) Chongjiao xiaoyi Zhufa ji, 重校孝義祝髮記 by Zhang Fengyi, 張鳳翼 Beijing Library. (Zixiao ji) Chongjiao Zixiao ji, 重校紫簫記 by Tang Xianzu, 湯顯祖 1602 edition, Beijing Library. Shide Tang 世德堂 (Baiyueting ji) Xinkan chongding chuxiang fushi biaozhu Yueting ji, 新刊重訂出相附釋標註月 亭記 by Shi Hui, 施惠 ed., the You of Xingxian Tang, 游氏興賢堂 1589 edition, Zheng Zhenduo collection, in GBXQCK, 1st series. (Duanfa ji) Chongding chuxiang zhushi Pei Shuying Duanfa ji tiping, 重訂出像註釋裴淑英斷 髮記題評 by anonymous playwright, 1586 edition, Kanda KiichirÔ’s collection, in ChÖgoku gikyoku zenpon sanshu. (Huandai ji) Xinkan chongding chuxiang fushi biaozhu Pei Du Huandai ji, 新刊重訂出像附釋 標注裴度還帶記 by Shen Cai, 沈采 ed., the You of Xingxian Tang, 游氏興賢堂 Beijing University Library, in GBXQCK, 1st series. ( Jiexiao ji) Qi chongding chuxiang zhushi Jiexiao ji tiping, 鍥重訂出像注釋節孝記題評 by Gao Lian, 高濂 ed., Chihuo Zhai, 尺蠖齋 Beijing Library, in GBXQCK, 1st series. Two titles are included: Xinkan chongding chuxiang fushi biaozhu Chenqing ji, 新刊重訂出像附釋標注陳情記 Xinkan chongding chuxiang fushi biaozhu Fugui ji. 新刊重訂出像附釋標注賦歸記 ( Jindiao ji) Xinke chuxiang Xue Pingliao Jindiao ji, 新刻出像薛平遼金貂記 by anonymous playwright, Beijing University Library. Jingchai ji, 荊釵記 by anonymous playwright based on the play by Ke Danqiu, 柯丹 邱 selected in Zhongguo banhua shi tulu. ( Jinghong ji) Xingqi chongding chuxiang fushi biaozhu Jinghong ji tiping, 新鍥重訂出像附釋 標註驚鴻記 by Wu Shimei, 吳世美 ed., Chihuo Zhai, Palace Museum, Taipei in GBXQCK, 2nd series. (Pipa ji) Chongjiao Yuanben daban shiyi quanxiang yinshi Pipa ji, 重校元本大版釋義全像音 釋琵琶記, by Gao Ming, 高明 annotated, Dai Junci, 戴君賜 published by Tang Cheng, 唐晟 National Central Library, Taipei. (Qianjin ji) Qi chongding chuxiang zhushi Han Xin Qianjin ji tiping, 鍥重訂出像註釋韓信千 金記題評 by Shen Cai, 沈采 Palace Museum, Taipei. (Shuangfeng qiming ji) Xinke quanxiang Shuangfeng qiming ji, 新刻全相雙鳳齊鳴記 by Lu Huafu, 陸華甫 Beijing Library, in GBXQCK, 2nd series. (Shuihu ji) Xinkan chongding chuxiang fushi biaozhu Shuihu ji, 新刊重訂出相附釋標註水滸記 by Xu Zichang, 許自昌1590 edition, studied by Kosai Naomi, 笠井直美 “KinryÔ Se-toku DÔ kan ‘Sui-ko ki’ ni tsuite,” 金陵世德堂刊『水滸記』につイて, TÔhÔ gaku, no. 83 ( January, 1992), pp. 79–94. (Wulun quanbei ji) Xinkan chongding fushi biaozhu chuxiang Wulun quanbei zhongxiao ji, 新刊重 訂陳釋標註出相伍倫全備忠孝記 by Qiu Rui, 丘睿 Beijing Library, in GBXQCK, 1st series. (Xiangnang ji) Xinkan chongding chuxiang fushi biaozhu Xiangnang ji, 新刊重訂出相附釋標注 香囊記 by Shao Can, 邵璨 selected in Zhongguo banhua shi tulu, p. 639.

appendix

303

Yuhe ji, 玉合記 by Mei Dingzuo, 梅鼎祚 Palace Museum, Taipei. (Zhaoshi gu’er ji) Qi chongding chuxiang fushi biaozhu Zhaoshi gu’er ji, 鍥重訂出像附釋標註 趙氏孤兒記 ed., Chihuo Zhai, Beijing Library, in GBXQCK, 1st series. (Zixiao ji) Xinqi chuxiang zhushi Li Shilang Huo Xiaoyu Zixiao ji tiping, 新鍥出像注釋李十郎 霍小玉紫簫記題評 by Tang Xianzu, 湯顯祖 1596 edition, Lü Da City Library. Wenlin Ge 文林閣 (Baiyueting ji) Chongjiao Baiyueting, 重校拜月亭 by Shi Hui, 施惠 recorded in Mingdai banke zonglu. (Chisong ji) Chongjiao dianban Zhang Zifang Chisong ji, 重校點板張子房赤松記 by anonymous playwright, in GBXQCK, 2nd series. (Gucheng ji) Xinke quanxiang Gucheng ji, 新刻全像古城記 by anonymous playwright, in GBXQCK, 1st series. (Hongfu ji) Chongjiao zhushi Hongfu ji, 重校注釋紅拂記 by Zhang Fengyi, 張鳳翼 Beijing Library, recorded in Mingdai banke zonglu. ( Jingchai ji) Chongjiao gu Jingchai ji, 重校古荊釵記, by Ke Danqiu, 柯丹邱 Beijing Library. ( Jinqian ji) Chongjiao Jinqian ji, 重校錦箋記 by Zhou Lüjing, 周履靖 recorded in Mingdai banke zonglu. ( Jinyin ji) Chongjiao quanxiang zhushi Jinyin ji, 重校全像注釋金印記 by Su Fuzhi, 蘇復 之 annotated, Luo Maodeng, 羅懋登 selected in Zhongguo banhua shi tulu. (Mudan ting) Xinke Mudan ting huanhun ji, 新刻牡丹亭還魂記 by Tang Xianzu, 湯顯祖 Beijing Library. (Qingpao ji) Xinkan jiaozheng quanxiang yinshi Qingpao ji, 新刊校正全相音釋青袍記 by anonymous playwright, in GBXQCK, 2nd series. (Shuanghong ji) Chongjiao jianxia Shuanghong ji, 重校劍俠雙紅記 by Gengsheng shi of Yuhang, 禹航更生氏 in GBXQCK, 2nd series. (Simei ji) Chongjiao Simei ji, 重校四美記 in Xiuxiang chuanqi shizhong, 繡像傳奇十種 KyÔto Daigaku Bungakubu, in GBXQCK, 2nd series. (Toubi ji) Chongjiao Toubi ji, 重校投筆記 by Qiu Rui, 丘濬 recorded in Mingdai banke zonglu. (Wansha ji) Chongke chuxiang Wansha ji, 重刻出像浣紗記 by Liang Chenyu, 梁辰魚 in Xiuxiang chuanqi shizhong, KyÔto Daigaku Bungakubu. (Wangyun ji) Xinke Di Lianggong you Zhou Wangyun Zhongxiao ji, 新刻狄梁公友周望雲忠 孝記 by Jin Huiyu, 金懷玉 in GBXQCK, 2nd series. Wenlin Ge chuanqi shizhong, 文林閣傳奇十種 edited by Wenlin Ge, recorded in Mingdai banke zonglu. (Wunao jiaopa ji) Xinke Wunao jiaopa ji, 新刻五鬧蕉帕記 by Shan Ben, 單本 in Xiuxiang chuanqi shizhong, KyÔto Daigaku Bungakubu, in GBXQCK, 2nd series. (Xiuru ji) Chongjiao Xiuru ji, 重校繡襦記 by Xue Jindui, 薛近兗 Shanghai Library. (Yanzhi ji) Xinke quanxiang Yanzhi ji, 新刻全像胭脂記 by Tong Yangzhong, 童養中 in GBXQCK, 1st series. (Yixia ji) Chongjiao Yixia ji, 重校義俠記 by Shen Jing, 沈璟 in Xiuxiang chuanqi shizhong, KyÔto Daigaku Bungakubu, selected in ChÖgoku kodai hanga ten. (Yixie ji) Xinke chuxiang Yixie ji, 新刻出像易鞋記 by Shen Jing, 沈鯨 in Xiuxiang chuanqi shizhong, KyÔto Daigaku Bungakubu, in GBXQCK, 1st series. (Yixie ji), Quanxiang zhushi Yixie ji 全像注釋易鞋記 by Dong Yinghan, 董應翰 selected in Zhongguo gudian wenxue banhua xuanji. (Yuan Wenzheng Huanhun ji) Chongke quanxiang Bao Longtu gong’an Yuan Wenzheng Huanhun ji, 重刻全像包龍圖公案袁文正還魂記 by Xinxin Ke, 欣欣客 in Xiuxiang chuanqi shizhong, KyÔto Daigaku Bungakubu, in GBXQCK, 2nd series. (Yulan ji) Xinke chuxiang Guanyin Yulan ji, 新刻出像觀音魚籃記 by anonymous playwright, in Xiuxiang chuanqi shizhong, KyÔto Daigaku Bungakubu, in GBXQCK, 2nd series.

304

appendix

(Yuntai ji) Xinke quanxiang Han Liu Xiu Yuntai ji, 新刻全像漢劉秀雲台記 by Pu Junqing, 浦俊卿 in Xiuxiang chuanqi shizhong, KyÔto Daigaku Bungakubu, in GBXQCK, 2nd series. (Yuzan ji) Chongjiao quanxiang zhushi Yuzan ji, 重校全像注釋玉簪記 by Gao Lian, 高濂 selected in Zhongguo banhua shi tulu. (Zhenzhu ji) Xinke quanxiang Gao Wenju Zhenzhu ji, 新刻全像高文舉珍珠記 by anonymous playwright, in Xiuxiang chuanqi shizhong, KyÔto Daigaku Bungakubu, in GBXQCK, 2nd series.

GLOSSARY

Airi Tang 愛日堂 An Jingshi gefanwu yuanti huixie 師格範舞院體詼諧 antou zhi shu 案頭之書

按京

bai jie 拜介 Bai Juyi 白居易 Bai Minzhong Chu Meixiang 白敏中 亻芻 梅香 Baisha Zhen 白沙鎮 Baishe ji 白蛇記 Baitu ji 白兔記 Baiyueting ji 拜月亭記 ban 板 Baneng Zoujin 八能奏錦 bannong 搬弄 banxin 版心 Bao Zhao 鮑照 Baojian ji 寶劍記 Baoshan Tang 寶善堂 Bawan 把玩 bazhan jie 把盞介 bense 本色 Bencao gangmu 本草綱目 bian’e 扁額 bianhuan 變幻 Bihua lou xinsheng 筆花樓新聲 binbai 賓白 Bojie zhushou 伯喈祝壽 Cai Bojie 蔡伯喈 cangbei 傖輩 Canggeng zi 鶬鶊子 Canhua zhuren 粲花主人 Cao Cao 曹操 cao gu zhi shi 操觚之士 Cao Zhi 曹植 Caolu ji 草廬記 cha tu 插圖 Cha You 察幽 chake dahun 插科打諢 Chalou tu 查樓圖 Changchun zongshi qinghui tu 師慶會圖 Changsheng dian 長生殿 Chen Boqing 陳伯卿 Chen Chun 陳淳

長春宗

Chen Dalai 陳大來 Chen Deyuan 陳德遠 Chen Hongshou 陳洪綬 Chen Miaochang 陳妙常 Chen Sanliang patang 陳三兩爬堂 Chen Wohan 陳我含 Chen Yujiao 陳與郊 Chen Zhensun 陳振孫 Chen Zhongfan 陳中凡 Cheng Juyuan 程巨源 Cheng Yuwen 程羽文 chenzi 襯字 Chibi fu tu 赤壁賦圖 Chiyi zipi 鴟夷子皮 chongping 重屏 chou 丑 chuanqi 傳奇 Chuanqi zhi sheng 傳奇之盛 chujiang 出將 Chulan Renren 鋤蘭忍人 Chundeng mi 春燈謎 Cilin yixiang 詞林逸響 Cipin 詞品 Ciqing Pai 詞情派 ciren 詞人 Cui Fan Shu 啐范叔 Cui Yingying 崔鶯鶯 Cuiqing Tang 萃慶堂 Cuishi Chunqiu 崔氏春秋 Cuishi Chunqiu buzhuan 崔氏春秋補傳 Da Ming chun 大明春 Da Ming tianxia chun 大明天下春 Da Song zhongxing yanyi 大宋中興演義 Da Song zhongxing Yue wang zhuan 大宋 中興岳王傳 Dabei duizong 大備對宗 Dacheng ji 大成記 Dadu Xiu 大都秀 dameng 大夢 dan 旦 dangchang 當場 danghang 當行 danghang jia 當行家 Datong 大同 Daye shiyi ji 大業拾遺記 Deng tu 登途

306

glossary

Dengtan ji 登壇記 Dengxi tu 燈戲圖 dianban 點板 Diaochong Guan 雕蟲館 Dili tuxu 地理圖序 Ding Yanghao 丁養浩 Ding Yunpeng 丁雲鵬 Diwang yushi you Xia zhizhuan 帝王御世 有夏誌傳 Dong Qichang 董其昌 Dong Su Qin yijin huanxiang 凍蘇秦衣 錦還鄉 Dong Yuan 董源 Dongpo zhilin 東坡志林 Dongting 洞庭 Dongyang Cun 東羊村 Dongyue Temple 東岳廟 Du Fu 杜甫 Du Mu 杜牧 Du Yan 杜衍 Duanfa ji 斷髮記 Ducheng jisheng 都城紀勝 duilian 對聯 Duixi 對溪 Dumen jilue 都門紀略 Duqu xuzhi 度曲須知 er ji ru wo zi 爾即如我自 Er Taishi yuefu lianbi 二太史樂府聯壁 Erlang Shen 二郎神 Fahua An kan Yuejiang lao na yi boshu 法華寺看月江老衲移柏樹 Fan Li 范蠡 Fan Lian 范濂 Fan Ruoshui 樊若水 Fang Shanxian 方善先 fangfu 彷彿 fanggu 仿古 fanli 凡例 fen 分 Feng Menglong 馮夢龍 Fengshen yanyi 封神演義 Fengyue jinnang 風月錦囊 Fenjin ji 分金記 Fuchun Tang 富春堂 Fu Xihua 傅惜華 fugu 復古 Fugui Jiaoyi 富貴教義 Fu Haoli 傅好禮 fumo kaichang 副末開場 Fuyan jiamen 敷演家門 Fuzi tuzhong xianghui 父子途中相會

Gao Lian 高濂 Gao Ming 高明 Gaoshi Shanfang 高石山房 Gaoshi tu 高士圖 Ge Yinliang 葛寅亮 geke 歌客 Gelü Pai 格律派 geshi 格式 gongshou jie 拱手介 goulan 勾欄 Gu Hongzhong 顧閎中 Gu Kaizhi 顧愷之 Gu Lienü zhuan 古列女傳 Gu mingjia zaju 古名家雜劇 Gu Mountain 孤山 Gu song-shui bi ge zhong ren dai ke guo 古松水壁閣中人待客過 gu wei jin yong 古為今用 Gu Xuanwei 顧玄緯 Gu zaju 古雜劇 Gu Zhengyi 顧正誼 Guafu zhengxi 寡婦征西 guan tu 冠圖 Guangqing Tang 廣慶堂 Guangsheng Si 廣勝寺 Guankou 灌口 Guanyuan ji 灌園記 Gucheng hui 古城會 gui ke 跪科 Guifan 閨範 Guiqu lai ci tu 歸去來辭圖 Gujin mingju hexuan 古今名劇合選 guoqu 過曲 Gushi huapu 顧氏畫譜 gushi ju 故事劇 Guwen zhengzong 古文正宗 Guxi geng 孤西埂 Haicheng 海澄 Hainei qiguan 海內奇觀 Haiyan 海鹽 Haiyue zhilin 海嶽志林 Han Wei zhu mingjia ji 漢魏諸名家集 Han Xizai yeyan tu 韓熙載夜宴圖 He Liangjun 何良俊 He Wei 和維 hengpi 橫批 Hengqu zhutan 衡曲麈譚 Herong ji 和戎記 Heyue 合樂 Ho Bi 何璧 Hong Jiuchou 洪九疇 Hong Mai 洪邁

glossary Hong Sheng 洪昇 Hong Wenke 洪文科 Hongdong County 洪洞縣 Hongfu ji 紅拂記 Hongguang 弘光 Hongniang 紅娘 Hongqu ji 紅渠記 Hongxian zaju 紅線雜劇 Hou Chibi fu tu 後赤壁賦圖 Hou Hanshu 後漢書 houfang zidi 後房子弟 Houzhu quanqi tu 後主觀棋圖 Hsiao Chen Hsiu-hua 蕭陳秀華 Hsiao His-hu 小西湖 Hsiao Shui-ping 蕭水萍 Hua Guan Suo zhuan 花關索傳 Hua shanshui 畫山水 hua zhong you shi 畫中有詩 Huachan Shi suibi 畫禪室隨筆 hualan 花欄 Hualun 畫論 Huancui Tang 環翠堂 Huandai ji 還帶記 Huang Ming zhusi gong’an zhuan 皇明諸 司公案傳 Huanyu Xiansheng Gong 寰宇顯聖公 Huayan 畫眼 Huimiao 繪妙 Huishi fawei 繪事發微 Huo Xiaoyu 霍小玉 jiamen 家門 Jiandeng yuhua 剪燈餘話 Jianyang 建陽 Jiang Daqi 蔣大器 Jiang Linji yao guan Sanguan shuhua 江 領幾邀觀三館書畫 Jiang Shaoshu 姜紹書 jiangshi 講史 Jiangting qiuse 江亭秋色 Jiaofang 教坊 Jiaohong ji 嬌紅記 Jide Tang 積德堂 jie 介 Jiezi yuan huapu 芥子園畫譜 Jigu Ge 汲古閣 Jin Shengtan 金聖歎 Jin Wengong fuguo tu 晉文公復國圖 Jindiao ji 金貂記 jing 淨 Jing Ke 荊軻 Jingang jing 金剛經 Jinghong ji 驚鴻記 jingji 經籍

307

Jingzhong qi 精忠旗 jinjiu jie 進酒介 Jinling 金陵 Jingmeng 驚夢 Jinping mei 金瓶梅 Jinqian ji 錦箋記 Jinshan si 金山寺 jinshi 進士 Jintai 金臺 Jinxian Tang 進賢堂 Jinyin ji 金印記 Jiuge tu 九歌圖 Jiyi Tang 集義堂 Jizhi Zhai 繼志齋 Ju Yingkui 車應魁 Jutou wang mingyue/Ditou si guxiang 舉 頭望明月/低頭思故鄉 Jupo congyu 菊坡叢語 juzhi 舉止 kaichang 開場 Kang Bofu 康伯父 Kang Hai 康海 kanxi 看戲 kaozheng 考證 ke 科 ke-jie 科介 Kimpika Temple 金光寺 King Mingying 明應王 Kobayashi Hiromitsu 小林宏光 Kong men rujiao liezhuan 孔門儒教列傳 Kong Rong 孔融 Kong Shangren 孔尚任 Kong sheng jiayu tu 孔聖家語圖 Kong Zhenyun 孔貞運 ku ke 哭科 Kuang gushi Yuyang sannong 狂鼓史漁陽 三弄 kuilei 傀儡 kuilei juchang 傀儡劇場 kuilei paichang 傀儡排場 Kunqu 崑曲 Lan Caihe 藍釆和 Lang Ying 郎瑛 Langya manchao 琅琊漫抄 Lanqiao yuchu ji 藍橋玉杵記 lei ke 泪科 Li Bai 李白 Li Bifeng 李碧峰 Li Gaochen 李告辰 Li Gonglin 李公麟 Li Kaixian 李開先 Li Rihua 李日華

308

glossary

Shilang 李十郎 Tianlin 李天麟 Tingmo 李廷謨 Weizhen 李維楨 Yaxian huajiu Qujiang chi 李亞仙花酒 曲江池 Li Yu 李玉 Li Yu 李漁 Li Zhi 李贄 Li Zhuowu piping Sanguo zhi 李卓吾批 評三國志 Li Zhuowu xiansheng piping Pipa ji 李卓吾 先生批評琵琶記 liang 兩 Liang Chenyu 梁辰魚 Liangdu ji 兩渡集 Liangjiang ji 量江記 Liangyuan Xiu 梁園秀 Liaodu geng 療妒羹 Lidai guren xiangzan 歷代古人像贊 Lidai minghua ji 歷代名畫記 Lienü zhuan 列女傳 Lijing ji 荔鏡記 Lin Bu 林逋 Ling Mengchu 凌濛初 (courtesy name Chucheng 初成) Linchuan Pai 臨川派 Linfan baojuan 臨凡寶卷 Linfen 臨汾 lishi ju 歷史劇 Liu Gansan 劉趕三 Liu Lingfu 劉齡甫 Liu Longtian 劉龍田 Liu Quan jingua 劉泉進瓜 Liushizhong qu 六十種曲 Lizhi ji 荔枝記 Longya 龍崖 Lou Xuan 樓宣 Lu Andao 陸安道 Lu Cai 陸采 Lu feng Yang shi 路逢楊氏 Lu Rui 魯睿 Lu Xinyuan 陸心源 Lu Youren 陸友仁 Lü Buwei 呂不偉 Lü Tiancheng 呂天成 Lu Yidian 陸貽典 Lü Yusheng 呂玉繩 Luo Guanzhong 羅貫中 Luo Pu 羅卜 Luo Ye 羅燁 Luo Zhang’er 羅章二 Luoshen fu tu 洛神賦圖 luoshi 落詩 Li Li Li Li Li

Lüshi chunqiu 呂氏春秋 Ma Hezhi 馬和之 Ma Shiying 馬士英 Mantian chun 滿天春 Mao Dun 茅盾 Mao Jin 毛晉 Mao Shi tujuan 毛詩圖卷 Mao Yixiang 茅一相 Mao Yuanyi 茅元儀 Mao’er xi 貓兒戲 Mei Lanfang 梅蘭芳 Meng Chengshun 孟稱舜 Meng Haoran 孟浩然 Mengjing ji 夢境記 Menglei chuanqi 夢磊傳奇 menlian 門聯 Mi Fu 米芾 Mi Heng 禰衡 Miaozhuang Wang 妙庄王 Min Qiji 閔齊伋 ming 命 Mizang quan 秘藏詮 Mo Shilong 莫是龍 mogu 模古 Mouni he ji 牟尼合記 Mozhong ji 磨忠記 Mudan ting 牡丹亭 Mulian jiumu jing 目連救母經 Nagasawa Kikuya 長澤規矩也 Nan Jiugong shisan diao qupu 南九宮十 三調曲譜. Nanci xulu 南詞敘錄 Nanguan xi 南管戲 Niulang Zhinü zhuan 牛郎織女傳 Ni Zan 倪瓚 Nü Xiaojing 女孝經 Nüshi zhen tu 女史箴圖 Oumian

偶眠

Pan Dechong 潘德沖 Pan Jinlian 潘金蓮 Pan Zhiheng 潘之恒 pangling kuilei 盤鈴傀儡 Peng Xinwei 彭信威 penglai 蓬萊 pengxiu 捧袖 Piandu 片牘 pihuang 皮黃 pinghua 平話 Pingyang 平陽 Pipa ji 琵琶記

glossary Prince Zhouxian 周憲王 Puyang 莆陽 Qi Biaojia 祁彪佳 qian 錢 qiang 腔 Qianjin ji 千金記 Qiannü lihun 倩女離魂 Qiao Zhongchang 喬仲常 Qiaoshan Tang 喬山堂 Qiefu ji 竊符記 Qimeng gushi 啟蒙故事 Qimiao liangfang 奇妙良方 Qin bing liuguo pinghua 秦併六國平話 Qin Guan 秦觀 qing jing jiao rong 情景交融 Qingjiang Tang 清江堂 Qingliang Shan 清涼扇 Qinglou ji 青樓集 Qinglou yunyu 青樓韻語 Qingpao ji 青袍記 qingshou 慶壽 Qingxi xing 清溪行 Qingzhong pu 清忠譜 Qinhuai jupin 秦淮劇品 Qinyou Tang 勤有堂 Qisheng ji 七勝記 Qishu Jigudu Yuan 祇樹給孤獨園 Qiting ji 旗亭記 Qiu Changru zuige he Huang Pingqian 邱長儒醉歌和黃平倩 Qiu Rui 丘睿 quan mian dan ye 全面單頁 Quande ji 全德記 Qulü 曲律 Qulun 曲論 qupai 曲牌 Qupin 曲品 Riji gushi. 日記故事 Rongyu Tang 容與堂 Rongzhai suibi 容齋隨筆 rou kuilei 肉傀儡 ru men shou jiao 儒門手腳 Ruan Dacheng 阮大鋮 Ruihong 瑞虹 Ruishi liangying 瑞世良英 Rulin waishi 儒林外史 ruxiang 入相 Sai Jiaorong 賽嬌容 Sanbao taijian Xiyang ji tongsu yanyi 三寶太 監西洋記通俗演義 Sancai tuhui 三才圖會

309

Sangui lianfang ji 三桂聯芳記 Sanguo yanyi 三國演義 Sanguo zhi tongsu yanyi 三國志通俗演義 Sanguo zhi pinghua 三國志平話 Sanhui Tang 三槐堂 Sanshanjie 三山街 Sanshe ji 三社記 Santai Guan 三台館 sanyan 三演 Sanyi chengyin 三義成姻 Sanyuan ji 三元記 Sanzhu ji 三祝記 Saoyin Jushi 騷隱居士 shan 刪 Shan Yu 單宇 Shang chun 賞春 shang tu xia wen 上圖下文 Shanshui zhenjia 山水真假 Shao Can 邵璨 Shen Chongsui 沈寵綏 Shen Jifei 沈際飛 Shen Jing 沈璟 Shen Rongpu 沈蓉圃 Shen Shouxian 沈受先 Shen Xing 沈行 shenduan 身段 Sheng 生 Sheng Ming zaju sanshi zhong 盛明雜劇 三十種 Shengji tu 聖蹟圖 Shengxian ji 昇仙記 shi ge qie wu 式歌且舞 Shi Pan 史槃 Shi yuzhuo 拾玉鐲 shi zhong you hua, hua zhong you shi 詩 中有畫,畫中有詩 Shide Tang 世德堂 Shi’er guafu zhengxi 十二寡婦征西 Shiguan 史官 Shiji 史記 Sijian Tang 師儉堂 Shilang fuma 石郎駙馬 Shilin guangji 事林廣記 Shishi yuanliu 釋氏源流 Shiyi ji 十義記 Shiyong tu 十詠圖 Shiyu huapu 詩餘畫譜 Shizhu Zhai shuhua pu 十竹齋書畫譜 shu hua tong yuan 書畫同源 Shu Huyin xiansheng bi 書湖陰先生 壁 Shuang jinbang ji 雙金榜記 Shuangfeng qiming ji 雙鳳齊鳴記 Shuangfeng Tang 雙峰堂

310

glossary

Shuanghong ji 雙紅記 Shuangyu ji 雙魚記 Shuangyuan ji 雙鴛記 Shuangzhong ji 雙忠記 Shuihu zhizhuan pinglin 水滸志傳評林 Shuai Ji 帥機 (courtesy name Weishen 惟審) shuochang cihua 說唱詞話 Shuying 書影 Siku quanshu 四庫全書 Sima Qian 司馬遷 Simei tu 四美圖 Sisheng yuan 四聲猿 Sishu ji 四書記 Siyou Zhai congshuo 四友齋叢說 Soushen ji 搜神記 Su Hanying 蘇漢英 Su San Qijie 蘇三起解 Su Shi 蘇軾 Suishu jingji zhi 隋書經籍志 Sumen xiaolü 蘇門嘯侶 Sun Kaidi 孫楷第 Sun Shu’ao 孫叔敖 Taihang sanyue Zhongdu Xiu zai ci zuo chang 太行散樂忠都秀在此作場 Taihe zhengyin pu 太和正音譜 Taiping guangji 太平廣記 Taiping shanshui tuhua 太平山水圖畫 Taiyin daquan 太音大全 Tan qinjia 探親家 Tanaka Issei 田仲一成 Tang Bohu hua Cui shi 唐伯虎畫崔氏 Tang Cheng 唐晟 Tang Dai 唐岱 Tang Fuchun 唐富春 Tang Guoshi 唐國士 Tang Hou 湯垕 Tang tu mingsheng tuhui 唐土名勝圖會 Tang Xianzu 湯顯祖 Tang Yin 唐寅 Tang Zhenwu 唐振吾 Tangshi guchui 唐詩鼓吹 Tangshi huapu 唐詩畫譜 Tanhua ji 曇花記 Tanqu zazha 譚曲雜劄 Tanyang zi 曇陽子 Tao Qian 陶潛 Tao’an mengyi 陶庵夢憶 Taohua shan 桃花扇 Ti hua xuejing 題畫雪景 tianci 填詞 Tianfei chushen zhuan 天妃出身傳 Tianguan cifu 天官賜福

tianyuan difang 天圓地方 Tianzhang Ge 天章閣 Tianzhu lingqian 天竺靈籤 Tiao Jiaguan 跳加官 ting xi 聽戲 Tingli 廷禮 Tipao ji 綈袍記 Tong Guang mingling shisan jue 同光名伶 十三絕 Tonghe Shanren 銅鶴山人 Tongjian gangmu 通鑑綱目 Tongmeng ji 同夢記 Toutao ji 投桃記 Tu Long 屠隆 Wai wupen 歪烏盆 Wanbao quanshu 萬寶全書 Wang Anshi 王安石 Wang Bomin 王伯敏 Wang Heng 王衡 Wang Huiyun 王會雲 Wang Jide 王驥德 Wang Jiusi 王九思 Wang Ling 王錂 Wang Mian 王冕 Wang Qi 王圻 Wang Shizhen 王世貞 Wang Siren 王思任 Wang Wei 王維 Wang Xiang ren 望湘人 Wang Xijue 王錫爵 Wang Yinglin 王應遴 Wang Zhaojun 王昭君 Wang Zhideng 王稚登 Wanhu Xuan 玩虎軒 Wanqu changchun 萬曲長春 Wanrong County 萬榮 Wansha ji 浣紗記 Wanxiang xin 萬象新 Wanyue Xuan 浣月軒 Wei Hang ren tihua 為杭人題畫 Wei Liangfu 魏良輔 Wei Zheng 魏徵 Wei Zhongxian 魏忠賢 Wen Boren 文伯仁 Wen Lin 文林 Wen Zhengming 文徵明 Weng Wenyuan 翁文源 Weng Zhengchun 翁正春 Wenlin Ge 文林閣 Wenshu zhinan tuzan 文殊指南圖贊 wenxue ben 文學本 woyou 臥遊 Wu Bing 吳炳

glossary Wu Daozi 吳道子 Wu Han 吳唅 Wu Jiamo 吳家謨 Wu Jingzi 吳敬梓 Wu School 吳派 Wu Shihui 武十回 Wu Weiye 吳偉業 Wu Yuanzhi 武元直 Wu za zu 五雜俎 Wu Zixu 伍子胥 Wujiang Pai 吳江派 Wuling Village 吳嶺莊 Wulun quanbei ji 伍倫全備記 Wulun zhuan Xiangnang ji 五倫傳香囊記 Wumu wang jingzhong lu 武穆王精忠錄 wutai ben 舞台本 Wuxiang zhishi song 五相知識頌 Xi Dongting Shan Tu 西洞庭山圖 Xi Hu zhuzhi ci 西湖竹枝詞 Xi Shi 西施 Xiang Yu 項羽 xiangfeng 相逢 Xiangmo bianwen 降魔變文 Xiangshan ji 香山記 Xiangxue ju 香雪居 Xianqing ouji 閒情偶記 Xiansuo bian’e 絃索辨訛 Xiao Yuncong 蕭雲從 Xiaojing 小景 Xiaojing tu 孝經圖 Xiaoxiang 瀟湘 Xiaoxiang tu 瀟湘圖 Xie Zhaozhe 謝肇淛 xietai 謝臺 Ximen Qing 西門慶 xingdong 行動 Xingshi yinyuan zhuan 醒世姻緣傳 Xingtian jushi 醒天居士 Xinjiang County 新絳縣 Xiong Damu 熊大木 Xiong Longfeng 熊龍峰 Xiongdi tan bing 兄弟談兵 Xiqing Tang 西清堂 Xiuran zi 修髯子 Xiuwen ji 修文記 Xixia Xiu 西夏秀 Xixiang ji 西廂記 Xixiang ji kao 西廂記考 Xixiang zalu 西廂雜錄 Xiyou ji 西遊記 xizhuan 析傳 Xu Dachun 徐大椿 Xu Fuzuo 徐復祚

311

Xu Qiao 徐翹 Xu Shifan 徐士範 Xu Wei 徐渭 Xu Wenqing 徐文卿 Xu Yu 許宇 Xuan gujin Nan Bei ju 選古今南北劇 Xuanxue pu 玄雪譜 Xue Rengui 薛仁貴 Xue Rengui zheng Liao 薛仁貴征遼 Xunmeng 尋夢 Xunqin ji 尋親記 Xuputi 須菩提 yan 眼 Yan Ge 延閣 Yanbei zazhi 硯北雜志 Yang Erceng 楊爾曾 Yang jiafu yanyi 楊家府演義 Yang Shen 楊慎 Yang Weizhen 楊維楨 Yangchun Tang 陽春堂 Yangmen nüjiang 楊門女將 Yanmen Guan 雁門關 Yanqing huimei 延清薈美 Yanshan Xiu 燕山秀 yanshang zhi qu 筵上之曲 Yanxian qingshang qian 燕閒清賞箋 Yanzi qian 燕子箋 Yaodu Taihang sanyue ren Zhang Dehao zai ci zuo chang 堯都大行 散樂人張德好在 此作場 Yao Maoliang 姚茂良 Ye Dehui 葉德輝 Ye Liangbiao 葉良表 Ye Xianzu 葉憲祖 Ye Zhou 葉晝 Yibai Tang 夷白堂 Yihuang 宜黃 Yili’an 一笠庵 Yin Shizhi 尹士直 Yingtao meng 櫻桃夢 yingua 隱括 Yingwu ji 鸚鵡記 Yingying Zhuan 鶯鶯傳 yinshi 音釋 Yipengxue 一捧雪 Yipin dangchao 一品當朝 Yixia ji 義俠記 Yiyang 弋陽 Yiyong cijin 義勇辭金 Yiyong Wu’an Wang wei 義勇武安 王位 Yiyun Ge 怡雲閣 Yong meihua jiju 詠梅花集句

312

glossary

Yongle dadian 永樂大典 Yongshun Shutang 永順書堂 Yongyu zi 庸愚子 Yu Chengzhang 余成章 Yu Jiyue 余季岳 Yu Siya 余泗崖 Yu Wentai 余文台 Yu Xiangdou 余象斗 yu yanbo haomiao jian 於煙波浩渺間 Yuan Hongdao 袁宏道 Yuan Wenzheng Huanhun ji 袁文正還魂 記 Yuan Zhen 元稹 Yuanqu xuan 元曲選 Yuanshan Tang jupin 遠山當劇品 Yuanshan Tang qupin 遠山堂曲品 Yuchai ji 王釵記 Yue Fei 岳飛 Yuefu chuansheng 樂府傳聲 Yuefu jinghua 樂府精華 Yuefu hongshan 樂府紅珊 Yugeng Tang 與畊堂 Yugu laoren 愚谷老人 Yugu diaohuang 玉谷調簧 Yuhuang jiangzhi ci yaoqin 玉皇降旨賜 瑤琴 Yuhe ji 玉合記 Yujue ji 玉玦記 Yukui jingu 語窺今古 Yunjian jumu chao 雲間據目抄 Yushu ying 玉樹英 Yunyu Huapin 韻語畫品 Yuzan ji 玉簪記 Yuzhou feng 宇宙鋒 zaohui 藻繢 Zeng Ji 曾幾 Zhang Dai 張岱 Zhang Fengyi 張鳳翼 Zhang Jishi 張吉士 Zhang Kai 張楷 Zang Maoxun 臧懋循 Zhang Mengzheng 張夢澂 Zhang Qi 張琦 Zhang Shangde 張尚德 Zhang Shenzhi 張深之 Zhang Wanxuan 張萬選 Zhang Xian 張先 Zhang Xie zhuangyuan 張協狀元 Zhang Yanyuan 張彥遠 Zhangsun Wuji 長孫無忌

zhanyu yanju 氈毹演劇 Zhao Bangxian 趙邦賢 Zhao Wuniang 趙五娘 Zhaojun chusai 昭君出塞 Zhaoshi gu’er 趙氏孤兒 Zhe School 浙派 zhe zhe yan yan chuang fang jing 掩掩穿芳徑 Zhen kuilei 真傀儡 Zhen Guoxuan 鄭國軒 Zheng Heng 鄭恆 Zheng Shaozhai 鄭少齋 Zheng Yingtai 鄭應台 Zheng Zhiwen 鄭之文 Zheng Zhizhen 鄭之珍 Zhengbo zoujie zhuan 征播奏捷傳 Zhenwen ji 貞文記 zhexiu 遮袖 Zhici lu 致詞錄 Zhong Renjie 鍾人傑 Zhongfang Shuzhai 眾芳書齋 Zhongshan lang 中山狼 Zhou Deqing 周德清 Zhou Liang 周良 Zhou Lianggong 周亮工 Zhou Ruilong 周瑞隆 Zhou Shuming 周叔明 Zhou Wenju 周文矩 Zhou Wu 周蕪 Zhou Xun 周遜 Zhou Yu 周羽 Zhouju shi 舟居詩 Zhu Chaoding 朱朝鼎 Zhu Guozhen 朱國楨 Zhu Quan 朱權 Zhu Tianran 朱天然 Zhu Tongfen 朱統鐼 Zhu Youdun 朱有燉 Zhu Yu 朱玉 Zhu Zhifan 朱之蕃 Zhuangyuan tukao 狀元圖考 zhuanji 傳記 zhuma 竹馬 Zichai ji 紫釵記 Zixiao ji 紫簫記 Zong Bing 宗炳 Zou Yuan 鄒園 Zuiweng tanlu 醉翁談錄 Zunsheng Guan 遵生館 Zuojian 昨見 zuoyi ke 作揖科

遮遮

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INDEX

Abbott, Anthony, 198 actor Meng, 286 Akamatsu Kenji, 42 Akamatsu Norihiko, 101 all-around master 286 Anhui, 8, 31, 84–5, 106, 108 Annals, The, 180, 189 Annals of Wu and Yue, 188 antou zhi shu, see book for the desk Appreciating the Spring, 117 bai jie, 111 Bai Minzhong Chu Meixiang, 280 Bai Juyi (772–846), 70, 212–5 Baisha, 160 Baishe ji, 118, 268, 272, 296 Baitu ji, 27–9, 95, 257, 268 Baiyueting ji, 68, 90, 104, 107, 111, 121, 123, 127, 151 ban and yan, see rhythmic accents Baneng zoujin, 130 bannong (to act), 79 banxin, 295 Bao Zhao (c. 414–466), 292 Baojian ji, 59 Barth, John, 198 bawan (plaything), 79 bazhan jie, 111, 125, 148 Beijing, 23, 27, 84, 95, 268 Being on the Road, 115 bense, 48, 53, 68 true color: 53, 68 natural language, 68 accessible language, 48 Bentley, Tamar Heimarck, 89 Berger, Harry, 42 Besio, Kimberly, 43 bian’e, 89–90, 99, 104, 106, 107, 109, 167, 169, 171, 275 Bianjing, 280 binbai, 72, 76 biographical play, 190 Birds and Flowers, see Huaniao blurred boundaries, 203–5, 214, 230, 241 blurring of boundaries, 203, 205–6, 211, 227 Bocai, Temple of, 232

Bojie Celebrates the Longevity of his Parents, 127 Bojie zhushou, see Bojie Celebrates the Longevity of his Parents book for the desk, 45, 58, 63, 70, 76 Book of Ghosts, The, 4 Borges, Jorge Luis, 198 Brothers Discuss the Military, see Xiongdi tan bing Cahill, James, 31 Cai Bojie, 130, 138, 144, 148, 153, 155, 162 Cai’s father, 144, 153, 155 Cai’s mother, 144, 155 Cai’s wife, 148 Canggeng zi, 189 Canhua Zhuren, see Wu Bing Cao Cao (155–220), 182, 184, 197–9, 280 Cao Zhi (192–232), 21 Carlitz, Katherine, 1 carpet performance, 162, 164, 292 carpet stage, 35 cartouche, 90, 93, 95, 97–99, 104, 106–8 cha tu, see pictures-amid-text Cha You, 197–8 chake dahun, 136 Chalou tu, 106, 156–7 Changsheng dian, 83 Changzhou, 231 chantefable, 23, 27–8, 95 Chen Boqing, 268 Chen Chun (1483–1544), 207 Chen Dalai (active c. early 17th century), 185, 190, 295 Chen Deyuan, 229–30 Chen Hongshou (1599–1652), 8, 31–2, 88–9, 296 Chen Jiru (1588–1639), 297 Chen Sanliang patang, 109, 153 Chen Wohan, 92 Chen Yujiao (1544–1611), 280–1, 297 Chen Zhensun (active c. mid-13th century), 206–7, 234 Cheng Juyuan (active c.1580), 189 Cheng Yizhong, 178

336

index

Cheng Yuwen, 284 “Chibi fu” tu, see Picture of “The Rhapsody of the Red Cliff” China, 3, 5, 7, 17, 41, 60, 67, 111, 121, 157, 177–8, 181, 187, 196, 203, 205, 235, 242, 273 chopping, see double screen chou (clown), 138 Christian Bibles, 295 Chu An, 229 chuanqi, 51, 55, 60,190, 256, 275, 289 Chuci, 66 chujiang, see Enter the General Chundeng mi, 67, 272, 298 Chunqiu, see Annals, The Cilin yixiang, 290 Cipin, 254 Ciqing Pai, see School of Poetic Talent Ciren (lyricist), 64 close-up shot, 115, 168 clownish fumo, 270–1 Clunas, Craig, 5, 7 Concealing Sleeve, 134 Conation of Emotion and Scenery, 282–3, 288 Confucian, 68–9, 179 Confucius (BC 551–479), 180, 187 196, 202, 239–41, 247 conversational dialogue, 76 Copying the Past, 3 Court Concert, A, 208 Cui’s Annals, 189–90 Cui Fan Shu, 101 Cui Yingying, 33, 134, 215, 217, 241–3, 245, 253 Hongniang, Cui Yingying’s maid, 215, 242 Madam Cui, Cui Yingying’s mother, 218 Cuiqing Tang, 106–108 Cuishi chunqiu, see Cui’s Annals Cuishi chunqiu buzhuan, 189 Cultural Revolution, 179

Delbanco, Dawn Ho, 10, 34 Denda Akira, 42 Deng tu, see Being on the Road Dengtan ji, 59 Dengxi tu, 103 Devil’s Defeat, 17–8 Diamond Sutra, see Jingang jing dianban, see musical notation Ding, Yunpeng (1574–1628), 31 dingchang bai, see scene-setting speeches Dong Qichang (1555–1636), 207, 231 Dong, Rulong, 110 Dong Su Qin yijin huanxiang, 101 Dong Yuan (?–962), 231 Dongpo, see Su Shi Dongpo zhilin, 184 Dongting, 207 Double half-folio pages, 13–4, 278–9 double screen, 207, 215, 219, 227 drama illustration, 1–2, 4, 16, 25, 36, 88–9, 99, 104, 108, 111, 156, 215, 240–1, 245–6, 249–50, 252, 273 drama publication, 1, 16–7, 23–5, 29–30, 40–1, 43, 45, 57–8, 75, 77, 85, 92, 162, 164, 176, 179, 245, 247, 250, 252–3, 255, 257–8, 267–8, 273, 275, 278, 285, 288–9, 294, 295, 296 dramatized biography, 190–2, 194, 254 Du Fu (712–770), 203–4, 237, 290 Du Jin (. 1465–1509), 209, 211–2 Du Liniang, 66 Du Mu (803–852), 193, 292 Du Yan (978–1057), 223–4 Duanfa ji, 90, 104, 111, 115, 123, 127, 148, 171, 220 Ducheng jisheng, 178 Dudbridge, Glen, 252 duikou bai, see conversational dialogue duilian, 106–7, 109 Duixi, 92 Duke of Zhou and Shao, 180 Dunhuang, 17–8, 88, 95 Duqu xuzhi, 60

Da Ming tianxian chun, 93 Da Song zhongxing yanyi, 193 Dabei duizong, 106 Dance of Promotion, 267 Dacheng ji, 196, 202, 241, 247, 256, 280 dan mian quan ye, see half-folio page danghang, 53, 280, 285 Dashi (music key), 65 Datong, 95 Degree Winner Going to the Banquet, the, 136

E IngakyÔ, 19 Eight Immortals, 101 Elizabethan, 195, 256 embedded realities, 34, 215, 217–8, 224 Emperor Hui and Qin of Northern Song, 113 Emperor Huizong of the Northern Song, 235 Emperor Shizu of Yuan, 235–6 Emperor of the Southern Tang Dynasty Playing Chess, An, 212

index Emperor Taizhu of Ming, 235–6 Emperor, Yongle (1403–1424), 256 England, 256 Enjoying the Antiques, 209 Enter the General, 111 Eoyang, Eugene, 185 Er Taishi yuefu lianbi, 291 Exit the Minister, 111 exit-poems, 55 Eunuch Wei, see Wei Zhongxian Evaluation of Lyric-poetry, see Cipin Fan Li, 193 Fan Lian, 165–6 Fan Ruoshui, 144, 187 Fan Shuqing, see Fan Ruoshui Fang Shanxian, 229–231 Fanggu, see Imitating the Past Fanghui, 76 Fangzhu, 70 Female General of the Yang, The, 177 Feng Menglong (1574–1645), 43, 57–8, 79–80, 82–3, 297 Fengliu meng, 79, 83 Fengyue jinnang, 92 Fenjin ji, 155, 268, 271, 296 ction illustration, 273 lling in the lyrics, 74 First Emperor of Qin, 109 esh puppetry, 221 Four Cries of the Gibbon, see Sisheng yuan Fraser, Sarah E., 17, 88 Freedberg, David, 230 Fu Haoli, 250 Fu luochang, 280 Fu Xihua, 7 Fu Yue, 180 Fuchun Tang, 90, 92, 99, 104, 107–8, 113, 115, 117–8, 121, 123, 127, 138, 140, 145, 148, 155–7, 162, 171, 176, 267–8, 270–3, 275–7, 279, 295–6 Baishe ji, 118, 268, 272, 296 Fenjin ji, 155, 268, 271, 296 Guanyuan ji, 275, 296 Herong ji, 113, 117, 123, 277–8 Hufu ji, 123, 140, 157 Jindiao ji, 140, 191 Lienü zhuan, 99, 104 Mulian jiumu, 123, 140 Sangui lianfang ji, 127, 148, 276 Shiyi ji, 275 Shuangzhong ji, 186, 191, 268, 271 Soushen ji, 99 Tipao ji, 115, 149, 155 Xiangshan ji, 145, 157, 268, 272

337

Xunqin ji, 138, 268, 270, 276–7, 296 Yingwu ji, 162, 176, 191 Yuchai ji, 268, 271 Yujue ji, 90, 107, 118, 127, 156–7, 171 Zhufa ji, 296 Zixiao ji, 118, 145, 156, 220, 268, 271 Fugu, see Recovering the Past Fujian, 8, 19, 23–4, 84–5, 92–3, 95, 106, 108–9, 130, 193 fumo, 28, 88, 170, 191, 256–8, 267, 269–72, 275, 298 see also clownish fumo fumo kaichang, 170 see also kaichang, and jiamen Fuxi, 235 Gangmu, see Tongjian gangmu Gao Lian (active c. 1573–1619), 234 Gao Ming (c. 1306–1359), 10, 76, 130 Gao Ru (active c. 1522–1567), 185 Gaoshi Shanfang, 113, 127, 258, 268, 270 Gaoshi tu, see Picture of the Virtuous Gentleman, The Ge Yinliang, 229 geke (singer), 64 Gelü Pai, see School of Music Genet, Jean, 198 geshi, see musical form Ginzberg, Carlo, 181 God Erlang, 101 Gold-Star Taibai, 277–8 Gong (music key), 65–6 Gongjin, see Zhou Yu, 186 gongshou, 118, 121, 153 gongshou jie, 118 goulan, see public theater Gu Hongzhong (c. 910–c. 980), 208 Gu Kaizhi (c. 344–c. 405), 20–1, 249 Gu Lienü zhuan, 20 see also Lienü zhuan Gu mingjia zaju, 280 Gu Mountain, 102 gu wei jin yong, 178 Gu Xuanwei, (active c. 1565), 245 Gu zaju, 280 Guafu zhengxi, 165 guan tu, see pictures-before-text Guan Yu (?–219), 279 Guangqing Tang, 111, 121, 157, 162, 279 Guangsheng, Temple, 99 Guankou, 101 Guanyuan ji, 275, 296 Gucheng hui, 144

338

index

Guifan, 157 Guimen dao, see Path through the Door of Ghosts Guiqu lai ci tu, see Picture of “The Poem of Return” Gujin mingju hexuan, 281, 285 Guo Xi, 203 Guofeng, 66 guoqu, 69–70 Gushi huapu, 232 gushi ju, see story drama Guwen zhengzong, 104 Guxi geng, 140 Haicheng, 90, 92 Hainei qiguan, 229, 231–2 Haiyan, 59–60 Haiyue zhilin, 234 half-folio page, 11, 13–4, 22, 27, 155, 169–70 full-half-folio page: 155, 169 Hall of King Mingying, 99–102, 111, 149 Halle, Edward, 181 Han Xizai yeyan tu, see Night Banquet of Han Xizai, The Hanan, Patrick, 61 Handan meng, 34 Handke, Peter, 198 hand-scroll, 20–2, 95, 97, 269 Hangzhou, 8, 123, 160, 217 220, 295 see also Wulin He Bi, 225 He Liangjun (1506–1573), 40, 56–7, 61–2, 65, 75, 205, 233, 253–5 He Wei (active c. 1459), 290 Hegel, Robert, 5, 7, 14–5, 26, 35, 88, 93, 97, 273, 275 Henan, 160 hengpi, 106 Hengqu zhutan, 65 Herong ji, 113, 117, 123, 165, 277–8 Henry V, 202 Henry VIII, 196, 256 Heyue tu, see Court Concert, A Hirose Leiko, 43, 81 historical drama, 177–9, 181, 187 Historiographer, 192 Hong Jiuchou, 190 Hong Kong, 121 Hong Mai (1123–1202), 203–6, 212, 214, 234 Hong Sheng (1645–1704), 83 Hong Wenke, 199–201

Hongdong County, 100 Hongfu ji, 156, 200 by Zhang Taihe, 286–7 by Zhang Fengyi, 287 Hongniang, 215, 242 Hongqu ji, 127 “Hou Chibi fu” tu, see Picture of “The Second Rhapsody of the Red Cliff” Hou Hanshu, 197 Hou Zhenshang Zhai, 241 houfang zidi, 191 Houzhu guanqi tu, see Emperor of the Southern Tang Dynasty Playing Chess, An Hua Guan Suo zhuan, 23–4, 27–8, 97 Hua shanshui, see Painting Landscape hua zhong you shi, see poetry within painting Huachan Shi suibi, 207 hualan, 295 Hualun, 234 Huancui Tang, 121, 151, 160, 162, 276 Huandai ji, 138 Huang jushi from Jizhou, 92 Huanhun ji, 79 Huaniao, 32–34 Huanyu Xiansheng Gong (active c. early 17th century), 196, 202–3, 241, 247, 280 Huapin, 228 Huayan, 207 Hufu ji, 123, 140, 156–7 Hui School, 7–8, 31 Huimiao, 233–4 Huishi fawei, 227 Human Condition, The, 219 Huo Xiaoyu, 118 Idema, Wilt, 134, 256–7 Imitating the Past, 3 insightful reading, 284–5, 289 Isobe Akira, 101 Jetavana Anâthapindikârâma, see Qishuji Guduyuan jiamen, 256, 275 see also fumo kaichang, and kaichang Jiang Daqi, see Yongyu zi Jiang Linji, 214 Jiang Shaoshu (The Minister of Works in Nanjing in 1642), 235, 238 Jiang Xingyu, 42 jiangshi, see narrative history Jianyang, 90, 92, 108 Jiaofang, see Musical Studio

index Jiaohong ji, 25–6, 149, 268 Jide Tang, 25, 149, 268 Jie, 110–1 bai jie, 111 bazhan jie, 111, 125, 148 gongshou jie, 118 jinjiu jie, 111, 125 shangchang jie, 111 Jigu Ge, 75 Jin Shengtan (1608–1661), 79, 297 Jin Wengong fuguo tu, see Picture of the King of Jin Jindiao ji, 140, 191 Jing Ke, 109 Jingang jing, 15, 93 jingji, 192–3 Jingzhong qi, 57 jinjiu jie, 111, 125 Jinling, 8, 25, 149, 268, 278–9, 295–6 see also Nanjing Jinping mei, 162 Jinqian ji, 123, 171, 190 Jinshan si, 167 Jintai, 289 Jinxian Tang, 92 Jinyin ji, 162, 170, 272–3 Jiuge tu, see Pictures of the Nine Songs Jiyi Tang, 169 Jizhi Zhai, 123, 125, 127, 130, 140, 148, 156–7, 160, 162, 169–71, 251, 276, 295 Hongfu ji, 156 Hongqu ji, 127 Jinqian ji, 123, 171, 190 Liangjiang ji, 123, 127, 144, 148, 156, 162, 171, 187, 190, 251 Pipa ji, 130, 169 Qiting ji, 125, 148, 160, 251 Shuangyu ji, 125, 160 Yuzan ji, 140, 156, 171 Ju Yingkui (active c. 1637), 240 Jupo congyu, 189 kaichang, 256–8, 267–70, 272–3, 275–6 see also fumo kaichang, and jiamen Kang Bofu, 233 Kang Hai (1475–1540), 40, 291 Kangcheng, 76 ke, 110, 111, 118 die ke, 136 gui ke, 111 ku ke, 111, 121 lei ke, 121

339

xiu ke, 130 zuoyi ke, 118 keben, see printed edition ke-jie, 86, 111, 118, 121, 123, 125, 138, 144, 165, 168, 171, 269, 270–2, 275, 278 King Hui of Liang, 180 King Huo, 145 King Miaozhuang, 145 King Mingying, 100–1 Hall of King Mingying, 99–102, 111, 149 Kobayashi Hiromitsu, 8–9, 34 Kohara Hironobu, 89 Kong Rong (153–208), 197 Kong Shangren (1648–1718), 67 Kong men rujiao liezhuan, 106 Kong sheng jiayu tu, 239 Kuaiji, 193 Kuang gushi Yuyang sannong, 197–9 kuilei, 197, 225 see also puppet kuilei juchang, 225 see also puppet theater kuilei paichang, 197 see also puppet performance Kun opera, see Kunqu Kunqu, 41, 54, 60, 80 Kunshan, 54, 59–60, 67 Lan Caihe, 102, 160 landscape illustration, 30–2, 22, 272, 294 Lang Ying (b. 1487), 203–6, 235–6 Langya manchao, 188 Lanqiao yuchu ji, 127, 136, 138, 144, 157, 160, 254, 258 Lantern Festival, 103 Li Bai (699–762), 211–2, 220, 283 Li Bifeng, 92 Li Gaochen (active c. 1630s), 241, 284 see also Yan Ge Li Gonglin (1049–1106), 20, 26, 149 Li Kaixiang (1501–1568), 40, 59, 81, 189 Li Rihua (1565–1635), 60–1, 237–8, 290 Li Shilang, 118 Li Tianlin, 250 Li Tingmo, see Li Gaochen Li Wa, 186 Li Xifan, 177–8 Li Yaxian huajiu Qujiang chi, 186 Li Yu (b. 1610–20, d. after 1671), 35, 190 Li Yu (1611–c. 1680), 39, 46, 49, 51–2, 59, 70–5, 77–9, 195–6, 204, 256

340

index

Li Zhi (1527–1602), 295, 297 Li Zhuowu piping Sanguo zhi, 97 Li Zhuowu xiansheng piping Pipa ji, 295 Li Zicheng, 157 Li Zicheng chengwan, 157 Liang Chenyu (c. 1508–c. 1581), 53–5, 60, 188 Liangjiang ji, 123, 127, 144, 148, 156, 162, 171, 187, 190, 251 Liao Ben, 101 Liaodu geng, 189 Lidai guren xiangzan, 238 Lidai minghua ji, 205 Lienü zhuan, 99, 104 Fuchun Tang 1587 edition, 99, 104 Gu Lienü zhuan, 20 Lijing ji, 24, 29, 268–9 Lin Bu (957–1028), 236 Linchuan, 64, 66, 248, 288 Linchuan Pai, see School of Linchuan Lindenberger, Herbert, 190, 195 Linfen baojuan, 160 Ling Chucheng, see Ling Mengchu Ling Mengchu (1580–1644), 53–55, 60–1, 72, 75–6, 80, 294 Lisao, 66 lishi ju, see historical drama literati editions, 32 Liu Bei (161–223), 182, 184 Liu Gansan, 165–6 Liu Junxi, 92 Liu Lingfu, 92 Liu Longtian, 92 Liu Nianzi, 101 Liu Quan jingua, 102 Liu Shi-yee, 89 Liushizong qu, 75, 80 Lizhi ji, 23–4, 29, 92, 268 longer-range shot, 117 Lonely Mountain, 236 Longya (Yang Shen’s uncle), 204 Lord, Albert, 188 Lord Guan, see Guan Yu Lord Liu, see Liu Bei Lou Xuan, 213 Lu Andao (1517–?), 207 Lü Buwei (d. BC 235), 189 Lu Cai, 110, 248 Lu Eting, 41 Lu feng Yang shi, see Meeting Lady Yang on the Road Lü Jiangshan, see Lü Yusheng Lü Tiancheng, 57, 62–3, 65, 67–8, 78, 178, 248

Lu Rui, 241, 284, 289 Lu, Sheldon Hsiao-peng, 181 Lu Yidian, 294 Lu Youren (active c. 1330), 213 Lü Yusheng, 63, 79, 80 Lu Xinyuan (1834–1894), 213–4 Lugui bu, see Book of Ghosts, The Luo Guanzhong (. 1300–1400), 181 Luo Pu, 148 “Luo Shen fu” tu, see Picture of “The Rhapsody of the Goddess Luo” Luo Ye jiwen, 186 Luo Yuming, 110 Luo Zhang’er, 57, 63, 80 luoshi, see exit-poems lyric for the banquet, 45, 58 Lüshi chunqiu, 189 Ma Hezhi (c. 1130–c. 1170), 20 Ma Shiying (c. 1590–1646), 67 Madam Cui, 218 McLaren, Anne, 28, 87, 175 Mair, Victor, 18–9 Mantian chun, 92 Mao Jin (1599–1659), 75, 234 Mao Shi tujuan, see Pictures from The Books of Songs Mao Yixiang, 234 Mao Yuanyi (. 1636), 81 Mao’er xi, 109, 134, 149 Mei-liu, 190 Meeting Lady Yang on the Road, 115, 118 Mencius, 180 Meng Chengshun (c. 1600–c. 1648), 187–8, 281–5, 297 Meng Haoran (689–740), 65 Menglei chuanqi, 58 menlian, 99 meta-performance, 164, 198 metapicture, 9, 219 meta-stage-framing, 108 meta-theatrical play, 198 Mi Fu (1051, 1107), 233–4 Mi Heng (173–198), 197–9 Miller, J. Hillis, 273 mimetic, 10–1, 17–8, 23, 25, 30 mimetic function, 10–1, 30 mimetic illustration, 11 Min Qiji (1580-after 1661), 9, 34, 215, 217, 220, 224–5, 227 Ming drama 39, 43, 49, 51, 60, 65–6, 82, 85, 103–4, 170, 178, 191, 290, 292 Mo Shilong (?–1587), 207

index Mogu, see Copying the Past Mohan Zhai dingben chuanqi, 83 Mouni he hi, 67 Mozhong ji, 123, 194 Mr. Li Zhuowu Comments on Pipa ji, 295 Mrs. Wang (in Wu shihui ), 145 Mudan ting, 34, 38, 41, 43, 46, 55, 57, 61, 66, 79–83, 248–9, 287–8 Mulian jiumu, 19, 113, 123, 127, 140, 148, 154, 258, 267–8, 270–1, 273 Fuchun Tang edition, 123 140 Gaoshi Shanfang 1582 edition, 113, 127, 148, 154, 258, 268, 270–1 Mulian jiumu jing, 19 Murray, Julia K., 19, 21–2 music key, Dashi, 65 Gong, 65–6 Shang, 65–6, 73 Yu, 73 musical form, 62 musical notation, 294 Musical Studio, 72–3 Nagasawa, Kikuya, 7 Nan jiugong shisan diao qupu, 39, 62 Nanci xulu, 110, 118 Nanguan xi, see Southern Musical Theater Nanjing, 7, 25, 84, 90, 92, 108, 235, 237, 295 see also Jinling Nanke meng, 34 narrative history, 178 narrative illustration, 20–2, 24, 269 narrative painting, 20–2, 151 narrative picture, 22 narrative representation, 22 natural language, 68–71 Nazi swastika, 218 Neo-Confucianism, 226 Ni Zan (1301–1374), 236–7 Night Banquet of Han Xizai, The, 208 Ninghe, 157–162 Niulang Zhinü zhuan, 106 “Nüshi zhen” tu, see Picture of “The Female Historian’s Teachings” Nü Xiaojing tu, see Picture of the Classic of Female Filial Piety Ofcial History, 182–3, 190, 193 Orphan of the Zhao, The, see Zhaoshi gu’er Orthodox Confucianism, 218

341

Outlines of a Comprehensive History, see Tongjian gangmu Owen, Stephen, 2–3, 292 P4524 (scroll), 17–8, 22 Painting Landscape, 207 painting within poetry, 22, 249 Palace Museum, Taipei, 136 Pan Dechong, 109 Pan Jinlian, 145 Pan Zhiheng (1556–1622), 200–1 parallel couplets, 76–7 Parry, Milman, 188 past serves the present, the, see gu wei jin yong Path through the Door of Ghosts, 4, 199 Peking Opera, 60, 62, 67, 109, 111, 113, 115, 118, 134, 140, 144–5, 153, 165, 167 Chen Sanliang patang, 109, 153 Gucheng hui, 144 Jinshan si, 167 Shi yuzhuo, 140 Shizi jingfeng, 115 Su San qijie, 153 Tan qinjia, 165 Wu shihui, 140, 145 Zhaoshi gu’er, 109 Pelliot, Paul, 17 Peony Pavilion, The, 218 see also Mudan ting performance illustration, 4, 11, 30, 32–3, 87, 92, 109–11, 117, 151, 155–6, 164, 167–71, 174–6, 179, 202–3, 220, 245–7, 251–2, 254–5, 258, 267, 269, 276, 278–9, 285, 290, 294 performative function, 11, 30 Picking up a Jade Bracelet, see Shi yuzhuo Pictorial Compendium of the Three Powers, see Sancai tuhui Picture of the Classic of Female Filial Piety, 21 Picture of “The Female Historian’s Teachings,” 20, 25 Picture of the King of Jin, 20 Picture of “The Poem of Return,” 20 Picture of “The Rhapsody of the Goddess Luo,” 21 Picture of “The Rhapsody of the Red Cliff,” 21 Picture of “The Second Rhapsody of the Red Cliff,” 21 Picture of Ten Recitations, 206 Picture of the Virtuous Gentleman, The, 235 Picture of West Dongting Mountain, 207

342

index

pictures-above-text, 11, 13–4, 17, 19–29, 269 pictures-amid-text, 13–4, 17, 25–9 pictures-before-text, 13, 15, 17, 30 Pictures from The Books of Songs, 20 Pictures of the Book of Filial Piety, 26, 149 Pictures of the Nine Songs, 20, 25 Pictures of the Sage’s Life, 21–2, 239 pinghua, 19–20, 22–4, 28–9, 109, 276 Pingyang, 97, 102 Pipa ji, 10, 13, 41, 53, 55–6, 58–9, 68, 76, 8, 123, 125, 127, 130, 134, 136, 138, 144, 148, 153–7, 162, 169, 189, 294 Jizhi Zhai edition, 130 Lu Yidian, 294 Nan Pipa ji, 130 Qifeng Guan edition, 130, 148 Rongyu Tang 1610 edition, 10, 13, 295 Shide Tang edition, 127, 136, 144, 148, 153–7, 162, 294 Unknown publisher edition, Palace Museum, Taipei, 125, 136, 144 Wanhu Xuan edition, 123, 130, 169, 170 Zunsheng Guan edition, 130, 136, 138, 144, 154–5 Pirandello, Luigi, 198 poetry within painting, 22, 249 Popular Rendition of the History of the Three Kingdoms, 179, 182 Popular Rendition of the Restoration of the Song Dynasty, 193 printed edition, 77 Prμufek, Jaroslav, 18–9 public theater, 72 publisher/illustrator, 253–5, 276, 284–5, 287 Pugliatti, Paola, 181, 187, 194–6 puppet, 111, 215, 217–24, 226–7, 282 performance, 217, 225 reality, 219 screen, 218–9 show, 221 stage, 215, 217, 220–2, 224, 226–7 theater, 111, 225 world, 217, 223 puppeteer, 217–9, 221–2, 226 puppetry, 217, 221 Puyang, 228 Pynchon, Thomas, 198

Qi Biaojia (1602–1645), 49, 50, 52, 70–2, 78, 189, 267, 279–80 Qian Nanyang, 257 qiang, 59 Qianjin ji, 90, 170 Qiannü lihun (by Wang Jide), 70 Qiao Zhongchang (c. 12th century), 21 Qiaoshan Tang, 92, 104, 107–8, 134 Qiefu ji, 185–6, 195, 200, 256 Qifeng Guan, 130, 148 Qimeng gushi, 23–4 Qin bing liuguo pinghua, 109 Qin Guan (1049–1100), 65 qing (sincere emotion), 218, 281 qing jing jiao rong, see Conation of Emotion and Scenery Qingliang shan, 49 Qinglou yunyu, 228 Qingpao ji, 138, 148 Qingshan ji, 192 Qingsuo gaoyi, 186 Qingxi, 212 Qingyuan daoren, 65 Qingzhong pu, 190 Qinhuai jupin, 200 Qisheng ji, 157 Qishuji Guduyuan, 93 Qiting ji, 125, 148, 160, 251 Qiu Rui (1418–1495), 40 Qixiu leigao, 235 Qu Yuan (B.C. 343–277), 20, 66 Quande ji, 111, 121, 162 Qulü, by Wang Jide, 46, 50, 68, 69, 76 by Wei Liangfu, 60 Qulun, by He Liangjun, 56, 61 by Xu Fuzuo, 71 qupai, 62 Qupin, by Lü Tiancheng, 67, 178, 248 by Qi Biaojia, 78 RaudrÊksha, 88 Real Puppet, The, 223–4 reclining and wandering, see woyou Records of Yue Fei’s Loyalty, 194 Recovering the Past, 3 rened language, 68–71 Renaissance, 181 René Magritte, 219 reproductive authorship, 296 rhythmic accents, 62

index River Wu, 171 role-type, 52 Rongyu Tang, 10, 13, 248, 295, 297 Xixiang ji, 248 Rongzhai suibi, 203 rou kuilei, see esh puppetry Ruan Dacheng (1587–1646), 57, 66–7, 78, 272, 288, 297–8 Ruicheng, 109 Ruihong (Yang Shen’s uncle), 204 Ruishi liangying, 240 ruxiang, see Exit the Minister Sabin, Samantha, 8 Sai jiaorong, 52 Sancai tuhui, 217, 225, 231–2 Sangui lianfang ji, 127, 148, 276 Sanguo zhi, Li Zhuowu piping Sanguo zhi, 97 Sanguo yanyi, 181–3 Sanguo zhi pinghua, 95 Sanguo zhi tongsu yanyi, 179, 182, 184 Sanguo zhizhuan, 12 San-kuo chih, 185 Sanshe ji, 190 Sanyuan ji, 191 Sanzhu ji, 121, 151, 160 SÊriputra, 88 scene performance, 41 scene-setting speeches, 76 Schiller, 195 School of Linchuan, 64 School of Music, 64 School of Poetic Talent, 64 School of Wujiang, 64 Shakespeare, 42, 181, 187, 195–6, 202 Shan Yu (a jinshi in 1439), 189 Shang (music key), 65–6, 73 Shang chun, see Appreciating the Spring shang tu xia wen, see pictures-above-text shangchang jie, 111 Shanxi, 95, 97, 100, 102, 109, 157 Shao Can (active during 1465–1505), 201 Shen Chongsui (d. 1645), 60, 66 Shen Jifei, 248–9, 287–8 Shen Jing (1553–1610), 39, 57, 61–5, 67, 75, 79–80, 82 see also Wujiang, and Ciyin Shen Shouxian (active during 1506–1521), 191 Shen Zhou (1427–1509), 31 shenduan, 16, 86, 111, 167

343

Sheng Ming zaju sanshi zhong, 284 Shenji tu, see Pictures of the Sage’s Life Shengxian ji, 197 Shi Chi, 185 see also Shiji Shi Pan (Shukao, c. 1530–c. 1630), 71 Shi yuzhuo, 140 shi zhong you hua, see painting within poetry Shide Tang, 90, 99, 104, 107–8, 111, 113–5, 118, 121, 127, 134, 136, 138, 144, 148, 153, 154, 155–7, 162, 169–70, 276, 294–5 Baiyueting ji, 68, 90, 104, 107, 111, 121, 123, 127, 151 Duanfa ji, 90, 104, 111, 115, 123, 127, 148, 171, 220 Pipa ji, 127, 136, 144, 148, 153–7, 162 Qianjin ji, 90, 170 Shuangfeng qiming ji, 113, 115, 118, 121, 155, 220 Xiyou ji, 92, 104 Shiguan, see Historiographer Shih, Chung-wen, 179 Shiji, 185–188 see also Shi Chi Shijian Tang, 297 Shijing, 66 Shiling guangji, 98 Shishi yuanliu, 19 Shiyi ji, 275 Shiyong tu, see Pictures of Ten Recitations Shiyu huapu, 232 Shizhu zhai shuhua pu, 232 shu hua tong yuan, 22 Shuai Ji (1537–1595), 45, 62, 76 Shuang jibang ji, 288 shuang mian quan ye, see double half-folio pages Shuangfeng qiming ji, 113, 115, 118, 121, 155, 220 Shuanghong ji, 278 Shuangyu ji, 125, 160 Shuangyuan ji, 71 Shuangzhong ji, 186,191, 268, 271 shuimodiao, see water polished shuochang cihua, see chantefable Shuying, 231 Sieber, Patricia, 43, 81, 293, 296 si-liu, see parallel couplets

344

index

Sima Qian (BC 145–186), 185–6, 189, 288, 296 Sima Zichang, 185, 288 Ssu-ma Ch’ien, 185 Zichang, 186 Simei tu, 97–8 Sisheng yuan, 12, 157, 197 Sishu ji, 130 Siyou Zhai congshuo, 253 Song Yu, 66 Soushen ji, 99 Southern Musical Theater, 221 stage-centered reading, 42 Stoppard, Tom, 198 story drama, 177 Su San qijie, 153 Su Shi (1036–1101), 21, 184–5, 193 Subhûti, 15, 93 Suishu Bibliography, 192 Suishu jingji zhi, see Suishu Bibliography Suiyang (Zhang Yuan), 186 Sullivan, Michael, 93 Sun Kaidi (1898–1986), 183 Sun Quan, 182 Sun Shu’ao, 286 Supplementary Biography of the Cui’s Annals, see Cuishi chunqiu buzhuan Swatek, Catherine, 41, 43–4, 63, 69, 80–3 Taihang, 100–2 Taihe zhengyin pu, 178 Taipei, 241 Taiping shanshui tuhua, 232 Taiping, Temple of, 231 Taiwan, 111, 121, 145, 221, 267 Taiwanese opera, 72–3 Tan Fang, 43 Tan qinjia, 165 Tanaka Issei, 41, 84, 85 Tang Cheng, 90 Tang Dai (1673–?), 227 Tang Fuchun, 92, 296 Tang Guoshi, 231 Tang Hou (active c. 1291–1328), 234 Tang tu mingsheng tuhui, 106 Tang Xianzu (1550–1616), 34, 38, 44–5, 55, 57, 61–8, 76, 78–80, 82, 218, 248, 255, 286–8 see also Linchuan, Qingyuan Daoren, and Yuming Tang Tang Yin (1470–1524), 236–7, 241–3, 245 Tang Zhenwu, 279

Tangshi guchui, 108 Tangshi huapu, 232 Tanqu zazha, 53, 72, 76 Tanhua ji, 123, 138, 226 Tanyang zi (d. 1580), 223 Tao Qian (365–427), 20 Tao’an mengyi, 58, 67 Taohua shan, 67 Taylor, Gary, 42 Temple of Bocai, see Bocai, Temple of Temple of Guangsheng, see Guangsheng, Temple of Temple of Taiping, see Taipiing, Temple Temple of Wind and Rain God, see Wind and Rain God, Temple of text-centered reading, 42 textual creation, 42 textual reception, 42 Three Kingdoms, the, 21, 95, 179, 181–2, 184 see also Sanguo zhi Three Variations on the Yuyang Tune by the Mad Drummer, see Kuang gushi Yuyang shannong tianci, see lling in the lyrics Tianzhang Ge, 33, 134 Tianzhu lingqian, 19 Tiao Jiaguan, see Dance of Promotion Tingli, 92 Tipao ji, 115, 149, 155 Tonghe Shanren, see Xu Qiao Tongjian gangmu, 180, 194 Tongmeng ji, 79 Toubi ji, 200 Toutao ji, 121, 127, 162 Tu Long (jinshi in 1577), 226–7 valance, 89–90, 92, 99, 102–4, 106–7, 109, 167, 171 Vandier-Nicolas, Nicole, 17 Vinograd, Richard, 88–9 Vitz, Evelyn B., 184 Wagner, Rudolf, 175, 178 Wallenstein, 195 Wang Anshi (1021–1086), 214–5 Wang Bomin, 8, 87, 99 Wang Heng (1564–1607), 223–4 Wang Huiyun, 92 Wang Jide (d. 1623), 46–50, 54–5, 57, 65, 68–74, 76–78, 281 see also Fangzhu, 70 Wang Jiusi (1468–1551), 35, 40, 291 Wang Ling, 296

index Wang Peng, 184 Wang Qi, 231 Wang Shifu (c. 1250–c. 1337), 56, 66, 242–3, 247, 249, 296 Wang Shizhen (1526–1590), 59 Wang Siren (1575–1646), 66, 211, 220, 289 Wang Wei (698–759), 80 Wang Wenke, 239 Wang Xijue (1534–1610), 223 Wang Yinglin, 49–50 Wang Zhaojun, 123, 165, 277 Wang Zhideng (1535–1612), 207 Wang Ziye, 177 Wangu tu, see Enjoying the Antiques Wanhu Xuan, 123, 130, 169, 170 Wanrong County, 102 Wansha ji, 54–5, 60, 123, 160, 188, 192, 200 Yangchun Tang 1608 edition, 123, 160 Wanxiang xin, 93 Wanyue Xuan, 127, 157, 254 water polished, 54 Wei Liangfu (active during 1522–66), 54, 60 Wei Yan, 203 Wei Zhongxian, 67, 194 Weiss, Peter, 198 Wen Boren (1502–1575), 207 Wen Lin (1445–1499), 188 Wen Zhengming (1470–1559), 31–2 Weng Wenyuan, 123, 138 Weng Zhengchun, 162 Wenlin Ge, 138, 148, 278–9 Qingpao ji, 138, 148 Shuanghong ji, 278 Wenshu zhinan tuzan, 19 wenxue ben, 257–8 West, Stephen, 81, 134 Wind and Rain God, Temple of, 102 Winter Landscape, 80 woodblock illustration, 5–7, 22, 31, 33, 88, 229 woodblock print, 8, 21, 31, 36, 89, 97 woyou, 205–9, 211 write/picture, 249, 253 writer/painter, 249 writing/picturing, 249, 252 Wu Bing (?–c. 1647), 189 Wu Dalang, 140 Wu Daozi (680–740), 232, 249 Wu Han (1909–1969), 177

345

Wu Hung, 9, 21, 32, 34, 208, 215, 219–21, 224, 243 Wu Jiamo (jinshi in 1607), 239–40 Wu Mei (1884–1939), 79 Wu School, 31–2 Wu shihui, 140, 145 Wu Shufu, 83 Wu Weiye (1609–1671), 190 Wu Yuanzhi (1126–1223), 21 Wu Yue chunqiu, 188, 193 Wu za zu, 192 Wujiang, 64 Wujiang Pai, see School of Wujiang Wulin, 160 see also Hangzhou Wuling Village, 148 Wulun quanbei ji, 191 Wulun zhuan Xiangnang ji, see Xiangnang ji Wumu wang jingzhong lu, 193 wutai ben, 257–8 Wuxiang zhishi song, 19 Wuxing, 282 Xi Dongting shantu, see Pictures of West Dongting Mountain Xi Hu zhuzhi ci, 290 Xi Shi (Xi zi), 193 Xiang River, 231 Xiang Yu, 170–1 Xiangmo bianwen, see Devil’s Defeat Xiangnang ji, 68, 79, 83–4, 201 Xiangxue Ju, 247 Xianqing ouji, 39, 46, 51, 70, 73, 77 Xiangshan ji, 145, 157, 268, 272 Xiansuo bian’e, 66 Xiao Yucong (1596–1673), 8, 31, 232 Xiaojing tu, see Pictures of The Book of Filial Piety Xiaoxiang, 207 Xie Zhaozhe (1567–1624), 192 xietai, 101 Ximeng Qing, 145 Xin’an River, 211 Xingtian Jushi, 232 Xiqing Tang, 23 Xiong Damu (. mid-sixteenth century), 193 Xiongdi tan bing, 113 Xiuran zi, 182, 183, 184 Xiuwen ji, 151 Xixiang ji, 9, 23–4, 29–30, 32–4, 41, 56, 60–1, 66 84, 88, 92, 95, 97–8, 104, 107, 109, 134, 151,189–90, 215, 218,

346

index

220, 225, 241–2, 246–9, 253, 268, 289, 294, 296–7 1498 edition, 23–4, 29–30, 84, 88, 95, 97–8, 151, 246, 268, 289 Jin Shengtan edition, 297 Ling Mengchu edition, 294 Min Qiji 1640 edition, 9, 34, 109, 215, 220, 225 Qiaoshan Tang 1592 edition, 92, 104, 107, 134 Rongyu Tang edition, 248 Tianzhang Ge 1640 edition, 33, 134 Xiangxue Ju 1614 edition, 247 Yan Ge edition, 241 Zhang Shenzhi 1639 edition, 32, 89, 296 Xixiang ji kao, 245 Xixiang zalu, 245 Xiyou ji, 92, 102, 104 Shide Tang 1592 edition, 92, 104 Xu Dachun (c. 1699–1778), 49, 199 Xu Fuming, 42, 54, 257–8 fumo kaichang, 42, 257–8 Liang Chenyu, 54 Xu Fuzuo (1560–1630), 39, 71 Xu Qiao (a jinshi in 1591), 187–8, 190 Xu Rixi ( jinshi 1622), 79 Xu Shifan (active c. late 16th century), 189 Xu Shuofang, 42 Xu Wei (1521–1593), 12, 110, 197, 199, 217, 221–2, 236–8, 243, 245, 281 Xu Wenmei, 89 Xu Wenqing, 207 Xu You, 231 Xu Yu, 290 Xuan gujin Nan Bei ju, 281 Xuanxue pu, 64 Xue Rengui, 144 Xunqin ji, 138, 268, 270, 276–7 Xuputi, see Subhûti ya and zu, 41 Yan Ge, 241, 284 see also Li Gaochen Yanbei zazhi, 213 Yang Erceng (active c. 1610s), 229–30 Yang Shen (1488–1599), 204–6, 228–9, 254 Yang Weizhen, 290 Yangchun Tang, 123 Yangmen nüjiang, see Female General of the Yang, The Yanqing huimei, 207

yanshang zhi qu, see lyric for the banquet Yanxian qingshang qian, 234 Yao Dajuin, 31, 87 Yao Maoliang, 186–7, 191 Yanzi qian, 66–7 Ye Changhai, 43, 64 Ye Liangbiao, 296 Ye Zhou (. 1595–1624), 248–9, 253, 295 Yi Yin, 180 Yihuang, 57, 59 Yin Shizhi (. 1500–1600), 189 Yingwu ji, 162, 176, 191 Yingju shiliu guan, 89 Yingying zhuan, 242 yinshi (pronunciation), 294 Yipengxue, 35, 162, 224 Yiru gu’er ji, see Zhaoshi gu’er Yixia ji, 57 Yiyang, 59, 60 Yiyong cijin, 279 Yiyong Wu’an Wang wei, 97 Yiyun Ge, 188 Yonghuai Tang, 298 Yongle dadian, 256 Yongle Gong, 109 Yongshun Shutang, 23, 27–8, 95, 97, 268 Yongyu zi, 179–80, 182–3 Yu (music key), 73 Yu Siya, 92 Yu Chengzhang, 106 Yu County, 160 Yu Xin’an, 24 Yuan Fengzi, 12 Yuan drama, 4, 49, 53, 73–4, 81–2, 101–2, 178–9, 189, 286 Yuan Hongdao (1568–1610), 207, 212, 220, 281 Yuan Zhen (779–831), 204, 242 Yuanqu xuan, 82, 286 Yuanshan Tang jupin, 70, 189, 279 Yuanshan Tang qupin, 267 Yuchai ji, 268, 271 Yue Fei (1103–1141), 57, 194 Yuefu chuansheng, 49, 199 Yuefu hongshan, 61, 64 Yuefu jinghua, 92 Yugeng Tang, 92 Yugoslavia, 188–9 Yugu diaohuang, 92 Yugu Laoren, 290 Yuhe ji, 154, 157 Yujue ji, 69, 90, 107, 118, 127, 156–7, 171 Yukui jingo, 200

index Yuming Tang, 66, 81 Yunjian jumu chao, 165 Yushu ying, 92 Yuzan ji, 140, 156, 171 Zang Jinshu, see Zang Maoxun Zang Maoxun (1550–1620), 43, 79, 80–2, 282, 286–8 zaohui, 68–9 Zeitlin, Judith, 203 Zeng Ji (1084–1166), 203–4 Zeng Jifu, see Zeng Ji Zhang Boqi, see Zhang Fengyi Zhang Dai (1597–before 1690), 58, 67 Zhang Dehao, 102 Zhang Fengyi (1550–1636), 185, 187, 195–6, 286, 296 Guanyuan ji, 296 Hongfu ji, 287 Zhufa ji, 296 Zhang Geng, 178 Zhang Gong, 242, 249, 253 Zhang Jishi, 291 Zhang Kai (1398–1460), 21–2 Zhang Mengzhen, 228 Zhang Qi, 65 Zhang Shangde, see Xiuran zi Zhang Shenzhi, 32, 89, 296 Zhang Taihe, 286 Zhang Wanxuan (active c. 1648), 232 Zhang Xian (990–1078), 206 Zhang Xie zhuangyuan, 256–7 Zhang Xun, 186 Zhang Yanyuan (active c. 862), 205 Zhang Yuniang, 188 Zhangsun Wuji (?–659), 192 zhanyu juchang, see carpet stage zhanyu yanju, see carpet performance Zhao Bangxian, 290 Zhao Wuniang, 127, 130, 134 Zhaoshi gu’er, 109, 192 Zhaozhou, 232 Zhe School, 31 Zhejiang, 9, 58, 215 Zhen kuilei, see Real Puppet, The Zheng Guoxuan, 296 Zheng Heng, 217

347

Zheng Rouyang, 68 Zheng Shaozhai, 104, 108 Zheng Yingtai (active c. early 17th century), 228–9 Zheng Zhiwen (a jinshi in 1610), 251 Zheng Zhizhen (active c. 1582), 258, 267–8 Zhenwen ji, 187 zhexiu, see Concealing Sleeve zhezi xi, see scene performance Zhici lu, 250 Zhong Renjie, 12 Zhongdu Xiu, 100–2 Zhongfang Shuzhai, 245 Zhongshan lang, 35 Zhou Lianggong (1612–1672), 231–2 Zhou Shuming, 206 Zhou Wenju (b. c. 917), 208, 211–3, 224, 227 Zhou Wu, 7–8 Zhou Xun (active c. 1554), 254 Zhou Yibai, 101 Zhou Yu (175–210), 186, 276 Zhou Yude, 44, 63 Zhu Chaoding, 247 Zhu Quan (d. 1448), 178–9 Zhu Tianran (active c. 1498), 238 Zhu Tongfen (active c. 1637), 240 Zhu Youdun (1374–1437), 52, 186, 279–80 Zhu Yu, 103 Zhu Zhai, 177 Zhu Zhifan (a jinshi in 1595), 232–3 zhuan, see dramatized biography zhuanji, 190, 191 Zhuangyuan fuyan, see Degree Winner Going to the Banquet, the Zhuangyuan tukao, 157–162 Zhufa ji, 296 Zhuzi (Zhu Xi), 180 Zichai ji, 45, 62 Zixiao ji, 45, 62, 76, 118, 145, 156, 220, 268, 271 Zong Bing (375–443), 205–7, 214, 230–1 Zunsheng Guan, 130, 136, 138, 154–5, 169–70 zuoyi, 118

China Studies ISSN 1570–1344 1. Berg, D. Carnival in China. A Reading of the Xingshi Yinyuan Zhuan. 2002. ISBN 90 04 12426 8 2. Hockx, M. Questions of Style. Literary Societies and Literary Journals in Modern China, 1911-1937. 2003. ISBN 90 04 12915 4 3. Seiwert, H. Popular Religious Movements and Heterodox Sects in Chinese History. 2003. ISBN 90 04 13146 9 4. Heberer, T. Private Entrepreneurs in China and Vietnam. Social and Political Functioning of Strategic Groups. 2003. ISBN 90 04 12857 3 5. Xiang, B. Transcending Boundaries. Zhejiangcun: the Story of a Migrant Village in Beijing. 2005. ISBN 90 04 14201 0 6. Huang, N. Women, War, Domesticity. Shanghai Literature and Popular Culture of the 1940s. 2005. ISBN 90 04 14242 8 7. Dudbridge, G. Books, Tales and Vernacular Culture. Selected Papers on China. 2005. ISBN 90 04 14770 5 8. Cook, C.A. Death in Ancient China. The Tale of One Man’s Journey. 2006. ISBN-10: 90 04 15312 8, ISBN-13: 978 90 04 15312 7 9. Sleeboom-Faulkner, M. The Chinese Academy of Social Sciences (CASS). Shaping the Reforms, Academia and China (1977-2003). 2007. ISBN-10: 90 04 15323 3, ISBN-13: 978 90 04 15323 3 10. Berg, D. (ed.) Reading China. Fiction, History and the Dynamics of Discourse. Essays in Honour of Professor Glen Dudbridge. 2007. ISBN-10: 90 04 15483 3, ISBN-13: 978 90 04 15483 4 11. Hillenbrand, M. Literature, Modernity, and the Practice of Resistance. Japanese and Taiwanese Fiction, 1960-1990. 2007. ISBN-10: 90 04 15478 7, ISBN-13: 978 90 04 15478 0 12. Hsiao, L. The Eternal Present of the Past. Illustration, Theater, and Reading in the Wanli Period, 1573-1619. 2007. ISBN 978 90 04 15643 2 13. Gerritsen, A. Ji’an Literati and the Local in Song-Yuan-Ming China. 2007. ISBN 978 90 04 15603 6 14. Starr, C.F. Red-light Novels of the late Qing. 2007. ISBN 978 90 04 15629 6