Politics of Performance in Modern Taiwanese Theatre
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The Pennsylvania State University The Graduate School College of the Liberal Arts INTERCULTURAL BODIES: POLITICS OF PERFORMANCE IN MODERN TAIWANESE THEATRE A Dissertation in Comparative Literature and Asian Studies by Wei-Chih Wang © 2016 Wei-Chih Wang Submitted in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy August 2016 ii The dissertation of Wei-Chih Wang was reviewed and approved* by the following: Charlotte D. Eubanks Associate Professor of Comparative Literature Director of Graduate Studies Dissertation Advisor Chair of Committee Shuang Shen Associate Professor of Comparative Literature Jonathan Abel Associate Professor of Comparative Literature On-Cho Ng Professor of History Head of Asian Studies Sarah J. Townsend Assistant Professor of Spanish, Italian, and Portuguese *Signatures are on file in the Graduate School. iii Abstract The nature of the historical relationship between aesthetics and politics in modern Taiwanese theatre, especially after the lifting of martial law (1949–1987), remains a highly contested issue. At the same time, searching for a new Taiwanese body continues to be a major direction of theatrical experiments and is under-theorized. In regard to historical surveys, Taiwanese scholars such as Chung Ming-Der, Ma Sen, Lin He-Yi, and Chi Wei-Jan have published considerable work on the development of modern Taiwanese theatre. Shih Wan-Shun, Wang Li-Wen, Chang Ivy I Chu, Liang Pei-Lin, Cheng Fan-Ting, and Wu Chen-Tse have all, in their theses and dissertations, attended to questions of thematics and theatrics in modern Taiwanese practice. However, so far, few works have examined the tension between the historical continuum of political oppression and the immediacy of theatrical performance. The continued sedimentation of politics and aesthetics embedded in bodily performance constitutes a dominant research emphasis in performance studies, but has yet to be fully explored in modern Taiwanese theatre. Via a close reading from a biopolitical perspective of the body in text and on stage, my dissertation bridges the scholarly gap between historiography and theory as each pertain to the theatre. I argue that the body carries ideology-ridden messages, making corporeal existence a crucial site deployed by theatre participants to reconfigure the idea of Taiwan since the Japanese colonial period. In my Introduction, I revisit the historical development of modern Taiwanese theatre pertaining to the body. Chapter One focuses on Tian Chi-Yuan (田啟元, 1964–1996) and his White Water (白水, Baishui 1993). Concentrating on Tian’s multiple schemas of the body, I argue for a “constructivist” model of national identity to consider the experiment of modern Taiwanese theatre as a critical hybrid of borrowing and rejecting local traditional resources and iv foreign cultural references. Chapter Two shifts the focus to two of the most significant playwrights and directors in modern Taiwanese theatre, Stan Lai (賴聲川, 1954– ) and Hugh K. S. Lee (李國修, 1955–2013). The realistic style of performance, or “critical realism,” a term suggested by Tobin Nellhaus, of Lee’s Far Away from Home (西出陽關, Xi Chu Yang Guan 1988) and Lai’s A Dream like a Dream (如夢之夢, Ru Meng Zhi Meng 2000) foreground the nuanced flow between social realities and theatrical representations in which the enacted body can express memories and traumas in response to defining historical junctures. Chapter Three explores the work of Robert Wilson (1941– ) and Suzuki Tadashi (1939– ) and their intercultural, flagship productions in twenty-first-century Taiwan, with special attention to Wilson’s Orlando (2009) and Suzuki’s La Dame aux Camélias (2011). Overall, I argue that modern Taiwanese theatre provides a powerful instance of intercultural performance functioning as a subjectivity reformed via an emotional articulation of a transfigured postcolonial, political, and cultural identity. In the Conclusion, I reiterate the ways in which the body continues to be an experimental site for challenging issues of identity in modern Taiwanese theatre. By analyzing performances in the post–martial law era, I offer micro-reading of the body in performance and formulate an analytical angle on performance with sociopolitical specificities. On this basis, I show that the concepts of modernity, trauma, and subjectivity—themes repeatedly tackled by scholars—are more than abstract notions and textual representations. Instead, these concepts also constitute physical practice by reflexively generating knowledge and affect. I am, therefore, offering an argument in opposition to the idea of interpreting modern Taiwanese theatre as an attempt to construct Taiwan. In my account, modern Taiwanese theatre functions as a biopolitical practice that refracts identity struggles captured in history and in the present day of an impossibly delayed “Taiwanese” identity. v Note on the Romanization, Translation of Names, and the Figures For East Asian names, mainly Chinese, Taiwanese, and Japanese, I have followed the local custom of putting the family name before the person’s given name. For Chinese names and Taiwanese names, I rely principally on the Hanyu Pinyin system. Yet, if any person referenced has an established spelling or an English name, Stan Lai (賴聲川, Lai Sheng-Chuan, 1954–), for instance, I follow this practice out of respect for that person. The playwright’s or practitioner’s original name and birth year (if known) are given only if that person’s work is analyzed as a primary source. The names of scholars and researchers are only given in English. All English translations of texts are mine unless specified otherwise in the footnotes. Great efforts have been made to identify and contact copyright holders for all the images and figures used in this dissertation. However, image 6 can only be traced back to Shi Li’s thesis; its original source remains unknown. vi Table of Contents List of Figures ............................................................................................................................... vii Acknowledgments ........................................................................................................................ viii Introduction ..................................................................................................................................... 1 Chapter One Constructing Taiwan: Tian Chi-Yuan and Conscious Constructivism ......................................... 55 Chapter Two Embodying Taiwan: Hugh Lee, Stan Lai, and Critical realism .................................................. 121 Chapter Three Transgressing Taiwan: Suzuki Tadashi, Robert Wilson, and Intercultural Theatre ................... 183 Conclusion .................................................................................................................................. 243 Works Cited ................................................................................................................................ 270 vii List of Figures Figure 1. The hourglass model .................................................................................................. 41 Figure 2. The “toy” model ......................................................................................................... 43 Figure 3. Tian’s explanation on his conception of walking, which emphasizes the changed rhythm of moving feet ............................................................................................... 75 Figure 4. Different styles of body in Tian’s training method .................................................... 76 Figure 5. Tian’s plan for acting training .................................................................................... 81 Figure 6. Tian with a “water lotus lamp” .................................................................................. 94 Figure 7. The poster of White Water (1994) ............................................................................. 95 Figure 8. The scene in which Old Qi asks Mi Mi to touch him .............................................. 150 Figure 9. The list of songs ....................................................................................................... 200 Figure 10. Min-Yao and Liu Yi’s pas de deux ........................................................................ 250 Figure 11. Imitation of a hand raised to answer a question ..................................................... 250 Figure 12. A gesture of protest ................................................................................................ 251 viii Acknowledgments I wrote this dissertation with the support of many people and institutions. My deepest gratitude goes to my advisor, Charlotte Eubanks, for her inspiring comments on my work. Her passion for scholarly endeavor and her humble approach of listening to the text first and attending to theory later, fundamentally changed my own approach to literature and theatre. My gratitude also goes to Shuang Shen, who was virtually a co-advisor to me. Her practice of proposing conceptual questions was instrumental in my development as a more critical thinker. I would like to express appreciation to my committee members, On-Cho Ng, Jonathan Abel, and Sarah Townsend: they demonstrated the greatest patience by reading the draft of this dissertation and providing me with many insightful suggestions. Together, they pushed me to reflect critically on the significance of Taiwanese theatre and they helped me to elaborate my argument. Without