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Chinese drama by Gao Ming From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Tale of the Pipa (traditional Chinese: 琵琶記; simplified Chinese: 琵琶记; pinyin: Pípa jì; Wade–Giles: P'i-p'a chi "Tale of the Pipa" or "The Story of the Lute") is a Chinese nanxi play written by the playwright Gao Ming during the late Yuan dynasty.[1][2] There are French, German, English translations of the play, and an English novelization-translation.
It was the most popular drama during the Ming dynasty,[3] and it became a model for Ming drama as it was the favorite opera of the first Ming emperor Zhu Yuanzhang.[4]
The play is set during the Han dynasty.[3] Based on an older play, Zhao zhen nü (The Chaste Maiden Zhao), it tells the story of a loyal wife named Zhao Wuniang (T: 趙五孃, S: 赵五娘, P: Zhào Wǔniáng, W: Chao Wu-niang) who, left destitute when her husband Cai Yong is forced to marry another woman, undertakes a 12-year search for him. During her journey, she plays the pipa of the play's title in order to make a living. The original story sees Zhao killed by a horse and Cai struck by lightning, however in Gao Ming's version the two are eventually reconciled and live out their lives happily.[5][6][7] Gao reportedly composed The Lute over a three-year period of solitary confinement, locking himself in an attic room and wearing down the floorboards by tapping out the rhythms of his songs.[2][8]
The Lute won considerable critical acclaim amongst Gao's contemporaries, since it raised the popular and somewhat rustic form of Southern folk opera to a high literary standard, and it became a model for Ming dynasty theatre.[7] It was a favourite play of the first Ming Emperor Zhu Yuanzhang, who commanded that it be performed every day at court.[9][10]
Antoine (A. P. L.) Bazin wrote a French translation in 1841.[11] This version, titled Le Pi-pa-ki ou l'Histoire de Luth, was published in Paris in 1841 by the Imprimerie Royale.[12] A group of Chinese students in Boston performed an English-language version of the play in 1925, translated by Y.H. Ku and Liang Shih-chiu, and acted by Liang and Bing Xin among others.[13] Vincenz Hundhausen wrote a German translation in 1930.[14] A complete English translation and study by Jean Mulligan appeared in 1980. [15]
Memoirs of the Guitar, published in Shanghai in 1928,[16] is an English-language novel self-described as "A Novel of Conjugal Love, Rewritten from a Chinese Classical Drama". The author was Yu Tinn-Hugh and the publisher was the China Current Weekly Publishing Company.[17]
A 1946 American musical comedy based on the Chinese play, titled Lute Song, was written by Will Irwin and Sidney Howard.[18] This adaptation was produced on Broadway. It starred Yul Brenner and Mary Martin.[2] Cyril Birch, collaborator in a translation of The Peach Blossom Fan, wrote that presumably the basis of the American play was the A. P. L. Balzin French translation of the Chinese play.[11]
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