From Local Theatre to National Symbol of Identification
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rd Paper presented at 3 conference of European Association of Taiwan Studies Paris, France, 30-31 March 2006 Preliminary draft, not for citation From Local Theatre to National Symbol of Identification: Process of Taiwanization in The Theatre P±-tē-hì Chen, Longting Diwan College of Management in Madou [email protected] The puppet theatre (p±-tē-hì) is one of traditional cultural arts, which were once assumed to inevitable decline in Taiwan. It is a miracle that the puppet theatre unceasingly survived and presented Taiwan as a result of the icon election. The campaign “Show Taiwan to the World” launched last year (2005) by the Government Information Office, it consisted in asking Taiwanese citizens to vote on which of 24 different images most distinctively symbolize Taiwan. With some 780,000 people voting, an image depicting the folk art of glove puppetry has emerged as the top choice of the people, garnering over 130,000 votes. The runner-up was an image of Jade Mountain, the highest peak in Asia east of the Himalayas. In third place was Taipei 101, the world’s tallest building. The selected icons will be used to promote the nation internationally. It is interesting to note that the main process of Taiwanization in the puppet theatre developed from a form of local entertainment to symbol of national identity. In the age of globalization, this campaign is highly meaningful events that can help the Taiwanese people rediscover aspects of their country of which they can feel proud, and maintain their Taiwanese identity. A great deal of effort has been made on Taiwan’s puppet theatre. What seems to be lacking, however, is its relationship with identification. Based on the analysis of “phenomenon Sú Iān-bûn”, we will discuss the relationship among of Taiwanese theatre, language, and political symbol. The results of this study show that the “resistance” of folk culture is a contributing factor to promoting Taiwanese identity. Introduction First of all, we have to consider one historical event. The puppet theatre played an important role on election campaign in Taiwan. One of remarkable events is “who murder Sú Iān-bûn” in 1994, which evoked the bitterest passion and collective memories under the authoritarian historically. Sú Iān-bûn was a very famous role of puppet theatre in the age of 1970s, which was created by œg Chùn-hiông and was broadcast live on Taiwan Television. Both the introduction of mass media and government interference influenced this ancient form of performance. Before its arrival of television, the puppet theatre was an important element of local religious worship and entertainment. The most audiences have been exposed to television for many years in 1970s, and pupils preferred to imitate the dialogue in Taiwanese language of the puppet theatre. Because of opposition to the national language policy of KMT government, the outstanding program of œg Chùn-hiông “Sú Iān-bûn, the Great Confucian Hero of Hûn-chiu” which performed in Taiwanese was prohibited from mass medium. The event “who murder Sú Iān-bûn” had a great influence on election campaign and then the politician was apt to take a picture with the glove puppet. The importance of this political gesture is not the performance at all, but awakes the identity of 2 Taiwanese consciousness, or pronounces his Taiwan’s love. The glove puppet (p±-tē-hì ang-á) as the name suggests is a cloth bag fitted over the hand. The head, hands, and feet of the glove puppet are joined together with cloth shaped to resemble a body. The puppeteer manipulates the puppet by inserting his hand；the politician manipulates the knowledge of the Taiwanese history by posing the gesture. Although passing away, this event drives us to these questions: why Sú Iān-bûn was mentioned, which meaning this role symbolizes and its relationship to the process of Taiwan’s democratization, how the puppet theatre maintained the Taiwanese language under the authoritarian, and how the puppet theatre resorts to modern mass media and continues to survive. As space is limited, we have concentrated on three categories: 1) development of puppet theatre, 2) official language policy of KMT, 3) the political symbol of Sú Iān-bûn. Development of Puppet Theatre There is fairly general agreement that the glove puppet theatre was originated about three hundreds years ago in Hok-kiàn province, China. The local theatre can be reasonably dated from the early years of the 19 th century (Chiu 1992：173). During the middle years of this century, these puppeteers left China to settle in Taiwan and brought it to Taiwan. Nevertheless, it was one of the most popular performances and was presented on its own style. The glove puppet theatre has developed and charmed generations of audiences in Taiwan. In the beginning, it is possible that the majority of puppet operators in Taiwan were formerly with the Hok-kiàn opera troupes and left to join the puppet theatre. The music of the glove puppet theatre consists of different vocal melody and speech types as well as percussion music, each associated with different dramatic function. According to these music styles, there are three main tradition or “schools” of glove puppet theatres in Taiwan: lâm-kóan, pçh-jī-á and 3 tiô-tiāu. In the early years of the 20 th century, the musicians of pak-kóan created the new tune for puppet theatre. The new style of music is more and more fashionable, which characterized by simple and variety. This tendency provided the more powerful and more improvisational performance (Chen 2000). After the World War II, a few of the glove puppet troupes succeeded in the commercial theatre. Nevertheless, the post-war development of puppet theatre was not smooth. After the 28 February incident in 1947, the restriction on “freedom of assembly” implemented affected theatre performance directly. Including outdoor performance, public gathering were banned for one year in order to prevent possible trouble and provocation. Besides, the policy of reforming folklore was implemented, restricting the frequency and the scale of religious festivals since 1951. In response, many puppet troupes transformed themselves into an entertainment business. The commercial troupe of glove puppet performed in a building is called “Indoor Theatre” (lāi-tâi-hì). The ritual theatre that is performed commonly in honor of deities and played in open-air is called “Outdoor Theatre” (gōa-tâi-hì), “Open-Air Theatre” (iá-tâi-hì) or “Folk Theatre” (bîn-hì). In theatrical troupe’s angle, the latter provides basic technical training and survival main source of income; the former lets the performance display the imagination space. A good puppeteer must be able to make puppets juggle with weapons, somersault, carry out fighting scenes, and other acrobatic feats. The master-puppeteer is not only to know how to manipulate, but also to act with different vocal melody and speech types. He has an essential character to influence the quality of the performance. The orchestra in the puppet theatre is made up two sections: the military ensemble (played by two percussionists) and the civil ensemble (played by two or three instrumentalists). The head-drummer is the soul of the orchestra, who directs to play the percussion when there is a change of scene, before and after the curtain is raised and to accompany the puppets when they are 4 about to leave the stage or to appear again. Stringed and wind instruments forming the “civil” ensemble, accompany the singing and provide background music when need. These musicians produce live sound effects and also use tape recorders and phonographs to play Taiwanese music. We may say that the glove puppet theatre had been changed from the quasi-opera style into the narrative style (Chen, 1997). More noteworthy is that Beijing opera was granted the official status as the symbol of “national culture”, and it was crowned with the title guoju by KMT government, representing orthodox Chinese performing arts. In contrast, all the other forms of theatres were grouped as “local theatre”, implying a parochial and somehow secondary limitation. Nevertheless, the performance of puppets, which accompanied the Taiwanese fashionable music with women singers, was victorious. The remarkable troupe Ng¯-chiu H£g which started performing in the 1950s and made a revolutionary change in the manipulation of puppets. Many puppet theatre troupes today have started making new clothes to replace the century old partly ones from China. These new clothes usually have sequins and a large size, which glitter to attract audiences. Instead of silk and satin, some of these new costumes are made of colorful nylon material. Old costumes from China, which require elaborate embroidery work, are still used as higher-ranking role. The costumes of puppet theatres of television have various forms (Chen 1990). In the 1970s, a famous puppeteer œg Chùn-hiông began to reform the size of the costumes, from 20cms to 60cms, and 90cms. In the middle of 1990s, the size of the costumes of puppets had changed to 100cms, which is the most fashionable one of puppet theatres of television. Another puppet theatres of television in the 1990s of Phek-lçk or Thian-ú, which attempt to use the multi-media’s technology, were under the influence of œg Chùn-hiông. Those new and hit puppet theatres had made a name for himself as a good creator of considerable talent. As Hsiao, Hisn-huang pointed out that the 1970s was the period of cultural 5 awakening in Taiwan (Hsiao 2004). In the trend of searching for Taiwanese identity, the tide finally turned. The traditional theatre overturned the old superstitious stereotype and began to take on a new role, representing native culture. Since the end of Chiang regime, Taiwan’s government was pressurized to take measures abandoning China centric policies and recognizing Taiwan’s indigenous roots.