Chinese Adaptations of Brecht: Appropriation and Intertextuality by Wei Zhang

Abstract

Reviewed by: Chinese Adaptations of Brecht: Appropriation and Intertextuality by Wei Zhang Wei Feng CHINESE ADAPTATIONS OF BRECHT: APPROPRIATION AND INTERTEXTUALITY. By Wei Zhang. Cham: Palgrave Macmillan, 2020. 200 pp. Hardcover, $81.00. Chinese Adaptations of Brecht is the first monograph in the English-speaking world that addresses the reception of Bertolt Brecht’s plays in mainland China from the end of the Cultural Revolution to the present day. It locates itself in the academic discourse of reciprocal correlation between Brecht and China, such as Renata Berg-Pan’s Bertolt Brecht and China (1979), Antony Tatlow’s The Mask of Evil: Brecht’s Response to the Poetry, Theatre and Thought of China and Japan (1977) and Brecht and East Asian Theatre (1982, co-edited with Tak-wai Wong), Lu Wei’s Cong bianzheng dao zonghe: Bulaixite yu Zhongguo xinshiqi xiju (From the Dialectic to the Syncretic: Brecht and Chinese Theatre in the New Era 2007), as well as individual essays and book chapters. Also for the first time, this book places Brecht along with the cluster of English works in the field of East-West comparative studies that deal with the reception history of Euro-American playwrights in China. Different from the majority of these works that either address Brecht’s reception of Chinese culture, or Chinese reception of Brecht’s works and thoughts, this book mainly focuses on specific renditions of Brecht’s plays. Given the absence of an English monograph on Brecht and China written by a Chinese scholar, Zhang’s addition of a Chinese perspective is of great value. Situated against the shifting political and cultural background of the post-Mao era, this book addresses Brecht’s work as inspiration for Chinese theatre practitioners in their search for modernity, and the [End Page 207] reevaluation of recent and remote historical, cultural, and political legacies. Scholars and students interested in international circulation of Brecht, intercultural theatre, or Sino-Western theatrical cross-currents will find this book a crucial read. The author structures her book around how Brecht’s concepts of Verfremdungseffekt and political theatre interact with Chinese philosophy, ethics, and aesthetics. The book comprises seven chapters, including an introduction and conclusion. The introductory chapter surveys the major connections between Brecht and China. Chapter Two examines director Chen Yong’s reinterpretation of Life of Galileo (1979, co-directed with Huang Zuolin), The Caucasian Chalk Circle (1985), and The Threepenny Opera (1998). These works, according to Zhang, joined the mainstream of socio-historical and cultural life in China from the late 1970s to the late 1990s. Zhang ingeniously chooses a less renowned female director and concentrates on her unique directorial perspective to Brecht’s female characters in those plays. Chapter Three examines to two xiqu productions of The Good Person of Szechwan adapted into chuanju (2002) and yueju (2013). This chapter contextualizes the two xiqu versions within the artistic agenda of modernizing traditional Chinese theatre. The author’s choice of cases is very thoughtful. Chuanju is an apt representative of xiqu modernization, not only because it took the lead in the nation to reform and reinvigorate itself shortly after the Cultural Revolution, but also because Wei Minglun, the adaptor of this production, is a pioneering dramatist in the cause of xiqu modernization. The yueju version is equally illuminating. On the one hand, because of its comparatively short history, yueju embraced artistic innovation, which makes it a fashionable genre; on the other hand, the production under discussion was performed by Zhejiang Xiaobaihua Yueju Company, a performance group dedicated to crossing artistic boundaries. Both productions, in their innovative and controversial form, displayed artistic vitality and courage otherwise restrained in more “orthodox” xiqu genres. Chapter Four considers two chuanju productions (1992 and 2011) of The Caucasian Chalk Circle, which was originally inspired by the fourteenth-century Chinese play The Chalk Circle. It investigates how the two adaptations address present-day social problems through Brecht’s political theatre as well as their attempt to Sinicize Brecht through chuanju. Chapter Five features an intertextual comparison of Brecht’s Turandot and Wei Minglun’s chuanju piece Chinese Princess Dulanduo. Although Wei’s work is not a direct adaptation of Brecht’s play, it resonates both narratively...