![]() In Tang Xianzu's day the Southern style of drama was at its peak of popularity. This style favored a play, or rather opera, of great length, with a large cast and many scenes, offering a kind of cavalcade effect as shifting groups of players paraded and sang their way through the leisurely days of some protracted celebration. The basic mode was romantic comedy: boy meets girl; obstacles to their match arise from family opposition, fortuitous separation, or the machinations of some boorish rival; obstacles are overcome and all celebrate union and reunion. It was the perfect vehicle for the presentation of a story Tang had read in a collection of storytellers' tales. These words are from Tang Xianzu's preface, dated 1598, to his own play. Close in time but halfway across the globe, William Shakespeare had completed Romeo and Juliet, his tragedy of starcrossed lovers consumed by the fire of their passion in an inimical world. But for Tang Xianzu love, passion, qing was a force he must celebrate. It was part of the new, humane currents of thought, in those late years of the Ming dynasty, to extol the spontaneous affections of the heart, to demonstrate their triumph over the conventions of the coldly rational. Love is of source unknown, yet it grows ever deeper. The living may die of it, by its power the dead live again. Love is not love at its fullest if one who lives is unwilling to die for it, or if it cannot restore to life one who has so died. And must the love that comes in dream necessarily be unreal? For there is no lack of dream lovers in this world. Only for those whose love must be fulfilled on the pillow and for whom affection deepens only after retirement from office, is it entirely a corporeal matter . . . . Introduction Has the world ever seen a woman's love to rival that of Bridal Du? Dreaming of a lover she fell sick; once sick she became ever worse; and finally, after painting her own portrait as a legacy to the world, she died. Dead for three years, still she was able to live again when in the dark underworld her quest for the object of her dream was fulfilled. To be as Bridal Du is truly to have known love. PL2695.M8E5 1980 895.1'24 799631 ISBN 0253357233 1 2 3 4 5 84 83 82 81 80 The jacket illustration and the frontispiece are photocopies of two of the woodblock prints used to illustrate an abridged version of the play under its alternate title Huan hun ji ("The Return of the Soul") printed in 1618, two years after the dramatist's death, and now rare. The abridgement, by Zang Mouxun, was included in a collection of four of Tang Xianzu's plays under the title Yuming xinci sizhong published by the firm of Diaochongguan. (Photocopies courtesy East Asiatic Library, University of California, Berkeley) (Chinese literature in translation) Play. Manufactured in the United States of America Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data Tang Xianzu 15501616. Copyright © 1980 by Cyril Birch All rights reserved No part of this book may be reproduced or utilized in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying and recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher. The Association of American University Presses' Resolution on Permissions constitutes the only exception to this prohibition. ![]() This book was brought to publication with the assistance of a grant from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation. ![]() The Peony Pavilion (Mudan Ting) Tang Xianzu Translated by Cyril Birch ![]() Page ii CHINESE LITERATURE IN TRANSLATIONĮditors Irving Yucheng Lo Joseph S. M. Lau Leo Oufan Lee
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