This volume is the first concise introduction to the splendid variety of the Chinese theatrical tradition. It presents a rounded perspective on the development of Chinese theater by considering all of its major aspects—history and social context, performance, costume, makeup, actors, playwrights, and theaters—and by discussing all the major forms of Chinese theater, including the Beijing opera, which arose in the eighteenth century, and the spoken play, an entirely twentieth-century form. Its contributors are uniquely qualified to write about the Chinese theater. They have enjoyed an intimate relationship with their subject, both as academics and as theater workers, and they have combined a deep knowledge of Chinese theater with a high regard for its long tradition and continuing vitality. The book is intended for general as well as more specialized readers. Those with an interest in theater as a worldwide phenomenon and those wanting a new light on Chinese culture and society will find it equally useful. To those with a particular interest in Chinese theater, it will be a rich and important resource.

The play recounts the love story of Emperor Xuanzong of Tang and his favorite consort, Yang Guifei. Though based on a large body of earlier literature and legend, it is unique in its overall form and lyric exposition.

This volume investigates the artistic development during the Qing Dynasty, the last of imperial Chinese dynasties, and shows the importance of opera and playwriting during this time period. Further analysis is dedicated to the development of scroll painting and the revival of calligraphy and seal carving. A General History of Chinese Art comprises six volumes with a total of nine parts spanning from the Prehistoric Era until the 3rd year of Xuantong during the Qing Dynasty (1911). The work provides a comprehensive compilation of in-depth studies of the development of art throughout the subsequent reign of Chinese dynasties and explores the emergence of a wide range of artistic categories such as but not limited to music, dance, acrobatics, singing, story telling, painting, calligraphy, sculpture, architecture, and crafts. Unlike previous reference books, A General History of Chinese Art offers a broader overview of the notion of Chinese art by asserting a more diverse and less material understanding of arts, as has often been the case in Western scholarship.

People of all times and in all cultures have produced and consumed fiction in a variety of forms, not only for entertainment, but also to spread knowledge, religious or political beliefs. Furthermore, fiction has taken part in reflecting and shaping the cultural identity of communities as well as the identity of individuals. This volume aims to explore the concept and the use of fiction from different epochs, in different cultures and in different forms, both ancient and more recent. It covers a broad field of interests, from ancient literature, art, philosophy and theater to Bollywood productions, television series and modern electronic media. Twenty-three scholars from ten countries and from different areas and fields of interests in the Humanities assembled in Stockholm on a conference in August 2012 to exchange views on "Fiction in Global Contexts". This volume presents the results of their discussions. It contains fresh perspectives on issues and topics such as: the nature of fiction fiction and its relationship to "truth" the demand for and the function and uses of fiction the development of fiction from ancient to modern times different forms of fiction fiction in social contexts or in a gender perspective

China Reinterpreted is the first comprehensive study on the representation of Chinese figures and motifs in Muromachi Japanese noh theater. Given that China had a strong influence on Japanese culture from the sixth to the early seventeenth centuries, research on Japanese reception of Chinese culture abounds.This book examines how noh theater integrated earlier reception of Chinese culture in various disciplines to produce its reinterpretation of China and Chinese culture on stage. Centering on a group of noh plays that features Chinese characters and motifs, China Reinterpreted explores not only the different means and methods of adaptation, but also the intricate (re)construction of diverse and complex images of China. This studysituates the selected Chinese plays in the context of the dramaturgy and artistic conventions of noh, as well as the sociopolitical stances and artistic preferences of the audiences, and thus highlights the aesthetics, cultural, and sociopolitical agendas of noh theater of the time. By analyzing the various images of China (Japan’s cultural Other) staged in Muromachi noh theater, China Reinterpreted offers a case study of the representation of the Other in an intra-Asia context.

The Chinese Ladys of Los Angeles by Sunny Blue is about 25 Chinese-American women from different countries who come to the United States to pursue the American dream. They learn and grow in the midst of confusion and suffering, refine their personalities in the midst of moral and legal conflicts, and walk out of their own paths in the pursuit of love and money.

Zha Liangzheng (1918-1977), better known by his pen name Mu Dan, was a Chinese poet-laureate and remarkable translator. Via mutual attesting of poems and history, and with a multitude of letters, reminiscent documents and poems, A Critical Biography of Mu Dan (Zha Liangzheng): A Poet and a Translator genuinely represents the life of Mu Dan, known as a member of Jiuye School, against macroscopic academic view and broad historical backgrounds. The school of poetry marks the maturity of Chinese modernist literature and indicates the peak of the development of new poetry in China. The book reviews the glorious achievements of Mu Dan’s new poetry writings, confirms his contributions to Chinese translations of Russian poems and British romanticism poems as well as modernist poems. Moreover, the author spares no efforts to delineate numerous noticeable colonies of Chinese poets and historical figures such as Mao Zedong, Zhou Enlai, Yu Youren, and Sun Liren. In the monograph, the diachronic and synchronic descriptions are both elaborate and unambiguous; and the historical narratives are both sincere and magnificent. Together with abundant and subtle emotional expressions, A Critical Biography of Mu Dan (Zha Liangzheng): A Poet and a Translator is an artistic and academic biographic monograph.