This volume focuses on the theatre history of Asian countries, and discusses the specific context of theatre modernization in Asia. While Asian theatre is one of the primary interests within theatre scholarship in the world today, knowledge of Asian theatre history is very limited and often surprisingly incorrect. Therefore, this volume addresses a major gap in contemporary theatre studies. The volume discusses the conflict between tradition and modernity in theatre, suggesting that the problems of modernity are closely related to the idea of tradition. Although Asian countries preserved the traditional form and values of their respective theatres, they had to also confront the newly introduced values or mechanisms of European modernity. Several papers in this volume therefore provide critical surveys of the history of theatre modernization in Asian countries or regions—Japan, Korea, Taiwan, Hong Kong, India Malaysia, Singapore, and Uyghur. Other papers focus on specific case studies of the history of modernization, discussing contemporary Taiwanese performances, translations of modern French comedy into Chinese, the modernization of Chinese Xiqu, modern Okinawan plays, Malaysian traditional performances, Korean national theatre, and Japanese plays during World War II. Renowned academics and theatre critics have contributed to this volume, making it a valuable resource for researchers and students of theatre studies, literature, and cultural studies.

Bodies and their Spaces: System, Crisis and Transformation in Early Modern Theatre explores the emergence of the distinctively modern "gender system" at the close of the early modern period. The book investigates shifts in the gendered spaces assigned to men and women in the "public" and "private" domains and their changing modes of interconnection; in concert with these social spaces it examines the emergence of biologically based notions of sex and a novel sense of individual subjectivity. These parallel and linked transformations converged in the development of a new gender system which more efficiently enforced the requirements of patriarchy under the evolving economic conditions of merchant capitalism. These changes can be seen to be rehearsed, contested and debated in literary artefacts of the early modern period - in particular the drama. This book suggests that until the closure of the English theatres in 1642, the drama not only reflected but also exacerbated the turbulence surrounding gender configurations in transition in early modern society. The book reads a wide range of dramatic and non-dramatic texts, and interprets them with the aid of the "systems theory" developed by the German sociologist Niklas Luhmann.

This book examines the intersection between sound and modernity in dramatic and musical performance in Manila and the Asia-Pacific between 1869 and 1948. During this period, tolerant political regimes resulted in the globalization of capitalist relations and the improvement of transcontinental travel and worldwide communication. This allowed modern modes of theatre and music consumption to instigate the uniformization of cultural products and processes, while simultaneously fragmenting societies into distinct identities, institutions, and nascent nation-states. Taking the performing bodies of migrant musicians as the locus of sound, this book argues that the global movement of acoustic modernities was replicated and diversified through its multiple subjectivities within empire, nation, and individual agencies. It traces the arrival of European travelling music and theatre companies in Asia which re-casted listening into an act of modern cultural consumption, and follows the migration of Manila musicians as they engaged in the modernization project of the neighboring Asian cities.

Chinese spoken drama flourished in the 1980s when it generated a series of national controversies. In important respects, this was the golden age of drama in the People's Republic, as the stage became a most effective arena for exploring long suppressed cultural and political issues, constituting an indispensable dimension of the reform that has been altering the landscape of contemporary Chinese culture and society. The plays in this volume are among the most influential and controversial, having engendered intense cultural debate and political confrontations. They include the only complete English language translation of Bus Stop by Nobel Prize-winning author Gao Xingjian. The film script was chosen from among the most acclaimed contemporary Chinese films for its high significance in the history of Chinese film and its international influence in the cinematic world. For general readers with diverse cultural and artistic interests, this anthology introduces a new world of performing culture that enriches, delights, and challenges. For students and scholars of modern Chinese culture and society, it provides insights into China's profound social, political, and cultural transformation. For students and scholars in theatre and film studies who are increasingly interested in dramatic creations beyond the boundaries of the European tradition, it offers much needed materials for broadening cultural horizons. Yan Haiping, who holds advanced degrees in theater arts from Cornell University, was awarded the First Prize for Excellence in Drama 1980-81 by the Society of Chinese Dramatists and the Ministry of Culture of the PRC for her ten-act historical play Li Shimin, Prince of Qin. contents Plays: WM, by Wang Peigong, playscript revised for performance by Wang Gui, translated by Thomas Moran; Pan Jinlian:The History of a Fallen Woman, by Wei Minglun, translated by Dave Williams with Xiaoxia Williams; Shanshuping Chronicles, by Chen Zidu, Yang Jian, Zhu Xiaoping, translated by Rong Cai; The Bus Stop by Gao Xingjian, translated by Kimberly Besio. Film: ld Well, by Zheng Yi, directed by Wu Tianming, translated by Shiaoling Yu.

This important contribution to the Theatre And series explores what the possibilities and limits of 'community' contribute to our understanding of theatre, and what theatrical practice and representation reveal about the tensions inherent in community settings. Drawing on case studies from wide-ranging locations, from the Middle East, to Latin America and South Asia, the text underlines the plurality of meanings associated with community, as well as the plurality of ways that theatre has engaged with those meanings. Interdisciplinary in its reach, this is the ideal companion for students of theatre and performance studies with an interest in applied theatre or performance in communities.

This interesting study examines emotional responses to socio-economic pressures in early modern England, as they are revealed in plays, historical narratives and biographical accounts of the period. These texts yield fascinating insights into the various, often unpredictable, ways in which people coped with the exigencies of credit, debt, mortgaging and capital ventures. Plays discussed include Shakespeare's The Merchant of Venice and Timon of Athens, Jonson's The Alchemist and Massinger's A New Way to Pay Old Debts. They are paired with writings by and about the finances of the corrupt Earl of Suffolk, the privateer Walter Raleigh, the royal agent Thomas Gresham, theatre entrepreneur James Burbage, and the Lord Treasurer Lionel Cranfield. Leinwand's new readings of these texts reveal a blend of affect and cognition concerning finance that includes nostalgia, anger, contempt, embarrassment, tenacity, bravado and humility.

Consuming Visions explores the relationship between cinema and writing in early twentieth-century Brazil, focusing on how the new and foreign medium of film was consumed by a literary society in the throes of modernization. Maite Conde places this relationship in the specific context of turn-of-the-century Rio de Janeiro, which underwent a radical transformation to a modern global city, becoming a concrete symbol of the country's broader processes of change and modernization. Analyzing an array of literary texts, from journalistic essays and popular women's novels to anarchist treatises and vaudeville plays, the author shows how the writers' encounters with the cinema were consistent with the significant changes taking place in the city. The arrival and initial development of the cinema in Brazil were part of the new urban landscape in which early Brazilian movies not only articulated the processes of the city's modernization but also enabled new urban spectators--women, immigrants, a new working class, and a recently liberated slave population--to see, believe in, and participate in its future. In the process, these early movies challenged the power of the written word and of Brazilian writers, threatening the hegemonic function of writing that had traditionally forged the contours of the nation's cultural life. An emerging market of consumers of the new cultural phenomena--popular theater, the department store, the factory, illustrated magazines--reflected changes that not only modernized literary production but also altered the very life and everyday urban experiences of the population. Consuming Visions is an ambitious and engaging examination of the ways in which mass culture can become an agent of intellectual and aesthetic transformation.

Modern Japanese Theatre and Performance is a collection of sixteen essays on Japanese theatre, including historical overviews of twentieth century theatre, analyses of specific productions and individuals, and consideration of the intercultural nature of modern Japanese theatre. Also included is a new translation of a 'Superkyogen' play.