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Nora's Performance in China

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Nora's Performance in China Nora’s Performance in China (1914-2010): Inspiration, Communities and Political Theatre By Xiaofei Chen Master thesis Center for Ibsen Studies UNIVERSITETET I OSLO Spring semester, 2010 Acknowledgements I came to Oslo University by serendipity. When I was searching the resources for my thesis Nora’s rewriting in China(1914-1948), by accident the website of Ibsen Center jumped out. Then I came to Norway and studied at Ibsen Center. Whether in Norway or in China, many people asked me why I had chosen Ibsen studies and had come to Norway. I always said because I liked Ibsen’s plays and Norway has an Ibsen Center. It turned out that I had chosen correctly. At the Ibsen Center, professors and students from all over the world gave me lots of chances to access different ideas and insights into Ibsen studies, especially from theatre and performance aspects. I could access the original Ibsen’s texts and understand Norwegian society in Ibsen’s times, and I could watch Ibsen’s performances from different countries either in the National Theatre or through DVDs in class. Thanks to Ibsen Center for giving me the opportunity to study here, and I also want to show my appreciation for all the professors at the Ibsen Center: especially Frode Helland, Astrid Sæther, Jon Nygaard, Atle Kittang, Erika Fischer-Lichte and Nilu Kamaluddin, Julie Holledge, Knut Brynhildsvoll, who gave me the latest information about Ibsen studies through lectures and seminars. My special thanks for my professor, Jon Nygaard, who gave me the inspiration to write this topic with fresh insight. When I was depressed, he encouraged me and supported me patiently. During the process of writing, he gave me valuable suggestions and corrected my Norwegian translations. I also want to show my gratitude to my friends both in Norway and in China, especially Zhu Shuofeng, who works in the China National Library; Ren Xiaoxia, who works in Peking University. They helped me find the Chinese resources when I could not access them from here. As the first reader, my husband Christian Mogensen, who always supports me and encourages me and helps me improve my English, helped me correct the English grammatical mistakes and made it more fluent. Oslo University, 2010-4-10 2 Contents Introduction………………………………………………………………………..4 Chapter I Nora as a Special Stressor of Spoken Drama in China (1914-1922)...11 1 The Function of Traditional Theatre in China...………………………………..14 2 From Civilized Drama to Spoken Drama…...………………………………......17 3 Spring Willow Society, Nora and Spoken Drama...…………………………….20 4 The Greatest Event in Life―The First Chinese “Nora Theme Play”………….26 Chapter II Noraism and Its Communities: Nora’s Performances were Active in the Political Arena (1923-1948)…………………………………………34 1ProgressiveStudentCommunity:Nora’s Performance was Everywhere (1920s).36 2 Amateur Drama Societies and Nora (1920s)…………………………………….45 3NoraYear and Nanjing Nora Performance Scandal: unexpected shock (1930s)55 4 Fade from History (1937-1948)………………………………………………......67 Chapter III Nora = Ibsen = Ibsenism? (1949-1979)…………………………………......72 Chapter IV Where is Nora? (1980-2010)…………………………………………..81 1 Historical Special Administrative Region of China...…………………………..81 2 Mainlands: Artists’ International Cooperation…………………………………85 3 2006 Forever Ibsen Drama Festival: Political Show……………………………92 Conclusion……………………………………………………………...................99 References……………………………………………………………………......109 Appendix………………………………………………………………………….112 3 Introduction Henrik Ibsen (1828-1906) has been revered as the greatest dramatist since Shakespeare. The Swedish scholar Martin Lamm (1964) declared Ibsen to be the Rome of modern drama.1 “All roads lead to Rome”. In Western countries, scholars would like to use this metaphor to praise Ibsen that all modern drama derived from Ibsen. Therefore, he has a cult as “the father of modern drama”. In China, Ibsen was regarded as a great philosopher and ideological reformer, which influenced tremendously Chinese politics, society and culture. He was very popular for a long time, labeled as a great reformer and great thinker. Not only the dramatists who would like to become Chinese Ibsen, but also many modern authors would like to be Chinese Nora whatever they were men or women, which formed the splendid spectrums in China modern literature history. This modern thinker, whose ideas of individualism, feminism, iconoclasm expressed through the drama, has affected far-reaching impacts all over the world. Performances have been more or less neglected by the researchers in the discussion of Ibsen’s influence in China. Even if mentioned partly, many only used it as a brief introduction to add backgrounds to the literary studies. They seldom just concentrate on Ibsen’s performances. Although there are a few people who have mentioned the problem, mainstream scholars still did not focus on it. Therefore, it is important to stress the importance of studying the performances of Ibsen’s plays in China. The reception and influence of Ibsen in China has attracted critical attention both in China and abroad. There are about more than six doctoral dissertations concentrated on this topic: Ibsen in China: reception and influence by Tam Kwok-Kan; China’s Ibsen: from Ibsen to Ibsenism, by Elisabeth Eide; Henrik Ibsen and Modern Chinese Drama, by He Chengzhou; Ibsen and China, by Wan Xiaojun; Ibsenism and its Influence to China Spoken Drama, by Xue Xiaojin and “Nora” in 1 Lamm, Martin 1964: Det moderna dramat: 1830-1930, Stockholm: Aldus/Bonnier 4 China: The Image-making of New Women and its Transformation（1900s – 1930s）， by Xu Huiqi. Among of them, the former three are published in English; the other three are published in Chinese. But few of them focus on the performance. Even if they all mention the performances more or less, they always deal with them in comparison to the text. For example, Tam claims a panoramic view of the cultural, literary and social impact of Henrik Ibsen in China with a brief description of the performance up to the early 1980s. As she wrote in her book, Eide tries to demonstrate how the diverse backgrounds, schooling and attitudes of the transmitters transformed Ibsen into a European thinker, liberal reformer, or sinicized iconoclast2. And her discussion is limited to a narrower period (1917-1935). He Chengzhou, Wan Xiaojun, Xue Xiaojin focused on Ibsen’s influence on modern Chinese drama, but they did not base their discussion on the Ibsen’s performances. Even if they mentioned performances, they just devoted to investigating and analyzing the similarities and parallels between Ibsen’s plays and modern Chinese dramas on the basis of textual analysis. Performances mentioned by Xu Huiqi are most as a series of historical events, which helped the women movement in China to set up a model of the new women. In brief, these studies were limited to the texts and how the texts conveyed Ibsen’s original intention or how Ibsen’s texts influenced the new Chinese drama. Researchers have seldom only focused on the performance, until now most people still give more attention on analysis the text than on performances. Ibsen’s popularity in China not only relied on his philosophy conveyed through his plays, but also embedded in the performances, especially in the history of spoken drama’s development. In addition, media’s impetus during the periods of the performance tours was also one of the elements of the success promoting the performance. For example, Nora Year in Chinese drama history and the big scandal about Nora’s performance in that year were great events; 2006 Eternal Ibsen International Festival invited the mass 2 Eide ,1987, p11. 5 media to supply propaganda. Among the most international plays of Ibsen, A Doll’s House is absolutely regarded as an extraordinary example. Almost no any other country owned so many performances of A Doll’s House as China, especially in the certain periods, for example, May Fourth Movement period and in 1930s, A Doll’s House is performed in China more frequently than any other of Ibsen’s plays and it impacts China’s intellectuals profoundly. In contrast, now in China A Doll’s House is almost completely forgotten. The performances of A Doll’s House in China represented the reception and influence of Ibsen in China and also reflected the social development; therefore, my claim will be focused on the point that understanding Ibsen’s play and its impacts should be embedded in its performances and the background. From this perspective, I will give an interpretation how Noraism formed an imagined community and how Nora’s performance was active or declined on the China political arenas. In contrast to the great influence of Nora as well as Ibsen in the earlier period, his plays did not gain more attention and emphasis on Ibsen in China today. Even in the 2006 Eternal Ibsen International Festival, which was supported both by Norwegian and Chinese governments, the influence was still very limited. Many scholars felt pity for the situation. If we criticized that Ibsen earlier have been over-interpreted and that Ibsenism once mislead the development of China’s spoken drama, now we should reconsider the question: Is Nora as well as Ibsen outdated in current China? It is well-known that Ibsen was so popular in China, mostly due to the great influence of one of his dramas – A Doll’s House. In some senses, Nora was more popular than Ibsen at that time. And also because the first household name of A Doll’s House in Chinese translation was Nora (in Chinese called Nala), here I prefer to use “Nora’ performance” instead of the performance of A Doll’ House. And if the adaption of A Doll’s House had the very different name far from Nora, I will keep the Chinese name together with the name of A Doll’ House. By presenting and discussing the performance history of A Doll’s House in China and the relation between society’s development and performance, I will make up the 6 gap of the Ibsen studies in this perspective.
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