STUDIES IN CHINESE COMMUNIST TERMINOLOGY

No. 15

YANG-PAN HSI — NEW THEATER IN CHINA

by

Hua-yuan Li Mowry

1973

THE CURRENT CHINESE LANGUAGE PROJECT under the joint chairmanship of Cyril Birch and John C. Jamieson is a research project of the Center for Chinese Studies of the University of California at Berkeley.

©1973 by the Regents of the University of California

ISBN 0-912966-13-0

Library of Congress Catalog Card Number 73-620133

Printed in the United States of America

$2.50

US ISSN 0069-3693

CURRENT CHINESE LANGUAGE PROJECT PUBLICATIONS

Studies in Chinese Communist Terminology (out of print, but available on microfilm from University Microfilms, 300 North Zeeb Road, Ann Arbor, Michigan 48106):

1 Li Chi. General Trends of Chinese Linguistic Changes Under Communist Rule. July 1956, 42 pp.

2 Li Chi. Preliminary Study of Selected Terms. July 1956, 24 pp.

3 Li Chi. Part I, Literary and Colloquial Terms in New Usage, Part II, Terms Topped by Numerals. April 1957, 51 pp.

4 Li Chi. Part I, The Communist Terms “The Common Language” and Related Terms, Part II, Dialectal Terms in New Usage (continued). December 1957, 88 pp.

5 Li Chi. The Use of Figurative Language in Communist China. December 1958, 84 pp.

6 Li Chi. “A Provisional System of Grammar for Teaching Chinese” With Introduction and Commentary. June 1960, 204 pp.

7 T. A. Hsia. Metaphor, Myth, Ritual and the People’s Commune. June 1961, 60 pp.

8 Paul L-M Serruys. Survey of the Chinese Language Reform and the Anti-Illiteracy Movement in Communist China. February 1962, 208 pp.

9 Li Chi. New Features in Chinese Grammatical Usage. Summer 1962, 72 pp.

10 T. A. Hsia. A Terminological Study of the Hsia-Fang Movement. Summer 1963, 68 pp.

11 T. A. Hsia. The Commune in Retreat as Evidenced in Terminology and Semantics. Summer 1964, 91 pp.

12 H. C. Chuang. The Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution--A Terminological Study. Summer 1967, 72 pp.

Studies in Chinese Communist Terminology (available on order from the Center for Chinese Studies, University of California, Berkeley, California 94720):

13 H. C. Chuang. The Little Red Book and Current Chinese Language. August 1968, 58 pp. ($2.00)

14 H. C. Chuang. Evening Chats at Yenshan, or the Case of Teng T’o. January 1970, 46 pp. ($2.00)

YANG-PAN HSI — NEW THEATER IN CHINA

Table of Contents

Preface

Abbreviations

I. Introduction

II. From Yang-pan t’ien to Yang-pan hsi

III. Process and Methodology

IV. Realism and Revolutionary Realism

V. Development and Synopses of the Texts

Footnotes

PREFACE

It is a commonplace observation that no regime in Chinese history has been more assiduous than the present one in cultivating the garden of letters, and that none ever succeeded in reducing the number of blooms to such a handful. As a line from a famous T’ang quatrain puts it, “The palace flowers bloom red into the silence.” The paradox of this situation is Mrs. Hua-yuan Li Mowry’s starting-point as she traces the principles and processes in line with which virtually all efforts for the past seven years have been devoted to seven “model dramatic productions.”

With admirable skill and objectivity Mrs. Mowry depicts the political and ideological background against which the model dramas came into being. Ranging over a considerable body of materials she analyzes the underlying developments in literary theory, and pays particular attention to the principles and methods of collective composition, the application of Mao’s thought and the crucial role of guidance assumed by Chiang Ch’ing. In the best tradition of the Center’s Current Chinese Language Project she has devoted careful attention to those neologisms, catchwords, slogans which can be made to reveal the subtlest shades of new thinking. Her study will be of the greatest interest and value to all concerned with the present and future of the Chinese civilization.

Movie versions and recordings, at least, of the dramas under discussion are becoming accessible within the United States. I had the welcome opportunity to attend a stage performance of Shachiapang in Hong Kong in October 1970. Since Mrs. Mowry’s concerns have precluded the particularly detailed consideration of content, it may be of interest if I quote here from notes I made at the time on this one “revolutionary Peking opera”:

The guiding theme of Shachiapang, the heroism of the People’s Liberation Army and of the underground Party workers in the struggle against national and class enemies, is too obvious to require much comment. Some minor motifs are skilfully harmonized: the adoration of the peasant masses for their Army saviors is stressed when after exhausting work on the harvest the men eagerly go out to catch fish for the soldiers’ supper. The Army’s self-sacrifice in reciprocation is illustrated by the less seriously wounded who volunteer for work in the fields during their convalescence. The motif of the bad old days is sounded for the benefit of the generation born after 1949 when Auntie Sha recalls (scene 2) the three of her four sons who died (two of starvation, the third beaten to death by Tiao’s landlord father). These reminiscences are fairly smoothly introduced into the movement of the dialogue, but they are in fact quite anachronistic: why would the youngsters she is ostensibly addressing, in the middle of the Japanese War, be interested in hearing about the bad old times--which were still very much at hand?

The virtues of self-help and improvisation, much stressed in propaganda from the Great Leap onwards, are symbolized in scene 5 when the wounded men, cut off in the reed-beds from their peasant supporters and facing the threat of starvation discover edible roots.

The villains of the place epitomize evil targets which have been attacked with renewed vigor since the Cultural Revolution. They are of course Westernized in the worst possible ways, drinking brandy and smoking cigarettes (Tiao, in particular, through an effeminate-looking cigarette-holder). It used to be possible, but I think no longer, to depict underground Party heroes as chain smokers living on their nerves. Now, only the corrupt indulge the habit. The dress of the villains carefully subsumes the range of undesirable influences: Hu wears gorgeous Mandarin gowns and jackets, Tiao wears an elegant Ruritanian-style cloak over his uniform, the interpreter working for the Japanese is startlingly incongruous in a light-beige Hong Kong suit. (The Soviet-style New Fourth Army uniforms, presumably, are seen as a perfectly natural development rather than as a manifestation of Western influence.)

We come closer still to the Cultural Revolution in the anti-intellectual jibe against Tiao for studying overseas (in Japan), and in the portrayal of Hu as “addicted to the old”: the Yuan-dynasty landscape scroll hanging in his headquarters seems to be no less an object of derision than his evil passion for mahjong.

Fortunately the play does have theatrical as well as propaganda values. Ah-ch’ing’s wife has several fine moments: it is a part to make a mature actress drool. Fending off, in scene 4, Tiao’s suspicion that she is in league with the Reds, she claims to treat all patrons of her teahouse on an equal basis. “When the customer leaves, the tea grows cold,” she sings, and fits action to words by pouring out at that precise moment the slops from Tiao’s own bowl. She continues in scene 6 cleverly to play off puppet staff-officer against puppet commander. But one of her finest dramatic moments comes in the long and climactic scene 7. Puppet soldiers drag off her friend Auntie Sha to be shot. A moment of silence, then Ah-ch’ing’s wife springs to her feet. The villainous pair, Hu and Tiao, stare expectantly: now at last she is about to confess. “Commander!” she begins. They wait. With superb lightness she says, “I must be on my way.” The effect is best described in the old Punch cliché, “collapse of elderly gentleman.”

Two of the most successful applications of traditional stage techniques to this very untraditional kind of production occur in scenes 4 and 6. During scene 4 there is a growth of mutual suspicion between Hu, Tiao and Ah-ch’ing’s wife. Inner doubts are expressed in a trio of asides: the three revolve round and round, each in turn coming forward to address an aside to the audience while the other two freeze in the background. This little dance of duplicity is skilfully executed. In scene 6, Party Secretary Ch’eng and Ah-ch’ing’s wife at last get a hurried chance to exchange intelligence. The two stand side by side downstage center, leaning inwards towards each other with the effect of whispering, but their eyes moving guardedly outwards. They speak rapidly, in turn, out over the audience rather than to each other. The effect of secrecy and caution is enhanced by the tableau formed by the lookouts behind them left and right.

Which of the two, Party or Army, really predominates in Shachiapang? In terms of the action one would say the Party, for Ah-ch’ing’s wife is outstandingly the dramatic lead. Her courage and wit are the salt, and the most effective single line is her closing revelation before the cringing, deceived puppets: “I am a member of the Communist Party!”

From a reading of the text, the Party wins hands down. But in performance, in visual terms, Shachiapang is an Army show. Ah-ch’ing’s wife, in her teahouse apron, merely talks and acts. Kuo Chien-kuang and his eighteen comrades blaze through scene after scene with their red armbands, red kerchiefs, red banners, their heroic postures and tableaus, their precision of movement and ability in combat. How the Red Guards must have cheered these big brothers when Shachiapang was performed in China!

Cyril Birch

July, 1972

University of California

Berkeley

ABBREVIATIONS

Forum Summary

Summary of the Forum on Literature and Art in the Armed Forces with which Comrade Lin Piao Entrusted Comrade Chiang Ch’ing (Lin Piao t’ung-chih wei-t’o Chiang Ch’ing t’ung-chih chao-k’ai-te pu-tui wen-i kung-tso tso-t’an-hui chi-yao

JMJP

Jen-min jih-pao (People’s Daily)

KMJP

Kuang-ming jih-pao (Kuang-ming Daily)

Yenan Talks

Talks at the Yenan Forum on Literature and Art (Tsai Yenan wen-i tso-t’an-hui-shang-te chiang-hua

I. INTRODUCTION

The present study attempts an interpretation of some of the recent developments in the theater in Communist China. These developments are treated as social, educational, and political phenomena rather than merely as questions of literature and art. The interpretation offered is, of course, only one of the many possible.

Our source material comes mainly from Communist Chinese publications: newspapers, magazines, and books dealing with the theater. The particular analyses and conclusions, however, are those of this writer.

It was in 1942 that Mao Tse-tung issued the call to “reject the old and develop the new” (t’ui-ch’en ch’u-hsin ).[1] But it was not until more than two decades later, in 1966, that seven dramatic productions bearing the official badge of recognition and approval emerged from the stormy background of the Chinese theater.[2] Their emergence at the time when the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution was approaching its climax has given them a unique and dual character. They are both a fruit of that Revolution and a powerful weapon for its furtherance. It is the latter--the furthering of the revolution--that the Communist regime considers the principal task of literature and art. And the efforts to achieve this task have so completely reshaped the nature of literature and art in China that one must approach these dramatic productions in a manner quite different from that preferred for their counterparts in the non-Communist world.

The Chinese Communist leaders have always stated frankly that literature and art are to be primarily considered a means of achieving political goals.[3] Nonetheless, there seems to have been a tendency for outside scholars to stress, instead, the regime’s heavy reliance on censorship and control. It is true that one can find much evidence of government control, although this control has varied in its rigidity.[4] In any event, it is questionable whether total control in literature and art is possible.[5] However, the ultimate purpose has remained the same: to turn the stage into a political rostrum, the theater into a lecture hall.[6]

How can the theater be made immune to undesirable elements so that it can better serve its purpose? This has been a perennial problem for the Chinese. For two decades--from approximately 1942 until 1965--various tactics were employed, aimed both at theatrical workers and at the theater itself. Playwrights, performers, directors, and other members of the theatrical field were re-educated and repeatedly corrected through different channels. Old plays were revised or completely barred from the stage. New works were produced.[7] Still it seemed that results were unsatisfactory. Then, at the end of 1965, when Yao Wen-yüan’s unfavorable criticism of Wu Han’s historical play Hai Jui’s Dismissal from Office[8] officially raised the curtain on the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution, the seven so-called yang-pan hsi , or “model dramas,” were already in the making and, armed with Mao’s thought, were ready to perform their duty on the cultural front.

In the eyes of the leadership, are these “models” free, then, of the “poisonous” influences of the bourgeois-capitalist-revisionist line? It is hard to say, for we are time and again reminded by the Chinese themselves that none of these works is perfect and that they are constantly subject to revision. However, with the emergence of these model works, one theme is insisted upon:

The lesson drawn from the last decade or so is that we seized hold of (chua ) [the field of literature and art] belatedly. We have only seized upon (chua) some individual, isolated problems, but have never seized hold of (chua) [the field] systematically and in its entirety. So long as we do not seize hold of (chua) [this entire field], we will inevitably forfeit many positions to the Black [i.e., anti-Party] Line.[9]

Just as there can be no compromise on any other front, neither can there be any compromise on the proletarian cultural front.

The Party has learned its lesson and has won another battle--a battle which may well be one of the more significant since the establishment of the People’s Republic in 1949. For after numerous struggles, the Party (in the name of the people) has at last taken over the task of “creative writing” (if we can still use that term) from the hands of those individuals choosing literary or artistic creation as their calling in life. This may not be the best way to carry forward a nation’s literature and art; but in the view of the leaders it is certainly the surest and safest way feasible at present.

In speed and scope, the “takeover” is indeed a revolutionary rupture with the past. In this sense Chiang Ch’ing has fittingly replaced the time-honored term kai-ke (reform) with ke-ming (revolution).[10]

As we shall see in the following pages, the Party’s successful seizure of power in the field of dramatic art has made theatrical activity in Communist China generally similar in character to the work of production teams in the agricultural and industrial spheres. The theater has formally been ushered into the struggle of implementing the Party’s general line for socialist construction.

We can most appropriately examine what the regime considers to be the exemplary value of the yang-pan hsi, or “model dramas,” by looking at two aspects: the “creative” methods and procedures adopted; and the sketchy but explicit principles offered in connection with the selection and handling of materials.

In this era of Mao Tse-tung’s thought, Mao’s theories of literature and art are the canon for all proletarian workers in this field:

They [Mao’s writings concerning literature and art] are the most complete, the most thorough and the most correct according to Marxist-Leninist lines for literature and art; they are the guiding documents for the proletarian cultural revolution; and they are the highest directives for [carrying out works of] proletarian culture and art. . . . The revolutionary workers on the front of culture and art should all consider these brilliant works of Comrade Mao Tse-tung to be the guiding principles for remoulding the world-view, for the [practice] of artistic creation, and for solving various problems in the field of culture and art.[11]

It would seem, however, that these “highest directives” have unfortunately failed to provide a set of concrete methods of creation.[12] This is only natural because, from the time of Mao’s Yenan Talks until the Party’s successful seizure of power on the cultural front, literary and artistic creation had by-and-large been considered a private accomplishment, even though this privacy was greatly restricted. Mao himself recognized and acknowledged this situation:

Works of literature and art as ideological forms are products of reflection, in the human brain, upon the life of a given society. Revolutionary literature and art are the products of reflection upon the life of the people, in the brains of revolutionary writers and artists.[13]

If literary and artistic creation be indeed the product of “reflection in the brains” of artists and writers, then one might assume that only the creative artist or writer himself has the right to decide upon his method of creation.[14]

In his Yenan Talks Mao pointed out: “. . . the crux of this matter [i.e., literature and art] consists fundamentally of the problems [involved in] working for the masses, and [of knowing] how to work for the masses.”[15] For solving these two problems Mao has repeatedly emphasized the absolute necessity for workers in art and literature constantly to study (hsüeh-hsi ) and constantly to remould (kai-tsao ) themselves. He has also pointed out that the best and the most effective means to study and remould oneself is to go out among the masses:

China’s revolutionary writers and artists, writers and artists of promise, must go among the masses; they must for a long period of time, unreservedly and wholeheartedly, go among the masses of workers, peasants and soldiers--go into the heat of the struggle, go to the only source, the broadest and richest source, in order to observe, experience, study and analyze all the different kinds of people, all the classes, all the vivid patterns of life and struggle, all the raw materials of literature and art. Only then can they proceed to creative work.[16]

The question still remains: Will satisfactory works of literature and art be produced merely by going out among the masses and by constant study and self-remoulding on the part of workers in literature and art? Judging from the literature and art of the previous two decades in Communist China, the answer is apparently negative. For it seems that so long as individuals maintain the right--no matter how little and how restricted it be--to “create,” there will always be the danger of “poisonous” elements creeping in.

With the introduction of the yang-pan hsi or model dramas, this “danger” has, however, been greatly reduced. Since literary and artistic creation is no longer to be a private affair, the regime can now lay down with relatively less difficulty the “recommended” methods and processes of creation. It should nevertheless be noted that the pivot of the regime’s success in “revolutionizing” the theater is the inherent group character of the theatrical art: no individual can singlehandedly produce a full-fledged stage show. Similarly, the absence of “models” in other literary genres in Communist China can largely be explained by their inherently private or “non-mass” character.

Before we turn our attention to the term yang-pan hsi, it might not be out of place to note the often-debated controversy as to the relation between content and form. In his Yenan Talks, Mao established two criteria for literary and art criticism: the political, and the artistic. The political criterion is for the assessment of the content; the artistic, for the form.[17] Of the two criteria, the first is unquestionably primary. However, Mao denies the permanence of either by saying: “We deny not only that there is an abstract and absolutely unchangeable political criterion, but also that there is an abstract and absolutely unchangeable artistic criterion.”[18] Western critics may challenge the credibility of the second part of this statement; but no one at all familiar with the cultural and especially the political realities of the past three decades in China can ignore the “truth” contained in the first part of the statement.[19] Indeed, it must be the absence of any abstract and absolutely unchangeable political criterion that explains why workers in proletarian literature and art must be constantly re-educated and remoulded. And it was also this “absence of any abstract and unchangeable political criterion” which prescribed the basic nature and orientation both of the subsequent drama reform movement, and of the most recent revolution in the field of theatrical art.

As already stated, the use of literature and art is considered to be a means of achieving political goals. From this premise evolved both Mao’s dual standard for” the criticism of literature and art, and the master-subordinate relationship between content and form. “Reject the old and develop the new” is aimed chiefly at the content; adjustment of form is but a corollary of the new content. This is true as it pertains both to the drama reformers of the 1940s and 1950s, and to the drama revolutionaries of the 1960s.

Here, we might briefly compare the remarks of two individuals involved respectively in the “reform,” and in the “revolution.” In an article entitled “Correctly Carrying Out the Policy of ‘Reject the Old and Develop the New’”[20] Ma Shao-po , a well-known drama critic, wrote in 1959:

Drama reform should be focused on the content. . . . Just as Chairman Mao has pointed out, “History is made by the people; yet on the stage of the old days (and in all the old literature and art, which are divorced from the people), the people are presented as though they were but the dregs. The stage is dominated by lords and ladies and their pampered sons and daughters.” In this new era, in the new China of today, we cannot watch quietly and ignore the concepts which openly propagate the counterrevolutionary and the decadent, and which are harmful to the masses. Therefore, by standing on the side of the people and by adopting the viewpoint and method of Marxism-Leninism, we must conscientiously analyze and reflect upon historical social life so that we can restore historical truth and turn the drama from a plaything of the counterrevolutionary ruling class into a tool for educating the people. According to the principle of “first general then detail, first content then form,” we should first emphasize the depoisoning of the content. After we have started to move [in this direction], the form is bound to change accordingly.[21]

Ma’s opinion has been echoed throughout the years with but very little variation. Be it in the reform of historical, traditional opera or the creation of new, revolutionary dramas depicting the socialist revolution and socialist construction, the focus of attention has always been upon the content. Let us now examine a statement made fifteen years later, in the summer of 1964, by Chiang Ch’ing, the gist of which is virtually the same as that of Ma Shao-po’s statement:

Theaters are places originally [designed to] educate the people, but now every stage is dominated by emperors and kings, generals and ministers, scholars and beauties, dominated by feudal and bourgeois stuff. This state of affairs cannot serve to protect but will actually destroy our economic base. . . . I think the key problem (concerning how to change the undesirable status-quo in the theater) lies in the script (chü-pen ). If you have only director and performers but no script, then there is nothing to be directed or acted. Some people say, “play-script, play-script, the heart of a play (chü-pen, chü-pen, i-chü-chih-pen , , ).” This is quite true. Therefore, we must seize hold of (chua ) the work of creative writing.[22]

In comparing the remarks of Ma Shao-po and Chiang Ch’ing, it becomes apparent that the so-called “revolutionaries” of the 1960s are in fact but radical “reformers.” For these revolutionaries have contributed nothing at all to theory; they have, however, through their endeavors, gradually drawn up a diagram to illustrate how a revolutionary dramatic work should be constructed.

Finally, it seems clear that theatrical art is the existing art form most readily suited to implementing Mao’s demand for the “unity of politics and art, of content and form.”[23] In pursuit of this almost impossible unity, many have tumbled and disappeared (at least for the time being) from the proletarian stage. Does the appearance of the yang-pan hsi, then, at last mark the end of that pursuit? In the eyes of the present leaders, this is far from being the case. They consider the yang-pan hsi to be but the “first step of a ten-thousand mile Long March.”[24] It is hoped that the reader will find the following chapters a useful commentary upon the pace and the general direction of this “first step.”

II. FROM YANG-PAN T’IEN TO YANG-PAN HSI

One of the expected results of “going out among the masses” is uniformity: in appearance, in language, and in every aspect of social life. Indeed, in the course of a persistent struggle against the “ego” from which human vices allegedly have sprung, individuality has become a negative quality in Communist China. The people are constantly asked to deny themselves for the sake of the state. P’o-szu li-kung (destroy self, establish public) has been proclaimed a national aspiration and the key to the sought-for proletarian society.

In order to guide the people, the party has set up long lists of models and paragons in almost every sphere of human activity. These we see reflected in the language, where a host of words and terms denoting the nature and attributes of these models and paragons has been incorporated into the everyday vocabulary. Yang-pan (lit. “Pattern-board,” i.e., template) is one such term.

Originally a technical term, yang-pan found its way into common use during and immediately after the Great Leap Forward (1958-1959) when the importance of science and technology was once again stressed by the Party.[1] In a dictionary of science and technology published in Peking in 1958, we find the following definition of yang-pan under the general heading “mechanics”:

A kind of measuring instrument. It is used to gauge and measure the complex surface of a piece of [mechanical] work. Usually it is made of metal plate. The plate is carefully formed into the same shape and size as the outlines of the work (in general it is opposite in shape to the actual work; e.g., if the work is convex the yang-pan will be concave) to gauge whether the work conforms with the demands of the diagram.[2]

After assimilation into the everyday vocabulary, yang-pan lost part of its mechanical connotation. Now it is a term denoting normative or exemplary qualities. Yang-pan thus has come to be little different from pang-yang or yang-tzu ,[3] both common expressions of the vernacular. In a lengthy news report (JMJP, 11/9/58, p. 7) covering the successful implementation of an ambitious local plan to increase wheat production, the three terms are used similarly. The report is headed: A pang-yang for high-yield movement in large areas. Then in a short essay cited in this same report (entitled “A great revolution in the plowing system”), we find yang-pan and yang-tzu in the following contexts:

First we worked on the [smaller] experimental farm plots. Through working on these experimental farm plots the cadres obtained experience and also produced [some] yang-pan to educate the masses. . . . According to our experience, the best way to solve problems of [agricultural] technique is to work out a yang-pan t’ien (yang-pan field or “demonstration field”). . . . Having produced the yang-tzu, we then assembled the cadres and masses for a viewing and thereafter convoked a [discussion] meeting on the spot (i.e., at the yang-pan t’ien).

Here the three terms are almost interchangeable, and can all be translated “model” or “example.” But unlike pang-yang and yang-tzu, yang-pan does not refer to human paragons. This is probably due to its origin as a technical term and its early association with farming. In fact, both its origin and its early association with farming were important, for they provided a broad yet clearly demarcated ground in which the term yang-pan might take root. Thus by the time it reached the superstructure to designate a group of theatrical productions, it readily invoked concrete images.

It should not be surprising in a centrally directed and rapidly changing society, like that of Communist China, to find similarly swift and sharp developments in the current vocabulary. Words, whether old or new, take on an unaccustomed fluidity. They “overflow” the normal social or linguistic usage. Sometimes the new use or connotation will vitalize a term, enriching its content, bringing it added shades of meaning, and giving it new life. Yang-pan is a good example of such a term.

It was more than faddish newfangledness that made yang-pan seem suitable to China’s cultural leaders when they sought a descriptive term for their revolutionary theatrical works. It was precisely the term’s unequivocal connotation and concrete implication that made it appropriate for this new usage. So, with sudden universality, was created the term: yang-pan hsi. To understand the meaning that the term is intended to have--for workers in art and literature, as well as for the Chinese audience--we should go back to its origin.

The phrase that contributed to the popularization of yang-pan and brought it into public consciousness was actually yang-pan t’ien . From the Jen-min jih-pao quotation already cited, we know that yang-pan t’ien had already come into use by the end of 1958.[4] From this quotation we also get the impression that a yang-pan t’ien is some kind of t’ien or agricultural field which serves as and also produces yang-pan or examples for demonstration purposes. By 1965, however, when cultivation of the yang-pan t’ien had become a nationwide, government sponsored movement,[5] a set of principles surrounding this project had also been fully developed. It should be pointed out here that the exemplary value of the yang-pan t’ien lies not in the field or its yield, but rather in the people at work in the field. The abundant crops reaped from the yang-pan t’ien are only a manifestation of the correct and, therefore, successful efforts made by the people. This, of course, does not mean that production is not a concern: on the contrary, increasing production is actually the ultimate goal.[6] It is to achieve this that numerous yang-pan t’ien were established throughout the country to show how this can be most effectively done.[7]

The features and essential functions of the yang-pan t’ien are described in a front-page editorial entitled “Yang-pan t’ien Is the Principle Position from which Agricultural Science Might Serve Production” (JMJP, 10/25/64):

In recent years, the collective economic system of the people’s commune has provided very advantageous conditions for the research of agricultural science. The leading departments of agricultural science have accumulated a great deal of experience in organizing scientific workers to serve production well. The scientific workers in turn have also gradually obtained the experience of participating in productive practice. People have by now searched out a concrete way in which research work in agricultural science might effectively serve production. This way is that the leading cadres, the scientific workers and the experienced peasants, these three kinds of people at a given locality, should form into a unit; and that according to the current production needs of that locality, they should, under unified planning and unified guidance, and by adopting the method of combining small plots with larger areas (tien-mien chieh-ho ),[8] cultivate yang-pan t’ien in relatively broader areas; on one hand, to sum up and popularize the peasants’ experiences in increasing production, and on the other hand, to disseminate the results of scientific research and proceed to multiple experiments.

The tri-unified[9] yang-pan t’ien has evolved from the shih-yen t’ien (experimental field). In recent years various shih-yen t’ien have been set up in almost every locality of the country. Among them many are tri-unified--i.e., set up by the combined effort of cadres, agricultural experts and peasants.

What are the differences between shih-yen t’ien and yang-pan t’ien? Generally speaking the mission of shih-yen t’ien lies mainly in conducting single- or multi-subject experiments on [scientific] measures which might increase production. Yang-pan t’ien, on the other hand, is to try out the results of scientific research concerning measures for increasing production (which results include the scientific summing-up of the peasants’ advanced experiences). It is a large-scale experiment conducted in a large field to meet the actual situation. . . . It (yang-pan t’ien) tightly binds together the three kinds of works: the works of experiment and research; the works of summing-up the experience of the masses and the works of demonstrating and dissemination.

From this description we can itemize the most important attributes of the yang-pan t’ien as follows:

1. It is “tri-unified” (san-chieh-ho te ).

2. It has evolved from the smaller shih-yen t’ien or “experimental field.”

3. Though more advanced and almost always serving as an applied “pattern” or a “model” in various aspects,[10] the yang-pan t’ien is now and will continue to be in the “experimental stage.”

4. It is the center for propagating and disseminating scientific agricultural knowledge and experience.

For almost eight years the Chinese people had read and talked about the yang-pan t’ien, and a great many of them had actually participated in cultivating one kind or another of yang-pan t’ien. The demands and policies implied in this term were so forcefully imprinted on the minds of the people that they automatically drew parallels from it when the new term yang-pan hsi was introduced to the theater in 1966.

The term yang-pan had already been frequently used, as early as the spring of 1965, to describe the four ke-ming hsien-tai Ching-chü (revolutionary Peking operas on contemporary themes)[11] which constitute half of the works that later on came to be known as yang-pan hsi; nevertheless, the term yang-pan hsi did not become popular until the latter part of 1966.

The earliest official source proclaiming the group of eight literary and art productions to be yang-pan hsi seems to be a special news report entitled “Carrying Out Chairman Mao’s Line on Literature and Art: Brilliant Models” (JMJP, 12/9/66, p. 4). This report consists of excerpts selected from letters in which members of the audiences of these eight works express their views and appreciation. Prefaced to the excerpts is a short editorial note on the birth and significance of these works:

Since 1964, under the brilliant radiance of Chairman Mao’s line on literature and art, the high-tide of revolutionary reform in the fields of Peking opera, of ballet dance-drama, and of symphonic music has swelled. The revolutionary yang-pan hsi has been created, which consists of the Peking operas Sha-chia-pang, Hung-teng chi, Chih-ch’ü wei-hu-shan, Hai-kang and Ch’i-hsi pai-hu-t’uan; the ballet dance-dramas Hung-se niang-tzu-chün and Pai-mao nü; and the symphony Sha-chia-pang. . . .

Here we see that the eight works, which fall roughly in the category of what can be termed the performing arts, have been grouped together under the descriptive term yang-pan hsi. Hsi, a general term referring to almost any kind of stage performance,[12] is here probably an abbreviation of either hsi-chü or hsi-ch’ü , commonly used and officially recognized terms for the drama. Due to the unique role that dance and singing have played in the history and formation of Chinese dramatic art,[13] there is good justification for calling the Sinicized ballet a hsi.[14] But a symphony, even be it adapted from a Peking opera and equipped with costumed soloists and chorus,[15] is in essence still a piece of musical composition. In fact, mentioned alone, it is still termed chiao-hsiang yin-yüeh (symphonic music),[16] while each of the seven remaining works when mentioned alone has frequently been designated either yang-pan hsi or ke-ming yang-pan hsi. Strictly speaking then, although there are eight yang-pan, there are only seven yang-pan hsi.

An expedient way to clarify the situation here is to note the dual status of this term: as it stands now, yang-pan hsi is both a proper noun and a common noun. In the former capacity it is the collective name of the group of eight art and literary works produced at a particular time, under particular circumstances, and following the directives of a particular individual, namely, the Chairman’s wife, Chiang Ch’ing; in its latter capacity as a common noun, it can be used to designate any of various drama productions which might meet the approval of authority as having the exemplary qualities shown by these eight works.[17]

However, more than five years has elapsed since the emergence of the eight works, during which time not a single yang-pan hsi has been added to the existing list. As a matter of fact, not a single literary and art composition worthy of the name yang-pan has been produced. Yang-pan hsi, then, has for all practical purposes become a proper noun for the previously mentioned eight works (and their variations).[18]

What are the most striking differences between the yang-pan hsi and other drama productions in Communist China? What do the cultural leaders expect their people to learn from the yang-pan hsi? One is impressed here by the irresistible force of words. In a country where unity and conformity are heavily emphasized, words not infrequently do carry more weight than elsewhere. Once having grasped the essentials of a policy term, the masses respond almost instinctively whenever this term appears again. Over the past five years, yang-pan hsi has come to assume the same general garb which yang-pan t’ien was made to assume. Moreover, the four previously mentioned characteristics of the yang-pan t’ien have all found their respective places in the yang-pan hsi.

The first message is that the so-called “mass line” (ch’ün-chung lu-hsien ) must be followed in the theatrical field as elsewhere. Under the direct leadership of the Party, artists and other theatrical workers are urged to combine their efforts with those of the masses. In other words, the principle of “tri-unification” (san-chieh-ho ), which played such an important role in the cultivation of the yang-pan t’ien, should govern every stage of a dramatic creation. As early as the summer of 1964, Chiang Ch’ing called upon all concerned to adopt the method of “tri-unification” in writing libretti for Peking opera:

These last few years, creative writing in drama has lagged far behind reality. This is particularly true of creative writing for Peking opera. Playwrights are few, and they lack [experience] of life. So it is only natural that they cannot produce good plays. The key to seizing hold of (chua ) creative writing is to unify the three kinds of people: the leadership, the professional workers, and the masses. . . .[19]

The “leadership” here refers to the Party cadres of various theatrical organizations.

The relations among the three components of a tri-unified theatrical troupe, and the roles played by each of them, will be dealt with in the next chapter. However, in speaking of any tri-unified organization--whether that which cultivates a yang-pan t’ien or that which produces a yang-pan hsi--one must realize that the “unification” is not formed on a basis of equal partnership. A member of the Number One Peking Opera Troupe of Peking (Pei-ching ching-chü i-t’uan ), recollecting the creation of the yang-pan hsi Sha-chia-pang, commented:

We profoundly feel that Sha-chia-pang is a collective creation on a large scale. It is a creation of the tri-unification of the Party leaders, the professional workers and the masses. And the deciding factor in this tri-unification is the leadership of the Party. In tackling revolutionary Peking opera, just as in other revolutionary undertakings, among the thousands and ten thousands [of principles, following] the lead of the Party comes first.[20]

As in any other sphere of endeavor, it is always the Party cadres who assume the most responsibility--more than is assumed by the professional workers and the masses. While participating in agricultural practice, the cadres are encouraged to work first with the shih-yen t’ien[21] in order to obtain the experience necessary for setting up the yang-pan t’ien later on. Taking part in theatrical work, the cadres are likewise advised to work first within a limited scope and on an experimental basis. In other words, when handling problems in the sphere of the superstructure, cadres are expected to have learned from, and to be able to draw comparisons with, their experience in conducting productive works in the area of agriculture or industry.

Chiang Ch’ing has here set an exemplary precedent. We are told that when she was taking the lead in revolutionizing Peking opera she chose the Number One Peking Opera Troupe of Peking as her shih-yen t’ien.[22] In the speech she gave at a symposium (attended by 20,000 literary and art workers), Chiang Ch’ing also asserted:

The Number One Peking Opera Troupe of Peking is the first unit in the capital to receive the glorious task of reforming Peking opera at this time [i.e., during the period of Chiang Ch’ing’s “revolution” in Peking opera]. Under the guidance of Mao Tse-tung’s thought, in the short period of just a few years, you (the Number One Peking Opera Troupe of Peking) have indeed accomplished much in the work of creating a modern drama; and you have erected a yang-pan for the entire nation in the reformation of Peking opera.[23]

It is significant that in addition to yang-pan, the term shih-yen t’ien and the expression chung-hao shih-yen t’ien (cultivate well the shih-yen t’ien) should also have been adapted into the domain of literature and art. Without any other context, one might take a sentence such as “we must continue to study the works of Chairman Mao, conscientiously carry on investigation and research, cultivate well the experimental field and produce some models (chung-hao shih-yen t’ien, kao-hao yang-pan ). . .”[24] to be a reference to farming or agronomic research. This kind of language carry-over seems to reflect an attempt to make the nation’s literary and art activity parallel that of agricultural or industrial work under the planned economy of the state.

A major concept for all participants in cultivating the tri-unified shih-yen t’ien or yang-pan t’ien is that of the “uninterrupted revolution.”[25] They are urged to carry out their plans and promote production in the “spirit of the uninterrupted revolution” (pu-tuan ke-ming te ching-shen ). In agriculture, this “spirit of uninterrupted revolution” is based on two positive assumptions: the infinite possibilities to be found in science, and the invincible strength of human endeavor. These two forces constantly work together to make nature serve the needs of man. In accordance with the “spirit of uninterrupted revolution,” it is only natural that the yang-pan t’ien is and will forever continue to be in the experimental stage. By analogy and implication it is clear that the yang-pan hsi should be similarly viewed. That is to say, we should never expect to have a final or definitive version of any of the seven exemplary dramas, for the quest for the unity of politics and art is endless and its course is ever changing.

During the past five or six years each of the seven dramas has indeed been revised time and again. In reference to textual revision, two most frequently used expressions which deserve special attention are ching i ch’iu ching (excellent but seek still greater excellence) and i pu-tuan ke-ming te ching-shen (with the spirit of uninterrupted revolution).[26] Both imply that the yang-pan hsi can always be improved to reflect the political and artistic needs of the continuing revolution. One passage from among the numerous writings by Chinese theatrical workers participating in the creation of the yang-pan hsi and consciously aware of the regime’s policy on the drama can illustrate the general attitude within theatrical circles:

Needless to say, in Sha-chia-pang there still exist many defects in my performance as A-ch’ing’s wife. But under the guidance of the Party, under the brilliant radiance of Chairman Mao’s thought, I will never be content with the present situation; with the spirit of uninterrupted revolution, I have the confidence forever to strive ahead and continuously to improve my skill in order to make the image of this character [A-ch’ing’s wife] still more rich, more true to life and more vivid.[27]

It was previously mentioned that the ultimate goal of the cultivation of the agricultural yang-pan t’ien is to increase production by adopting the best available scientific method. Similarly, the ultimate goal in the creation of the yang-pan hsi is to promote theatrical activity along the lines of Mao Tse-tung’s theory of literature and art. After a yang-pan has been produced, in agriculture and in the theater as well, it is expected that the results should be made known to all concerned; and that the knowledge and experience obtained during the process should be popularized and disseminated. Thus, in 1970, when each of the seven yang-pan hsi had reached a tentatively satisfactory level, there was officially ushered into the nation a movement to “strenuously popularize the revolutionary yang-pan hsi” (ta-li p’u-chi ke-ming yang-pan hsi ) (Hung Ch’i, No. 7, 7/2/70, p. 35; JMJP, 7/15/70, p. 1).

This movement has been largely carried out through three or four channels: radio, stage performance, cinema, and television. Radio had already been utilized as early as 1966 to broadcast the stories and songs of the yang-pan hsi. The winter 1971-spring 1972 schedule of the Central People’s Broadcast Station (JMJP, 11/15/71, p. 6) suggested that at least two hours daily be devoted to “teaching the songs of the revolutionary yang-pan hsi.”

Stage presentation, needless to say, is the basic means of popularizing the yang-pan hsi. Ever since their official appearance in 1966, the five Peking operas and the two ballet dance-dramas have been continuously staged by various troupes, in every theatrical form, throughout the country. During the October First celebration of 1967, at least three Peking opera troupes and one company working in a traditional local style--the Hopei pang-tzu --announced forthcoming concurrent presentations in Peking of the yang-pan hsi Sha-chia-pang (JMJP, 10/5/67, p. 8). For uniform presentation, whenever there is a major textual revision, the new script is always published so that a standard text can be used by all interested theatrical troupes.[28]

At present the best, most effective medium used to reproduce a stage performance for a large audience is not radio or stage, but rather the cinema. Since 1970, with the steadily advancing pace of the movement “strenuously to popularize the revolutionary yang-pan hsi,” six of the seven yang-pan hsi have been filmed, and presented to Chinese audiences either through television or the cinema.[29]

One cannot gauge the actual impact of the yang-pan hsi, but the apparent success of its popularization movement is quite impressive. The following episode provides us with a vivid insight into the efforts of the regime to familiarize every citizen with the yang-pan hsi:

“The people’s fighter loves the people in every way.” The officers and soldiers of this Rotation Training Team [of the People’s Liberation Army] think about the people all the time. They are discreet with important events and prudent about small things. Whenever there is a movie sponsored by this Rotation Training Team, they go from family to family, door to door to invite all the commune members [to view the film]; and they always provide the masses with the best seats. One time, the colour film Sha-chia-pang was to be shown. The officers and soldiers as well as the commune masses had all come together; but old uncle Ma Huai-ch’eng had not shown up yet. The brigade leader Chang Chi-ch’ing thought that the movie Sha-chia-pang was a text for indoctrinating [the Party] ideology and [the Army] tradition, and that uncle Ma would certainly want to see it. He hurried out to fetch uncle Ma. It turned out that uncle Ma lived on a hill and he found it inconvenient to travel at night--this explained his absence. As soon as Chang Chi-ch’ing arrived at uncle Ma’s place, not even stopping to catch his breath nor to wipe away his sweat, nor even to pull up a chair for a bit, he assisted uncle Ma down the hill. . . . (JMJP, 1/31/72, p. 2)

In 1971, five years after the emergence of the yang-pan hsi, the cultural leaders reaped their first crop: four new drama productions--three Peking operas and one dance-drama--all presented in Peking for the October National Holiday Celebration.[30]

The information available indicated that the stage productions of these four dramas are all “experimental presentations” (shih-yen yen-ch’u ).[31] We are also told that each of the four works was produced as part of the movement “strenuously to popularize the revolutionary yang-pan hsi” (JMJP, 10/1/71, p. 4). The implication is that these new works were created by observing the yang-pan hsi and then following suit.

Not much has been said in the Chinese press about these new works of drama, nor have the results of their presentation been reported. However, one thing is clear to both the Chinese audience and the Western critic: for an indefinite period of time the yang-pan hsi will continue to be the sole important occupant of the Chinese cultural stage.

III. PROCESS AND METHODOLOGY

As has been pointed out, a tri-unified theatrical work team is not formed on any basis of equality. This is evidenced by the designations of the three component parties. The responsible cadre is usually referred to as the “leader” (ling-tao ). He is the plan drawer and the decision maker and dominates the other two parties to the union. The professional personnel (chuan-yeh jen-yüan ) or professional workers (chuan-yeh kung-tso-che ) are referred to by their respective professions, such as chü-tso-chia (playwright), tao-yen (director), yen-yüan (performer), tso-ch’ü (composer), etc. They are skilled doers who perform the duty designed for and assigned to them. The constitution of the ch’ün-chung (the masses) varies according to the situation. In general we can say that, excluding the leadership and the experts, all those who choose to be concerned, or are chosen to be concerned, are members of the “masses.” Basically they consist of the fellow workers with the expert or experts in the same theatrical organization and the worker-peasant-soldier audiences for whom the theater is created.

In order to draw a distinct line between the cadres in charge of the creative work and the professional workers equipped with the technical know-how, the term chua-ch’uang-tso-te t’ung-chih or chua-ch’uang-tso-te kan-pu (comrade or cadre in command of creative work) has been coined, to be juxtaposed with ch’uang-tso-che (creative writer or creative worker).[1] Chua (lit. to grab or to seize)[2] is one of the most graphic and pithy catch-words in the current Chinese language. It fails, however, to show clearly the domain ascribed to these two kinds of people. To a Western playwright or actor this juxtaposition may seem strange, since to “create” (ch’uang-tso ) connotes initiative and originality and is therefore incompatible with imposed government control, especially when the control consists of, instead of taboos, a series of positive orders.

As Chiang Ch’ing brought forth the yang-pan hsi, she demonstrated how a chua-ch’uang-tso-te t’ung-chih or kan-pu, in the capacity of an all-round leader, is supposed to “grab” (chua) in a tri-unified theatrical organization; and in so doing, she also marked off the duties of both the professional workers and the masses. Her plan had been conceived as early as 1964. Chiang Ch’ing gives a concrete example in her “On the Revolution of Peking Opera”:

The key to seizing hold of (chua ) creative writing is unifying the three kinds of people: the leadership, the professional workers and the masses. Recently, when I studied the experience gained in creating Great Wall Along the South Sea, I found that they had done things exactly that way. First, the leadership set the topic (ch’u t’i-mu ). Then, the playwright three times went down to [the masses for acquiring experience of] life (san-hsia sheng-huo ), even taking part in a military operation to exterminate enemy spies. After the script was written, many leading comrades of the Kuangchou military command took part in discussions pertaining thereto. After the rehearsals, opinions were widely solicited and revisions made. In this way, as a result of constantly soliciting opinions and constantly making revisions, they succeeded in producing, in a relatively short time, a good, timely play reflecting a real life struggle.[3]

Ch’u t’i-mu (set the topic or the main theme) is the first duty ascribed to the leadership of a tri-unified theatrical organization. Although it is to be preferred, a theme does not have to be original. It can be the trimming of an existing play or the transformation of a story from another literary genre. In fact, each of the seven yang-pan hsi is either an adaptation (kai-pien ) or a grafting (i-chih ) of this nature. And since none of the yang-pan hsi is a new creation, the first step taken by Chiang Ch’ing as the leader in revolutionizing the theatrical art turns out to have been not that of setting a topic, but rather that of selecting a script (hsüan chü-pen ).

In her “On the Revolution of Peking Opera” Chiang Ch’ing has mentioned two criteria to which special attention should be paid in selecting a script for planned adaptation or grafting: first, the story should be politically sound; second, it should suit the conditions of the troupe concerned. Indubitably, the political criterion is of prime concern to the leadership and has become the yardstick not only for selecting scripts but also for the subsequent refining (chia-kung ) and revising (hsiu-kai ) of the works. Chiang Ch’ing herself has observed this dictum faithfully.[4]

In carrying on literary and art work, the leader is warned not to “adopt a bureaucratic attitude” but to “share the joys and hardships with the creative writers and artists.”[5] He is asked to go through the complete process of creation with both the experts and the masses. He should “repeatedly undergo the test of practice over a long period of time” and should strive to make the literary and art work advance “from excellent to still more excellent to achieve a unity of revolutionary political content and the best possible artistic form.”[6]

Thus, to ensure that the potentially good scripts selected be successfully pruned to meet the ideological and political standards of the Party, Chiang Ch’ing personally participated in the “refining” and “revising” processes of all the yang-pan hsi. In order to obtain some firsthand materials and knowledge of the story Hung-se niang-tzu-chün, she organized a trip for the entire ballet troupe to Hainan Island where the struggle took place in the 1920s and 1930s. She also personally visited the various localities where the detachment had once stayed, to “carry on systematic, detailed and well-planned investigations.”[7] She also gave “patient and meticulous guidance to and showed sincere concern for the editing and directing, the decor, the lighting, the costumes, the music, the choreography, and the life and thinking of all the members of the troupe. From September 22nd of 1964 to January 24th of 1965, in this short period of only four months, Comrade Chiang Ch’ing personally visited the troupe and several times viewed the rehearsals. And each time, she would give detailed and important directives on every aspect [of the ballet dance-drama Hung-se niang-tzu-chün].”[8] Similarly impressive efforts were made by her for the seven other yang-pan productions.

In the course of repeatedly refining and revising a drama production, the leader must observe the rules of the Party’s “democratic centralism” (min-chu chi-chung-chih ).[9] While practising this democratic centralism it is important for the leader to “always bear two points in mind: first, be good at listening to the opinions of the broad masses; second, be good at analyzing these opinions, accepting the right ones and rejecting the wrong ones.”[10] In other words, the masses and the creative artists are granted the right (or rather, are encouraged) to express their views; but the final decision should always be made by the leader.[11] As a leading cadre, Chiang Ch’ing has followed this principle; and her exemplary leadership has been lauded nationwide.[12] One example will suffice to show how this “comrade in command of creative work” listens to and analyzes opinions of the masses:

Shortly after the revolutionary Peking opera Hung-teng chi had been staged, [The China Peking Opera Academy] received more than 600 letters from its worker-peasant-soldier audiences. . . . When Comrade Chiang Ch’ing learned that they had received so many letters, she requested that all 600-odd letters be sent to her. At that time she was not feeling well and was under medication. Still, she insisted on studiously reading every letter to the end and noting down and categorizing each of the opinions in these letters. She exhorted the comrades of the Academy always to pay attention to the letters from the worker-peasant-soldier masses. When Hung-teng chi was undergoing the several refining and revising processes after its debut presentations, a large part [of the revision] was based upon the opinions expressed in these 600-odd letters from the worker-peasant-soldier audiences.[13]

Since correct thought is the soul of and provides guidelines for all human activity, the most urgent task for a cadre in command of theatrical work is therefore to chua ssu-hsiang (seize hold of thought). The task of the cadre, then, implies less that he should chua his own thought--since being a cadre “requires” this--than that he should chua the thought of others, including all the members of the theatrical organization.

Chiang Ch’ing always asks the revolutionary artists and writers to study Mao’s works well and to arm themselves with Mao’s thought before they proceed to any kind of literary or art creation. The Selected Works of Mao Tse-tung has become her favorite present for young writers and artists who have worked under her in bringing about the yang-pan hsi. She stated in 1966 that “various problems now exist in literary and art circles which, for most people, are problems of ideological understanding and of raising such understanding through education.[14] She advised the proletarian literary and art workers to “study Marxism-Leninism and Chairman Mao’s works and to remain revolutionary all their lives.”[15]

The last demand--to remain revolutionary all one’s life--has now become the mutual promise and most sacred vow of the leadership and the revolutionary literary and art workers in Communist China. The currently prevailing slogan yao yen ke-ming-hsi, hsien tso ke-ming-jen (in order to take part in a revolutionary drama, one must first become a revolutionary) is often cited with enthusiasm by the young theatrical artists and frequently borrowed--rephrased to suit the circumstances--by writers and authors of other disciplines.[16]

This pledge of “becoming a revolutionary” can perhaps be regarded as an extension of and an inevitable response to the call to “go out among the masses” on the part of the politically conscious young artists and writers. Many artists in the proletarian theater have made attempts to fulfill this almost impossible commitment and have achieved varying degrees of success. Since being a ke-ming jen is a prerequisite to performing ke-ming-hsi, striving to become a ke-ming-jen consequently occupies what might be regarded as an inordinate amount of the time and energy of the Chinese theatrical worker, and has become his first concern and gravest duty.

In attempts at fulfilling this duty, Mao’s formulas prescribed for literary and art workers in his Yenan Talks have been once again invoked by both leaders and professional workers in the theater. Two aspects of his literary and art theories have received special emphasis and have been expanded and modified in the course of the creation of the yang-pan hsi: (1) the requirement for the literary and art worker constantly to study Marxism-Leninism; (2) the necessity for the literary and art worker to mingle with the masses.

As to the former, the modern revolutionists in the theater have added the thought of Mao to Marxism-Leninism.[17] In fact, since 1965 Mao’s writings have been elevated to an even higher status than those of Marxism-Leninism. This elevation can be examined on two planes. On a nationwide scale we can say that the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution--regardless of its intricate and complex nature and its far-reaching impact on Chinese culture as a whole--is in itself a mammoth mass movement to promote Mao’s thought. This movement has of course exerted immense influence upon the theater which played such an active role in the beginning of the Revolution. Within a limited scope, in the theater itself, this elevation has largely been entailed by practical needs. For in the shift from “literature and art for workers, peasants and soldiers” (wen-i wei kung-nung-ping ) to “literature and art of workers, peasants and soldiers” (kung-nung-ping-te wen-i ), only the “heroic images of the workers, peasants and soldiers armed with the invincible thought of Mao Tse-tung” should be portrayed. And the proletarian stage, in turn, should be considered a “position from which to propagate Mao Tse-tung’s thought.”[18] In order to carry on this mission, it has now become an objective necessity, required by their profession, for the theatrical workers to “educate” themselves and to “conscientiously study Chairman Mao’s works all their lives.”[19]

Since Yenan days, doing some manual labor--as well as attending political lectures and discussion sessions--has constituted an important part of the curriculum of a writer or an artist. The so-called “five-alongsides” or “six-alongsides” movement (wu-pien or liu-pien yün-tung )[20] represents a microcosm of an artist’s life in Communist China.

Both the requirement of studying Marxism-Leninism and Mao’s works, and that of taking part in manual labor are imposed upon the theatrical worker with the regime’s presupposition that this will contribute to the remoulding of the artist’s world-view and to the promotion of his political and ideological awareness. However, by 1964 when the staging of dramas on contemporary themes had become the sole concern of the cultural leaders in the regime, the theatrical artists themselves expressed a need to learn from the workers, peasants and soldiers whom they are to portray. This inadequacy was especially strongly felt by the Peking opera artists whose stylized art, distilled through the artistic conventions of many generations, lends itself only with great difficulty to the depiction of modern life. An example is this description of a Peking opera troupe which has been staging Peking operas on contemporary themes since 1958:

The other difficulty encountered by the Peking Opera Troupe of Ching-chou city in staging operas on contemporary themes is that the workers, peasants and soldiers portrayed by our actors do not resemble the workers, peasants and soldiers [in real life]. Why is this so? The most important reason is that the actors are not familiar with the life, thinking and emotions of the workers, peasants and soldiers; they do not really understand the workers, peasants and soldiers. Furthermore, the actors have so long played only the parts of emperors and kings, talented scholars and beautiful ladies that they cannot in a short period of time break through or alter the stage conventions and accustomed ways of acting, nor do they start from real life and from the characters [they are to portray], but rather they force the stage conventions upon their characters and thus in the end make them appear artificial.[21]

This lack of understanding and experience was widely recognized. Measures to correct the situation were earnestly sought; Mao’s call of more than two decades ago, for Chinese writers and artists to plunge deeply into life, again resounded throughout the theatrical world. This time, however, there seems to have been a broad response--one marked by professional interest and fidelity to one’s art on the part of the theatrical workers. As such, it went beyond the response evident in the several previous rectification campaigns in the literary and art circles, when artists and writers were sent out to villages, factories and military command units to study and to “acquire the experience of life.” Many artists who have contributed to the creation of the yang-pan hsi volunteered their time to “plunge deeply into life” and claim to have benefited immensely from mingling with the masses.[22]

The professional worker in the theater finds living and laboring together with the masses to be beneficial in two respects. It familiarizes the artist with the character he is to portray and with the environments in which events are to take place. It also provides opportunity for him to observe, to imitate, and to abstract the varieties of human behavior which he finds useful to his art as he attempts to depict modern life. For the actor of Peking opera and of ballet dance-drama on contemporary, revolutionary themes, one of the most difficult yet frequently encountered scenes is that of depicting combat with modern weapons. Many have found that the most effective means of mimicking and recreating modern battle scenes on stage is to gain actual experience with the People’s Liberation Army.[23]

Aside from their zeal in constantly studying Mao’s works and their persistent attempts to identify with the masses by living among them, the artists of the several yang-pan theatrical organizations have demonstrated yet another spirit which is considered exemplary and has been emulated by other theatrical troupes in the nation. This is the spirit of pi-hsüeh-kan-pang: pi (comparing oneself with the more advanced), hsüeh (learning from the more advanced), kan (catching up with the more advanced), and pang (helping the less advanced).[24]

This slogan, become popular during the Great Leap Forward,[25] has since then constantly been called upon, in different spheres and at various levels, to incite revolutionary zeal for the construction of a socialist China. A pi-hsüeh-kan-pang movement is useful when there is a common objective which can be realized only through collective effort and collective wisdom. The cultivation of the yang-pan t’ien--a nationwide mass movement to promote agriculture production--is in this light a manifestation of the pi-hsüeh-kan-pang spirit.

To revolutionize the nation’s theater and promote theatrical activity along the lines of Mao’s theory of literature and art, a large-scale pi-hsüeh-kan-pang movement with special emphasis on hsüeh (learning from the more advanced) and pang (helping the less advanced) was initiated in the nation’s theatrical circles.[26] The need to learn and receive help from the more advanced is keenly and particularly felt by the various Peking opera troupes. Inexperienced in staging operas on contemporary themes, the Peking opera troupes are urged to learn from theatrical organizations of other dramatic kinds that have had a longer history in depicting modern life and revolutionary themes.

Of the seven yang-pan hsi, two--Hung-teng chi and Sha-chia-pang--were adapted from the recently flourishing Hu-chü or Shanghai opera.[27] Greatly influenced by the modern prose drama (hua-chü ) and by Western cinematic techniques, the Shanghai opera, when compared with other provincial or local operas, has a relatively long history and an outstanding record in staging operas on modern themes. Hence, Shanghai opera has been considered a more “advanced” operatic form, and has been an object of emulation.

In the course of making their adaptations, both the China Peking Opera Academy (the Peking opera company which produced Hung-teng chi) and the Peking Opera Troupe of Peking (the Peking opera company which produced Sha-chia-pang) have received great help from the Shanghai opera troupes which originally presented these two operas. The China Peking Opera Academy has twice visited the Ai-hua Shanghai Opera Troupe of Shanghai City;[28] and the Peking Opera Troupe of Peking has invited the Shanghai People’s Shanghai Opera Troupe to Peking to attend discussion forums and to exchange experiences.[29]

One principle in cultivating the yang-pan t’ien is continuously to sum up experience and to propagate the summed up experience without delay. This principle is likewise observed by the various yang-pan theatrical organizations. Under the banner of the pi-hsüeh-kan-pang movement, the several yang-pan troupes have toured widely, helping the less advanced to “catch-up” in staging operas on contemporary themes. Their help has included, for example, demonstration performances, lectures, or informal talks. Numerous emulation campaigns have in turn been carried out by the less advanced, that they might learn and obtain advanced knowledge from the yang-pan troupes through all the various channels available.[30]

In the eyes of the Western actor, the burden placed on the theatrical artist in Communist China is indeed awesome. It is not enough for the Chinese artist to observe and familiarize himself with the people he portrays: he must actually become as one with them. It is insufficient to study and understand the ideas and ideals they represent: he must also live up to those lofty concepts in a mundane world. For the Chinese artist, literary and art creation has become a learning and soul-purifying process-- a means of keeping his pledge to become a ke-ming-jen. His art becomes another tool hammered out for the great and continuing work of revolution.

Although not directly participating in the creation of a drama work, the masses play a role no less important than that of the leadership or the professional workers. In his Yenan Talks Mao said: “man’s social life is the only source of literature and art.” Since the worker-peasant-soldier masses constitute the most basic element of man’s social life, it has come to be accepted that, as the prevalent saying has it, “the masses produce life” (ch’ün-chung ch’u-sheng-huo ).

It would seem that the “life” produced by the masses has a twofold function. It provides the writers and artists with “the source of literature and art,” the raw materials for literary and art creation. It also serves as the all-important place in which to learn and to be educated. Mao has repeatedly exhorted the Chinese revolutionary literary and art worker first to become a pupil of the masses; only thereafter should he attempt to teach anything to the masses. During the creation of the yang-pan hsi, both the leadership and the theatrical workers have repeatedly echoed this exhortation.

One way to apply this motto to actual practice in theatrical creation is the so-called “open-door rehearsal” (k’ai-men p’ai-hsi ).[31] A theatrical troupe invites the masses to view its rehearsals. Opinions are solicited on the spot, and revisions are made accordingly. Not infrequently, members of the audience are asked to assume the roles of “instant tutors” or, more accurately, “live models” (huo yang-pan ).[32]

Aside from providing “life,” the masses also “control” the machinery of literary and art criticism. Mao has implied, through his Yenan Talks, that the worker-peasant-soldier masses are the only qualified critics of that proletarian literature and art--which, in turn, has been designed for their use. This clue has been taken up and clearly stated in Chiang Ch’ing’s Forum Summary: “We must encourage revolutionary, militant mass criticism of literature and art and break the monopoly of literary and art criticism by the few so-called critics (those who have the wrong orientation, or are deficient in militancy). We must place the weapon of literary and art criticism in the hands of the masses of workers, peasants and soldiers and integrate the professional critics with critics from among the masses.”[33]

Thus entrusted with the power of literary and art criticism, the masses have been given the authority of approval or disapproval (p’i-chun-ch’üan ). The logic behind this is explained in a short Jen-min jih-pao article (5/3/66, p. 2) entitled “The Workers, Peasants and Soldiers have the Authority of Approval” (“Kung-nung-ping yu p’i-chun-ch’üan” ):

The question of who has the authority of approval or disapproval (of literature and art) is a problem which has long been solved. As early as twenty or more years ago, Chairman Mao had already set forth the policy of making literature and art serve the needs of workers, peasants and soldiers; and during those twenty odd years, Chairman Mao has constantly instructed us that literature and art must serve the needs of workers, peasants and soldiers. This being the case, the workers, peasants and soldiers naturally have obtained the authority of approval or disapproval with regard to literary and art works.

The workers, peasants and soldiers do have the authority of approval. This authority is conferred upon them by history. The reason is evident: the worker-peasant-soldier masses are not only the creators of society’s material wealth, but also the creators of society’s spiritual wealth. What we should specially point out is that our nation’s worker-peasant-soldier masses are armed with Mao Tse-tung’s thought. While criticizing literary and art works, they are filled with strong class feelings and are brimming over with revolutionary and militant spirit; and they will always consider the political criterion first. Their opinions are the most correct, conforming the most with reality, and are always the closest to the truth.

Whatever one may think of the validity of this doctrine, it has become a fact in China that the masses have been named the most qualified literary and art critics. From the materials available, we know that each of the eight yang-pan works has received the “official approval” of the masses--although nothing has been said as to the exact ways and procedures by which the masses exercised their power in this area. Nor is anything ever said as to the mechanism which tabulates the opinions and votes of the masses.

When literature and art are first and foremost a tool for achieving political objectives, there is no place for personal expression. Public sentiments and aspirations become the only permissible content of expression; and collective creation is the resultant cover for the individual writer or artist. The appearance of the tri-unified theatrical organization and the tri-unified approach to literary and art creation is thus a natural outcome. The cultural authorities see this tri-unified approach as “the best method of (literary and art) creation in a socialist era. It embodies the policy of carrying on creative works along the mass-line; and it pools the wisdom of all the people, and their abilities to perform the works of (literary and art) creation.”[34]

The “correct” attitude that writers and artists in China should have toward the tri-unified method of literary and art creation is well summarized by the young writer Chin Ching-mai . Written in the winter of 1966, his statement appears to be still valid as a reflection of current literary policy:

Chairman Mao says, “Proletarian literature and art are part of the whole proletarian revolutionary cause; they are, as Lenin said, cogs and wheels in the whole revolutionary machine.” Since our literature and art are an enterprise of the Party and the people, and since they are created for the workers, peasants and soldiers and are for the use of the workers, peasants and soldiers, the creative activities (of the writers and artists), then, must undergo the evaluation and approval of these workers, peasants and soldiers; and the writers and artists must listen to the commands of the workers, peasants and soldiers. In order to do this, we must everywhere put the character kung (public) in first place. In performing the works of literature and art, however, there has for many years existed a strange and absurd phenomenon. The workers produce goods and the commune members produce food. Their products have always been counted the wealth of the group and of society, with neither the workers nor the commune members considering these products private belongings upon which to carve their names, while not allowing other people to touch them. But it is not like this in regard to literary and art works. In feudal times, there were people who would say things such as “literature is an accomplishment of myriad years; its success and failure can only be known in the inch-long heart (of certain individuals).” Even though we have attained a socialist society, there are still some people who advocate things such as “each person is responsible for his own writing.” What they really intend is not to allow other people to raise opinions about or to look at their writings. This is to regard (literary and art) creation as an individual accomplishment and to regard (literary and art) production as private property. And this is to put the character ssu (private) in first place.

In dealing with one’s (literary and art) productions there also exists a serious struggle between kung and ssu. I have felt that no individual alone can write good socialist literary and art works. Only by putting the character kung in first place, by considering literary and art productions to be part of the wealth of society, by relying upon the directives and help of the Party and the masses, and by taking the road of “tri-unification,” can we become intelligent and fulfill our duty to (literary and art) creation. . . .

The hero [i.e., the protagonist of Chin Ching-mai’s novel, the Song of Ou-yang Hai] was nourished by the great Mao Tse-tung’s thought; the hero performed his deeds by creatively studying and applying Chairman Mao’s works; the masses supplied the materials; the concrete ways of writing everything down came from collective thinking. In the entire course of the creation, I have done only the small job of recording the words, and even this has resulted only from following Chairman Mao’s instruction to continuously “destroy self, establish public.” The appearance of the Song of Ou-yang Hai is a victory of the great Mao Tse-tung’s thought.[35]

As outsiders, we are in no position to measure the sincerity of the Chinese writers and artists when they acclaim the wonders of the tri-unified method of creation. But whatever their true feelings, they have little choice but to follow the tri-unified path set out for them by the Party.

IV. REALISM AND REVOLUTIONARY REALISM

By 1969 the frenzy and chaos caused by the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution had subsided. The Chinese people finally had a chance to look from a distance at the “cultural” aspect of their nation, whose immense heritage had in the past three years suffered nearly total denial by her proletarian citizens. With the eight yang-pan works on their side, serving as the official yardstick, each “poisonous weed” was then thoroughly examined, compared, and invariably condemned. This process is still going on today.

To direct mass criticism into the correct, Party-led channels and to concentrate this critical force upon the essentials and the fundamentals, a call upon the 800 million critics was issued in the fall of 1969: they were to focus their attention upon the “repudiation of revisionist literary and art thought and upon its representative ting-tien lun (‘pinpointed’ theories).”[1]

It should be noted here that the “representative theories” have been “pinpointed” (ting-tien), i.e. singled out, not by the condemned revisionists but by the cultural leaders. It seems that in order to attack the heart of the most recently prevalent literary and art theories, which the regime considers detrimental and has labeled collectively “revisionist,” it is necessary for the cultural leaders to “mark out” or to “pinpoint” several theories as the main targets of literary and art criticism and repudiation. These theories have come to be known as ting-tien lun or “pinpointed theories.”

These several representative literary and art theories had in fact already been “pinpointed” as early as 1966;[2] and all the suspected “plotters” had been criticized and purged. Why, then, did the new cultural leaders reopen the issue? A clue to the answer is discernable from the current literary and art situation in China. Since 1969, the literary and art field has been occupied by two kinds of activity: on one hand, the eight yang-pan works; on the other, the continuous repudiation of “pinpointed theories.”

Ever since 1905, after Lenin advocated a “Party literature,”[3] there have, by implication, coexisted in the Communist world two opposing lines on the literary front--a Party literature and a non-Party literature. This coexistence is considered by the Chinese materialistic dialecticians to be normal, and sometimes even to be a driving force for the permanent revolution. In the eyes of the Chinese cultural leaders, human history progresses only through the constant struggle of two opposing forces, and literature and art are no exceptions. Such thinking manifested itself in many forms during the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution. The omnipresent slogans focusing upon the relationship between p’o (destroy) and li (establish) are among the most apparent of these forms.[4]

In this light, it is necessary for literary and art workers to carry on simultaneously the tasks of p’o, or the repudiation of the “pinpointed theories,” and of li, the promotion of literary and art activity centered on the yang-pan hsi. These tasks are the two sides of a single coin. The Party hopes that the characteristics of the Party literature, in contrast with the non-Party, or anti-Party literature, will shine even more brilliantly.

Of the several “pinpointed theories,” the theory of hsieh chen-shih (writing the truth) is among the most severely criticized. It has been declared the hallmark of the revisionist camp despite the fact that many of the accused advocates of this “black” theory had been purged long before the term “revisionism” came into vogue, and before “revisionist” became a tag for literary dissidence.[5] This theory of “writing the truth,” as well as other theories touching upon the controversial problems of “truth” and “reality,” has become identified by the literary theorists now in power with “critical realism” (p’i-p’an hsien-shih chu-i ),[6] which they see as opposed to the formula, allegedly coined by Mao in 1958, of “combining revolutionary realism with revolutionary romanticism.”[7]

No literature or art can ever be wholly divorced from reality. It is not surprising, then, that ever since the May Fourth Literary Movement, “realism” has been the literary term most difficult to define and the core of endless debates among Chinese literary theorists. In the two decades since the Communists came to power in 1949, countless writers and artists have been criticized for their “wrong” interpretation of “realism.” The complexity and delicate nature of this term have been recognized by the cultural leaders, for no attempt has ever been made at an official definition. Furthermore, the supremacy of the “principle of Party spirit” (tang-hsing yüan-tse ) precludes the possibility of any well-defined literary theory independent of the concrete Party policies of any given time.

However, the political and ideological struggles of the past twenty or more years have provided a basis for understanding literary happenings in China. By comparing the several rectification campaigns which have demarcated different literary periods, it is now feasible to make a generalization as to the dominant literary and art trends, and to present critical studies pertaining to each of these trends. For the period presently under discussion, this feasibility is even greater: we have at our disposal not only the condemned, heterodox literature, but also a group of officially recognized literary and art works--the yang-pan hsi.

The current cultural leaders in Communist China regard the yang-pan hsi both as a weapon to be used against revisionist literature, and as the most faithful reflection of that “reality” which has been “distorted” by the revisionist writers under the pretext of “writing the truth.” The following pages will attempt to present a single facet of that “reality” through a study of the story Pai-mao nü (The White-haired Girl). It is hoped that in so doing we may obtain some insight into the realism currently advocated by the Party--specifically, revolutionary realism.

It is for obvious reasons that I have chosen Pai-mao nü from among the seven yang-pan hsi as the working material for an assessment of “revolutionary realism.” First, the opera Pai-mao nü was written in 1945, during the period of the so-called “new democratic revolution” (1917-1949) but after the delivery of the Yenan Talks. The development of Pai-mao nü from the opera into the ballet thus reflects the shifting course of the Party’s literary policies over this period of approximately two decades. Second, Pai-mao nü as an opera had always been considered by the regime to be a proletarian classic, until the official appearance of the ballet in 1966. Then, and ever since, the opera was condemned as a “poisonous weed” concocted by the revisionists to “distort the images of Chinese peasants.”[8] Thus, by contrasting the ballet with the opera, we may draw a comparison of the orthodox literary theories at two different periods, as found in varied political and literary environments. Third, despite the fact that some of the known writers and artists who directly or indirectly contributed to the creation of the opera Pai-mao nü have been purged, the opera, like the ballet, is nevertheless a collective creation which was produced under supervision of the Party.[9] Consequently, neither the opera nor the ballet should be seen as the aesthetic expression of certain individuals. They are, in fact, reflections of the prevailing literary thinking of their respective times. Fourth and finally, the legend of the “White-haired Girl” is said to have originated as a true, real-life story.[10] It thus provides a justifiable basis on which to discuss the problems of “realism” and “reality.”

Although such acknowledgment was never officially made, “socialist realism” (she-hui-chu-i hsien-shih-chu-i ), which Mao at one time considered “our” approach towards literary and art creation,[11] nevertheless made its exit during the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution. In its place there is now the new formula: “the combination of revolutionary realism and revolutionary romanticism.” The several literary and art works once considered to represent the peak of “socialist realism” have all been severely criticized. Among them is the opera Pai-mao nü.

The opera is set in the latter half of the 1930s and relates the tragic story of a poor peasant girl, Hsi-erh. Hsi-erh’s father Yang Pai-lao (notice the symbolic implication of Yang’s given name, Pai-lao: “toiling in vain”) works for the vicious landlord Huang Shih-jen . Unable to pay his grain rent and an accumulated cash debt, Yang is forced in his confusion and bewilderment to sign a contract, promising to give his daughter to the Huang family as payment. Yang, in desperation, commits suicide, whereupon Hsi-erh is forcibly taken away by Mu Jen-chih , the steward for the Huang family. Wang Ta-ch’un , Hsi-erh’s betrothed, runs away and joins the Eighth Route Army. Hsi-erh is cruelly treated in the Huang family and is raped by Huang Shih-jen. Seven months later, after Hsi-erh has become pregnant, Huang decides to sell her to a brothel and to marry a rich girl from a powerful family. Having learned of Huang’s scheme, Hsi-erh escapes from the landlord’s household and flees to the wild mountains, where she gives birth to her child. For more than two years Hsi-erh exists like an animal in a mountain cave; this hard life turns her skin and hair completely white, so that the villagers who encounter her take her to be an apparition. Finally the Eighth Route Army, under the leadership of the Communist party, comes to her rescue. The village is liberated, Huang Shih-jen is executed, and Hsi-erh is changed from a “ghost” back into a human being.

The opera vividly brings out the main theme of this story: that “the old society forced men to turn into ghosts; the new society changes ghosts back into men” (chiu she-hui pa jen pi-ch’eng kuei; hsin she-hui pa kuei pien-ch’eng jen ).[12] This theme, which has won the sympathy of many audiences, has been severely criticized since the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution as being a “misinterpretation of reality.”

First of all, the two antonyms jen (man) and kuei (ghost), which are employed to show the sharp contrast of life in the new society versus life in the old society, have been considered misrepresentative: the former fails to take any stand on class and the latter is derogatory towards the Chinese peasantry. One critic has rationalized his repudiation of this jen-kuei antithesis as follows:

In fact, the main theme expressed by the authors of the opera Pai-mao nü, be it “the old society turning men into ghosts” or “the new society changing ghosts back into men,” has, in any case, blurred the class-character of men. All the way through, the opera emphasizes the abstract “man.” It is not only that this work, on account of “turning men into ghosts,” is devoid of the revolutionary spirit of revolt which is the class attribute of the poor and lower-middle peasants; but also that, on account of “changing ghosts back into men,” the opera turns the revolution and the emancipation of the poor and lower-middle peasants--the liberation of the deprived and oppressed class--into the liberation of the abstract “man.” And in the opera thus conceived, class opposition and class struggle, which still exist in the new society, have been completely eliminated.[13]

To correct this mistake the scenarists of the ballet have not only deleted the sentence chiu she-hui pa-jen pi-ch’eng kuei; hsin she-hui pa kuei pien-ch’eng jen from the lyrics, but have rebuilt the images of almost all the positive characters. Yang Pai-lao does not commit suicide in the ballet story but, in the spirit of revolt, fights against his oppressors and is beaten to death. Similarly Hsi-erh is changed into an embodiment of hatred, the spirit of revenge. She is cruelly treated in the ballet version of the story but not sexually assaulted--this would make the image of the Chinese peasantry “ugly” and erase the “spirit of resistance” from the heroine. In the epilogue, as a symbol of the entire Chinese proletarian class, she joins the ranks of the Eighth Route Army to carry on the eternal revolution of the proletariat. Uncle Chao, in the opera Yang Pai-lao’s old friend and a poor peasant, also is changed into an underground Party member.

All these revisions have been made in the name of “revolutionary realism.” As previously mentioned, the opera Pai-mao nü was based on a true story and had always been considered a masterpiece of “socialist realism.” Now, however, this “realistic” work has been repudiated, and the realism therein embodied in the characters has likewise come to be considered false. Fidelity to man’s actual life in society, which the Chinese materialists claim to regard as the only source of literary and art creation, is apparently no longer the basic ingredient for the realism currently advocated. What, then, is the object of the fidelity and faithfulness that is sought in “revolutionary realism?” Ironically, “revolutionary realism” is intelligible only in terms of fidelity to theory and concepts, though this is an approach once condemned as being “idealistic.”

Reporting on the forthcoming Peking premiere of the ballet Pai-mao nü, the Hsin-hua news agency commented:

The opera Pai-mao nü, which has been circulating widely among the people, exposes the crimes of the landlord class and reflects the hard life of the peasantry in old China. It is an excellent dramatic creation produced in the period of the New Democratic Revolution. Today, however, history has already entered a new era--an era of socialist revolution and socialist construction; and the people urgently demand that our literary and art productions better serve the current revolutionary struggle. The playwrights and directors of the dance-drama Pai-mao nü, under the guidance of Mao Tse-tung’s thought, have therefore recreated the story on the basis of the opera. They have focused on the resistance and fighting spirit of the poor and lower-middle peasants to cause the audience, through the vivid artistic images, to understand the principle of class struggle: that wherever there is oppression there is resistance; and to understand the great truth: that only under the leadership of the Party, taking the road of armed struggle, can the oppressed obtain liberation.[14]

This comment came prior to the repudiation campaign against the opera Pai-mao nü. It nevertheless provides a useful footnote to the definition of “revolutionary realism” as opposed to “critical realism.” One must conclude that the “truth” or “reality” of “revolutionary realism” exists mainly in theories and concepts; and the “truth” or “reality” of “critical realism” has its roots in actual human life. Hence, while the opera tells a story which could have happened or likely did happen in real life, the ballet tells a story which according to theory--or more precisely, according to Mao’s thought--[15] should have happened. In order to conform to and confirm the principle that “wherever there is oppression there is resistance,” Yang Pai-lao has to fight to the death and Hsi-erh cannot be humiliated. In order to mirror the truth that “only under the leadership of the Party, taking the road of armed struggle, can the oppressed obtain liberation,” it is necessary to transform Uncle Chao from a poor, simple peasant into an underground Party member so that he can direct the young peasants to take up weapons and join the revolutionary camp. And, since the revolution is continuing, Hsi-erh has to keep her fire of hatred burning even after she has been revenged. This theoretical realism--or “revolutionary realism”--is the realism dominating the literary and art scene in China today.

The basic characteristic of this revolutionary realism is its transience or variability. This characteristic is a natural result of conformity to the “principle of Party spirit.” As times and circumstances change, the policies of the Party as well as its literary criteria for gauging reality and truth change accordingly. This is true of all the yang-pan hsi, and is one of the main reasons for the absence of any final version of the seven dramas.

Another aspect of revolutionary realism is that it provides ample scope for the rewriting of old, already existing literary and art works which the people have always enjoyed. For in adopting revolutionary realism as a method, the artists and writers are allowed to transcend limitations on the reality of life, both historical and contemporary, and to reject any episodes and descriptions which are not in accordance with the prevailing ideology of the Party, regardless of the fact that these episodes and descriptions may in fact be faithful portrayals of actual social happenings and human phenomena. The re-creation of the story Pai-mao nü is one such revealing example.

Ensuing from the ascendancy of revolutionary realism is a reassessment of the functions of “exposing” (pao-lu ) and “extolling” (ke-sung ). Since the most urgent--indeed, the only--task presently assigned to the Chinese proletarian literary or art worker is to “sculpt the heroic images of workers, peasants and soldiers,”[16] and since the main function of revolutionary drama is to “extol positive characters,”[17] “exposing” has thus become secondary. The villains of the seven yang-pan hsi are all stupid cowards, cardboard figures without depth or dimension. Contrasted with the omnipotent proletarian heroes, their cruelty and viciousness, which are supposed to elicit strong hatred from the audience, appear to be but the pitiful, helpless and ridiculous gestures of defeated clowns: the worker, peasant, and soldier heroes literally take over the stage.

Portraying some of the dark aspects of pre-Communist China is also discouraged under revolutionary realism,[18] for this would tend to “make the working class ugly” and thus “distort the heroic images of the people.” The charges of distortion of reality that have been laid against the opera version of Pai-mao nü are that it took too negative an attitude toward the spirit of the masses. Hence, the theme of the old society “forcing men to turn into ghosts” must be abandoned because the working people “would never have quietly let the reactionary ruling class control their fate at will; they are not wandering, illusory spirits but the impetus for the creation of world history,”[19] Indeed, in the theater of the proletariat there is no place for the “evil” influences of the past.

Ironically, though “extolling” superseded “exposing” to become the principal mode of literary and art expression, it would seem that “extolling” is not as potent as “exposing” when it comes to inciting emotions. To commemorate the twentieth anniversary of the delivery of the Yenan Talks, the Central Operatic and Dance-drama Academy revised and restaged the opera Pai-mao nü in 1962.[20] In this version several changes were made in the vein of deleting “exposing” and increasing “extolling.”[21] The prevailing reactions in the literary and art circles, however, were not favorable. This feeling of dissatisfaction was explicitly, if tactfully, voiced by Hsiao San (i.e., Hsiao Ai-mei ), a veteran Marxist:

The opera Pai-mao nü is easily capable of moving an audience to tears. Is this due to the flawlessness of the artistic performances? Just what is it which causes the people to cry? Could it be that it is the plot instead of the virtuosity of the performers? . . . This time, however, in viewing the revised opera I was able to control my tears. Was this on account of the deletion of some of the dramatic episodes from Act IV onwards, and an increase in narration (hsü-shu ) and explanation (shuo-ming )?[22]

If we interpret revolutionary realism in terms of fidelity to Marxist-Leninist-Maoist theories of revolution, then the bombastic slogans and redundant eulogy abundant in all the yang-pan hsi appear but normal. It is ideological conflict--perhaps on the level of pure theorizing or, if the dramatist is not a thinker, on the level of admonition--which supersedes other human interests to become the sole concern of the playwright; and formulism and dogmatism consequently prevail. This is particularly true with dramas seeking to depict socialist construction and socialist revolution in the new China. Hai-kang (On the Docks) is a good example: “narration” and “explanation” are profuse, and dramatic episodes few. In fact, attempts at emphasizing ideology at the expense of plot (ch’ing-chieh ), or dramatic incident, have comprised a great portion of the work of “refining” and “revising” all seven yang-pan hsi.

In the development of the yang-pan hsi two closely linked slogans have often been cited with pride as new accomplishments in the proletarian theater: make the ancient serve the present, the foreign serve the Chinese (ku wei chin yung, yang wei chung yung , ). The ancient and the foreign are the artistic forms, and what is “present” and Chinese is the content. Ever since the founding of the People’s Republic in 1949, creating dramas on the contemporary has remained one of the main concerns of the cultural leaders. Chiang Ch’ing, in her “On the Revolution of Peking Opera,” declared in 1964: “In advocating revolutionary drama on contemporary themes we must reflect the actual life during the fifteen years since the establishment of our country. And on our theatrical stage, we must create the images of contemporary revolutionary heroes. This is the foremost task.” However, Chiang Ch’ing herself has failed to carry out this “foremost task.” Of the seven yang-pan hsi produced under her direct guidance, only two--Ch’i-hsi pai-hu-t’uan and Hai-kang set respectively in the 1950s and 1960s--can reasonably be said to reflect “contemporary” life. The remaining five are all stories which took place prior to the establishment of the People’s Republic.

The inability of the cultural leaders to carry out this particular literary policy is linked with the prescriptive nature of revolutionary realism. As followers of historical materialism, the Party ideologists regard “class struggle” (chieh-chi tou-cheng ) as an eternal truth of man’s social life. Literature and art as educative tools should always, therefore, have class struggle as their theme. This policy has been reinforced since 1962 with the continual insistence on the theme: “never forget class struggle.”[23] But “armed struggle” is the means prescribed by the Party ideology for dealing with class enemies; and there are obvious problems in finding such struggle in the present-day, socialist era. One result of this search for class struggle themes has been that the settings for most of the so-called hsien-tai hsi (contemporary dramas) have been pushed back to the anti-Japanese war and civil war periods in the 1930s and 1940s when armed struggle was of course prevalent; but these settings hardly meet the demand that drama should “reflect actual life during the fifteen years since the establishment of our country.”[24]

Perhaps it is in compensation that the theme of “internationalism” has been introduced into the yang-pan hsi. The audience of Hung-se niang-tzu-chün, in viewing the story of an oppressed slave girl, is explicitly told that “only by emancipating all mankind can the proletariat achieve its own final emancipation” (Scene IV). Similarly, in the epilogue to Pai-mao nü, the innocent peasant girl joins the Eighth Route Army in order to help carry on the revolution forever. The consciousness of all the yang-pan hsi protagonists of the “world revolution” or the “emancipation of all mankind” is unmistakably “contemporary” because it refers to a situation that exists in the minds of the playwrights and audiences of the 1960s and 1970s.

Struggle with nature is another theme frequently utilized by the revolutionary dramatist to portray the unyielding “contemporary” spirit of the proletarian hero. In the ballet Pai-mao nü the choreographers have designed a scene (Scene IV) in which Hsi-erh fights against the harsh environment of the wilderness, which is here intended to be a symbol of the dark forces of the old society. Substituting nature for social or human evil as an object to conquer is perhaps the best way to solve the problems of “exposing” and “extolling” without omitting the role of “struggle” as the most important theme of literature and art. Traditional Chinese literature can be said to emphasize cultural assimilation and seek the harmony of man and nature. On this basis, the yearning to “emancipate all mankind” and the determination to surmount obstacles caused by non-human factors, are both foreign to the Chinese literary tradition--though well in tune with revolutionary realism.

While the content of the yang-pan hsi departs from actual life, we see that the “form,” or the means of literary and artistic expression, has become increasingly realistic. Concrete objects have replaced the imaginary as stage decor, and actual human behavior has superseded mimetic stage abstraction. Linguistically, the plain dialogue of everyday speech now receives much attention--all pointing in a direction quite opposite to that of the traditional theater, which aims at suggestiveness and symbolic beauty.

In the view of the cultural leaders, the conventions and basic skills (chi-pen kung ) of the traditional theater are no longer adequate to portray contemporary life and should therefore be discarded.[25] This “inadequacy” has been based on two grounds. First, this is the era of the proletariat, and the theater is a place for and of the proletariat; but the highly stylized stage conventions, in the eyes of the Party, do not cater to the taste and understanding of the worker, peasant and soldier masses. Second, as a consequence of the new content there has now arisen a demand for formal adjustment.

In addition to these two officially acknowledged reasons for discarding traditional conventions and skills, there are other reasons which stem largely from the utilitarian outlook of the Marxist-Leninist-Maoist literature and art theorists. As an instrument of propaganda, the theater in Communist China has always operated in coordination with political policies. The slogan to k’uai hao sheng (more, faster, better, more economical), allegedly coined by Mao in the early part of 1958 for stimulating the productivity of the nation’s economy,[26] has also had an impact as a standard in promoting drama. In order to achieve greater (to ), faster (k’uai ), better (hao ) and more economical (sheng ) results (i.e., to get the message directly and unequivocally across to the worker, peasant and soldier audience), it is necessary for the revolutionary artists to imitate life at a much more realistic level than the traditional theater and foreign art forms--such as ballet--have been doing. Theatrical workers are continually urged to improve their artistry by depicting actual life (sheng-huo ) rather than by resorting to stage convention (ch’eng-shih ). The old concept that a young performer must study for a long period of time under a recognized master is no longer held to be valid; and the traditional master-disciple relationship, greatly valued by previous generations, has almost entirely vanished.

The subject matter prescribed by the Party for literary and art creation has also contributed to directing the theater toward a more realistic way of expression. Compared with the characters of the traditional theater, the worker, peasant and soldier heroes of the yang-pan hsi are all much simpler people. They have no inner conflicts, no personal ambitions, and their private longings are identical with those of the public. The character of these proletarian heroes is usually not developed at length; and if it is, it always follows the same straight path. In the light of revolutionary realism, the proletarian workers, peasants and soldiers all belong to the same class and therefore have the same class nature. Fighting, working, and praising the thought of Mao comprise the entire range of such heroes’ stage activity. For them the only meaningful thing in life is to carry on the revolution. In dramas portraying such “contemporary” heroes, imagination finds little or no place, but strength, clarity and directness are highly esteemed.

What are some of the possible reactions towards this “realistic” way of dramatic expression? While it is impossible to tabulate the opinions of the masses, we have a quantity of published materials reflecting the thinking of the experts: the playwrights, the performers, the dramaturgists, and the well-disciplined theater-goers.

When the opera Pai-mao nü was restaged in 1962, two casts were assembled for the presentation. The different acting styles of the two actresses at that time impersonating Hsi-erh gave rise to some interesting discussions pertaining to aesthetic appreciation of the various levels of the stage imitation of human behavior. Wang K’un, a veteran actress from Yenan days, had presented Hsi-erh in a highly realistic manner basing her acting mostly on observations from actual life, whereas Kuo Lan-ying , a young performer versed in traditional operatic art, had utilized a great deal of mimetic technique of the traditional opera. The critics’ taste and preference varied, but one point was agreed upon by all. It was well stated by the noted dramatist T’ien Han (purged during the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution):

As for the performing styles, to put it succinctly, the acting of Wang K’un contains much “realness” (chen ). Of course, there is also the “beautiful” (mei ); Kuo Lan-ying’s acting is much more “beautiful” (mei) while it is also very “real” (chen). Shall we say that Wang K’un has more natural colour (pen-se ) and Kuo Lan-ying more elegance and refinement (wen-ts’ai )?[27]

It is clear that in the view of an expert, or a connoisseur, the current trend in the theater of imitating life at a “more realistic” level is not as aesthetically pleasing as the traditional approach. But again, the experts are not the intended audience of the yang-pan hsi, and a connoisseur has no voice in the theater of the proletariat.

In conclusion we may say that “revolutionary realism,” to the extent that it is reflected in the seven yang-pan hsi, has a dual character. With regard to the content, it is fidelity to the prevailing revolutionary theory which is considered most important. With regard to the form, however, a true-to-life approach to acting and to stage decor is now the dominating trend in today’s theater of Communist China.

V. DEVELOPMENT AND SYNOPSES OF THE TEXTS

1. Hung-teng chi (The Red Lantern)

The origins of this Peking opera are a screen play Tzu yu hou-lai-jen (Certainly There will be Successors)[1] and the hua-chü San tai jen (Three Generations). A composite version of these plays provided the basis for a Shanghai opera Hung-teng chi staged by the Ai-hua Shanghai Opera Troupe of Shanghai.[2] A further adaption resulted in the script of the present opera.

The Peking opera Hung-teng chi centers about the railroad worker Li Yü-ho, a staunch Party member and representative of the second generation of the family. The various earlier versions had either given equal importance to all three generations of the family or else put stress on the coming generation as personified by the young girl Li T’ieh-mei.

The opera made its debut in March 1964, presented by the China Peking Opera Academy. In the summer of the same year it was presented at the National Festival of Peking Opera on Contemporary Themes and immediately after the Festival was acclaimed a yang-pan. The script of the Peking opera Hung-teng chi was first published in Chü-pen, No. 11, 1964. The synopsis here is based on the May 1970 version.[3]

.   .   .

Principal characters:

Positive:

Li Yü-ho

switchman, member of the Communist Party of China

T’ieh-mei

Li’s daughter

Granny Li

Li’s mother

Knife-grinder

platoon leader of the guerrillas of the Eighth Route Army in the Cypress Mountains

Hui-lien

Li’s neighbor

Negative:

Hatoyama

chief of the Japanese gendarmerie

Wang Lien-chü

puppet police, inspector, and an underground Communist who turns traitor

Time: the War of Resistance against the Japanese

Place: a railway station town, North China

Scene one: T’ieh-mei stops by the railway station on her way home from peddling and is told by Li Yü-ho to take the message that “an uncle is coming” to Granny Li. A liaison man of the Eighth Route Army jumps off a running train. Li’s rescue of the liaison man is covered by Wang Lien-chü who, as camouflage, shoots himself in the arm and points in the opposite direction when questioned by the pursuing Japanese gendarmes.

Scene two: T’ieh-mei asks Granny Li about her numerous “uncles” who constantly visit their house. Li carries in the liaison man, who has passed out from the fall. The man wakes up. They exchange passwords and identify themselves through the red signal lantern. The liaison man entrusts Li with the “secret code” to be delivered through a knife-grinder to the guerrillas in the Cypress Mountains, and takes his leave.

Scene three: At a congee stall, Li is to meet the knife-grinder. The knife-grinder enters, but before Li can speak to him a siren wails and the Japanese gendarmes charge in. The knife-grinder overturns his bench to distract the enemy’s attention. Li pours the congee into his lunch box where he has hidden the secret code. The gendarmes search both the knife-grinder and Li, but find nothing.

Scene four: Under torture Wang Lien-chü betrays the Party and reveals Li’s identity as a member.

Scene five: T’ieh-mei learns of the importance of the secret code. Incidents take place one after the other at Li’s house: Granny Li and T’ieh-mei give food to their starving neighbors; a bogus liaison man comes for the code, but Granny Li sees through his scheme and he is pushed out the door; Li comes back and tells Granny Li where he has hidden the code; and finally, an auxiliary Japanese gendarme arrives with an invitation card from Hatoyama. Having toasted her son farewell, Granny Li tells T’ieh-mei the history of the family: 17 years ago the maintenance man of a locomotive depot was killed in a railway workers’ strike. One of his two apprentices was killed at the same time, leaving behind him a baby girl; the other was gravely wounded. The wounded apprentice carried the baby to his late master’s house, where he told the former maintenance man’s wife, “From now on, I’m your own son and this child is your own granddaughter.” T’ieh-mei, upon learning the story of the family, determines to follow in the footsteps of both her fathers and to help carry on the revolution forever.

Scene six: Failing to move Li with bribes, Hatoyama orders Li put to severe torture, again to no avail.

Scene seven: Granny Li and T’ieh-mei are under secret surveillance. T’ieh-mei removes a loose stone at the foot of the wall which separates the Lis from the neighboring house and crawls through into Hui-lien’s room. With her help, T’ieh-mei gets out, searching for the knife-grinder, but failing to find him. Hatoyama visits Granny Li and T’ieh-mei. Unable to get them to hand over the code, he takes them away with him.

Scene eight: Granny and T’ieh-mei are brought separately to Li Yü-ho. Li expresses his determination to resist until the end; without mentioning it directly (the Japanese have installed a hidden microphone), he hints that they should do everything possible to get the code to the guerrillas. Granny and Li are killed but T’ieh-mei is spared and released as bait.

Scene nine: Burning with hatred, T’ieh-mei determines to be the successor to the keepers of the red lantern. With the help of Hui-lien’s mother-in-law, T’ieh-mei puts on Hui-lien’s clothes and gets out through the neighbor’s house while Hui-lien, having disguised herself as T’ieh-mei, goes out of the Lis’ house.

Scene ten: T’ieh-mei encounters the knife-grinder on her way to the Cypress Mountains. Approaching from behind, Hatoyama leads Wang Lien-chü and the Japanese soldiers to fight against the knife-grinder and the ambushed guerrillas. The guerrillas in a total victory kill all the enemies.

Scene eleven: The knife-grinder takes T’ieh-mei to the guerrilla leader, to whom she hands the code. Holding high the red lantern, T’ieh-mei joins the revolutionary ranks.

2. Sha-chia-pang

Adapted from the Shanghai opera Lu-tang huo-chung (Spark Amid the Reeds)[4] by the Peking Opera Troupe of Peking. In the summer of 1964, the Peking opera Lu-tang huo-chung[5] was presented at the National Festival of Peking Opera on Contemporary Themes and was warmly received by each audience. After the Festival much revision was done and the title was changed, at Mao’s suggestion,[6] from Lu-tang huo-chung to Sha-chia-pang (the place where the story happens).

The main difference between Lu-tang huo-chung and Sha-chia-pang is that the former stresses dramatic elements centered around the witty teahouse proprietress, an underground Party member, while the latter emphasizes the armed struggle of the New Fourth Army soldiers under the leadership of their company political instructor, Kuo Chien-kuang.

The text of Sha-chia-pang was first published in the Jen-min jih-pao (on the 18th, 19th and 20th of March, 1965); the synopsis given here is based on the May 1970 stage script.[7]

.   .   .

Principal characters:

Positive:

Kuo Chien-kuang

company political instructor of the New Fourth Army

A-ch’ing’s wife

Party member, underground worker (nominally teahouse proprietress)

Ch’eng Ch’ien-ming

secretary of the Ch’ang-shu County Committee of the Communist Party of China

Auntie Sha

activist in Sha-chia-pang

Sha Szu-lung

son of Auntie Sha, Sha-chia-pang militiaman and later, soldier of the New Fourth Army

Negative:

Hu Ch’uan-k’uei

commander of the puppet “Loyal and Just National Salvation Army”

Tiao Te-i

chief-of-staff of the “Loyal and Just National Salvation Army” (son of the late wealthy landlord of Sha-chia-pang)

Time: the War of Resistance against the Japanese

Place: Sha-chia-pang, a small town in Ch’ang-shu hsien, Kiangsu province

Scene one: A-ch’ing’s wife receives from Secretary Ch’eng the eighteen wounded New Fourth Army men under their leader Kuo Chien-kuang, and undertakes to hide them from the Japanese while they are recuperating from their wounds.

Scene two: Auntie Sha tells the bitter story of her family, praising the Communist Party. The “people” and the “soldiers” express their mutual affection. A-ch’ing’s wife reports the impending arrival of Japanese soldiers, whereupon the wounded go into hiding in the vast reed-beds edging the lake by Sha-chia-pang.

Scene three: Hu and Tiao collaborate with the Japanese; the “Loyal and Just National Salvation Army” prepares to move into Sha-chia-pang.

Scene four: Hu and Tiao arrive at Sha-chia-pang. A-ch’ing’s wife, who once saved Hu’s life from the Japanese, greets them at her teashop. Tiao suspects her of working for the New Fourth Army; she replies cleverly and wittily to his queries. Tiao schemes to entice the wounded out. A-ch’ing’s wife sees through Tiao’s plot and throws a brick covered with a straw hat into the lake. Thinking that someone has jumped into the water, Hu and his adjutant open fire. The shooting warns the wounded that something has happened in the town. Tiao orders the confiscation of all boats at Sha-chia-pang.

Scene five: The wounded, hiding amidst the reeds, endure storm and lack of supplies, determined to hold out.

Scene six: Disguised as an itinerant doctor, Secretary Ch’eng arrives at the teashop where A-ch’ing’s wife has just been refused a boat to take Szu-lung, pretending to be sick, to the city for treatment. Ch’eng exchanges intelligence with A-ch’ing’s wife. Szu-lung steals a boat to move the wounded to another village.

Scene seven: Upon learning about the safe transfer of the wounded, Hu and Tiao try in vain to force a confession from the villagers. Tiao, still suspicious of A-ch’ing’s wife, interrogates Auntie Sha in the presence of A-ch’ing’s wife, even urging her to persuade Auntie Sha to confess. Both women see through Tiao’s scheme. Auntie Sha undauntedly challenges Hu and Tiao, carefully avoiding implication of A-ch’ing’s wife; A-ch’ing’s wife, in turn, cleverly convinces Hu and Tiao of her innocence, and even persuades them to spare Auntie Sha’s life.

Scene eight: Kuo leads a commando platoon on the way to Sha-chia-pang; they dodge an enemy patrol.

Scene nine: Kuo leads his men over the wall into Tiao’s back garden. A-ch’ing’s wife and the militia are to meet the main force approaching Sha-chia-pang.

Scene ten: The New Fourth Army and militia wipe out the Japanese and the puppet soldiers. Hu, Tiao and the Japane se colonel are taken prisoner. A-ch’ing’s wife reveals her true identity to the enemy. The last scene ends with the grand happy reunion of all positive characters.

3. Chih-ch’ü wei-hu-shan (Taking Tiger Mountain by Strategy)

Adapted by the Peking Opera Troupe of Shanghai in 1958 from Ch’ü Po’s well-known novel Lin-hai hsüeh-yüan (Forest Seas, Snowy Plains).[8] In January 1963, Chiang Ch’ing read the script in Shanghai and requested the Peking Opera Troupe of Shanghai to revise it for the National Festival of Peking Opera on Contemporary Themes to be held in Peking in the summer of 1964.[9] After the Festival the script was again revised several times. Since 1963 the revising work has always consisted of attempts at “sculpting from different aspects the splendid images of the proletarian heroes.”[10] In this case, this means especially the principal character Yang Tzu-jung, the scout platoon leader of the People’s Liberation Army. The revised, 1964 version of the opera was published in Chü-pen, No. 12, 1964; the synopsis given here is based on the July 1970 stage script.[11]

.   .   .

Principal characters:

Positive:

Yang Tzu-jung

scout platoon leader of the Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA)

Shao Chien-po

PLA regimental chief-of-staff

Li Yung-ch’i

railway worker

Ch’ang Pao

hunter’s daughter

Negative:

Mountain Vulture

bandit chieftain of Tiger Mountain, Kuomintang brigadier

Luan P’ing

liaison adjutant of the bandit chieftain of Breast Mountain

Time: winter, 1946

Place: a snowy, mountainous area in Manchuria

Scene one: Shao orders his pursuit detachment, which has been marching along a snow-covered mountain trail, to halt. Yang comes back from his scouting trip and reports to Shao the whereabouts of Mountain Vulture and his gang.

Scene two: Mountain Vulture and his gang pass by Chia-p’i Valley on their way to Tiger Mountain. The bandits plunder the village, snatching up young villagers. A bandit captain snatches Li Yung-ch’i’s baby from Li’s mother and throws it over the cliff. Mountain Vulture is about to shoot at Li; Li’s wife flings herself in front of her husband and is killed. The bandits drag Li off.

Scene three: Yang revisits Hunter Ch’ang whose daughter he saved from a snowy ravine a few days earlier. Ch’ang Pao, disguised as a mute boy for fear of harassment by the bandits, recounts a bitter story which happened to the family eight years earlier. Hunter Ch’ang explains the geographical situation of Tiger Mountain to Yang. Soldiers report the discovery of a female body. From a glove left by the murderer, Hunter Ch’ang identifies the killer as Howling Wolf, one of Mountain Vulture’s men who has killed Luan P’ing’s wife for a certain “contacts-map.”

Scene four: Yang captures Howling Wolf and gets hold of the “contacts-map” which Mountain Vulture is anxious to possess. From Luan P’ing, whom Yang took prisoner earlier, Yang learns about the hundred-chicken feast which Mountain Vulture holds every year to celebrate his birthday. Yang and Shao study the situation and draw up a plan: Yang is to disguise himself as a bandit with the “contacts-map” as a gift for Mountain Vulture, and go up to Tiger Mountain, where he is to find out how the bandits’ tunnels and bunkers are laid out. Then, during the hundred-chicken feast, when all the bandits are in the main hall, Shao and his pursuit detachment will launch a surprise attack from without.

Scene five: Amid gunshots, a group of bandits comes down from Tiger Mountain to find that Yang has killed a tiger in the foothills. Awed, the bandits lead Yang up to Tiger Mountain.

Scene six: Yang introduces himself to Mountain Vulture as a friend of Luan P’ing who, Yang pretends, has slandered Mountain Vulture by intending to present the “contacts-map” to a certain Commissioner Hou. However, Yang continues, Luan P’ing was drunk and “I jumped on his black-maned horse, and through the snowstorm galloped directly to Tiger Mountain.” With the “contacts-map” laid out before him, Mountain Vulture is convinced, and proclaims Yang Number Nine (Lao Chiu ) on Tiger Mountain.

Scene seven: Li Yung-ch’i runs back home from Tiger Mountain. Shao and his detachment also arrive at Chia-p’i Valley. The villagers are at first suspicious of the PLA soldiers, but soon detect the difference between this Army and the “troops” and “bandits” who previously plundered the village. Shao arouses and organizes the villagers.

Scene eight: Having familiarized himself with Tiger Mountain, Yang is ready to send the information down to Shao, when Mountain Vulture, still suspicious of Yang, designs another “test.” Replying to a trick with a trick, Yang opens fire when told that the Communists are coming. He wins the trust of Mountain Vulture, thereby getting a chance to travel down the mountain, where he will deliver his message.

Scene nine: As the militia organize in Chia-p’i Valley, Ch’ang Pao asks to join the combat ranks and is accepted. News comes that Luan P’ing has escaped. Shao receives the message from Yang and leads the militia and the pursuit detachment skiers up to Tiger Mountain.

Scene ten: Luan P’ing escapes to Tiger Mountain and attempts to reveal the story of Yang to Mountain Vulture. Yang outwits and executes Luan P’ing. At the hundred-chicken feast, Yang, to celebrate Mountain Vulture’s birthday, orders pine torches burned--a signal for Shao. The militia and the pursuit detachment rush in. Yang shows his true identity. The bandits are wiped out and Mountain Vulture is taken prisoner.

4. Ch’i-hsi pai-hu-t’uan (Raid on the White-tiger Regiment)

Written collectively in 1958 by the Peking Opera Troupe of Chinese People’s Volunteers (Chung-kuo jen-ming chih-yüan-chün ching-chü-t’uan ) on the eve of their return from Korea.[12] After its return the Troupe was incorporated into the Shantung Provincial Peking Opera Troupe (Shan-tung-sheng ching-chü-t’uan ) and Ch’i-hsi pai-hu-t’uan has since become a popular piece in the repertoire of Shantung Provincial Peking Opera Troupe. In 1963-64, before the National Festival of Peking Opera on Contemporary Themes, the opera underwent several revisions, and then was highly praised at the Festival. After the Festival the opera was again greatly revised before it was approved as a yang-pan. The revision emphasizes Mao’s theories of “people’s war” and, in order to establish the “heroic image” of this people’s fighter “still higher and greater,”[13] introduces new incidents centered around the leading character Yang Wei-ts’ai, leader of the scout platoon of a regiment of the Chinese People’s Volunteers.

The 1964 script of this opera can be found in the Chü-pen, No. 9, 1964. This script, with excerpts from the scores, was later published in book form by the China Drama Publishing Company (Chung-kuo Hsi-chü Ch’u-pan-she).

The synopsis given here is based upon the 1967 script.[14]

.   .   .

Principal characters:

Positive:

Yang Wei-ts’ai

leader of the scout platoon of a regiment of the Chinese People’s Volunteers (CPV)

Commissar Kuan

a regimental political commissar of the CPV

Han Taenyŏn

intelligence cadre (member of China’s Korean National minority)

Auntie Ch’oe

Korean villager

Auntie Ch’oe’s daughter-in-law

Negative:

American Adviser

Colonel of the White Tiger Regiment

Time: July, 1953

Place: vicinity of the district of Anp’yŏng-ni , along the Kŭmsŏng front, Korea

Scene one: Yang and his men revisit Anp’yŏng-ni and are greeted by Auntie Ch’oe who once tended Yang at her house after he had been wounded in battle. The Chinese soldiers and Korean villagers express their mutual affection. News comes that the truce talks have again broken up and the soldiers bid farewell to the villagers.

Scene two: Anp’yŏng-ni is occupied and Auntie Ch’oe and her daughter-in-law observe the enemy’s movements from the top of a hill. The villagers refuse to repair the road which they destroyed prior to the takeover. The American Adviser and the Colonel of the White-tiger Regiment order the village set on fire, burning the people out. Auntie Ch’oe and a group of villagers resist dauntlessly. The Colonel and the American Adviser shoot Auntie Ch’oe. Before she dies, Auntie Ch’oe tells her daughter-in-law to carry on the struggle and to wait for Yang at Ch’ŏngsŏng-ni ().

Scene three: Late at night, Yang and his men scout Anp’yong Mountain. Upon learning of what has happened in the village, they decide to request a battle assignment from the regimental leaders.

Scene four: Missing the regimental commander and the commissar, Yang returns from the regimental headquarters. The soldiers of Yang’s scout platoon are all anxious for a battle assignment. At this juncture, Commissar Kuan arrives with the good news. The regiment is to make a thrust assault, with a deep thrust battalion to be organized having a bayonet squad up front; this squad is to make straight for the headquarters of the White-tiger Regiment. Furthermore, the regimental Party committee has already decided to assign Yang and his platoon as the bayonet squad.

Scene five: In the regimental headquarters, plans and preparations for the assault are drawn up. Yang meets Han Taenyŏn, an intelligence cadre sent from above to help Yang. The soldiers pledge to arm themselves with Mao’s thought and to surmount every difficulty and win a victory.

Scene six: With everyone disguised as puppet (South) Korean soldiers, leaders Yang and Han by night slip the bayonet squad behind the enemy lines. Yang defuses a landmine which he steps on. To avoid the minefield the squad wades up a stream, reaching a highway. A puppet soldier, mistaking the squad for a group of deserters, trails the squad and is taken prisoner. From the prisoner, Yang and Han find out the password and the location of the enemy’s headquarters.

Scene seven: The enemy changes its battle plans; armbands serving as temporary passes are given to the puppet soldiers. Yang, Han and the squad kill two puppet sentry-guards and capture their lieutenant. The puppet lieutenant reveals the enemy’s present military situation and plans. Pressed for time, Yang and his men decide to swim a fast-flowing river.

Scene eight: The daughter-in-law of Auntie Ch’oe, who with the help of the villagers is on her way to Ch’ŏngsŏng-ni, runs into the bayonet squad in the mountains and leads Yang and his men across another river and over a cliff, to the top of a gorge overlooking the headquarters of the White-tiger Regiment. Yang and his men climb down the gorge by means of a rope.

Scene nine: In the headquarters of the White-tiger Regiment, the American Adviser is ready to desert his allies and run for his life. Yang suddenly leaps in through the window, whereupon the Colonel of the White-tiger Regiment and the wounded American Adviser flee through the window, Yang and his men chasing after them.

Epilogue: Yang and his men capture the Colonel and the Adviser. The CPV Regimental Commander and Commissar Kuan enter with their soldiers, the heroes attributing their exploits to Mao’s thought and thereafter pressing onward to win still more victories.

5. Hai-kang (On the Docks)

Adapted from the Huai opera (Huai-chü ) Hai-kang te tsao-ch’en (Morning on the Docks).[15] In the spring of 1964, Chiang Ch’ing attended a performance of this Huai opera and found the “internationalism embodied by the dockers” a good theme for adaptation.[16] The script of this opera was then given to the Peking Opera Troupe of Shanghai to be rewritten into a Peking opera. In the latter part of 1966, after “numerous struggles,” the Peking opera Hai-kang made its Peking debut and was soon acclaimed a yang-pan.[17]

Since then revisions have constantly been made. The most recent script[18] has added, in the fourth scene, the episode of Fang Hai-chen--leading character and secretary of the Party branch of the Loading Brigade--reading the communique of the tenth Plenary Session of the Eighth Party Central Committee; this script thus gives more prominence both to the theme of “class struggle in the socialist era” and to the “heroic image of the proletarian worker armed with Mao Tse-tung’s thought.”

The synopsis given here is based on the January 1972 stage script.

.   .   .

Principal characters:

Positive:

Fang Hai-chen

secretary of the Party branch of the Loading Brigade

Kao Chih-yang

section chief of the Loading Brigade, member of the Party branch committee

Han Hsiao-ch’iang

young docker

Negative:

Ch’ien Shou-wei

dispatcher

Time: summer, 1963

Place: Shanghai port

Scene one: With the approach of a strong typhoon, Ch’ien attempts to delay a shipment of seed-rice bound for Africa. Under the leadership of Fang and Kao, the dockers are busy loading the rice and moving sacks of wheat, purposely left in the open by Ch’ien, to the warehouse.

Scene two: The discontented young docker Han Hsiao-ch’iang drops and spills open a sack of wheat. Ch’ien sweeps most of the spilled wheat into a dustpan containing scrap fiber-glass and pours the whole mixture back into the wheat sack. In a hurry, Han mistakes a sack of rice, pointed out to him by Ch’ien, for a sack of wheat, carrying it into the warehouse. Kao notices the wheat still lying on the ground.

Scene three: Egged on by Ch’ien, Han starts a dispute with Kao. Knowing the seriousness of the “spilled sack” incident, Fang decides to lock up the warehouse and to guard the scene for the investigation.

Scene four: Fang quotes to Chao the words of Mao that “we should never forget class struggle.” To beat the typhoon, the wheat has to be loaded ahead of schedule to meet a morning shipment; so Fang and the dockers search through the warehouse all night long for the “spilled sack.”

Scene five: Denied his request for a transfer, Han throws away his work card and stomps off. Fang confronts Ch’ien, and thereby discovers the sack of seed-rice carried into the warehouse by Han at Ch’ien’s direction. Disregarding the storm, Kao gets into a steam launch to go after the barge and bring back the spilled sack which has been mistaken for a sack of rice and is on its way to the freighter bound for Africa.

Scene six: By comparing the dockers’ lives in the old and the new China, Fang and Ma help Han see his mistake in looking down upon dock work. Han tells of the “spilled sack” incident; the crime of Ch’ien then becomes evident.

Scene seven: Kao brings back the sack of spilled wheat. A docker tells of Ch’ien’s attempted escape and his final capture by Chao.

6. Hung-se niang-tzu-chün (Red Detachment of Women): ballet dance-drama.

Adapted by the Ballet Troupe of the Central Opera and Dance-drama Academy (Chung-yang ke-chü wu-chü yüan Pa-lei wu-chü-t’uan )[19] from the movie script of the same name.[20] This ballet, which had its Peking premiere in October 1964,[21] has in Communist China been considered “the first notable model carrying out Chairman Mao’s concept of ‘making foreign things serve China’ and a fine first fruit of the policy of using Mao Tse-tung’s thought to remould the art of ballet.”[22] It has been lauded for embodying Mao’s theory that “political power grows out of the barrel of a gun” (ch’iang-kan-tzu li-mien ch’u cheng-ch’üan ).

The scenario of the ballet has been so considerably altered from that of the movie story that the author of the original screenplay says, “It is a re-creation, not an adaptation.”[23] The major changes in the ballet version consist of, first, a simplification of the plot;[24] and, second, the concentration of dramatic action on the hero, Party representative Hung Ch’ang-ch’ing, and on the heroine Wu Ch’ing-hua, a slave girl and later a soldier in the Detachment. This concentration of dramatic action brings out the theme of “armed struggle,” and emphasizes the “spirit of revolt.”

The synopsis given here is based on the May 1970 stage script of the ballet.[25]

.   .   .

Principal characters:

Positive:

Hung Ch’ang-ch’ing

(male) Party representative in the Women’s Company

Wu Ch’ing-hua

slave girl, later a soldier in the Women’s Company, then its Party representative

Company Commander

leader of the Women’s Company

Little P’ang

boy messenger in the Red Army

Negative:

The Tyrant of the South

despotic landlord, commander of the “civil guards” of the Cocoanut Grove Manor

Lao Szu

his bailiff, head of the “civil guards”

Time: the Second Revolutionary Civil War period, 1927-1937

Place: Hainan Island

Prologue: Lao Szu and a guard enter the dungeon in which Wu Ch’ing-hua has been chained to a post. Lao Szu unlocks the shackles, releasing Ch’ing-hua. Catching him off guard, Ch’ing-hua kicks him to the ground, and as the two peasant women confined to the same dungeon throw themselves upon Lao Szu and the guard, Ch’ing-hua dashes out.

Scene one: Ch’ing-hua flees into the depths of the dark cocoanut grove. In the darkness she bumps into Lao Szu, leading the guards in search of her. They struggle, and again she kicks him to the ground and runs, but the guards catch up with and seize her. The Tyrant orders her beaten to death. Thunder rumbles--a storm is brewing. The Tyrant and his gang leave in a hurry. Hung and Little P’ang pass by the cocoanut grove on a scouting mission. They spot Ch’ing-hua, help her up and hear her bitter story. In the morning, Hung points out the road which will lead Ch’ing-hua to the revolution; she runs off in the direction he has indicated.

Scene two: At a Red base, people are celebrating the formation of a Eed Army women’s company. At this happy moment Ch’ing-hua arrives. Hung introduces her to the people and she is warmly accepted. The company commander and Hung approve Ch’ing-hua’s request to join the Red Army. She is handed a weapon.

Scene three: The Tyrant’s birthday. Disguised as a rich overseas merchant, Hung, accompanied by Little P’ang, is received into the manor. Ch’ing-hua, disguised as a bondmaid, is also assigned to the mission. At the sight of the Tyrant, who has left his house to see off his guests, Ch’ing-hua, driven by the thought of revenge, forgets the prearranged plan and fires two shots. Upon hearing the gunshots, the Red Army unit charges in and the manor is taken. The Tyrant and Lao Szu jump into a secret tunnel and flee. The Tyrant’s granary is opened and the grain distributed to the poor. Having breached discipline, Ch’ing-hua is reprimanded by the company commander and is relieved of her weapon.

Scene four: After a political class, Ch’ing-hua remains behind, pondering the words written on the blackboard: “Only by emancipating all mankind can the proletariat achieve its own final emancipation.” She suddenly grasps the meaning of the words. Delighted to see Ch’ing-hua maturing politically, the company commander helps her practice shooting and grenade throwing, and, at the request of Hung, returns Ch’ing-hua’s weapon. (Dances depict the various activities of the soldiers and civilians at the Red base.) Little P’ang brings news that Kuomintang troops have launched a major offensive against the base area. Hung and the company commander, leading the Red Army and militia, hasten to the battlefield.

Scene five: A platoon under Hung is holding a mountain pass to give the main force of the Red Army enough time to safely complete its move to the enemy’s rear. Hung leads a few soldiers to protect their flank, ordering Ch’ing-hua to command the holding action in the pass. The main force having moved according to plan, Hung orders Ch’ing-hua, who has just been admitted to the Party, to lead the platoon out while he remains behind to cover the withdrawal. He is severely wounded and surrounded by a group of Kuomintang soldiers and the Tyrant.

Interlude: The main force of the Red Army advances in pursuit of the enemy troops.

Scene six: In the Tyrant’s courtyard, Hung contemptuously rips up the sheet of paper prepared by the enemies for his “recantation.” Displaying his proletarian spirit, Hung calmly mounts the pyre beneath a banyan tree, awing the enemy with his courage. The Red Army then surges into the Tyrant’s manor, where Ch’ing-hua kills Lao Szu and the Tyrant. To the strains of the Internationale, the Red Army soldiers and the liberated masses gather before the banyan tree to pay homage to Hung. The battalion commander announces that Ch’ing-hua has been appointed Party representative of the Women’s Company. Ch’ing-hua accepts Hung’s dispatch case from the commander and pledges to model herself after Hung and to help carry on the revolution forever.

7. Pai-mao nü (The White-haired Girl): ballet dance-drama.

Adapted from the well-known opera of the same name[26] by the Shanghai Dance School (Shang-hai-shih wu-tao hsüeh-hsiao ). After more than two years’ continuous revising and rehearsing under the direct guidance of Chiang Ch’ing, this ballet made its Peking debut on the 30th of April, 1966, for the May Day celebration (KMJP, 4/30/66, p. 3), and was soon acclaimed a yang-pan for revolutionizing the foreign art form, ballet.[27] In the new ballet version of Pai-mao nü, the theme of “armed struggle,” the “spirit of revolt,” and slogans in praise of Mao and of the Chinese Communist Party each receive particular emphasis.

A complete scenario of this dance-drama is as yet unavailable to the writer of this paper. The synopsis given here is a composite based upon the explanatory booklet accompanying the recordings of excerpts from the ballet, and upon the illustrated introduction to the story of this ballet in the Jen-min jih-pao (4/30/66, p. 6).

.   .   .

Principal characters:

Positive:

Yang Pai-lao

poor peasant

Hsi-erh

Yang’s daughter

Wang Ta-ch’un

Hsi-erh’s betrothed, young peasant and later platoon leader of the Eighth Route Army

Uncle Chao

poor peasant and underground Party member

Negative:

Huang Shih-jen

landlord and traitor

Mu Jen-chih

Huang’s steward

Time: the latter half of the 1930s, during the War of Resistance against the Japanese

Place: Yang-ke Village, Hopei

Prologue: The chorus sings of the sufferings of the poor people under the despotic landlords, and of their hatred which is now fostering their determination to resist.

Scene one: After seven days’ hiding from the debt collector, Yang Pai-lao returns home on the eve of Chinese New Year. Landlord Huang forces his way into Yang’s house, taking Hsi-erh away as payment for Yang’s debt. Yang resists and is beaten to death. Hsi-erh is dragged away and her betrothed Wang Ta-ch’un, under the direction of Uncle Chao, joins the Eighth Route Army.

Scene two: Hsi-erh is cruelly treated in the Huang family. Burning with hatred and covered with wounds, she runs away from Huang’s house.

Scene three: Hsi-erh hides in the reeds edging a river. Her pursuers, seeing the shoes which have fallen from her feet during her flight, mistakenly assume that she has drowned herself.

Scene four: Days go by. The hard life in the wild mountains has turned Hsi-erh’s hair white; but she lives on persistently and, tempered by the storms and winds, her determination to revenge herself becomes ever firmer and stronger.

Scene five: The Eighth Route Army liberates Yang-ke village; Wang Ta-ch’un, returned with the Army, is by now a platoon leader. After the liberation, Wang Ta-ch’un leads a small detachment of the Army which has remained behind in the village to organize the masses. Uncle Chao and Wang Ta-ch’un mobilize the villagers, waging a struggle against Huang Shih-jen and Mu Jen-chih. Huang and Mu escape from the village.

Scene six: Caught by a storm, Huang and Mu hide in the Goddess’ Temple. Looking for food, Hsi-erh also comes to the Temple, encounters her mortal enemies, and frightens them away; she pursues them. Meanwhile, Wang Ta-ch’un and the others also arrive at the Temple in pursuit of Huang and Mu.

Scene seven: Hsi-erh goes back to her cave, Wang Ta-ch’un following her. They recognize each other and Ta-ch’un leads Hsi-erh out of the cave into the sun. The chorus sings: “The sun has risen. . . . The sun is Mao Tse-tung; the sun is the Communist Party.”

Scene eight: Hsi-erh and the villagers list the crimes of Huang and Mu. The villains are executed. The chorus sings praises to Mao and the Party, expressing its loyalty.

Epilogue: After they have joined the Eighth Route Army, Wang Ta-ch’un leads Hsi-erh and the villagers to the frontline of the revolution.

FOOTNOTES

Chapter I

1. See the opening sentences of Kuo Han-ch’eng’s article “Hsi-ch’ü i-shu t’ui-ch’en ch’u-hsin te ch’eng-chiu ho ching-yen” (Accomplishment and Experience [Gained in Carrying Out the Policy of] “Reject the Old and Develop the New” in Theatrical Art), Wen-i pao , Nos. 19-20 (1959), P. 21:

In the fall of 1942, when the Yenan Academy of Peking Opera was first established. Chairman Mao wrote the four characters t’ui-ch’en ch’u-hsin for this academy of dramatic art. Thereafter these four characters have always been the guiding principle for the carrying out of works in drama reform.

2. Altogether eight yang-pan or “models” have officially been announced. They consist of seven drama productions and one symphonic work. The seven “model dramas” are:

Hung-teng chi (The Red Lantern, Peking opera)

Sha-chia-pang (Shachiapang, Peking opera)

Chih-ch’ü wei-hu-shan (Taking Tiger Mountain by Strategy, Peking opera)

Ch’i-hsi pai-hu-t’uan (Raid on the White Tiger Regiment, Peking opera)

Hai-kang (On the Docks, Peking opera)

Hung-se niang-tzu-chün (Red Detachment of Women, ballet dance-drama)

Pai-mao nü (The White-haired Girl, ballet dance-drama)

The symphony entitled Sha-chia-pang is a creation based upon the Peking opera of the same name. See “Carrying Out Chairman Mao’s Line on Literature and Art: Brilliant Models,” JMJP, 12/9/66, p. 4.

It is not surprising that five of the seven drama productions should be Peking operas. A fully developed art from, Peking opera has become the national drama, and therefore the “most stubborn fortress” (tsui-wan-ku-te pao-lei ) for the revolutionary fighters on the theatrical front.

3. Quoting Mao Tse-tung: “The purpose of our meeting today is precisely to ensure that literature and art fit well into the whole revolutionary machine as a component part, that they operate as powerful weapons for uniting and educating the people and for attacking and destroying the enemy, and that they help the people fight the enemy with one heart and one mind.” “Talks at the Yenan Forum on Literature and Art” in Mao Tse-tung lun wen-i (Peking: Jen-min wen-hsüeh ch’u-pan-she, 1967), p. 3; Mao Tse-tung on Literature and Art (Peking: Foreign Languages Press, 1967), p. 2.

4. Most noticeably during the period of 1956-1957. See Chao Ts’ung , Chung-kuo ta-lu te hsi-ch’ü kai-ke, 1942-1967 : (Drama Reform in Mainland China, 1942-1967), (Hongkong: Chinese University of Hong Kong, 1968), pp. 91-96.

5. In reference to government control, Hellmut Wilhelm has expressed his optimism by saying, “If control were total, I would say there would be no hope whatsoever. But even in China the degree of control can never be total.” See Cyril Birch, “The Particle of Art,” The China Quarterly, No. 13 (January-March 1963), p. 7.

6. A news report covering the activities during the national celebration of October, 1966, was headlined: “New fruition in thoroughly carrying out Chairman Mao’s line on literature and art: new victory for the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution: the stage in the capital has become a rostrum for propagating the thought of Mao Tse-tung.” KMJP, 10/12/66, p. 2.

7. See Chao Ts’ung, op. cit., pp. 53-84.

8. Yao Wen-yüan , “P’ing hsin-pien li-shih-chü ‘Hai Jui pa-kuan’” , (“A Criticism of the New Historical Play ‘Hai Jui’s Dismissal from 0ffice’”), Shanghai Wen-hui pao , 11/10/65; JMTP, 11/30/65.

9. “Summary of the Forum on Literature and Art in the Armed Forces with Which Comrade Lin Piao Entrusted Comrade Chiang Ch’ing” (henceforth Forum Summary, JMJP, 5/29/67; Hung ch’i, No. 9, 1967). The forum was held in Shanghai from the 2nd to the 20th of February, 1966. According to the first part of the Forum Summary, and the “Letter of Comrade Lin Piao to Members of the Standing Committee of the Military Commission of the Party Central Committee” (prefaced to the Forum Summary), the forum was originally organized to discuss questions concerning the literary and art work in the armed forces. The Forum Summary, however, dealt with questions pertinent to literature and art in general. Ever since its publication, the Forum Summary, along with the other well-known speech of Chiang Ch’ing, “T’an Ching-chü ke-ming” (“On the Revolution of Peking Opera,” JMTP, 5/10/67), has been accepted as part of the orthodox Chinese Communist theoretical documents of literature and art. From Lin Piao’s letter we also learn that the Forum Summary has “three times been personally examined and revised by the Chairman.” For references to a study of the word chua, see Chapter III, note 2.

10. As early as 1963, the theatrical workers had already turned their attention from “reform” (kai-ke ) to “revolution” (ke-ming ):

Ever since last August (1963), after the theatrical circles had convened (in Peking) to discuss how to push a step further in thoroughly carrying out the policy of “letting a hundred flowers bloom” and “expelling the old and producing the new,” the focus of discussion (concerning the theater) has gradually turned from how to reform the traditional and historical drama to how to successfully stage dramas on contemporary themes. This shift indicates that if we are going to raise the socialist revolution in theatrical art, we must strenuously advocate and develop dramas on contemporary themes which reflect the socialist times.

Hu Hsi-t’ao , “Hsi-chü, shih-tai, jen-min, t’an t’i-ch’ang hsien-tai-chü te ke-ming i-i” , , (“The Theater, Times and People: On the Revolutionary Significance of Advocating Dramas on Contemporary Themes”), KMJP, 3/22/64, p. 2.

11. Publisher’s note, Mao Tse-tung lun wen-i.

12. In his “Twenty Years after the Yenan Forum,” Mr. T. A. Hsia has presented a discussion centered around the method of creation. The China Quarterly, No. 13 (January-March, 1963), pp. 245-253.

13. Mao Tse-tung on Literature and Art, p. 18.

14. Ho Chih (Ch’in Chao-yang ), a well known literary critic and then assistant editor of the literary monthly Jen-min wen-hsüeh (People’s Literature), boldly and eloquently expounded this view in his controversial article “Hsien-shih chu-i: kuang-k’uo te tao-lu” (“Realism--The Broad Path”), in Jen-min wen-hsüeh, September, 1956, pp. 1-13.

15. Mao Tse-tung on Literature and Art, pp. 9-10; Mao Tse-tung lun wen-i, p. 14.

16. Mao Tse-tung on Literature and Art, p. 19.

17. See Mao’s Yenan Talks, Mao Tse-tung lun wen-i, pp. 42-46. For an interesting contrast between Mao’s concept of content and form and that of Western scholars, cf. Cyril Birch, “The Particle of Art,” op. cit., p. 4.

18. Mao Tse-tung on Literature and. Art, p. 29.

19. The literary and art works performed and produced by Communist China’s cultural workers during the past three decades can best be regarded as a realization of Mao’s conviction that “Party work in literature and art occupies a definite and assigned position in Party revolutionary work as a whole, and is subordinate to the revolutionary tasks set by the Party in a given revolutionary period” (Mao Tse-tung lun wen-i, p. 38). Thus, literary and art creation is always performed in coordination with concrete political policies; hence, the absence of an abstract and unchangeable political criterion for art and literary criticism.

20. First published in Hsi-ch’ü pao , October, 1949. The text used here is a later version found in Ma Shao-po’s anthology Hsi-ch’ü kai-ke san-lun (Casual Notes on Drama Reform) (Peking: I-shu ch’u-pan-she, 1956), pp. 1-12.

21. Ibid., p. 4. The quoted statement of Mao Tse-tung comes from his “Letter to the Yenan Peking Opera Academy after Seeing ‘Driven to Join the Liangshan Rebels,’” in Mao Chu-hsi kuan-yü wen-hsüeh i-shu te wu-ke wen-chien (Chairman Mao’s Five Documents on Literature and Art) (Peking: Jen-min ch’u-pan-she, 1969); Peking Review, No. 23, 6/2/67.

22. Chiang Ch’ing, “T’an Ching-chü ke-ming” (“On the Revolution of Peking Opera”). The speech was made in July, 1964, at a forum attended by theatrical artists and workers participating in the National Festival of Peking Opera on Contemporary Themes.

23. See Mao’s Yenan Talks.

24. Forum Summary, Part II, Item 2.

Chapter II

1. See Mao’s “Speech at the Chinese Communist Party’s National Conference on Propaganda Work,” delivered on March 12, 1957:

If over a period of several five-year plans a fairly large number of our intellectuals accept Marxism and acquire a fairly good grasp of it through their actual work and life, through the practice of class struggle, production and scientific activity, that will be fine. And that is what we hope will happen. Selected Readings From the Works of Mao Tse-tung (Peking: Foreign Languages Press, 1971), p. 483.

The “practice of class struggle” (chieh-chi tou-cheng shih-chien ), “practice of production activity” (sheng-ch’an shih-chien ) and “practice of scientific experiments (k’e-hsüeh shih-chien ) have since come to be known as either the “Three Great Practices” (san ta shih-chien ) or the “Three Great Revolutionary Movements (san ta ke-ming yun-tung ); they have received an unusual amount of attention and publicity--especially in 1957-58, and again during the Cultural Revolution.

2. A Concise Dictionary of Science and Technology (Chien-ming k’e-chi tz’u-tien ), Peking, 1958 (first edition), p. 235. Cf. “(template, or templet) Any temporary pattern, guide, or model by which work is either marked out or by which its accuracy is checked. Usually light thin plates of wood or metal cut to special outlines. Used in all the departments of engineering.” Dictionary of Mechanical Engineering Terms (Horner and Abbey, 1960), p. 369.

3. Yang-tzu is the nontechnical counterpart of yang-pan , often employed in reference to paper-cut or cloth-made patterns. Before yang-pan t’ien became the officially established term for the “demonstration field,” yang-tzu t’ien was sometimes used as an alternative (e.g., JMJP, 10/9/60, p. 1); and the expression tso-ch’u yang-tzu (e.g., JMJP, 6/28/61, p. 2; 6/16/64, p. 2) is still just as common as the expression tso-ch’u yang-pan (e.g., JMJP, 6/28/61, p. 2; 7/9/64, P. 5).

4. Cf. “Yang-pan t’ien is a new (agricultural) form having appeared in our country some time after 1958. It [functions as] a guide in agricultural production [activity] and in developing agricultural science.” JMJP, 3/28/65, p. 2.

5. “Recently the State Council convoked a national conference in Peking on the experimental work of the nation’s agricultural science. It issued a call upon the agricultural scientists and the agricultural technicians to go up to the mountain regions and down to the countryside (shang-shan hsia-hsiang ) to mingle with the broad masses. Under the guidance of the Party, they were actively to develop the movement for experiments in agronomy, centered around the yang-pan t’ien, backed by the expertise of agricultural scientists and agricultural technicians, and based on the scientific experimental activities of the broad masses and peasants.” Ibid.

6. “The appearance of yang-pan t’ien has opened up a broad path for effectively carrying out the Party’s policy of making science serve production.” Ibid.

7. According to a 1965 report by Chiang I-chen , then Vice Minister of Agriculture, there were in 1965 some 5,000 officially sponsored yang-pan t’ien. Of these, 1000 were partially sponsored by the various research divisions of agricultural science and engaging about one-fourth of the nation’s agricultural scientists. More than 4000, in twelve provinces and regions, were partially sponsored by the agricultural technique dissemination centers of those areas. The mass-sponsored yang-pan t’ien were even greater in number. JMJP, 3/28/65, p. 2.

8. For a detailed study of tien and mien and their interrelations, see T. A. Hsia’s A Terminological Study of the Hsia-fang Movement (Berkeley: Center for Chinese Studies, 1963, Studies in Chinese Communist Terminology no. 10), pp. 48-51.

9. San-chieh-ho is a significant term in connection with any Chinese mass movement or collective activity. The basic form of a san-chieh-ho organization normally consists of these three kinds of people: cadres, professional workers and masses. However, except for cadres, the constitution of the “professional workers” and the “masses” is decided upon by actual circumstances. In recent years the most important, nationwide, san-chieh-ho organization at various levels is the Tri-unified Revolutionary Committee (san-chieh-ho te ke-ming wei-yüan hui ) which is formed by “leaders of revolutionary mass organizations that truly represent the broad masses, the representatives of the People’s Liberation Army units stationed in the area, and revolutionary leading cadres.” Hung ch’i, No. 5 (1967), editorial; and Peking Review, 3/17/67, p. 14. For a brief survey of the origin of the term san-chieh-ho in Chinese Communist jargon, see Miss Li Chi, Terms Topped by Numerals (Berkeley: Center for Chinese Studies, 1957, Studies in Chinese Communist Terminology no. 3), pp. 40-41.

10. To emphasize its exemplary character and its high-yield quality, the yang-pan t’ien is sometimes redundantly described as “shih-fan” yang-pan t’ien (“model-demonstrating” yang-pan t’ien) or “kao-ch’an” yang-pan t’ien (“high-yield” yang-pan t’ien). Occasionally, however, a yang-pan t’ien is designed to show the contrast between the desirable or the correct, and the undesirable or the wrong means of farming. This kind of yang-pan t’ien is called “tui-pi,” i.e., “contrast,” yang-pan t’ien (e.g., JMJP, 7/9/64, p. 5).

11. Sha-chia-pang, Hung-teng chi, Chih-ch’ü wei-hu-shan and Ch’i-hsi pai-hu-t’uan were all among the thirty-seven Peking operas presented at the National Festival of Peking Opera on Contemporary Themes held in Peking in the summer of 1964 (June 5 to July 30). After the Festival, under the direction of Chiang Ch’ing, all four were revised several times and were acclaimed yang-pan by the “worker, peasant and soldier audience.” Cf. T’an Yüan-shou , Yung Mao Tse-tung ssu-hsiang su-tsao ying-hsiung hsing-hsiang (Using Mao Tse-tung’s Thought to Sculpt the Image of the Hero), JMJP, 5/14/67, P. 6.

12. The comprehensiveness of this word can be seen in the compound po-hsi (hundred hsi), already in common use as early as Han times, where the term referred to the various kinds of entertaining performances. See “Yüeh chih” (“The Treatise on Music”), in T’ang shu (T’ang History).

13. For a brief yet scholarly discussion as to the roles played by song and dance in the traditional Chinese drama, see Wang Kuo-wei , Sung-Yüan hsi-ch’ü shih (History of the Sung and Yüan Drama), especially chapters 1, 4, 11, 13, 14 and 16.

14. Instead of the customarily established transliteration pa-lei (ballet), the Communist cultural leaders prefer the term wu-chü (dance-drama) or pa-lei wu-chü (ballet dance-drama) in which the dramatic aspect, i.e., the content, is emphasized. It should also be noted that singing has been added to the ballet Pai-mao nü (“White-haired Girl) in order to “help the audience understand the story” and to “bridge the gap between them (i.e., the worker-peasant-soldier audience) and the ballet.” Chinese Literature, Wo. 8 (1966), p. 127.

15. See the speech of Ch’en Ju-t’ang (a member of the Central Orchestra ) in commemoration of the 25th anniversary of Mao’s Yenan Talks, Hung ch’i, No. 8 (1967), pp. 51-53.

16. It is interesting that even among Chinese artists and musicians themselves, there has been a certain degree of confusion concerning the true identity of the symphony Sha-chia-pang:

Chou Yang, Lin Mo-han and the rest tried desperately to strangle Sha-chia-pang. After Comrade Chiang Ch’ing and the worker-peasant-soldier audiences had set the seal of warm approval on it, Li Ling, on Chou Yang’s instructions, called a meeting of the whole orchestra to discuss whether Sha-chia- pang could be considered symphonic music or not. They incited certain members of the orchestra who were not clear about the real situation to attack the symphony, in order to achieve their base political end. Some people openly declared: “I honestly can’t regard Sha-chia-pang as a symphony.” Having collected 96 criticisms, they launched a slanderous whispering campaign and attempted to stir up enough opposition to crush this new but sturdy bud.

During this fight to the finish, the broad masses of workers, peasants and soldiers armed with Mao Tse-tung’s thought rose up and came resolutely to our support. They declared in no uncertain terms: Sha-chia-pang is a very fine symphony! Led by Comrade Chiang Ch’ing and supported by the workers, peasants and soldiers, we ruthlessly swept aside all stumbling blocks and defeated the frenzied counterattacks of the counterrevolutionary revisionists. . . . Chinese Literature, No. 3 (1967), p. 7.

17. Cf. the commentary on ke-ming yang-pan-hsi in the column “Terms Explained” (“Ming-tz’u chieh-shih” of the Hong Kong Ta-kung pao (6/24/69, p. 2):

Yang-pan has the meaning “model” (pang-yang ) and “pattern” (pan-shih ) indicating an exemplary quality worthy of emulation. The revolutionary yang-pan-hsi is an outstanding new dramatic genre which [has followed the policy of] “expelling the old and producing the new” and has made the classical artistic form express revolutionary content. . . . Following Chairman Mao’s line on literature and art, conforming to his teaching that literature and art should serve the workers, peasants and soldiers and that we should make the ancient serve the present, and the foreign serve the Chinese, and under the direct guidance of Comrade Chiang Ch’ing, the Chinese art workers have created some outstanding yang-pan in the field of revolutionary literature and art: the revolutionary modern Peking operas Hung-teng chi, Chih-ch’ü wei-hu-shan, Sha-chia-pang, Hai-kang and Ch’i-hsi pai-hu-t’uan; the revolutionary modern ballet dance-drama Hung-se niang-tzu-chün and Pai-mao nü; the revolutionary modern symphonic music Sha-chia-pang and that new revolutionary art and literary genre of the proletariat, the piano music Hung-teng chi with Peking opera singing.

18. Three variations of Hung-teng chi had already appeared by the end of 1968; all were produced under the “personal care” of Chiang Ch’ing and “approved” by the “broad masses.” They include the Peking opera Hung-teng chi, the piano music Hung-teng chi with Peking opera singing, and the Peking opera Hung-teng chi with Western style orchestral accompaniment (JMJP, 10/1/68, p. 3 and p. 7).

19. Chiang Ch’ing, “On the Revolution of Peking Opera.”

20. Hsiao Chia , “Sha-chia-pang te tan-sheng” (“The Birth of Shachiapang”), Shanghai Wen-hui pao, 6/4/65; and Ching-chü Sha-chia-pang p’ing-lun chi (Anthology of Criticism on the Peking Opera Shachiapang), (Peking: Chung-kuo hsi-chü ch’u-pan-she, 1965), p. 247.

21. Shih-yen t’ien, it should be noted, “is a domain created for the cadres who are more ‘red’ than they are ‘expert.’” T. A. Hsia, A Termino logical Study of the Hsia-fang Movement, p. 37.

22. See Kung Ch’i Yang-pan-hsi hsiao-shih (A Brief History of Yang-pan Hsi): “Bringing about a revolution in Peking opera, the Number One Peking Opera Troupe of Peking is Comrade Chiang Ch’ing’s shih-yen t’ien. . . .” Hong Kong Wen-hui pao, 7/26/67, P. 9.

23. The symposium was held on November 28, 1966, in Peking, where Chiang Ch’ing was officially declared the advisor on cultural affairs to the PLA. It was also announced that the Number One Peking Opera Troupe of Peking--together with the Chinese Peking Opera Academy, the Central Orchestra, and the Ballet Troupe and its Orchestra of the Central Opera and Dance-drama Academy--was to be integrated into the PLA system by the directive of the Military Commission of the Central Committee, and by the decision of the Cultural Revolution Group of the CCP’s Central Committee. (JMJP, 12/4/66, pp. 1-2.) It should be noted that this was the first speech of Chiang Ch’ing’s to be released and reported in detail, in the official organ Jen-min jih-pao, immediately after its delivery.

24. Forum Summary, Part III.

25. The concept of “uninterrupted revolution” was re-emphasized at the time of the Great Leap Forward, and again during the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution. For a study of this concept in these two periods, see Stuart R. Schram, “Mao Tse-tung and the Theory of the Permanent Revolution, 1958-1969,” The China Quarterly, No. 46 (April-June, 1971), pp. 221-244.

26. E.g., “Chih-ch’ü wei-hu-shan goes from ‘excellent to still more excellent.’ . . . Under the guidance of the Party, with the ‘spirit of uninterrupted revolution,’ the comrades of the [Shantung Peking Opera] Troupe have made considerable revision of the script [of Ch’i-hsi pai-hu-t’uan].” (JMJP, 4/25/66, p. 6.)

27. Chao Yen-hsia , “Still More Rich, Still More True to Life--Some Feelings and Thoughts in Playing the Part of A-ch’ing’s Wife,” KMJP, 5/1/65; and Ching-chü Sha-chia-pang p’ing-lun chi, p. 135.

28. As an example, see the editor’s note on the October 1969 version of the Chih-ch’ü wei-hu-shan, published in Hung ch’i:

Here we publish the script of the opera as staged in Peking in October 1969, and recommend it to our broad worker, peasant and soldier readership fighting at different posts. All the theatrical troupes in various localities should use this text as the standard version when they stage this drama. Hung ch’i, No. 11 (1969), P. 32.

29. As of the writing of this paper, the only yang-pan hsi not yet available in cinema version is Ch’i-hsi pai-hu-t’uan. To the knowledge of this writer, the ballet dance-drama Pai-mao nü was filmed in 1970 for television only (JMJP, 10/3/70, p. 6). However, at the beginning of 1972, a movie version of the ballet was also made available to the Chinese audience (JMJP, 2/24/72, p. 4). The remaining five have all been produced as regular full-length color films.

30. The three Peking operas are P’ing-yüan tso-chan (Battle on the Plain), Tu-ch’üan shan (Tu-ch’üan Mountain) and Lung-chiang sung (Lung River Ode); the dance-drama is entitled Yi Meng sung (Ode of Yi Meng). Aside from these four productions, the Peking opera Hung-se niang-tzu-chün (Red Detachment of Women), which was among the thirty-seven operas presented at the 1964 National Festival of Peking Opera on Contemporary Themes, was also revived in 1971 (JMJP, 10/l/71, p. 4). However, the new version has been adapted from the ballet dance-drama of the same name and is, therefore, different from the 1964 version.

31. The rationale of this “experimental presentation” is that “the birth of any outstanding, revolutionary work of art and literature must undergo the process of ‘thousands of forgings and hundreds of refinings’ (ch’ien-chui pai-lien ) as well as the process of going from ‘excellent to still more excellent’ (ching i ch’iu ching ). This is a rule for literary and art creation; and the practice of ‘experimental presentation’ conforms with this rule.” JMJP, 11/22/71, p. 3.

Chapter III

1. Forum Summary, Part II, Items 5 and 6.

2. For a study of this word chua in the Communist phraseology and its new application as well as implications, see T. A. Hsia, A Terminological Study of the Hsia-fang Movement, pp. 43-45. “Chua probably connotes complete, exclusive and unrelenting control.”

3. The Great Wall Along the South Sea (Nan-hai ch’ang-ch’eng), a play of five acts, tells the story of how the militia at Ta-nan Harbor (Ta-nan kang ) successfully destroyed an American-Chinese Nationalist landing attempt on the South China coast on the eve of October first, 1962.

4. The reason, we are told, for choosing the script of the Shanghai Ai-hua Shanghai Opera Troupe (Shang-hai Ai-hua Hu-chü-t’uan ) from among the more than ten then existing drama versions of Hung-teng chi is that “the characterization of the railway worker Li Yü-ho [the principal hero and an underground Party member] is somewhat better [than that of the other versions].” Kung Ch’i, Yang-pan-hsi hsiao-shih, Hong Kong Wen-hui pao, 7/23/67, p. 9.

5. Forum Summary, Part II, Item 5.

6. Ibid.

7. Ch’ün Ying , “Mao Tse-tung ssu-hsiang chih-yin-che pa-lei-wu ke-ming” (“Mao Tse-tung’s Thought is Guiding the Revolution in Ballet”), JMJP, 6/2/67, p. 4.

8. See the editor’s note on “Chiang Ch’ing’s Directives for the Ballet Dance-drama ‘Hung-se niang-tzu-chün,’ “Chin-chün pao, 5/31/67; this article can also be found in Chung Hua-min’s Chiang Ch’ing cheng-chuan (A Biography of Chiang Ch’ing) (Hong Kong: Union Research Institute, 1967), pp. 103-112.

9. “Within the ranks of the people, democracy is correlative with centralism and freedom with discipline. They are the two opposites of a single entity, contradictory as well as united; and we should not one-sidedly emphasize one to the denial of the other. Within the ranks of the people, we cannot do without freedom, nor can we do without discipline; we cannot do without democracy, nor can we do without centralism. This unity of democracy and centralism, of freedom and discipline, constitutes our democratic centralism.” Mao Tse-tung, “On the Correct Handling of Contradictions Among the People” (delivered on the 27th of February, 1957), Selected Readings from the Works of Mao Tse-tung (Peking: Foreign Languages Press, 1971), p. 438.

10. Forum Summary, Part II, Item 6.

11. For an interesting reaction to the Party’s leadership in the writing of dramatic literature, see K’e Ch’ing-shih , “Strenuously Develop and Promote the Socialist Theater the Better to Serve the Socialist Economic Base” (“Ta-li fa-chan ho fan-jung she-hui-chu-i hsi-chü, keng-hao-te wei she-hui-chu-i-te ching-chi-chi-ch’u fu-wu” , ):

In the past, some people have used the pretext of “opposing the leadership’s interfering with creative writing” to deny the importance of the Party’s leadership. . . . They remarked with ulterior motives that the plays on contemporary themes “were all written under the direct leadership and with the direct participation of the Party organizations” and that “it would be better to say that these plays were written by the Party committees than to say that they were written by certain playwrights.” . . .

Hung ch’i, No. 15 (1964); KMTP, 8/17/64, pp. 2-3; Hsi-chü pao, No. 8 (1964), pp. 4-19; Peking Review (under the English title “A Flourishing Theater to Serve the Socialist Economic Base”), No. 35, 8/28/64, and No. 37, 9/11/64.

12. See, for example, Chou En-lai’s speech at the symposium held by the literary and art workers in Peking on the 28th of November, 1966:

The above-mentioned achievements in revolutionizing literature and art are inseparable from Comrade Chiang Ch’ing’s guidance and from the support and cooperation of the revolutionary leftists (ke-ming tso-p’ai ) in the fields of literature and art. These achievements are the result of the staunch struggle against the revisionist black-line which has existed in the fields of literature and art since the 30s. And Comrade Chiang Ch’ing has personally participated in the practice of struggle and the practice of art. JMJP, 12/4/66, p. 2.

13. Kung Ch’i, Yang-pan-hsi hsiao-shih, Hong Kong Wen-hui pao, 7/28/67, P. 9.

14. Forum Summary, Part II, Item 10.

15. Ibid.

16. See, for example, the editor’s note on “P’o-ssu li-kung, wei ke-ming erh ch’uang-tso” , (“Destroy Self, Establish Public, Write for the Sake of Revolution”) by Chin Ching-mai , author of the well known novel Ou-yang Hai chih ke (Song of Ou-yang Hai):

Following Chairman Mao’s teaching, Comrade Chin Ching-mai went to the army, the great school of Mao Tse-tung’s thought, to completely remould his own thought. . . . In the course of his soul-remoulding struggle, he bravely destroyed “self” and established “public”; he deeply felt that “in order to write revolutionary literature, one must first become a revolutionary person” (yao hsieh ke-ming-wen, hsien tso ke-ming-jen , ). JMJP, 12/5/66, p. 2.

Another example is the young female story-teller in a small village near Shanghai, who is said to have “firmly borne in mind the principle that, ‘in order to tell revolutionary stories well, one must first become a revolutionary person’” (yao chiang-hao ke-ming ku-shih, hsien tso ke-ming-jen , ). JMJP, 4/25/66, p. 6.

17. In 1966, Mao’s writings in literature and art were collected and put into one volume under the title Mao Tse-tung lun wen-i. According to one source this book, in 1966 (after the Forum on Literature and Art in the Armed Forces), was “printed and distributed, at Comrade Lin Piao’s suggestion, to all the literary and art workers in the armed forces; and a system was set forth whereby this book is to be read constantly, and whereby a general summing-up and examination is to be undertaken in May of every year.” Pei-ching hsin wen-i , No. 2, 5/18/67; quoted by Chung Hua-min, Chiang Ch’ing cheng-chuan, p. 221.

18. E.g., see the editorial in Hung ch’i, No. 6 (1967).

19. Forum Summary, Part II, Item 10. For an example of how classes of “Readings in Mao Tse-tung’s Thought” are organized, conducted, and tied in practice to the various theatrical activities, see the last part of “Tsai tou-cheng-chung tuan-lien, tsai tou-cheng-chung ch’eng-chang” , (“Tempered in Struggle, Grown in Struggle”), Hsi-chü pao, No. 9 (1964), pp. 34-39.

20. The “five-alongsides” movement calls upon the theatrical artists to labor, alongside with writing, performing, helping (the amateur troupes) and propagandizing (pien lao-tung , pien ch’uang-tso , Pien yen-ch’u , pien fu-tao , pien hsüan-ch’uan ). The five “alongsides” plus studying (pien hsüeh-hsi ) make up the so-called “six alongsides.”

21. “Shen-ju sheng-huo, kai-tsao ssu-hsiang, yen-hao hsien-tai-hsi” , , (“Plunge Deeply into Life, Reform Thought to Perform Dramas on Contemporary Themes Well”), KMJP, 8/27/64, p. 3.

22. For a typical answer, especially among the actors and actresses of the Peking opera, to the call for “plunging deeply into life” see Chao Yen-hsia , “Fang-hsia chia-tzu, ts’ung-t’ou hsüeh-ch’i” , (“Stop Putting on Airs, Learn from the Beginning”), Hsi-chü pao, No. 6 (1964), pp. 25-27.

23. In order to improve their artistry in portraying the proletarian fighter, for instance, the whole cast of the Red Detachment of Women “twice went to stay with units of the PLA, learning from the soldiers and getting training in military exercises. These experiences not only deepened their revolutionary outlook but also provided a more realistic basis on which to create and adapt ballet movements and create new dance movements suited to the new needs of their roles. . . . Such dances of the corps de ballet portraying the Red Army’s training as shooting and hand grenade throwing are modern innovations evolved out of the real life movements of PLA soldiers.” Peking Review, No. 6, 2/5/65, pp. 30-31.

24. Pi is an abbreviation of pi hsien-chin ; hsüeh is an abbreviation of hsüeh hsien-chin ; kan is an abbreviation of kan hsien-chin ; and pang is an abbreviation of pang hou-chin .

25. The origin of the pi-hsüeh-kan-pang movement can probably be found in Liu Shao-ch’i’s “Report on the Work of the Central Committee of the CCP to the Second Session of the Eighth National Congress,” delivered on May 5, 1958:

An emulation drive in which the backward learn from, and catch up to, and compete with the advanced [hsüeh hsien-chin, kan hsien-chin, pi-hsien-chin , , ] has been launched between individuals, production teams, enterprises, cooperatives, counties and cities. Set norms are being constantly surpassed and new techniques invented. Time after time the masses outstrip the targets set by enterprises and administrative organs.

Second Session of the Eighth National Congress of the Communist Party of China (Peking: Foreign Languages Press, 1958), p. 28.

26. “Using the old theatrical forms to portray modern life is presently still in the incipient stage. At this stage, in order to advance faster and better, it is necessary to develop pi-hsüeh-kan-pang activities among the various theatrical kinds and various theatrical organizations for the exchange of experiences.” “The Success of Lu-tang huo-chung Re-examined” (“Tsai-t’an Lu-tang huo-chung wei-shen-mo neng huo-te ch’eng-kung” ), KMJP, 5/18/64; and Ching-chü Sha-chia-pang p’ing-lun-chi, pp. 7-11. See also “Developing the Pi-hsüeh-kan-pang Movement on the Theatrical Front” (“K’ai-chan hsi-chü chan-hsien-shang-te pi-hsüeh-kan-pang yün-tung” ), Hsi-chü pao, No. 3 (1965), p. 41; and Ching-chü Hung-teng chi p’ing-lun-chi, pp. 1-3.

27. For a brief account of the origin and development and the charac teristics of the Hu-chü, or Shanghai opera, see the preface to the volume on Shanghai (pp. 5-8) in Chung-kuo ti-fang hsi-ch’ü chi-ch’eng (Anthology of Chinese Local Dramas) (Peking: Chung-kuo hsi-chü ch’u-pan-she, 1959).

28. See “What Are the Main Things We Should Learn from the Peking Opera Hung-teng chi?” (Women chu-yao hsiang ching-chü Hung-teng chi hsüeh-hsi shen-mo? ?), Chieh-fang jih-pao, 4/16/65; and Ching-chü Hung-teng chi p’ing-lun-chi, pp. 23-30.

29. See “The Success of Lu-tang huo-chung Re-examined.”

30. See, for example, the special report on the movement to emulate the Peking opera Hung-teng chi in Hsi-chü pao, No. 3 (1965), pp. 41-45.

31. Hsi-chü pao, No. 5 (1965), p. 32.

32. Ibid.

33. Forum Summary, Part II, Item 7.

34. Thus Chang Tung-ch’uan (vice-president of the China Peking Opera Academy), in his “Ching-chü Hung-teng chi kai-pien ho ch’uang-tso-te ch’u-pu t’i-hui” (“First Understanding Gained in the Adaptation and Creation of the Peking opera Hung-teng chi”), JMTP, 6/3/65; and Ching-chü Hung-teng chi p’ing-lun chi, pp. 312-325.

35. Chin Ching-mai, “P’o-ssu li-kung, wei ke-ming erh ch’uang-tso,” JMTP, 12/5/66, p. 3.

Chapter IV

1. See “Shen-ju chan-k’ai tui hsiu-cheng-chu-i wen-i p’i-p’an” (“Develop Extensively the Criticism of Revisionist Literature and Arts”), Shanghai Wen-hui pao, 9/10/69, editorial.

2. Forum Summary, Part II, Item 1.

3. V. I. Lenin, “Party Organization and Party Literature,” Collected Works (Moscow: Foreign Languages Publishing House, 1962), Vol. 10.

4. For examples of such slogans, see H. C. Chuang, The Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution: A Terminological Study (Berkeley: Center for Chinese Studies, 1967, Studies in Current Chinese Terminology no. 12), p. 40.

5. For example, both Feng Hsüeh-feng and Hu Feng , purged respectively in 1954 and 1955, have been accused of being exponents of this theory. See Note No. 1 to the Forum Summary in English.

6. P’i-p’an hsien-shih chu-i is the Chinese term for the realism popular in literary circles of 19th century Europe. According to some Chinese literary theorists, the advocates of this realism usually look at life from its seamy side only, with hypercritical moral judgment. Thus the term “p’i-p’an hsien-shih chu-i,” or “critical realism.”

7. D. W. Fokkema offers a discussion of this “combination of revolutionary realism and revolutionary romanticism” at its formative stage in 1958-59, in his Literary Doctrine in China and Soviet Influence 1956-1960 (The Hague: Mouton, 1965), pp. 196-202.

8. Kung Tun , “Mao chu-hsi ke-ming wen-i-lu-hsien te wei-ta sheng-li: t’an pa-lei wu-chü Pai-mao nü te kal-pien” : (“A Great Victory for Chairman Mao’s Revolutionary Literary and Art Lines: On the Revision of the Ballet Dance-drama, White-haired Girl”), JMTP, 6/11/67, p. 6.

9. See Ho Ching-chih , “Pai-mao nü te ch’uang-tso yü yen-ch’ü (“How the White-haired Girl Was Written and Produced”), appended to the text of the opera Pai-mao nü. Ho’s article has been partially translated and is prefaced to the English text published by the Foreign Languages Press, Peking, 1954.

10. Ibid.

11. Yenan Talks, in Mao Tse-tung lun wen-i, p. 40; and Mao Tse-tung on Literature and Art, p. 27.

12. “As with all stories handed down orally, there have been different versions, and ours is only one of many. However, the variants differ only in certain episodes; the central theme, chief characteristics and main episodes are common to all. . . . Through the tragic experiences of the daughter of a tenant peasant, the story gives concentrated expression to the sufferings of the peasants under the dark feudal rule of the old China, at the same time revealing the splendour of the new China and of the new democracy led by the Communist party in which the peasants have become their own masters. In the words of the opera: ‘The old society changed men into ghosts, while the new society changes ghosts into men’ (Act V, Scene 2),” Ho Ching-chih, op. cit.

13. Kung Tun, op. cit.

14. KMJP, 4/30/66, p. 3.

15. Yü Lu-yüan : “The artists and writers for the dance-drama Pai-mao nü, under the leadership of the Party, studied Chairman Mao’s works on classes, class contradictions and class struggle, and used his thought to analyze the subject and the main theme. By doing so, they have gained a better understanding of the relationship between Huang Shih-jen and Yang Pai-lao, Hsi-erh, and Ta-ch’un--a relationship of two opposing classes in mortal combat. The experience of Hsi-erh, Ta-ch’un and the rest truly reflected the life and fate of hundreds of millions of peasants in the old China. . . . The path they trod was the historical path travelled by the multitudes of the Chinese peasantry.” JMJP, 4/28/66, P. 5.

16. Forum Summary, Part II, Item 9: “The fine qualities of the worker, peasant and soldier heroes, emerging under the guidance of the Party’s correct line, are the concentrated expression of the class character of the proletariat. Doing everything possible, we must enthusiastically sculpt heroic images of the workers, peasants and soldiers.”

17. Chiang Ch’ing, “T’an Ching-chü ke-ming” (“On the Revolution of Peking Opera”).

18. In the eyes of the new cultural leaders, descriptions, both favorable and unfavorable, of the “wrong lines” are sometimes considered false. Cf., “In the past, there have been works which distorted the historical facts--works portraying only the erroneous lines not depicting the correct line.” Forum Summary, Part II, Item 9.

19. Kung Tun, op. cit.

20. On July 14, 1962, a forum sponsored by the editorial board of the Hsi-chü pao discussed the current staging of this revised opera Pai-mao nü. Excerpts from the opinions of the participants were published in Hsi-chü pao, No. 8 (1962), pp. 34-45.

21. The passages which describe Hsi-erh’s wishful thinking and fancy regarding Huang Shih-jen after she has become pregnant, for example, are deleted from this version of the story. Ibid., p. 39.

22. Ibid., p. 35.

23. “Communique of the Tenth Plenary of the Eighth Central Committee of the Communist Party of China,” JMJP, 9/29/62, p. 1; and Peking Review, No. 39 (1962).

24. Of the thirty-seven operas presented in the 1964 National Festival of Peking Opera on Contemporary Themes, only nineteen were operas “reflecting the new life since the establishment of our country.” The remaining were operas “reflecting the historical subjects of the revolution.” Hsi-chü pao, No. 7 (1964), P.14.

25. Forum Summary, Part II, Item 2.

26. “Comrade Mao Tse-tung has put forward the slogans ‘catch up with and outstrip Britain in fifteen years,’ ‘build socialism by exerting our utmost efforts and pressing ahead consistently to achieve greater (to ), faster (k’uai ), better (hao ) and more economical (sheng ) results,’ . . .” Liu Shao-ch’i, Report on the Work of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China to the Second Session of the Eighth National Congress (Peking: Foreign Languages Press, 1958), p. 28.

27. Hsi-chü pao, No. 8 (1962), p. 41.

Chapter V

1. A different Peking opera version based on the movie Tzu yu hou-lai-jen was also staged in 1964 at the National Festival of Peking Opera on Contemporary Themes. This opera was presented by the Harbin Peking Opera Troupe (Ha-erh-pin-shih Ching-chü-t’uan ) under the title “Ke-ming tzu yu hou-lai-jen” (“The Revolution Certainly Has Successors”). See KMJP, 5/31/64, p. 1; and Hsi-chü pao, No. 6 (1964, pp. 38-42.

2. The text of this Shanghai opera Hung-teng chi can be found in Chü-pen , No. 2 (1964); and in Hua-tung hsi-chü ts’ung-k’an (Shanghai: Wen-hua Ch’u-pan She, 1964).

3. Hung ch’i, No. 5 (1970), pp. 23-46; and Chinese Literature, No. 8 (1970), pp. 8-52.

4. The script was a collective creation of the Shanghai People’s Shanghai-Opera Troupe (Shanghai jen-min Hu-chü t’uan ) and was written by Wen Mu . See the preface to the text of the Peking opera Lu-tang huo-chung.

5. The text of the Peking opera Lu-tang huo-chung was published in 1964 by the China Drama Publishing Company (Chung-kuo Hsi-chü Ch’u-pan-she ), Peking. An English translation of this script can be found in Chinese Literature, No. 9 (1964).

6. See “Tsai Yenan wen-i tso-t’an-hui-shang-te chiang-hua chao-yao-cho Sha-chia-pang te ch’eng-chang” (“The Talks at the Yenan Forum on Literature and Art Illuminating the Maturing of Shachiapang”) by the Sha-chia-pang Group of the Peking Opera Troupe of Peking: “We can never forget that on July 23, 1964, our great leader Chairman Mao attended a performance of the Peking opera Lu-tang huo-chung, and personally conceived the name Sha-chia-pang.” Hung ch’i, No. 6 (1970), p. 40.

7. Ibid., pp. 8-39; and Chinese Literature, No. 11 (1970), pp. 3-62.

8. An English translation of the novel, under the title Tracks in the Snowy Forest, was published in 1962 by the Foreign Languages Press in Peking. Ch’ü Po’s book came out in 1957. With its romantic and adventurous incidents and exciting descriptions, the story was almost immediately transplanted to the screen and onto the stage. In 1958, the China Peking Opera Academy presented a Peking opera Lin-hai hsüeh-yüan which was adapted from the first eight chapters of Ch’ü Po’s novel; but a year earlier, the Peking Opera Troupe of Peking had staged an opera Chih-ch’in kuan-fei tso-shan-tiao (Capturing the Hardened Bandit Mountain-vulture by Strategy) which was an adaptation from chapters 11 to 21 of the novel Lin-hai hsüeh-yüan. See T’ao Chün-ch’i’s Ching-chü chü-mu ch’u-t’an (Peking: Chung-kuo hsi-chü ch’u-pan-she, 1963), pp. 503-504. Chih-ch’ü wei-hu-shan covers approximately the same range of episodes as did Chih-ch’in kuan-fei tso-shan-tiao.

9. Cf. a statement by the “Taking Tiger Mountain by Strategy Group” of the Peking Opera Troupe of Shanghai: “Eleven years have passed since it was first adapted and performed. But it has come to life only during the last seven years--seven glorious years from early 1963 to the present day, marked by sharp class struggle at every turn, during which the revising of the script proceeded under Comrade Chiang Ch’ing’s direct leadership and with her personal participation. . .” Hung ch’i, No. 11 (1969), pp. 62-78; and Chinese Literature, Wo. 1 (1970), pp. 58-74.

10. For a detailed report on the revising work carried out by the Peking Opera Troupe of Shanghai on the Chih-ch’ü wei-hu-shan, see ibid.

11. Chih-ch’ü wei-hu-shan (Peking: Jen-min ch’u-pan-she, 1970). An English translation of the 1967 version of the opera can be found in Chinese Literature, No. 8 (1967), under the title “Taking the Bandits’ Stronghold.” The popular October 1969 stage script was first published in Hung ch’i, No. 11 (1969); an English translation appeared under the title “Taking Tiger Mountain by Strategy” in Chinese Literature, No. 1 (1970).

12. See the preface to the Ch’i-hsi pai-hu-t’uan (Peking: Chung-kuo hsi-chü ch’u-pan-she, 1964). The story of Ch’i-hsi pai-hu-t’uan is said to have been based upon the actual deeds of a certain scout platoon of the Chinese People’s Volunteers during the Korean War. See “An Opera Embodying Mao Tse-tung’s Thought,” in Chinese Literature, No. 10 (1967), pp. 59-64.

13. See “Ch’i-hsi Pai-hu-t’uan chin-shang t’ien-hua” (“Flowers for Embroidering Raid on the White Tiger Regiment”), JMJP, 4/25/66, p. 6.

14. Chinese Literature, No. 10 (1967), pp. 13-58.

15. Huai-chü is a regional opera which originated in the area of Yen-ch’eng , Fu-ning and Huai-yin in Kiangsu province. See the volume on Kiangsu province in the Anthology of Chinese Local Dramas, 1959. For a discussion on the Huai opera Hai-kang te tsao-ch’en, see Hsi-chü pao, No. 9 (1964), pp. 21-23.

16. See Yang-pan-hsi hsiao-shih, “Hai-kang shih tsen-yang sha-ch’u-lai-te” (“How On the Docks Fought Its Way Out”), Hong Kong Wen-hui pao, 7/30/67, p. 9.

17. JMJP, 11/3/66, p. 6; KMJP, 11/3/66, p. 4.

18. Hung ch’i, No. 2 (1972), pp. 22-48; JMJP, 2/1/72, pp. 2-5; Chinese Literature, No. 5 (1972), pp. 52-98. A complete English translation of this 1972 script can also be found in Selections from China Mainland Magazines (Hong Kong: American Consulate General), March 1972, pp. 23-73.

19. The Ballet Troupe of the Central Opera and Dance-drama Academy was renamed the “Worker-peasant-soldier Ballet Dance-drama Company” (Kung-nung-ping pa-lei-wu-chü-t’uan ) during the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution. After 1969, it became the “China Dance-drama Company” (Chung-kuo wu-chü-t’uan ).

20. The screenplay was written by Liang Hsin , In 1962 the movie Hung-se niang-tzu-chün was awarded the “hundred flowers prize” as the best feature film of 1960-61. The script, and several articles dealing with the script and the film, have been compiled into one volume under the title Hung-se niang-tzu-chün--ts’ung chü-pen tao ying-p’ien (Red Detachment of Women--from Script to Film) (Peking: Chung-kuo tien-ying ch’u-pan-she, 1962). This screenplay can also be found in Chung-kuo tien-ying chü-pen hsüan-chi (Selected Scripts from Chinese Movies) (Peking: Chung-kuo tien-ying ch’u-pan-she, 1963), Vol. VII, pp. 83-165.

21. On October 8, 1964, Mao attended one of the performances of this ballet and approved it by saying that “the orientation is correct, the revolutionary element successful and the artistic quality good.” JMJP, 10/9/64, p. 1; KMJP, 10/9/64, p. 1.

22. “A Great Victory in ‘Making Foreign Things Serve China,’” Chinese Literature, No. 5 (1969), pp. 78-86.

23. Peking Review, No. 6 (1965), p. 30.

24. E.g., the second female movie protagonist Hung Lien is omitted from the ballet on account of her “plainness of character.” See “Chiang Ch’ing’s Directives on the Ballet Dance-drama Hung-se niang-tzu-chün,” Part 5, op. cit.

25. Hung ch’i, No. 7 (1970), pp. 35-65; and Chinese Literature, No. 1 (1971), PP. 2-80.

26. The opera Pai-mao nü, composed on the basis of a story circulating in northwest Hopei province, is the collective production of the Work Team of the Yenan Lu Hsün Art and Literature Academy (Yenan Lu yi kung-tso-t’uan ) and was written by Ho Ching-chih and Ting Yi . In April 1945 the opera was staged in Yenan for the first time, and achieved wide acclaim. Thereafter, it underwent several revisions and won the 1951 Stalin Prize. Ever since its first appearance the story has been constantly staged in various theatrical forms, including that of Peking opera, and has maintained its appeal for the general audience. An English translation of this opera was published by the Foreign Languages Press in 1954.

27. For a detailed and informative account on the creation of the ballet Pai-mao nü, see Yü Lu-yüan , “The Birth of the Grand Revolutionary Modern Ballet Dance-drama Pai-mao nü” (“Ta-hsing ke-ming hsien-tai pa-lei wu-chü Pai-mao nü te tan-sheng” ), JMJP, 4/28/66, p. 5. An English translation of this article, titled “The Revolutionary Ballet ‘The White-haired Girl,’” can be found in Chinese Literature, No. 8 (1966), pp. 117-132.