A DRUM TALE ON “WU SONG FIGHTS THE TIGER”

Vibeke Børdahl (Nordic Institute of Asian Studies, Copenhagen)

For Kate This essay is written in honor of Kate Stevens, who opened the door to Chinese storytelling for me. The occasion was a performance of Beijing drum singing (Jingyun dagu 京韻大鼓) at the Shaoyuan dormitory of Peking University in 1984, arranged by Kate for friends and colleagues and people around (such as myself, a student at Shaoyuan). This was not only my first experience of drum singing, but of Chinese “tell and sing” (shuochang 說唱) arts, as such. Later, when I had occasion to meet Kate Stevens again in 1989 in China and in 1999 in her home in Victoria, Canada, she generously shared her scholarship and friendship, for which I am deeply indebted to her.

In the following we shall take a close look at a drum tale entitled Jingyanggang Wu Song da hu 景陽崗 武松打虎 [Wu Song Fights the Tiger on Jingyang Ridge] and try out the analytic approach used for the core texts of my larger project, a study of “Wu Song Fights the Tiger” in Chinese storytelling.1 I regard the storyteller’s art, not as

1 I gratefully acknowledge the assistance offered by Yu Jing 喻京, Feng Yining 馮一 宁, and Huang Ying 黃瑛 in transcribing and drafting translations for the project “Wu Song Fights the Tiger in Chinese Storytelling.” The texts listed in the Appendix appear as scanned originals, along with character transcriptions and English translations, on the website www.shuoshu.org; this material forms part of the Database on Chinese Storytelling, created in collaboration with Jens Chr. Sørensen. I wish to thank Kirsten Thisted for inspiring conversations on ‘orality and literacy’ CHINOPERL Papers No. 27 (2007) ©2007 by the Conference on Chinese Oral and Performed Literature, Inc. CHINOPERL Papers No. 27 essentially ‘derived’ from the novel Shuihu zhuan 水滸傳 [Water Margin],2 but as a parallel tradition, which was already well developed at the time when the novel took form.3 In a society where the themes and heroes of Water Margin were living in popular culture, the individual tales were transmitted in a wealth of oral genres, some of which were also sooner or later written down. The constituents of a tale like the tiger story would be assembled by the storytellers from their orally inherited art (from their master), but also augmented with details invented or learned from other oral as well as written genres that were current in their own time. In the Wu Song project the main focus is on the linguistic form of the tale, in written, semi-oral and oral sources, old and new. My aim is to show the intertextual relation between a number of “instances” of the tale, both as words of performance (oral texts)4 and as words of written texts. Thus my project considers a broad synchronic and diachronic framework, encompassing oral performances on tape, CD and videos, as well as written texts, including novels and dramatic versions—a collection that will never cease expanding. during our stay at the San Cataldo institute in Italy, November 2004, where this study took shape. I am also grateful to Kathy Lowry and Margaret Wan for their comments. The Norwegian Research Council Program for Cultural Studies has given funding to the project. 2 For this approach, see for example Chen Wulou (1990: 32–33). Duan Baolin documents the complexity of oral and written sources for the Wang School of Yangzhou storytelling and demonstrates the idea of Shuihu zhuan as a turning point for the development (1990: 72–75, 86). 3 See the account by the Ming author Zhang Dai, “Liu Jingting shuoshu” 柳敬亭說 書 [The storyteller Liu Jingting], in Tao’an mengyi (1986: 68). Translation in Børdahl (1996: 13). 4 The word “text” does not, in the present usage, imply writing, unless otherwise specified. So we shall speak of both oral and written texts. Oral texts of the present study are available in electronic media.

2 Børdahl, A Drum Tale on “Wu Song” Focusing on the drum tale in the framework of this project, implies a double aim: 1) to bring out the special linguistic and narrative form of the drum tale as an instance of the ‘Wu Song and tiger’ tale; 2) to bring out the contrastive linguistic and narrative patterns that become apparent by comparison with other “instances” representing the three main genres where this tale is found: novel, drama and performed arts.5 The overall aim of the project, including this particular study of the drum tale, is to explore the interplay of oral and written culture in China.

The drum tale text Storytelling with drum accompaniment belongs within the umbrella genre of Chinese shuochang wenxue 說唱文學 [tell-and-sing litera- ture]. The text under study is not a performance, but a written text, a small booklet from the collection of su wenxue 俗文學 [popular literature] dating to the Late Qing and Early Republican era, in the

5 Ten instances from the core material are selected to form the framework of the present analysis, namely two versions of the Ming novel, two dramatic versions (Ming and Qing), four performance texts (Qing, Early Republic and People’s Republic) and two oral performances from recent years. See the Appendix.

3 CHINOPERL Papers No. 27

Figure 1. Drum tale A , cover page, 13 x 9,5 cm. Original in the Academia Sinica Collection. Academia Sinica Collection (hereafter ASC) held at the Fu Ssu-nien Library, Institute of History and Philology in Nangang, Taiwan.6 In this collection, under the main entry of shuoshu 說書 [storytelling], one finds eleven subcategories, among which five seem closely related and all share the drum for rhythmic accompaniment. These are the guci 鼓 詞 [drum tale], dagu 大鼓 [big drum], kuaishu 快書 [fast tale], zidishu 子弟書 [Manchu gentry tales] and Shipai shu 石派書 [Shi- style drum tale].7 The item we are concerned with carries the title

6 For an introduction to the ASC collection, see Stevens (1973: 24, 251n14); Børdahl (1999). 7 Cf. Stevens (1973: 273). Please, note that kuaishu and Shandong kuaishu are separate genres. The forms of zidishu and kuaishu are closely related; Cf. Chen

4 Børdahl, A Drum Tale on “Wu Song” Jingyanggang Wu Song da hu [Wu Song Fights the Tiger on Jingyang Ridge] as well as the printer’s name Baowentang 寶文堂 in big characters on the cover page. It is classified as dagushu 大鼓書 [big drum tale] in the ASC. During my research stay at the library in 1998 I located one edition in the rare book room and another with the title Wu Song da hu [Wu Song Fights the Tiger] among the library’s microfilm holdings. The present paper focuses on the ASC woodblock edition, which I call Drum tale A in what follows. The microfilm version, or Drum tale B, is very similar, though not identical with text A.8 The text

Jinzhao (1982). 8 Drum tale A has an inscription on the cover: Ku I 9-175, keben 刻本 [woodblock print], dagu 大鼓 [big drum]. It contains 8 pages, 18 couplets pr page (a + b), 143 couplets (only 17 couplets on the final page). I base my study on a scanned copy of the ASC original. Drum tale A is almost identical to Drum tale B in the ASC microfilms, MF 1854 NF 254. In the first line Drum tale A reads sheng wang 聖王 [sage ruler], while Drum tale B reads Song wang 宋王 [the Song ruler]. However, the woodblocks for B use simplified and variant forms of Chinese characters, or su zi 俗字 [non-standard character forms] and contain some extra lines. The cover page reads: Xin ke xiao duan Wu Song da hu, Tang zi 新刻小段武松打虎﹐堂梓 [Newly cut small section on Wu Song Fights the Tiger, Shop? edition]. It has 13 pages, with 12 couplets per page (a + b), a total of 153 couplets. In the early catalogue of the collection, Liu Fu and Li Jiarui ([1932] 1993, Vol I: 493), there is an entry under the title: Wu Song da hu [Wu Song Fights the Tiger], indicating place: Beiping [Beijing], format: mu 木 [wood(block)], 13 pages, with no printing shop mentioned. According to the page number, title and (lack of) printing shop, item B corresponds to the catalogue entry. The first two lines for this item are rewritten in the catalogue and are identical with version B, with only one deviation, that is, the name Tong Guan written with the characters 童貫, where both of the woodblock editions have 佟確. Versions A and B follow each other closely, with only small deviations (different forms of many characters, occasionally a different word, a few extra lines in version B). In this paper I comment only on differences that are relevant to the discussion. In the quoted examples the standard fanti forms are used. Transcriptions according to the original character forms will be available on the database, cf. note 1.

5 CHINOPERL Papers No. 27 of both editions contains only the words of the story and is devoid of any external information, such as genre name, tags for spoken portions versus sung portions, name of melodies or rhythmic patterns, etc. which are often found in performance texts, but not in the A or B texts.9 Drum tale B almost certainly belongs among the vernacular texts that Li Jiarui and Liu Fu collected in China 1917–1928, included in the first catalogue of vernacular literature that they published in 1932 (reprint 1993). Thus the latest possible date this item might have been printed is 1928. Drum tale A is not mentioned in the catalogue, but it is clearly part of a series of Wu Song drum tales published by Baowentang with uniform woodcut style. The catalogue lists another title Wu Song Mengzhou jiebai 武松孟州結拜 [Wu Song becomes a sworn brother in Mengzhou] that has exactly the same publication features and character style as our Drum tale A.10 On account of the publisher being Baowentang and the technique woodblock printing, the drum tale might have been printed much earlier, but how much? Some of the printing shops in Beijing existed for almost two hundred years, from the Qianlong period (1736–1796) to the Early Republic (ca. 1911-30). The format and woodblock printing technique found in these humble booklets would not be out of tune with cheap print from

9 The ASC catalogue labels the text Ku (drum), and identifies the genre as dagu shu [big drum storytelling] and dagu [big drum]. However, Liu Fu and Li Jiarui (1993 [1932]) catalogue this item without genre classification, perhaps in recognition of the fact that the text could belong to a number of performance styles. 10 This item is number three in the series, coming after the Wu Song fa pei 武松發配, announced at the end of Drum tale A, but not found in ASC. My own copy is from the microfilm collection, MF 1854 NF 254. Cf. Liu Fu and Li Jiarui (1993 [1932], Vol. II: 864).

6 Børdahl, A Drum Tale on “Wu Song” the middle of the nineteenth century that continued well into the 1920s.11 In connection with the drum tale versions A and B, a modern edition of a text in the genre of errenzhuan 二人轉 [double twist]12 from Jilin province should be mentioned. The errenzhuan text, entitled Wu Song da hu [Wu Song Fights the Tiger], is presented as a transcription from performance by one of the famous artists of the genre Cheng Xifa 程喜發 (twentieth century), and is one of several episodes from the Wu Song saga in a collection of Jilin local drama.13 It uses the format of printed texts for errenzhuan, noting the roles of the two performers of the dan 旦 and chou 丑 role-types in the margin of the text, showing how the couplets are to be sung/spoken alternately by these two. Additionally, there are directions for other aspects of performance: such as specifying the melody and rhythm for the various portions of the performance. As noted above, the Drum tale A

11 Cao Zhi lists printing shops in the area of Liulichang in Beijing during the late Qing period (Cao Zhi 1992: 332–35) and fails to mention a printing firm called Baowentang, while mentioning three times one called Wenbaotang. The owner of the Wenbaotang shop, Mr. Cao 曹氏, was active during the Tongzhi period (1862-1875). There is the possibility that Wenbaotang is a mistake for Baowentang. Gui Jingwen notes two printing shops, Xuegutang 學古堂 and Baowentang who issued drum tale booklets, but says nothing about the period. However, Gui’s bibliography is chronologically arranged, placing a Baowentang item roughly between the Qianlong era and 1918 (1989: 99). Additionally, Liu Fu and Li Jiarui record a small woodcut text from the Baowentang shop dated to 1924 (1993 [1932]: 578). Hrdlickova’s essay in this volume mentions booklets of similar content published by Baowentang as late as 1950 (2007). 12 Errenzhuan is categorized as a quyi genre of the zouchang 走唱 [walking and singing] type, belonging in Northeast China, cf. Zhongguo dabaike quanshu, xiqu quyi, (1983: 69-70). 13 Errenzhuan chuantong jumu huibian Vol II: (1981: 41–47). On Cheng Xifa, cf. Zhongguo dabaike quanshu, Xiqu quyi (1983: 70).

7 CHINOPERL Papers No. 27 and B versions both are completely devoid of this kind of information. However, apart from these editorial differences the errenzhuan text is obviously closely related to the two drum tale texts. In the discussion below we shall refer to this text as version C. While the language of versions A and B is nearly identical, few lines in version C are exactly identical to A and B. The language of C is in many places reformulated into a more modern style of Chinese, homophonic characters found in the drum tales are here given in their standardized form, omission and addition of lines (compared to the drum tale versions) are frequent and there are alternate wordings in almost every couplet. But nevertheless, the verbal similarity is so impressive that, for the purpose of the present study, the text version C will be treated together with the drum tale texts. Differences between the drum tale texts A and B vis á vis the errenzhuan version C will be discussed wherever they are pertinent to the analysis.

Analysis of the drum tale 1. The session as a textual unit On the first page and first line of the booklet Drum tale A, the item is defined as a hui 回 [session, chapter] in the opening stock phrase: yan yi hui 言一回 [let me tell in this session]. Again in the final line of the last page this name of the unit is repeated in the closing stock phrase: xia yi hui …zai xu shang 下一回…在敘上 [in the next session the story continues about …]. In the sentence before, the unit is alternatively called duan 段 [part, section]: zhe shi da hu yige duan 這 是打虎一個段 [this was the [first] part about killing the tiger].14 Drum

14 In the errenzhuan version C, the stock phrase of yan yi hui is not found. The performance begins directly with the first heptasyllabic line, the same as in version

8 Børdahl, A Drum Tale on “Wu Song” tale B is labelled xiao duan 小段 [small part] on the cover page, which may indicate that this kind of drum tale belongs to the pieces that were meant to be learned by heart, in contrast to longer pieces where improvisation would play a much stronger role.15 While the first stock phrase, mentioning this piece as a hui, would not necessarily indicate that it was part of a suite of several ‘sessions’ or ‘chapters’ belonging together, the last stock phrase does place the piece in a context of ‘continued sessions’. The piece starts with a prologue portion that describes the general situation in China during the Song dynasty when the heroes of the marshes were active, and this beginning gives the impression that it is the first episode in the series, and I have seen no other drum tale of this format that would fit before this item.16 In the ASC the following hui on Wu Song fa pei 武松發配 [Wu Song’s Exile] is missing, but the third hui entitled Wu Song Mengzhou jiebai, is extant. Some other hui from the Wu Song saga are also found in Baowentang edition, but not in exactly the same printing style.17

B. But the concluding stock phrase has xia yi hui…, so that the textual unit is hui, just like the drum tales proper. 15 Cf. Junko Iguchi’s studies of Laoting drum singing in the 1980s through the 1990s, Iguchi (2003: 70). 16 In the errenzhuan collection where we find version C, there is, however, a previous hui called Wu Song da nao Dongjia miao [Wu Song wreaks havoc in Dong family temple], probably featuring events reminiscent of those in the Shandong kuaishu tradition, cf. note 23 and 25. I have not seen this text. 17 Woodblock-printed drum tales from the Wu Song tale in the ASC include: Wu Dalang shang fen 武大郎上墳 [Wu Dalang goes to the tomb], Baowentang, cf. Liu Fu and Li Jiarui ([1932] 1993, Vol. II: 744), and Shizipo Sun Erniang kai dian 十字 坡孫二娘開店 [Sun Erniang in the tavern at Crossways Rise], Baowentang, cf. Liu Fu and Li Jiarui ([1932] 1993, Vol I: 64). The two latter items are closer to the coarse typographical style of Drum tale B. The tale of Wu Dalang is edited as a single hui with no previous or later sequence, while the tale of Crossways Rise seems to belong

9 CHINOPERL Papers No. 27 Comparing the textual unit of the drum tale with the other instances of the tiger story mentioned in the Appendix, we find that it is only in the context of the zhanghui xiaoshuo 章回小說 [novel] and the Shandong kuaishu 山東快書 [Shandong clapper tale] that the unit is named as hui in the text. In the novel—as a book for reading—the meaning of hui is close to the Western meaning of ‘section of a book, chapter’, while in the drum tale and the clapper tale the meaning is closer to ‘session of oral performance’. In the case of the drum tale, the hui is not part of a book, but it is a book, i.e. a printed booklet of ‘one session’, probably aimed at performance as well as reading. In the case of the clapper tale, the version for analysis is an oral performance, and when it is named a hui at the end of the performance, this indicates that in this tradition such performances or sessions are called hui.18 In to the drum tale series on Wu Song. Even though the series is not complete in the same typographical edition, we can nevertheless from the final couplets of each booklet and from some of the cover titles reconstruct the set as follows: 1. (Drum tale A and B): Jingyanggang Wu Song da hu; 2. (missing): Wu Song fa pei; 3. Wu Song Mengzhou jiebai; 4. Kuaihuolin Wu Song duo jiudian 快活林武松奪酒店 (cf. Liu Fu and Li Jiarui [1932] 1993, Vol I: 293. Unfortunately I have not seen this item) and 5. Shizipo Sun Erniang kai dian. In version C the next hui is announced to be Er Wu Song Yangguxian badang 二武松陽穀縣把當, while the text before it is Wu Song da nao Dongjia miao 武松大鬧董家廟. See the discussion of the Shandong kuaishu below. 18 The episode is called chu 出 / 齣 [act or scene] in the Ming chuanqi 傳奇 [drama], where it is act 4 of 36 acts, but the Qing manuscript of the Kunqu 崑曲 drama indicates that the item is quan chuanguan 全串貫 [complete linked scenes], so that this episode constitutes a full performance. In Fuzhou pinghua 福州平話 [Fuzhou storytelling] the booklet with the tiger tale is called ji 集[collection], it is the shang ji 上集 [first collection], and a xia ji 下集 [final collection] booklet is supposed to follow. The Yangzhou qingqu 揚州清曲 [Yangzhou ballad] has no intra-textual name for the item, but it belongs to the type called xiao taoqu 小套曲 [short song suites], cf. Wei Ren, Wei Minghua (1985: 25).

10 Børdahl, A Drum Tale on “Wu Song” the kuaishu 快書 text there is no mention of the name of the unit, but extratextual evidence indicates that the unit of the kuaishu should be considered a hui.19 In Yangzhou pinghua 揚州評話 [Yangzhou storytelling] the story cycles of the main heroes which belong to the 水滸 20 repertoire of the storytellers of SHUIHU [WATER MARGIN] are each 十回 武十回 called shi hui [ten chapters], e.g. WU SHI HUI [TEN 宋十回 CHAPTERS OF WU SONG], SONG SHI HUI [TEN CHAPTERS OF SONG

JIANG], etc. But in the oral tradition these ‘chapters’ only exist as part of titles of the repertoire, but not as named textual units in performance.21

19 In other pieces of kuaishu one finds occasionally the stock phrases biao yi hui 表 一回 [let me perform in this session] or shuo yi hui 說一回 [let me tell in this session], cf. Chen Jinzhao (1982: 260, 278). The kuaishu genre also shares many other stock phrases and other features with the drum tale and clapper tale (Shandong kuaishu), as we shall see below. 20 Titles of repertoires in oral tradition are written in SMALL CAPITALS, in order to distinguish them from book titles, written in italics. Titles of single performances, belonging to a larger oral repertoire, are written in normal print with single quotes. Titles of performance literature as written/published texts are written according to usual practice for publications, i.e. italics for book titles and “double quotes” for items inside a book. In this article we shall also quite often speak about thematics without reference to either specific books, chapters, or oral repertoires. These cases shall appear as standard type with capital letters, i.e. the theme of Water Margin. 21 In Yangzhou pinghua a full performance in the storyteller’s house is called yitian shu 一天書 [one day of storytelling] or yichang shu 一場書 [one session of storytelling]. A shorter performance is called duanzi 段子 [section]. ‘One day of storytelling’ usually consists of two to four duanzi, cf. Børdahl (2003: 79-80). When the oral genre is transferred to the written in so-called xin huaben 新話本 [new storytellers’ books], we find a division into ‘chapters’ (hui) in print. However, these hui are much longer than a single performance in the storytellers’ house, containing the material that would usually be told in three to six days. The ‘ten chapter’ structure is related to the particular cyclic structure of the first seventy chapters of Shuihu zhuan, but it seems premature to refer this organizing principle of the

11 CHINOPERL Papers No. 27 2. Storyline The plot or storyline of the tiger tale as it is realized in the drum tale is summarized below. The division into five sections is primarily based on textual markers, namely three connecting stock phrases and a poem (indented in the woodblock-printed copy).22 I have also added headings. Further division is based on the shifting of place or focus inside these five sections.

1. The heroes of Mount Liang

Yangzhou pinghua directly to the influence of the Ming novel. The ten chapter cycles might represent a feature already present in oral culture of pre-Ming date and continued, not only in the written tradition of the novel (where the ten chapter cycles are discernible, but not mentioned), but also in various oral and visual arts living alongside the written culture (where the ‘ten chapters’ have a pronounced existence), as found in the oral titles of the SHUIHU repertoire of Yangzhou pinghua, and in titles of popular prints (nianhua 年畫) featuring some of the heroes of the ‘Water Margin’, cf. Riftin 2007. For Wu shi hui as a title of the Wu Song saga in other written performance genres, see also Liu Fu and Li Jiarui ([1932] 1993, Vol. I: 152). 22 In version C the stock phrases are different or missing, and the poem is missing. After section 1 and 4, there are the stock phrases dan biao …單表…, and zai biao … 再表… The first is followed by an editorial interpolation: bao ban 抱板 [hold the clapper]. The various sections of the drum tale have probably also been performed in different rhythmic patterns and melodies, such as shown for Jingyun dagu, cf. Stevens (1973), Chapter VI, but this aspect is outside our scope here.

12 Børdahl, A Drum Tale on “Wu Song” Historical background of the 108 heroes on Mount Liang.23 The passage finishes with the stock phrase: ‘for the moment let’s wait performing ... let’s rather perform’ (qie bu biao, zai biao... 且不表…﹐在表…) (1a, c. 1–7).24

2. Wu Song’s background and flight from his hometown The personal background of Wu Song as the younger of two brothers is sketched. His love for the martial arts is described, leading to his fight with some local burglars, called ‘the five tigers of the Dong family’ (Dong jia wu hu 董家五虎).25 This bloody event leads to his flight from his hometown and his refuge in Cangzhou with the nobleman, called Liang Wang 梁王 [the King of Liang].26 (1a, c. 8–2 a, c. 2) The passage

23 This prologue is reminiscent of the one in the Ming novel in stating the chaotic situation in China during the Song empire, as well as hinting at the cosmic origin of the 108 heroes of Mount Liang. Told in only six couplets, it is of course merely suggesting background that is obviously considered part of common knowledge. This passage is not found in any other of the instances of my corpus. However, in the Wu Song zhuan 武松傳 [Saga of Wu Song] as recorded for the genre of Shandong kuaishu, cf. Shandongkuaishu Wu Song zhuan (1957: 1–2), a similar prologue is found in the first part of the collection of stories of Wu Song, called Dongyue miao 東岳廟 [Dongyue Temple], cf. below. 24 The couplets (c.) on each half-page are numbered from 1 to 9. 25 The episode of the ‘five tigers of the Dong family’ is hinted at in the Shandong kuaishu performance, cf. Appendix. It is also part of other versions from this genre, however not among the selection for comparison in the present paper; in some of these versions the episode is told as a separate performance in several ‘sections’ (duan), constituting the first event of the Wu Song saga, cf. Shandong kuaishu Wu Song zhuan 1957: 1-41. This story has no precedence in the Shuihu zhuan, and it is not found in most genres of my material, only in the dagu, errenzhuan and Shandong kuaishu. In the Jin Ping Mei cihua 金瓶梅詞話 and the Ming drama by Shen Jing 沈璟, cf. Appendix, there are, however, some names that are perhaps reminiscent of this episode, cf. the discussion of proper names below. 26 King of Liang (Liang Wang) or Little King of Liang (Xiao Liang Wang) is used in Yangzhou pinghua as a nickname for Chai Jin 柴進, cf. Børdahl (1996: 309, 339). In

13 CHINOPERL Papers No. 27 finishes with the stock phrase noted in section 1: qie bu biao, zai biao... (c. 3).

3. A letter from home. Wu Song on the march home. A roadside inn.

3.1 Wu Song’s brother, Wu the Elder (Wu Dalang 武大郎), narrowly escapes punishment on behalf of Wu Song. Later, because of a drought he has to flee with his wife from their hometown and arrives in a house close to Ximen Qing 西門慶. (2a, c. 4–2b, c. 1). 27

3.2 Wu the Elder is peddling his cakes in the street when he meets a horse monger Liu Tang 劉堂 who delivers news about Wu Song and volunteers to write a letter for him and then bring it to Wu Song (2b, c. 2–9).

3.3 Wu Song receives the letter from Liu Tang and gets homesick. Liang Wang gives him money and a quarterstaff to defend himself on his trip home (3a, c. 1–9).

3.4 Wu Song takes leave of Liang Wang and travels on, passing inns and beautiful women of whom he takes no notice. He finally arrives at a tavern announced by a big wine banner with the inscription ‘Turtledoves drinking our wine become a pair of phoenixes’ (yeji chi jiu bian fenghuang 野雞吃酒變鳳凰) (3b, c. 1–9). 28

C the name Chai Jin is used interchangeably with King of Chai (Chai Wang 柴王). See the discussion of proper names below. 27 The passages about the punishment of Wu the Elder on behalf of Wu Song, the mention of Ximen Qing at such an early point, as well as the role of the horse monger Liu Tang in bringing news to Wu Song are unique to the drum tale. In C, there is no mention of Ximen Qing at this point. 28 Two couplets of the drum tale mention that Wu Song meets beautiful women on the road but does not care about them. In the Fuzhou pinghua there is a long passage (one fourth of the whole text) about how a prostitute in one of the villages tries

14 Børdahl, A Drum Tale on “Wu Song”

3.5 Wu Song enters the tavern and the waiter is impressed with his looks. He is described as seen by the waiter (4a, c. 1–8) (ends with ‘When he had finished looking ... (kan ba... 看罷), then starts the conversation between the two, which continues in the following verses).

3.6 Wu Song’s conversation with the waiter during his drinking and eating in the inn. Wu Song wants the strong wine: “Good, good, good!” (Hao, hao, hao 好好好) The waiter tells him to come to the back room to taste the strong wine of the house, and Wu Song drinks 54 bowls before he is satisfied (4a, c. 9–5a, c. 7).29

3.7 Wu Song walks out to the counter to pay. As he is leaving, the waiter tells him about a tiger on Jingyang Ridge and suggests that he stay the night in the tavern, greatly annoying Wu Song. He slaps the waiter in his face and leaves the tavern in anger (5a, c. 8–6b, c. 2). This passage ends with a poem (indented) predicting the coming fight with the tiger (6b, c. 3–4).

4. The proclamation When Wu Song arrives at the foot of the Ridge he spots a gateway where a tablet inscribed with an official proclamation gives the same information about the tiger as told by the waiter a moment ago. Wu Song is furious, his anger is directed towards the tiger, and his only wish is to challenge the King of Beasts. He sits down and begins to dream of his hometown and relatives, his sister-in-law and his elder brother.30 The unsuccessfully to seduce Wu Song. In the other instances we hear nothing about women during his trip home. The name of the wine banner, ‘Turtledoves drinking our wine become a pair of phoenixes’, is unique to the drum tale, and the sexual connotations of this name fits with the mention of beautiful women. 29 The number of bowls cited, fifty-four, (found in versions A, B and C) that Wu Song is said to have emptied is more than double found in any other instance.

15 CHINOPERL Papers No. 27 passage ends with the stock phrase: qie bu biao…, zai biao... (6b, c. 5– 7a, c. 6).31

5. Fighting the tiger 32 5.1 The tiger is now the focus of the narrative and we hear about its suffering from hunger for three days (7a, c. 7–7b, c. 1).

5.2 As soon as the tiger discovers the man, it immediately attacks him, but when Wu Song wakes from his dreaming state, the tiger is described in noble terms. His first action is to grab his staff and bring it down on the tiger, but the tiger dodges and the staff is broken. Now he only has

30 In the drum tale the proclamation is found on a gateway at the entrance to the Ridge, while in other instances it is written either on the trunk of a tree or on a roadside temple, or both. At this point of the story Wu Song is in most cases described as reluctant about continuing and embarrassed about returning. Only in the drum tale and the Shandong kuaishu he has no such feelings, but immediately starts to swear at the tiger and promises to fight it. In the drum tale Wu Song falls asleep right after reading the proclamation and the place where he sleeps is not specified. This is again a unique feature of this text. In all the other instances (including text C) Wu Song continues up the mountain and only when he happens to find a big flat “black rock” (qing shi 青石), does he rest. The rock is one of the specific ingredients of the tale that is repeated in all the other examples, aside from the drum tale. Wu Song’s dream during his rest just before the tiger attacks is another unique ingredient (also in text C), not found elsewhere. The way the narrator of the drum tale repeatedly hints at happenings, taking place earlier as well as later than the tiger episode, indicates a special narrator-narratee relationship, as we shall discuss below. 31 At this point in text C Wu Song is not expressing anger towards the tiger. 32 The portion about fighting and killing the tiger covers only about one tenth of the drum tale, while comparatively more space is given in the other instances. Therefore the drum tale lacks many of the details of the fighting which are more or less common story-material in the other versions. The ending of the tale, where Wu Song meets two hunters in disguise, is again unique in so far as one of the hunters has a name, Dong Ping (also in text C), which does not occur elsewhere.

16 Børdahl, A Drum Tale on “Wu Song” his bare fists. He lifts the tiger by the neck and throws it down on the rocks, and that is the end of the tiger (7b, c. 2–8a, c. 7).

5.3 At that very moment two other tigers turn up and Wu Song must act quickly. He bends down to pick up a stone, aiming for those tigers (8a, c. 8–8b, c. 2).

5.4 The point of view changes to the ‘two tigers’ and one of them called Dong Ping 董平 shouts to Wu Song, that he should not attack them, because they are just hunters dressed in tiger fur. They tell Wu Song to follow them down the mountain and report to the authorities. The passage is framed by a stock phrase of conclusion leading over to the following session (in another booklet): ‘This was the first part about…In the next session the story about…continues’ (zhe shi …yige duan, xia yi hui ….zai xu shang) (8b, c. 3-8).33

In the following we shall refer to the various passages by using the numbering given in this exposition of the storyline. In the context of the larger project on “Wu Song and the tiger” an inventory of episodes that make up the storylines of every instance of the story in the core material is established. Comparing the episodes, subdivisions are made at a level of fairly small units of content. Here, I shall only give one example: Section 5.2 above of the drum tale contains everything that is said about the fight with the tiger in the piece. The passage is emphatic, but short, both in comparison with the space given to other happenings in the tale, and particularly in comparison with the detailed narratives of this event in other instances. However, in the drum tale we find a detail of the plot that is unique

33 In drum tale A the stock phrase introduces Wu Song fa pei, to be the next hui, while drum tale B announces Shizipo as the next hui. In text C the next hui is announced as Er Wu Song Yangguxian ba dang.

17 CHINOPERL Papers No. 27 among the instances of my material so far. At the beginning of the passage we hear how Wu Song’s staff is broken (8a, c. 1-2): … He grabbed his quarterstaff in his hand

He aimed straight for the fierce tiger But as the tiger dodged, his cudgel was broken

The tiger dodged! This is something that we only find in this drum tale.34 Elsewhere the tiger never dodges, on the contrary, Wu Song is continually dodging the tiger. In some versions of Yangzhou pinghua Wu Song has no staff—he is barehanded throughout the tale.35 Some performers describe Wu Song as having a staff which the tiger grasps with its mouth and breaks.36 In some instances, primarily the written versions of the novel, Wu Song cannot see clearly and hits an old tree instead of the tiger,37 or the staff is crushed against the rock where he slept when the tiger arrived.38 Through a comparison of how various instances of the story treat this first confrontation with the tiger, we can see how even the smallest incident can be divided into still smaller sub-episodes. Depending on the number of different instances taken into account, as well as on the degree of fineness of the analysis,

34 This detail is found in versions A, B and C. 35 Cf. Børdahl (1996: 247–86), performance by Wang Xiaotang 1992. 36 Cf. Børdahl (1996: 297, 306), performance by Li Xintang 1986. 37 Cf. Shi Nai’an, Luo Guanzhong ([1988] 1997: 321). The description of the crushing of the cudgel against a tree is found both in the jianben 簡本 and the fanben 繁本 versions of the novel. However, the illustration of the episode in the Rongyutang edition seems to suggest that the artist is visualizing that the cudgel is broken against the rock, cf. Shi Nai’an, Luo Guanzhong ([1988] 1997: 314). 38 Cf. Fuzhou pinghua.

18 Børdahl, A Drum Tale on “Wu Song” episodes, sub-episodes and sub sub-episodes, can be established for the purpose of discussing various features of the performance. In terms of the storyline, the drum tale has the same main plot development found in all the other instances of the core material—Wu Song traveling home, drinking in the inn, and fighting the tiger. But in addition, the drum tale has many plot details that are not part of any other version, and it contains a greater number of such ‘solitary’ ingredients than other versions, despite the brevity of the drum tale texts.39 Some rare details are shared with the clapper tale and the fast tale, and some only with the clapper tale. The drum tale also shares certain special features and expressions with the Fuzhou pinghua.

3. Narrative technique 3.1 Prose and verse The entire piece is printed over a ‘matrix’ in heptasyllabic meter, forming couplets of top and bottom lines, with the end-rhyme -ang for the bottom lines (and the very first top line). Some of the lines are irregular, with one to seven extra syllables; they are found at irregular intervals throughout the piece, but the large majority of lines consist of seven characters.40 On the pages of the woodcut edition, the vertical lines are arranged in the usual way with a space between the top line and the bottom line of the couplet. When a line has more than seven characters, these are either shrunk so that three characters occupy the space of two ‘normal’ characters, or two small characters are placed

39 Only the drama versions and the fast tale (kuaishu) are a little shorter. 40 The realization of the heptasyllabic form in oral performance is a highly complicated question that we can only touch upon superficially here. For a detailed study of the realization patterns of this basic form in Beijing drum singing, cf. Stevens (1973: 111-119). In text C, the errenzhuan version, we find the same meter as that used throughout the drum tale versions.

19 CHINOPERL Papers No. 27 side by side in the line. Whether the arrangement of smaller characters corresponds with faster rhythm in performance cannot be decided on the evidence of the printer’s arrangement.

Drum tale A, pages 6b (right) and 7a (left), each page 13 x 9,5 cm. Original in the Academia Sinica Collection. As mentioned earlier, there is a passage of two couplets in section 3.7, page 6b, c. 3-4, that is specially indented on the printed page and cut with smaller characters. Both the printer’s layout and the contents of the passage—a prediction of the valour of Wu Song during the coming fight with the tiger—indicate that the passage should be considered a shi 詩 [poem]. It has, however, exactly the same rhythm and rhyme as the rest of the drum tale. It is interesting that this one passage of the whole is arranged on the page as a poem. In this way the text, which is

20 Børdahl, A Drum Tale on “Wu Song” metrical throughout, acquires two levels of poetic status where one portion, the poem, is “more of a poem” than the rest.41

3.2 Narrator type The narrator belongs to the category of the ‘omniscient’ third person narrator.42 Through stock phrases of introduction, connection, and conclusion the narrator is on the point of taking the position of an overt first person narrator. The pronoun ‘I’ (wo 我) is not stated, but it is the logical subject of the stock phrases that open and conclude sections of the drum tale, such as ‘[Let me] tell in this session’ (yan yi hui), section 1, p. 1a, c. 1:

Let me tell in this session about when the Emperor had his seat in Bianliang All under Heaven was in a constant state of war

There is also a simulated dialogue with the audience, ‘you’ (ruo 若), signalized by the stock phrase ‘You may ask ...’ (ruo wen... 若問). Apart from this function of the stock phrases, serving to emphasize the oral situation of the performance and the direct communication between performer and audience, the narrative form does not—like in other genres such as the written novel and orally performed Yangzhou pinghua—directly point to the narrator as the storyteller or performer.43

41 The pattern of tone-alternation, ping 平 versus ze 仄, might be more regular in the lines that are indented as shi, but it seems likely that the poem, furthermore would be recited in a distinctive way. Text C lacks this poem. 42 The extradiegetic, heterodiegetic type, cf. Genette (1980: 228-248). 43 Cf. the Rongyutang edition of Shuihu zhuan, Shi Nai’an, Luo Guanzhong ([1988] 1997: 316), and Wang Xiaotang’s performance 1992, Børdahl (1996: 191-192). In text C the narrator is even less prominent, because the first stock phrase is missing and the stock phrase of simulated dialogue with the audience is changed into modern Chinese conditional sentence ‘if one asks’ yao wen 要問, which carries only a weak

21 CHINOPERL Papers No. 27 It is characteristic of the narrator’s style that episodes of Wu Song’s life, before and after the fight with the tiger, are regularly mentioned without any explanation. We have already, in the section about the storyline, seen that the drum tale at certain points hints at happenings that do not strictly belong to the tiger tale. In particular those taking place later, such as the mention of Ximen Qing in section 3.1 at a time when this person has not yet entered the universe of the fiction. In the majority of versions of the Wu Song saga, Ximen Qing only turns up after Wu Song has killed the tiger, found his elder brother and left his home again. This characteristic is given even more emphasis in section 4 when Wu Song, after reading the proclamation about the tiger, has fallen asleep at the gateway of the Jingyang Ridge where he “dreams about his sister-in-law, that woman née Pan.” Here he is dreaming about something he cannot possibly know anything about, since his brother’s marriage has taken place during Wu Song’s absence. His dream about Pan Jinlian 潘金蓮 just at the point when he is realizing the true danger of the tiger, seems to insinuate a connection between his tiger-fighting and his first explicitly erotic meeting with the female sex—the seductive Pan Jinlian, an even more formidable and potent opponent than the man-eating tiger. The understanding of the episode as a prelude to Wu Song’s later misogynist confrontations and killing orgies is understood not only in the drum tale, but also in some of the other performance-related instances of the tiger tale.44

resemblance of communication with the audience. The genre of errenzhuan seems to put less emphasis on direct appeal to the audience. 44 The Fuzhou pinghua stresses the question of Wu Song’s resistance to the opposite sex, introducing the hero to a prostitute in one village, before the drinking episode in the next village. However, the parallelism between the confrontation with the tiger and the confrontation with Pan Jinlian is even clearer in the drum tale.

22 Børdahl, A Drum Tale on “Wu Song” Mentioning characters and events that belong to events earlier or later than the tiger episode indicates that the narrator presupposes a certain ‘common knowledge’ by the narratee of the text (or the intended audience of a performance).45 It is therefore not only the narrator who is of the ‘omniscient’ type, but in the drum tale even the narratee could be characterized as ‘omniscient’. The high frequency of personal names and place names about which we hear little, but are supposed to be ‘reminded’ of in passing, are also markers of this kind of congenial narrator-narratee relationship.

3.3 Narrative form: narration and dialogue The narrative form consists of portions of narration alternating with portions of dialogue involving the protagonists. The narrative portions of this piece are mainly in the mode of summary, i.e. telling the string of actions which build up the plot, for example section 5.2, page 7b, c. 4: Second Master opened his eyes in haste, and saw a fierce tiger beside him there

Descriptive passages are few, but in section 3.5, 4b, c. 3-7, Wu Song is described from the point of view of the waiter in five couplets of inner monologue (thoughts), and likewise, the tiger is described in four couplets from the point of view of Wu Song on his first sight of it, right after the couplet quoted above, section 5.2, 7b, c. 5-8:

Its height was more than one staff’s length Its tail was truly like a spear

45 For textual constituents such as 'narrator' and 'narratee', see Gérard Genette (1988: 130–35).

23 CHINOPERL Papers No. 27 One hundred and eight stripes covered its body After a black one came a yellow

On its forehead a character stood out: three horizontal and one vertical stroke makes ‘King’!

Its gaping mouth—a pail of blood—was big as a dustpan, its two eyes staring at you like tea mugs.

In many of the performed genres of shuochang, the storyteller’s comment is an important ingredient in the performance, but in this piece there is little of this mode of narration. However, there are two cases of simulated dialogue with the audience, introduced with the stock phrase ‘You may ask ...’ (ruo wen... 若問). This rhetorical question does not initiate a real comment on behalf of the narrator, but the question is simply answered with factual information:

You may ask where he fled He went off to Cangzhou to seek refuge with the King of Liang46

A considerable part of the piece is dialogue and inner monologue where the pronouns ‘I’, ‘you’ (wo, ni) are prominent. Tags are sometimes used to introduce speech/thought, but they are just as often omitted. When there are no tags, it is the pronouns and the content of the sentences that indicate direct speech or thought, as for example in section 2, page 2a, c. 1, where Wu Song suddenly expresses his thought in monologue without any marker, apart from the use of the pronoun ‘I’ (wo). In section 3.7, page 5b, c. 5-8, Wu Song and the

46 The stock phrase is written in italics, cf. section 2, page 1b, c. 9. See also section 3.1, 2b, c. 1.

24 Børdahl, A Drum Tale on “Wu Song” waiter have a conversation without tag words. Their exchanges can only be inferred from the contents and in particular the use of pronouns.47 The use of tag words is often a sign of the literary mode, i.e. of pieces intended for reading, because oral performance in many genres allows the performer to differentiate speech and narration by imitating the specific voices of each character in the story, while reserving the ‘storyteller’s voice’ for the narrator. However, this may not be the case in the performance practice for this kind of drum tale. If the singing— as seems to be the case with modern Beijing drumsinging—tends to neutralize differences in voice quality between narration and dialogue of individual characters, then the tags become just as important for understanding as in a written text for reading. The tag words in the drum tale are ‘shout’ (jiao sheng 叫聲), ‘inquire’ (xun sheng 尋聲), ‘ask’ (wendao 問道, wen 問), ‘answer’ (huida 回答, dashang qiang 答 上腔), ‘curse’ (ma 罵), ‘think’ (siliang 思 量). ‘Say’ (shuo 說) is used as the neutral form, much like a colon, but it is relatively infrequent, since the above mentioned tags, among which the form jiaosheng is the most frequent, take over.48 A couple of times shuo is used in additional phrases of three characters: ‘XX shuo:…’, i.e. so-called ‘hats’ that are spoken outside of the rhythmic beat,49 e.g. section 3.6,

47 In text C, where the text is constantly alternating between the female dan performer and the male chou performer, we find that the text has basically the same form as in the two drum tale versions A and B, which are presumably meant to be performed by only one performer. There is no tendency in text C to turn more of the tale into dialogue. The two roles only take turns in telling the plot and acting the characters. 48 In this text dao 道 or yue 曰 are not found, with the exception of the form wendao 問道, used once. 49 See paragraph 4.2 Stock phrases, below.

25 CHINOPERL Papers No. 27 page 4b, c. 2 (see also section 3.7, page 5b, c. 9, and section 5.2, page 7b, c. 9):

The waiter said: “I have ‘Champion Red’ and ‘Buddha Hand Dew’, old vintages, Shaoxing wine and strong liquor.”

Jiubao shuo: Wo maide shi Zhuangyuan hong yu Foshou lu lao jiu Shao jiu baigan qiang

酒保說我賣的是狀元紅與佛手露 老酒紹酒白干強

However, in the drum tale some other tag words also function prominently as filler words providing the right number of syllables in the line, and often the rhyme as well. They often take the form of stock phrases or fixed phrases, adding to the formulary character of the piece, e.g. section 3.3, page 3a, c. 2:

Starting to talk, he called Second Brother, shouting: “Second Brother, listen to my simple words!

kai yan jiu ba erdi jiao jiao sheng: erdi ting zhong chang

開言就把二弟叫 叫聲二弟聽中常

Some of the stock phrases (italics) are at the same time markers of speech. The stock phrase ting zhong chang 聽中常 [listen to my simple words] is not a tag phrase, but a marker of conversation, occurring inside the dialogue (spoken by one of the characters). The

26 Børdahl, A Drum Tale on “Wu Song” formulary tag words of passages like this one seem redundant with a view to the meaning, but obviously serve to complete the verse. Their function in reinforcing the style of the genre and its formulaic characteristics is apparent from the way these expressions and variants of them are repeated throughout the piece.50

4. Shared language 4.1 Shared text portions Some instances of the tiger tale show close linguistic relationship, pointing to mutual textual borrowing or borrowing from a ‘master text’, whether oral or written. Here borrowing means: 1) copying of written texts, sometimes with slight editing; 2) learning by heart and transmitting accurately word by word, sometimes with small variations. This is the kind of relationship found among the various versions of the novel, and also among some dramatic versions. There are large portions of shared text, i.e. word by word shared paragraphs and sections, only slightly edited if changed at all. Drum tales A and B clearly exhibit this kind of relationship, even to the extreme degree that the entire text with only a few exceptions is the same. The main difference lies in the application of (unauthorized) simple characters su zi throughout in drum tale B, while A is much more conservative in this respect. In both texts a number of interesting homonym ‘loan characters’ for various proper names are found. Some of the written drama and written pinghua 評話 versions exhibit shared language of another kind: portions of the texts are so close in wording that some versions seem to be sentence by sentence paraphrases. Again, like ‘borrowing’, the process of paraphrasing can

50 In text C this kind of stock phrases are almost absent. This might be an effect of the editors’ influence, since there was at the time a tendency to remove ‘redundancies’ in order to polish and ‘correct’ the folklore texts.

27 CHINOPERL Papers No. 27 be: 1) rewriting a text by either condensing or amplifying; 2) oral re- creation of the mental text, substituting expressions, deleting (forgetting) and adding (creating), while basically sticking to a ‘master model’, probably inherited from another oral performer. The errenzhuan version C of the drum tale represents this kind of relationship to text A and B. Although many couplets correspond word for word with couplets in A and B, the majority are like paraphrases or alternative wordings of the same content.51 This text, printed in China in 1981, is in simplified characters according to the modern standard Chinese norm. As expected, many of the words that seem to be written with homonym ‘loan characters’ or ‘false characters’ (su zi 俗字 and cuo zi 錯字) in the A and B woodcut texts, are here replaced by the ‘correct’ forms.

4.2. Formulary language There are, however, other kinds of shared language which seem even more closely connected to the performance oriented aspects of storytelling. The formulaic linguistic units are usually on the level of sentence or phrase, seldom more than one sentence. Among the formulaic expressions a distinction is drawn between stock phrases and fixed phrases. Stock phrases are for our present purpose defined as phrases that function as narrative markers of introduction, connection and conclusion, as well as other narrative purposes, e.g. marking appeal to

51 This relationship seems to correspond to the kind of variation found with the tale of Changbanpo 長板坡 [Slopes of Changban], studied in detail by Kate Stevens. As she has shown, there is extended sharing of text portions between versions of the same genre and also between the different subgenres of the drum tale, cf. Stevens (1973:. 185-200), and Stevens (1990: 77).

28 Børdahl, A Drum Tale on “Wu Song” the audience, marking dialogue, etc. This part of the formulaic language seems often closely associated with conventions of the genre. The fixed phrases, on the other hand, are stable phrases and sentences that are used repeatedly in the given text or are found in a number of instances of the tale. Finally, on the level of words, proper names of persons and places have a strong formulaic and intertextual function. They are the indispensable signals of the expected basic ingredients in any given version of the particular story. Names of things also play a certain role and sometimes turn into fixed phrases.

4.2.1 Stock phrases The tale begins with a stock phrase of introduction: ‘Let me tell in this session’ (yan yi hui 言一回).52 This stock phrase is found also in some other drum tales and related genres registered in the catalogue by Liu Fu and Li Jiarui, mentioned above, of which the first lines are quoted.53 Sometimes the slightly different form ‘Let me perform in this session’ (yan yi hui 演一回) is the introduction.54 While the phrase is not obligatory for any of the drum tale genres, it is quite frequently used at the outset. Whenever it occurs, the line has the three characters of the stock phrase as extra syllables, apart from the regular seven characters. It seems close to the form and function of the additional phrases, ‘hats’, described for Beijing drumsinging and other drumsong genres,55 but such ‘hat’-like additions occur only a couple of times in the present drum tale text, and only with this and a few other stock phrases and tag phrases, as discussed below.

52 Used in text A and B and not in text C. 53 Cf. Liu Fu and Li Jiarui ([1932] 1993:. 508, 519, 547). 54 Cf. Liu Fu and Li Jiarui ([1932] 1993: 621, 639. 55 Stevens (1973: 114-116).

29 CHINOPERL Papers No. 27 As stock phrases of connection we find the combined phrases: ‘For the moment let’s wait performing...let’s rather perform…’ (qie bu biao…, zai biao... 且不表﹐在表), 56 used three times in the piece, page 1a, c. 7; page 2a, c. 3; page 7a, c. 6. The phrases serve to cut off one thread of the tale and take up another. In the present analysis they are, as mentioned, considered markers of the main sections of the drum tale. The last sentence of the piece is also a formulary sentence, a stock phrase of conclusion: ‘In the next session the story continues about...’ (xia yi hui ...zai xu shang 下一回…在敘上), page 8b, c. 8. This stock phrase concludes one session, but at the same time it functions as a connection to the following session or—as a written text—the next booklet in the series. This usage is obviously parallel to the concluding stock phrases found in the novel after each hui in the sense of ‘chapter’. Apart from these stock phrases of introduction, connection and conclusion, we find a few other types, mentioned above in the section on narrative form 3.3: An appeal to the audience: ‘You may ask ...’ (ruo wen... 若問) is used twice. Tag word phrase indicating dialogue, external to the dialogue sequence: ‘Starting to talk he called XX, shouting:…’ (kai yan jiu ba XX jiao, jiao sheng… 開言就把 XX 叫﹐叫聲…) is used thrice. Markers of dialogue, internal to the dialogue sequence, i.e. letting the characters of the story express that they are engaged in

56 In the woodblock printed editions of the drumtale, the character 在 zai [here] is frequently used in constructions where the meaning seems to be that of 再 zai [next], i.e. 在 is used as homophone, providing the sound. Similar usage is found in storytellers’ manuscripts from Late-Qing Early-Republic, cf. Børdahl (2005). In text C the character is given as 再 for the similar expressions zai shuo 再說 and zai biao 再表, but we do not find the ‘full’ stock phrase and there are no repetitions of such stock phrases in this text.

30 Børdahl, A Drum Tale on “Wu Song” conversation, typically function as fillers to provide rhyming phrases of three syllables (characters) for the bottom lines of each couplet: ‘...listen to my simple words’ (...ting zhongchang 聽中常)57 used four times; ‘...listen to my explanation’ (...ting duanchang 聽短長), ‘Tell me in detail...’ (shuo qi xiang 說其詳), ‘...listen carefully’ (...ting duanxiang 聽端詳), and ‘…listen to my good advice’ (…ting yan liang 聽言良), each used once, always in the bottom rhyming line.

4.2.2 Fixed phrases: repeated phrases/sentences and shared wording Repeated phrases or sentences are sufficiently frequent in the drum tale to give the impression that they are part of the style. Some couplets or half-couplets are word for word identical, apart from the slots XX where names or terms of address are inserted:

Page 2b, c. 3; and page 3a, c. 2:

Starting to talk, he called XX, shouting: “XX, listen to my simple words!”

kaiyan jiu ba XX jiao, jiao sheng XX ting zhongchang

Variants of the sentence above (consisting of several stock phrases) are found on page 3a, c. 6 , page 4a, c. 9, page 5a, c. 1, and 5a, c. 9, where

57 A homonym stock phrase of frequent usage in the Beijing drumsong texts, studied by Kate Stevens, is ‘listen to my heart’ or ‘listen to my sincere words’ (聽衷腸 ting zhongchang), which would apparently give better sense also in the lines of the present drum tale, cf. Stevens (1973: 110). I suspect that the writing 聽中常 ting zhongchang is a kind of ‘shorthand’, providing the sound, cf. the previous note. In fact, in text C we find 聽衷腸 in one single instance in a corresponding place in the text, but as mentioned, this type of stock phrases are otherwise not used in this text.

31 CHINOPERL Papers No. 27 the last three syllables are exchanged with other expressions that carry the same rhyme.

Three other phrases and sentences are repeated verbatim twice each:

Page 7a, c. 2; and page 8a, c. 1:

The more XX scolded, the angrier he became XX yue shuo xin yue nao

XX 越說心越惱

Page 6b, c. 4; and page 8a, c. 5:

He dodged the tiger’s head and grabbed its tail

rangguo hutou zhua huwei

讓過虎頭抓虎尾

Page 7a, c. 1; and page 7b, c. 9:

“Instead of staying high up in the mountain in royal dignity, you dare come down from the mountain and do people harm!”

bu zai gao shan wei wang wei, xia shan jiu ba ren lai shang

不在高山為王位 下山就把人來傷

32 Børdahl, A Drum Tale on “Wu Song” The repeated phrases and sentences seem to point to the importance of the oral performance situation envisaged for the piece. An author of a piece intended for reading might easily avoid this kind of repetition, if he wanted to.58 But in the format of the drum tale, repetition adds to the humorous flavor and obviously belongs to the genre-immanent features.

Wording shared with other instances of the tiger tale are infrequent in the drum tale. We only find three instances of such usage, and in each case the shared wording is found with minimal variation in an oral performance of Shandong clapper tale Shandong kuaishu, cf. Appendix.

1) Section 3.7, page 6b, c. 1:

“Leave, leave, please, just leave! Why should I care if you are eaten up by a tiger or a wolf?”

Ni zou, ni zou, ni jiu zou, wo guan ni wei hu shi wei lang

你走你走你就走 我管你喂虎是喂狼

Compare with the Shandong clapper tale: ni yao zou, ni jiu zou, wo guan ni wei hu, ni wei lang

58 In text C we do not find such repeated phrases and sentences. The piece is equally intended for oral performance, but I think the modern editors of the piece would tend to revise the text according to ‘good taste’ for the written medium. How far the oral performers would go in adding repetitions and formulary stock phrases to their performed versions is an open question.

33 CHINOPERL Papers No. 27 你要走你就走 我管你喂虎你喂狼

Section 5.2, page 7b, c. 7:

Three lines and one stroke reads as ‘king’

san heng yi shu nian ge wang

三橫一豎念個王

Compare with the Shandong clapper tale: san heng yi shu jiu nian wang 三橫一豎就念王59

Section 3.4, page 3b, c. 7:

Every character, every line was written very nicely

zizi hanghang xiede qiang

字字行行寫的強

This phrase is identical with Shandong clapper tale.

4.2.3 Proper names: persons, places and special things In the following the proper names in the drum tale are listed as they appear in the tale. Names, alternative names and nicknames of the same character are listed together with their first mention. Names that

59 The above expressions are also found in unaltered or only slightly altered form in text C.

34 Børdahl, A Drum Tale on “Wu Song” are found in the drum tale, but not in the other ten instances selected for comparison, are marked with an asterisk *.60

Persons:

Page 1a Wu Song 武 松 , Second Brother Wu (Wu Erlang 武 二 郎 ), Second Master (Er ye 二爺), Wu the Second (Wu Lao’er 武老二, Wu Er 武 二 ), Second Celestial Power* (Er Tiangang 二 天 罡 ), `Second Heavenly King* (Er Tianwang 二天王) Gao Qiu* 高球 [Minister of War]61 Tong Que* 佟 確 [probably for Tong Guan 童 貫 , eunuch and commander-in-chief]62 Cai Jing * 蔡景 [First Minister] Yang Jian * 楊劍 [Eunuch and commander-in-chief] Wang Qing * 王慶[leader of forces in revolt]

60 Only Chapter 22 or 23 of Shuihu zhuan (the tiger tale proper) and only the act or scene of the tiger tale in the dramas are considered in comparing proper names of the single ‘items’. Text C again differs from drum tale A and B in a number of details as will be pointed out in the notes. In the notes, additional information on proper names from other sources, including the entire novel of Shuihu zhuan and the Jin Ping Mei cihua, will be added. 61 The names are written with the characters used in drum tale A. Many of them are homophones, not the ‘correct’ characters used in official history for these persons. I shall discuss only a few of them here. For a discussion of homophonic writing in oral-related texts, see Ge Liangyan (2001: 111-112). 62 The characters Tong Que 佟確 (罐 guan ?) (versions A and B) seem to represent with homophone writing the name of Tong Guan 童貫, cf. Chapter One of Jin Ping Mei cihua, where the four ministers Gao, Yang, Tong and Cai are mentioned, just before the Wu Song tale begins. In the copied lines of Liu Fu and Li Jiarui ([1932] 1993) these characters are corrected to 童貫. In the errenzhuan version the name is also rendered as 童貫, cf. Errenzhuan chuantong jumu huibian, (1981: 41).

35 CHINOPERL Papers No. 27 Third Brother Song* (Song Sanlang 宋三郎) [Song Jiang, leader of the heroes on Mount Liang] King of Liang* (Liang Wang 梁王), Little King of Liang* (Xiao Liang Wang 小梁王)63 [Chai Jin] Wu Zishun* 武子順 [father of Wu the Elder and Wu Song] Wu the Elder * (Wu Dalang 武大郎), Wu Lin 武林 64

Page 1b Five Tigers of the Dong family(*) (Dong jia Wu hu 董家五虎 ) 65, Road-blocking Tigers (Lanlu hu 攔 路 虎 ),66 Kings of empty streets* (Jingjie wang 淨街王) Li Gui (*) 李貴 67

63 In drum tales A and B we only find this name, not Chai Jin 柴進. In the version of Yangzhou pinghua chosen for comparison, cf. Appendix, we do not find this name, but in another version performed by Chen Shiyong 1989, in Børdahl (1996: 352, 361), we find Xiao Liang Wang for Chai Jin. In text C the name is given everywhere as Chai Jin or Lord of Chai. 64 Text C does not have this name for Wu the Elder. 65 The Shandong kuaishu mentions the episode briefly and uses the expression ‘Five Tigers’ (Wu hu). 66 Lanluhu is found in drum tales A, B and C. In the Yangzhou pinghua version the expression ‘road-blocking tiger’ is used with reference to the tiger, not about the rascals in the Dong Family Temple (this episode is not part of Yangzhou storytelling). 67 The Shandong kuaishu mentions the Li family (Li jia) of despots, not the Dong family, see also Dong Family Temple, below. Li Gui, nicknamed Yaksha of Shandong (Shandong yecha 山東夜叉), is also a champion warrior in the Jin Ping Mei cihua. This figure is perhaps related to the warrior of the same name found in the early huaben 話本 Yang Wen lanluhu zhuan 楊溫攔路虎傳, cf. Hanan (1963: 37). In the drum tale and the Shandong kuaishu the nickname ‘road-blocking tigers’ (lanluhu) is used for Li Gui and his four brothers, while in the huaben tale it is the nickname of the main protagonist Yang Wen, who manages to win one fight with Li Gui. It seems probable that the huaben, Jin Ping Mei, Shandong kuaishu and the drum tale are drawing on a common tradition (oral and written) about a staff-fighting

36 Børdahl, A Drum Tale on “Wu Song”

Page 2a Master Kong * (Kong laoye 孔老爺) [village head]

Page 2b Ximen Qing * 西門慶[lover of Pan Jinlian]68 Little Liu Tang * 小劉堂[horse monger] King of Medicine * (Yao Wang 藥王) 69

Page 3b Liu Ling * 劉伶[famous drunkard] Du Kang * 杜康 [famous for making wine]70

Page 6a Pockmarked Wang * (Wang Mazi 王麻子), Classroom Zhang* (Zhang Xuetang 張學堂),71 Zhao * 趙, Qian * 錢, Sun * 孫, Li * 李, Zhou * 周, Wu * 吳, Zheng * 鄭, Wang * 王 [persons killed by the tiger]

Page 6b King of Beasts (shou zhong wang 獸中王) [the tiger]

Page 7a champion from Shandong, Li Gui with the nickname ‘road-blocking tiger’, but the attribution of this nickname and other names of the legend varies in each case. 68 Ximen Qing is not mentioned in text C. Here Wu Dalang is said to live behind Old Widow Wang (Wang Laogua 王老寡). 69 The mention of a King of Medicine close to the place where Wu Song is found by the horse monger, seems to be confused with the later Ximen Qing episode, since Ximen Qing owns a drugstore. 70 The names of Liu Ling and Du kang are not found in text C. 71 In text C the teacher is called Zhang Xiaotang 張小唐, otherwise the list of names is the same.

37 CHINOPERL Papers No. 27 Née Pan * (Pan shi 潘氏) [Pan Jinlian]

Page 8a Cun Xiao 存孝 [a former tiger killer] 72

Page 8b Dong Ping * 董平[hunter]73

Places:

Page 1a Bianliang * 汴梁 Huaiqing Prefecture * 淮慶 Mount Liang * 梁山 Guang Prefecture (*) 廣府 74 Qinghe District 清河縣 Kongsheng Village * 孔聖庄

Page 1b Dong Family Temple (*) (Dongjia miao 董家廟) 75 Cangzhou 滄州

72 Text C does not have this name. Instead it mentions Liu Xiu 劉秀, the first emperor of the Eastern Han, as the inventor of the expression King of the Beasts. 73 This name is found not only for one of the hunters in this tale, but also as a name for one of the guards following Wu Song to the tavern of Crossways Rise in the drum tale Shizipo mentioned above. In the novel Shuihu zhuan neither the hunters, nor the guards are mentioned by name, but in Chapter 69, a captain called Dong Ping, nicknamed Twin Spears, later counted among the 36 generals, turns up, cf. Shi Nai’an, Luo Guanzhong ([1988] 1997: 1016). The use of this name for one of the hunters in the drum tale could be pure coincidence, but it could also reflect the inter- textual reservoir of the Water Margin cycle in oral tradition from which the performer/creator of the drum tale sprinkled a few ready names. 74 The Fuzhou pinghua mentions this place as Guangping fu 廣平府.

38 Børdahl, A Drum Tale on “Wu Song”

Page 3b Peach Blossom Tavern* (Taohua dian 桃花店) Apricot Flower Village* (Xinghua zhuang 杏花庄)

Page 5b Jingyang Ridge (Jingyanggang 景陽崗)

75 The Shandong kuaishu mentions the same place as 東岳廟 Dongyue miao [Eastern Hill Temple]. The homophone or near homophone for this place name seems to point to a common reservoir of story material. In the Wu Song saga as told in Shandong kuaishu, cf. Shandong kuaishu Wu Song zhuan (1957: 1-41), the whole episode of Dongyue miao is told in four sections. This is a tale about how Wu Song kills the ‘five tigers’ of the Li family, which is the reason why he must leave his hometown and seek refuge with Chai Jin. Li Gui and his four brothers, who bully the local people, are all killed one after another by Wu Song in a dramatic cudgel fight. This tale has many details in common with the early huaben entitled Yang Wen lanluhu zhuan [Yang Wen, the ‘Road-Blocking Tiger’], originally from the collection Qingpingshantang huaben 清平山堂話本, translated in Ma and Lau 1983, but while ‘road-blocking tiger’ (lanluhu) is a positive nickname for Yang Wen, the cudgel fighter hero of the tale, it is a negative nickname for the five Li brothers in the Shandong kuaishu tradition. Li Gui is a great cudgel fighter in both stories. In the huaben, Li Gui is called Guankou Erlang 灌口二郎 [The God Erlang from Guankou], and he fights with a full-length quarterstaff (qimei gun 齊眉棍). In the Yangzhou pinghua Wu Song is called Guankou Erlang, and in several of the instances for comparison his weapon is named in particular a qimei gun, see below. Patrick Hanan writes about some vestiges of the huaben tale in Jin Ping Mei: “It is impossible, therefore to be certain that the author [of Jin Ping Mei] derived his knowledge of him [Li Gui] from this story [Yang Wen lanluhu zhuan]. It is quite conceivable that his account, including the braggadocio, is drawn from other popular narrative or dramatic literature which now no longer exists.” cf. Hanan (1963: 37). (Additions in square parentheses are mine.) To me it seems likely that the drum tale and the Shandong kuaishu tradition are examples of this story material in oral tradition up to the present. In chapter one of Jin Ping Mei cihua, Wu Song is said to have beaten a certain commissioner Tong 童 while drunk, and this is the reason for

39 CHINOPERL Papers No. 27

Special things:

Page 3b Brow high quarterstaff (qimei gun 齊眉棍) 76 Turtledoves turn into Phoenixes* (Yeji chi jiu bian fenghuang 野雞吃 酒變鳳凰)[name of wine]77

Page 4b Champion Red (Zhuangyuan hong 狀元紅)[name of wine] Buddha Hand Dew* (Foshou lu 佛手露)[name of wine] his flight to Cangzhou. Both André Lévy and David Roy translate this person as Tong Guan, cf. above, while Levy notes that such an episode is nowhere hinted at in Shuihu zhuan. Considering the widespread use of homophonic characters in oral- related writings and the range of inaccuracy (cf. the writing of Tong Guan in the drum tale above), one may speculate if this person Tong should be understood rather as one of the fellows at Dongyue miao or Dongjia miao, that we find in the drum tale and Shandong kuaishu. In the Ming drama by Shen Jing 沈璟, from which Act Four: Chu xiong 除兇, cf. Appendix, is selected, we find in Act Two: You yu 遊寓 a hint at this same place. Wu Song is said to have stayed in Dong Village (Dongzhuang 東庄) before he came to Chai Jin. Apart from this, nothing is mentioned in the play about the happenings at that place. 76 This special name of Wu Song’s staff is found in drum tales A, B and C, as well as in the kuaishu and the Fuzhou pinghua. In chapters 3 and 73 of Shuihu zhuan we find a similar appellation for this kind of staff, qimei mubang 齊眉木棒 or qimei duanbang 齊眉短棒, which is also mentioned in the huaben tale about the ‘Road blocking tiger’, cf. note 75. 77 It is noteworthy that the drum tale and the fast tale (kuaishu) do not mention the name of the strong wine as “Three bowls and you cannot cross the Ridge” (san wan bu guo gang 三碗不過崗) which is otherwise one of the most stable vocabulary items used in novel, drama and performance genres alike. In text C we find a wine name ‘Get off your horse and you’ll savor the flavor’ (xia ma wen xiang 下馬聞香) which is unique to this text.

40 Børdahl, A Drum Tale on “Wu Song”

The only names that are found in all examples of the tiger tale are: Wu Song and Jingyang Ridge. These two names also enter into the fixed phrase that is frequently adopted as the title of the story. Yet, in cases where the title does not include these names at all, as with the two dramas, or mentions only Wu Song, as in many performance genres, we still find both names as part of the tale: Wu Song is Wu Song, and the mountain where he fights the big beast is always Jingyang Ridge. The animal that Wu Song fights is always a tiger, but it is called by different names such as ‘big beast’ (da chong 大虫), ‘damned monster’ (niechu 孽畜), Lord of the Mountain (shanjun 山君), King of the Beasts (shou zhong wang 獸中王, bai shou zhi wang 百獸之王), ‘fierce tiger’ (meng hu 猛虎), ‘road-blocking tiger’ (lanlu hu 攔路虎), ‘tiger’ (hu 虎, laohu 老虎), etc. The drum tale is particularly rich in proper names (well over fifty). No other instance has so many names of persons, places and things. It is, however, noteworthy that the drum tale at the same time lacks some of the most common names and objects, such as the name of the strong wine ‘Three bowls and you cannot cross the ridge’ (San wan bu guo gang 三碗不過崗) and the object of the ‘black rock’ (qing shi 青石) where Wu Song in most cases falls asleep. Wu Song always drinks heavily before he ascends the mountain where the tiger lives, and the wine he drinks is most often called ‘Three bowls and you cannot cross the Ridge’, but we do not find this name in the drum tale. In the drum tale we have a wine name that is much more erotically tinged: ‘Turtledoves turn into Phoenixes’.78

78 Apart from the drum tale, only the fast tale does not mention the name of the wine as ‘Three bowls and you cannot cross the Ridge’. Instead, in the fast tale the tavern has a signboard with couplets, mentioning Apricot Blossom Village (Xinghuacun 杏 花村), which is traditionally a place famous for strong wine in Shandong.

41 CHINOPERL Papers No. 27 As for the various appellations of Wu Song, they are lacking in the drama versions, the novel versions of Shuihu zhuan only has one of them, while the rest belong to the performance genres. The name of the hero Cun Xiao is shared with the novel and drama versions, but with none of the other performance genres. The place names of Qinghe District and Cangzhou are shared with some novel and drama versions, and also found in some performance genres, but their distribution is not uniform. The expression King of the Beasts, a common metaphor for ‘tiger’, is found in the novel, the fast tale and the clapper tale. More interesting is the occurrence of two special names, i.e. the name of one kind of wine that the innkeeper has for sale, Champion Red, and the name of Wu Song’s staff, his quarterstaff [qimei gun ‘brow-high staff’]. The wine name is shared with the clapper tale, and the quarterstaff with the fast tale and the Fuzhou pinghua.

Intertextual lines Above I have mapped out the features of the drum tale in light of the other tiger tales selected for comparison. My observations and comparisons also include a few other texts or excerpts in those cases where the tiger tale is only one section from a larger cycle within a novel, drama, or clapper tale. Is it possible to discern any lines and patterns in the web of intertextual correpondences? Can we learn something about written and oral tradition and the interplay between them from this case study? We shall return to the point of departure once again and go through the various features of the drum tale that we have investigated, in order to put into relief the intertextual lines of connection. By lines of connection, I do not mean historical influence. The material for comparison is not well suited for a study of historical transmission, whether it be written or oral. The kind of intertextual lines one can find between the various items of the tiger tale is on the

42 Børdahl, A Drum Tale on “Wu Song” structural and lexical level, where a number of similarities and dissimilarities are tested, concerning textual unit, storyline, narrative technique, and shared language. In summing up the findings from the analysis of the drum tale, some preliminary thoughts and tentative conclusions on the oral and written modes of language will be made.

The drum tale is one hui, in the sense of a ‘round’ or a ‘session’ for performance, probably the first in a series of several hui from the Wu Song saga, all published as thin booklets of six to thirteen pages in a small format. The Shandong clapper tale and the fast tale genre (kuaishu) use hui in the same sense and function. In the novel Shuihu zhuan the tiger tale is a hui in a modulated sense, closer to the western idea of ‘chapter’. In the novel the word hui is part of the title, with a number, di ershisan hui [Chapter 23],79 and it also enters into the final stock phrase qie ting xia hui fen jie 且聽下回分解 [please, listen to the explanation in the next chapter], where the word ‘listen’ (ting) links the oral and written modes. The word hui does, however, not enter into the text of the novel in the way it does in the drum tale, clapper tale and fast tale, where the narrator may explicitly point to his own role as a performer of a ‘session’. The textual units for drama and the other performance genres represented have different monikers. However, even if the name is different, the idea of the daily sessions of performance for Yangzhou pinghua is essentially the same, that is: one ‘session’ (yichang shu) or one ‘day’ (yitian shu). The storyline of the drum tale follows the general layout of the Shuihu zhuan, namely Wu Song’s absence from his hometown and his stay with Chai Jin, followed by his journey back to his brother, his drinking

79 Chapter 22 of the jianben edition, cf. Appendix.

43 CHINOPERL Papers No. 27 in the tavern, the innkeepers warning about the tiger, Wu Song’s stubborn refusal to stay in the tavern, his discovery of the official proclamation on the Jingyang Ridge, the confrontation with and killing of the tiger, and finally meeting the two hunters in tiger’s fur. However, this general framework is composed from a wealth of minor building blocks which differ from the contents of the novel to an amazing degree. Taking the drum tale as a point of departure, we find that Shuihu zhuan lacks 1) the introductory passage;80 2) the passage about fighting the ‘five tigers’ of the Dong Family Temple (found in the clapper tale); 3.1) the fate of Wu the Elder after Wu Song’s escape; 3.2) the episode about the horse monger; portions of 3.4), namely the beautiful women; portions of 4) Wu Song’s dream. The novel also differs in details about fighting the tiger compared to section 5) of the drum tale. As the above analysis indicates, the storyline of the drum tale is closer to those of the clapper tale and the fast tale, and it also shares some special episodes with the Fuzhou pinghua.

The narrative technique of the drum tale departs conspicuously from the form of the novel. Yet, the drum tale bears a close resemblance to the modern Shandong clapper tale, both in narrative content and structure, as well as in shared language. The clapper tale is an oral performance available on compact disc, and the difference between rhythmic passages in spoken verse and passages in spoken prose can be heard. This kind of alternation may also be a feature of the drum tale as performance, but it cannot be seen in the written text at hand, which is presented as verse only (including a passage set off as a ‘poem’.) The fast tale has the same kind of rhythmic heptasyllabic verse, but the tale includes a number of clearly indicated performance

80 The material for the introduction is found in the earlier part of the novel, but not repeated in Chapter 22/23 about the tiger episode.

44 Børdahl, A Drum Tale on “Wu Song” styles: an introductory poem (shipian 詩篇),81 a prose introduction (zhutou 注頭), a section in rhymed verse (Qingyun ban 青云板), a portion in mixed prose and verse (Liushui ban 流水板), a second poem, a portion in spoken prose (huabai 話白) and then a final longer section in mixed prose and verse (Lianzhu diao 連珠調), which is performed in an accelerating tempo and has given the name to the genre.82 In Beijing drumsinging (Jingyun dagu) a number of different performance styles are likewise used for various portions of one ‘session’,83 and it seems likely that the drum tale under study would also have had similar performance traditions. The type of narrator for the drum tale is again closest to that of the clapper tale and fast tale. We find the same kind of stock phrases which introduce the narrator as a nearly overt first person, while at the same time maintaining the characteristics of the omniscient narrator common to all the narrative genres tested here (excluding the drama). The drum tale differs from all other instances of the tale in the large number of proper names that are mentioned with only little description. The artful enumeration of places and persons seems aimed at evoking the joy of a shared knowledge, supposedly existing between the performer and his audience (or on the textual level: the narrator and his narratee). As for the storyteller’s comment and simulated dialogue with the audience, the drum tale only has a few short sentences of this kind. In the clapper tale there are virtually no such passages, but a similar playing with rhetorical questions and answers is here attributed to the characters of the tale as inner monologue: instead of a narrator who

81 A shi poem is also found in the drum tale as a marker of connection, not as introduction, and only indicated by indentation. 82 Chen Jinzhao (1982: 65-77). 83 Stevens (1973: 176-178).

45 CHINOPERL Papers No. 27 engages in asking and answering his own questions, the characters talk to themselves. In Yangzhou pinghua, on the other hand, the narrator’s simulated dialogue is a very important narrative device, much more developed than in the novel or any other of the instances studied here. The two descriptive passages of the drum tale, on Wu Song and on the tiger, are likewise found in the clapper tale, where a number of identical lines are used. The use of formulary tag words in the drum tale to indicate the shifting modes of narration and dialogue (as well as fill the heptasyllabic line and provide a rhyme) is found also in the clapper tale, but far more infrequently.

The textual/linguistic relationship between text A and B of the drum tale and text C in the errenzhuan genre is particularly close, representing mutual borrowing/copying and in the case of text C a combination of borrowing and paraphrasing. The drum tale does not share any longer portions with the other ten instances of the tiger tale (except for the two relatively short descriptions of Wu Song and of the tiger, just mentioned above). We do, however, find shared formulaic language, such as stock phrases and fixed phrases. Here again, the drum tale is closest to the clapper tale, having a number of stock phrases and fixed phrases in common. Also, when comparing the proper names of persons and places, the drum tale shows a definitively closer relationship to the Shandong clapper tale and the fast tale. Several of the instances of the tiger tale that we have compared with the drum tale have features that point to a closer relationship to the Jin Ping Mei cihua (or the oral traditions from which the Jin Ping Mei draws its story material) than to the Shuihu zhuan. For example, the drum tale enumerates in the prologue portion historical and fictional persons that are also mentioned, much in the same way, in the first chapter of the Jin Ping Mei cihua, while these persons are not all

46 Børdahl, A Drum Tale on “Wu Song” found in the Shuihu zhuan, and definitely not in the chapter of the tiger tale. The episode in the Dong Family Temple about Wu Song’s fight with the Li family’s staff fighters seems to have some faint resonance in the Jin Ping Mei, in particular if evidence from the huaben of Yang Wen lanluhu zhuan is taken into account, while nothing is told about this in the Shuihu zhuan. Neither drum tale nor the Jin Ping Mei mention the name of the wine as “Three bowls and you cannot cross the Ridge,” a name that is given much emphasis in the Shuihu zhuan and most other instances.84 Even if we may notice such resemblances, it is clear that the drum tale cannot have borrowed the textual material directly from the Jin Ping Mei, because both texts A and B render some of the names with alternative homophonic characters.

Conclusion The word hui as used in the drum tale carries its original meaning of an oral performance session, and this meaning is also actively used in the oral performance of the clapper tale (Shandong kuaishu) from the 1990s. In the Ming novel the same word is already moving from the oral to the written meaning, which is the usual meaning in modern standard Chinese. In some other oral genres, such as Yangzhou pinghua, the word is not in use actively during performance, or as a name of a performance session in professional jargon, but it has survived only as a remnant in the title of the story cycles of SHUIHU, such as WU SHI HUI, SONG SHI HUI, etc. The fact that the drum tale follows the main plot of the tiger tale as rendered in the Shuihu zhuan does not seem to indicate any particular

84 In the Jin Ping Mei cihua, Chapter One, the episode in the inn is not told in any detail and the name of the wine is not mentioned.

47 CHINOPERL Papers No. 27 relationship to the novel. The tale is so widespread in Chinese culture, both written and oral, that the ‘sources’ for the drum tale can hardly be determined on this basis. However, investigating the finer details of the storyline, I observe a wealth of details that point to common sources for the drum tale and other performed genres, such as the clapper tale and fast tale (kuaishu). Interestingly, the drum tale is in a number of features closer to the Jin Ping Mei cihua than to the Shuihu zhuan. In narrative technique the closeness of the drum tale to the performance traditions of fast tale and clapper tale is even more pronounced than what is apparent from the storyline. Thus on this level of analysis the comparative approach is highly useful in establishing lines of correspondence. A number of prosodic features, stock phrases, and fixed phrases, as well as some special characteristics of the plot are common to these three genres as seen in the story about Wu Song and the tiger. However, the drum tale also shares a number of minor episodes and names with the Fuzhou pinghua, which seems especially close to a courtesan performance tradition, reminiscent of the Jin Ping Mei cihua rather than the Shuihu zhuan. While a direct textual borrowing from the written pages of the two novels seems out of the question, the reason for the common features should be looked for in the shuochang traditions to which the Water Margin theme belonged and contributed via oral as well as written sources.

APPENDIX Note: Each item is identified by its title (the titles are the same for a number of items), item number from the database Chinese Storytelling (under construction), genre, and other bibliographic information. Titles of items that

48 Børdahl, A Drum Tale on “Wu Song” are separate booklets are written in italics, those that are part of a larger book are written in normal print with quotes, oral performances are written without quotes. The collection of popular literature in the Fu Ssu-nien Library of the Academia Sinica, Taiwan, is abbreviated: ASC.

Drum tale versions of “Wu Song Fights the Tiger” A. Jingyanggang Wu Song da hu 14 景陽崗武松打虎 Dagu 大鼓, ASC, Ku I 9-175, woodcut, 9 pp. B. Wu Song da hu (no item number) 武松打虎 Dagu 大鼓, ASC, MF 1854 NF 254, woodcut, 13 pp. C. “Wu Song da hu” (no item number) 武松打虎 Errenzhuan 二人轉, performance by Cheng Xifa 程喜發, transcription by Wang Ken 王肯 and Wang Jie 王桔, in: Errenzhuan chuantong jumu huibian 二人轉傳統劇目彙編, Vol II, Jilinsheng difang xiqu yanjiushi 1981, pp. 41-47.

Instances of “Wu Song Fights the Tiger” selected for comparison

Written texts Novel “Di ershier hui: Henghaijun Chai Jin liu bin, Jingyanggang Wu Song da hu” 21 第二十二回 橫海郡柴進留賓 景陽崗武松打虎 Zhanghui xiaoshuo 章回小說, from: Jingben zengbu jiaozheng quan xiang Zhongyi shuihu zhuan pinglin 京本增補校正全像忠義水滸傳評林, 1594, 104 hui. Facsimile edition in: Ming Qing shanben xiaoshuo congkan chubian

49 CHINOPERL Papers No. 27 明清善本小說叢刊初編, Tianyi chubanshe, Taipei 1985. The text belongs to the simplified recensions (jianben) of the Water Margin.

“Di ershisan hui: Henghaijun Chai Jin liu bin, Jingyanggang Wu Song da hu” 41 第二十三回 橫海郡柴進留賓 景陽崗武松打虎 Zhanghui xiaoshuo 章回小說, from: Li Zhuowu xiansheng piping Zhongyi shuihu zhuan 李卓吾批評忠義水滸傳, 1610, 100 hui. Facsimile edition Ming Rongyutang ke Shuihu zhuan 明容與堂刻水滸傳, Shanghai renmin chubanshe, 1975. The text belongs to the full recension (fanben) of the Water Margin.

Drama “Di si chu: Chu xiong” 31 第四齣 除兇 Chuanqi 傳奇, in: Xiuke Yixiaji dingben 繡刻義俠記定本 (1612, 36 chu) by Shen Jing 沈璟 (1553–1610), Kaiming shudian, Taipei 1970, pp. 5–9.

Da hu quan chuan guan 29 打虎全串貫 Kunqu 崑曲, (Qing dynasty), ASC, Che Wang 車王 59 han 函 4ce 冊, manuscript, 8 pp.

Performance literature

“Wu Song da hu” 16 武松打虎 Kuaishu 快書, in: Chen Ruheng 陳汝衡: Chen Ruheng quyi wenxuan 陳汝衡曲 藝文選, Zhongguo quyi chubanshe, Beijing 1985, Shuoshu shihua 說書史話, (preface 1956), pp.234–36. The text is from Renmin shoudu de Tianqiao 人民首 都的天橋 n.d.

Jingyanggang Wu Song da hu 17 景陽崗武松打虎 Fuzhou pinghua 福州平話, ASC, 7, Ce, 21-201, lithography, 74 pp.

50 Børdahl, A Drum Tale on “Wu Song”

“Wu Song da hu” 42 武松打虎 Yangzhou qingqu 揚 州 清 曲 , in: Wei Ren, Wei Minghua 韋 人 , 韋 明 鏵 : Yangzhou qingqu 揚州清曲, Shanghai wenyi chubanshe, Shanghai 1985, pp. 66–69.

Oral performances

Wu Song da hu 65 武松打虎 Shandong kuaishu 山東快書, performed by Sun Zhenye 孫鎮業 (b.1944), CD: Shandong kuaishu 山東快書, Zhongguo quyi ming jia ming duan zhencang ban 中國曲藝名家名段珍藏版, China Record Corp. 1999, 14 minutes.

Wu Song da hu 15 武松打虎 Yangzhou pinghua 揚 州 評 話 , performed by Wang Xiaotang 王 篠 堂(1918- 2002), Zhenjiang 1992, tape, Private collection of the author, 80 minutes. A fragment is published on video and VCD, cf. Børdahl and Ross 2002.

REFERENCES

Børdahl, Vibeke (1996; Chinese edition 2006): The Oral Tradition of Yangzhou Storytelling, Nordic Institute of Asian Studies Monograph Series, No. 73, Curzon Press, Richmond. Chinese edition: Yi Debo 易德波: Yangzhou pinghua tantao 揚 州評話探討, Trans. Mi Feng 米鋒 with the author, Renmin wenxue chubanshe, Beijing.

51 CHINOPERL Papers No. 27

─ (1999): “Popular Literature in the Fu Ssu-nien Library of the Academia Sinica, Taiwan,” Asian Folklore Studies Vol. 58, No. 1: 231–35.

─ (2003): “The Storyteller’s Manner in Chinese Storytelling,” Asian Folklore Studies Vol. 62, No. 1: 65–112.

─ (2005): “Storytellers’ Scripts in the Yangzhou pinghua Tradition,” Acta Orientalia No. 66: 227–96.

Børdahl, Vibeke and Jette Ross (2002): Chinese Storytellers—Life and Art in the Yangzhou Tradition, including VCD 60 minutes, separate Video 60 minutes, Cheng & Tsui, Boston.

Cao Zhi 曹之(1992): Zhongguo guji banbenxue 中國古籍版本學, Wuhan daxue chubanshe, Wuchang.

Chen Jinzhao 陳錦釗(1982): Kuaishu yanjiu 快書研究, Mingwen shuju, Taipei.

Chen Wulou 陳午樓(1990): “Lun Wangpai ‘Shuihu’ de xingcheng he fazhan” 論王派“水 滸”的形成和發展, in: Wangpai “Shuihu” pinglun ji 王

52 Børdahl, A Drum Tale on “Wu Song” 派“水滸”評論集, Zhongguo quyi chubanshe, Beijing, pp. 13–33.

Duan Baolin (1990): “Wangpai ‘Shuihu’ shu de wenxue tese guankui” 王派“水 滸”書的文學特色管 窺, in: Wangpai ‘Shuihu’ pinglun ji 王 派“水滸”評論集, Zhongguo quyi chubanshe, Beijing, pp. 71–94.

Fleur en Fiole d’Or (Jin Ping Mei cihua)(1985): Translation by André Lévy, Editions Gallimard.

Ge Liangyan (2001): Out of the Margins.The rise of Chinese Vernacular Fiction, University of Hawai’i Press, Honolulu.

Genette, Gérard (1980): Narrative Discourse. An Essay in Method, Cornell University Press, New York.

─ (1988): Narrative Discourse Revisited, Cornell University Press, New York.

Gui Jingwen 桂靜文 (1989): Jingyun dagu 京韻大鼓, Xingzhengyuan Wenhua jianshe wei- yuanhui, Taipei.

Hanan, Patrick (1963):

53 CHINOPERL Papers No. 27 “Sources of the Chin P’ing Mei,” Asia Major new series Vol. 10, pp. 23–67.

Hrdlickova, Vena (2007): “The Story of Lao Ma and its Versions in Beijing Storytelling,” CHINOPERL Papers No. 27.

Iguchi, Junko 井口淳子 (2003): Zhongguo beifang nongcun de kouchuan wenhua 中國北方農 村的口傳文化, Xiamen daxue chubanshe, Xiamen.

Liu Fu and Li Jiarui 劉復﹐李家瑞 ([1932] 1993): Zhongguo suqu zong mugao 中國俗曲總目稿, I-II, Zhongyang yanjiuyuan Lishi yuyan yanjiusuo, facsimile reprint, Taipei.

Riftin, Boris (2007): “The ‘Tale of Wu Song’ in Chinese Popular Prints,” CHINOPERL Papers No. 27.

Shandong kuaishu Wu Song zhuan 山東快書武松傳 [The saga of Wu Song in Shangdong clapper tale] (1957): Zuojia chubanshe, Beijing.

Shi Nai’an, Luo Guanzhong 施耐庵﹐羅貫中 ([1988] 1997): Rongyutangben Shuihu zhuan, Shanghai guji chubanshe, Shanghai.

Stevens, Catherine (1973):

54 Børdahl, A Drum Tale on “Wu Song” Peking Drumsinging, Doctoral Thesis, Harvard University, Cambridge.

─ (1990): ‘“The Slopes of Changban.” A Beijing Drumsong in the Liu Style’, CHINOPERL Papers, No. 15, pp. 69-83.

The Plum in the Golden Vase, or, Chin P’ing Mei, Vol. I (1993): Translated by David Tod Roy. Princeton University Press, Princeton NJ.

Wei Ren, Wei Minghua 韋人﹐韋明鏵 (1985): Yangzhou qingqu 揚州清曲, Shanghai wenyi chubanshe, Shanghai.

Zhang Dai 張岱 (1986): Tao’an mengyi 陶庵夢憶, Jinfeng chubanshe, Taipei.

Zhongguo dabaike quanshu, Xiqu quyi 中國大百科全書﹐戲曲。曲 藝 (1983) Zhongguo dabaike quanshu chubanshe, Beijing and Shanghai.

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