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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 17 January 2025
Since 2013, the female playwright Li Jing has presented to the public a number of dramatic works which number among the most discussed plays in Chinese theatre circles. This article sketches an approach to her first work, Daxiansheng, which is based, thematically, on the life and work of the modern Chinese writer Lu Xun. By focusing on dramaturgical aspects of this play, such as the material and perspective selected for the story; the interweaving of all kinds of texts; the fragmentation and reassembling of the characters; the design of various contrasting modes and atmospheres; as well as the method of participation of both author and audiences, this article foregrounds the aspects of cosmopolitan theatre displayed both by Li Jing’s work and by contemporary Chinese drama more broadly.
1 The negotiator (Shuike 说客) is part of the Trilogy of the Spring and Autumn period (Chunqiu san bu qu 春秋三部曲), a work by contemporary Chinese playwright Xu Ying 徐英 which, as the title reveals, focuses on events that happened in China more than 2,500 years ago. The negotiator features, for example, Zigong, one of Confucius’s disciples, who is sent out by the Master in order to protect the small state of Lu from war. However, as Lin Zhaohua shows, through speaking of peace he creates more and more strife. Akin Sipal, ‘Der globalisierte Unterhändler’ (2011), https://www.thalia-theater.de/beitraege/197, [accessed 30 May 2024]. Where not indicated otherwise, all translations from German and Chinese are by the author.
2 Ibid.
3 Ibid.
4 Having considered several translations of the title Daxiansheng 大先生, I decided to simply use the pinyin transliteration for this article. As Li Jing reveals, she originally worked with the title ‘Lu Xun’. However, actor Zhao Lixin suggested changing it. Interestingly, the title Daxiansheng does not comprise any explicit mention of Lu Xun’s name. It could be translated as ‘Our Great Master’ or ‘Our Teacher’. However, as Li Jing also points out, Lu Xun, being the eldest of three brothers, was actually referred to in this way by his family. The currently available English translation of the play has opted for the title ‘Lu Xun’; see Jing, Li, ‘Lu Xun. Excerpts from an unstaged ahistorical play’, translated by D. N. C. Hull, Chinese Literature Today, vol. 8, no. 2, 2019, pp. 18–29.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
5 Indeed, the beginning of modern Chinese theatre itself could be conceived of as, in this sense, a ‘cosmopolitan’ event since: ‘the first spoken drama written and staged by Chinese citizens was Black Slave’s Cry to Heaven (Heinu yutianlu)—an adaptation of the Chinese translation of Harriet Beecher Stowe’s novel Uncle Tom’s cabin—presented by the Spring Willow Society in Tokyo in 1907’. Conceison, C., ‘Huaju’, in Encyclopedia of contemporary Chinese culture, (ed.) Davis, E. L. (Abingdon: Routledge, 2009; 2nd edn), p. Google Scholar. For me, the idea of ‘critical cosmopolitanism’ as expressed by Delanty is very useful for thinking about cosmopolitanism in China, whether in the period when modern Chinese drama was just beginning, or in Lu Xun’s period, or with regard to the work of Li Jing herself. As Delanty states: ‘cosmopolitanism as a normative critique refers to phenomena that are generally in tension with their social context, which they seek to transform’. See Delanty, G. and Harris, N., ‘The idea of critical cosmopolitanism’, in Routledge international handbook of cosmopolitanism studies, (ed.) Delanty, G. (Abingdon: Routledge, 2019; 2nd edn), pp. Google Scholar. For Lu Xun and cosmopolitanism, see Zhang, F. and Ren, C., ‘The spread of cosmopolitanism in China and Lu Xun’s understanding of the “world citizen”’, Frontiers of Literary Studies in China, vol. 6, no. 4, 2012, pp. 553–569.Google Scholar
6 In the years from 2010 until 2019 an unprecedented number of theatrical productions travelled between China and Germany. See the list in the appendix to Stecher, A., ‘Blessed bodies, extraordinary exhibitions and missed opportunities: Forty years of Chinese-German cultural projects and diplomacy—a conversation with Chen Ping’, in Contemporary German-Chinese cultures in dialogue, (eds) Jin, H., Stecher, A. and Rebecca, E. (Cham: Springer, 2023), pp. Google Scholar
7 See, for instance, Ferrari, R., Transnational Chinese theatres. Intercultural performance networks in East Asia (Cham: Palgrave Macmillan, 2020).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
8 An exception is the translation of Ziben lun 资本·论, written by Nick Rongjun Yu originally for the Shanghai Dramatic Arts Center, which has been playing extremely successfully under the title Das Kapital: Das Musical at the Theater Dortmund since its premiere in September 2023. See Theater Dortmund, ‘Das Kapital: Das Musical’, https://www.theaterdo.de/produktionen/detail/das-kapital-das-musical/, [accessed 30 May 2024]. As the translator of the script I have been involved in the translation process right from the beginning. The strategy that we opted for in this case was to transpose the play to the local context of Dortmund. I therefore produced a ‘super-commented’ translation where I pointed out—as much as I could—all kinds of humour, word plays, contexts, etc. The dramaturge Marie Senf, as well as the director Kieran Joel, the musicians, and even the actors then went on to ‘translate’ many scenes into their local context.
9 ‘Theatre translation’ has been much discussed in recent years. However, studies on the translation of Chinese works are still very limited. For an introduction to the field of theatre translation, see, for instance, Morini, M., Theatre translation. Theory and practice (London: Bloomsbury, 2022).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
10 Diamond, C., ‘Catalyst and conduit. A call for the bi-cultural dramaturge’, in Dramaturgies of interweaving. Engaging audiences in an entangled world, (eds) Fischer-Lichte, E., Weiler, C. and Jost, T. (Abingdon: Routledge, 2022), pp. 115–116.Google Scholar
11 Gissenwehrer, M., ‘Schafft es Ma Ji? Ein chinesischer Komödiant probt Szenen von Integration. Im Monsterland (2008) von Huang Weiruo’, in Die Konjunktur der Komödie im China der Gegenwart. Stücke und Zugänge, (eds) Stecher, A. and Xu, J. (Munich: Utz, 2022), pp. 183–189.Google Scholar
12 Also in the case of the title ‘Luocha haishi’ (罗刹海市) I have rested content with the pinyin transliteration. As the story makes clear, Pu Songling uses haishi 海市 with a double meaning, i.e. both in its literal sense of ‘sea market’ and in its broader, metaphorical sense of ‘mirage’. For a translation of the story, see, for instance, ‘The rakshashas and the ocean bazaar’, in Songling, Pu, Strange tales from Make-Do Studio (Beijing: Foreign Language Press, 1989)Google Scholar. In the case of Huang Weiruo’s play, the situation is clear: Luocha (罗刹国) surely signifies the land (or the country) of the luocha (in Chinese) or of the rakshasas (in Sanskrit). Since the central conflict of the play is whether to be a daemonic monster or a human being, we have opted for the translation The monster land.
13 Daxiansheng was a very successful production. The play toured several cities in China, and Li Jing won, due to this play, the Lao She Prize for Best Drama. See H. Liu, ‘Lu Xun as the great master. An interview with Li Jing’, translated by D. N. C. Hull, Chinese Literature Today, vol. 8, no. 2, 2019, pp. 30–37.
14 After Daxiansheng, Comedy of Qin (Qinguo xiju 秦国喜剧) also became a much-discussed play. Li Jing’s third play Rongyi’s cape (Rongyi zhi yi 戎夷之衣) is going to be staged in 2024.
15 Fischer-Lichte et al., Dramaturgies of interweaving, p. 3.
16 Meerzon, Y., Performance, subjectivity, cosmopolitanism (Cham: Palgrave Macmillan, 2020)CrossRefGoogle Scholar; E. Fischer-Lichte, T. Jost and Jain, S. I. (eds), The politics of interweaving performance cultures. Beyond postcolonialism (Abingdon: Routledge, 2014)CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Fischer-Lichte et al., Dramaturgies of interweaving.
17 Meerzon, Performance, subjectivity, cosmopolitanism, p. 1 ff.
18 E. Fischer-Lichte, ‘Introduction’, in The politics of interweaving performance cultures, (eds) Fischer-Lichte et al., pp. 1–21, p. 7.
19 Chirita, A., ‘History as farce and the intellectual as comedian: Li Jing’s metahistorical drama Comedies from the state of Qin’, Asian Theatre Journal, vol. 40, no. 1, 2023, pp. CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
20 Li Jing 李静, Daxiansheng 大先生 (Beijing: Zhongguo wenshi, 2015), p. 79. See note 26.
21 This material will be referenced here as ‘In conversation with Li Jing’. Some parts of these conversations have since been published in Italian translation in a special Lu Xun-themed issue of the journal Sinosfere; see A. Stecher, ‘Lu Xun in scena: conversazione con Li Jing’ (8 February 2023), http://sinosfere.com/2023/02/08/anna-stecher-lu-xun-in-scena-conversazione-con-li-jing/, [accessed 30 May 2024).
22 As Li Jing points out, she worked on the text for a very long time; there are several different versions. See Li, Daxiansheng, p. 75. My translations are all based on this book, which contains both the final version of the drama text as well as a number of other texts about the play. For the genesis of the play, see also Liu, ‘Lu Xun as the great master’, pp. 31–37.
23 For a review of the performance see, for instance, ‘On October 3, Shaoxing, Zhejiang, drama Mr. Big was put onstage’, http://en.wuzhen.com.cn/web/cultrue/details?id=44, [accessed 30 May 2024]. The book with the drama text also features a long conversation between Li Jing, art critic Chen Danqing, and the actor Zhao Lixin, see Li, Daxiansheng, pp. 129–185.
24 For an introduction to Lu Xun, see von Kowallis, J. E., The lyrical Lu Xun (Honolulu: University of Hawai‘i Press, 1996)CrossRefGoogle Scholar. For a summary of the play, see Liu, ‘Lu Xun as the great master’, pp. 30–37, pp. 31–32.
25 The many theatrical works inspired by Lu Xun’s life and his literary works are often summed up under the rubric ‘Lu Xun plays’ (Lu Xun xi). The history of this genre can be traced back to the 1920s and 1930s. For an overview of Lu Xun plays, see A. Stecher, ‘Shangyan Lu Xun: Lun xin shiqi yilai de Lu Xun xi 上演鲁迅: 论新时期以来的“鲁迅戏’, PhD thesis, Beijing Normal University, 2012.
26 Li, Daxiansheng, p. 79
27 Meerzon, Performance, subjectivity, cosmopolitanism, p. 8.
28 Ibid.
29 See Li, Daxiansheng, pp. 187–225.
30 ‘In conversation with Li Jing’.
31 Li, Daxiansheng, p. 96.
32 Ibid., p. 100.
33 ‘In conversation with Li Jing’.
34 Xun, Lu, Jottings under lamplight, (eds) Cheng, Eileen J. and Denton, Kirk A. (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2017), p. .Google Scholar
35 Li, Daxiansheng, p. 49.
36 Ibid., pp. 5–6.
37 ‘In conversation with Li Jing’.
38 Meerzon, Performance, subjectivity, cosmopolitanism, p. 4.
39 Ibid.
40 See also Liu, ‘Lu Xun as the great master’, p. 35.
41 ‘In conversation with Li Jing’.
42 Li, Daxiansheng, pp. 17–18.
43 Ibid., p. 2.
44 Meerzon, Performance, subjectivity, cosmopolitanism, p. 11.
45 ‘In conversation with Li Jing’.
46 Li, Daxiansheng, pp. 9–10.
47 Ibid., pp. 41–42. This paragraph is also translated by D. N. C. Hull in Li, ‘Lu Xun. Excerpts from an unstaged ahistorical play’, p. 19. In my translation, I aimed to emphasize the black humour, the grotesqueness, and the element of parody.
48 For the importance of the grotesque in contemporary Chinese theatre, see Yangyang, Yu, Chinesischer Karneval. Mit Bachtin das zeitgenössische Schauspiel lesen (Munich: Utz, 2022).Google Scholar
49 Li, ‘Lu Xun. Excerpts from an unstaged ahistorical play’, p. 20.
50 Meerzon, Performance, subjectivity, cosmopolitanism, p. 5.
51 Li Jing, Bixu maofan guazhong 必须冒犯观众 (Beijing: Xinxing, 2014).
52 Ibid., pp. 118–120.
53 Ibid., p. 118.
54 Ibid., p. 120.
55 Li, Daxiansheng, p. 68.
56 Chirita, ‘History as farce’, p. 47.
57 Li, Daxiansheng, pp. 49–50.
58 Ibid., p. 33.
59 ‘In conversation with Li Jing’.