Characteristics of character modeling in opera

I. Definition of Imaginative Characters

Characters on the stage of opera are imaginative characters that come from life but are different from life. The styling method and aesthetic interest of the imaginative characters have concentrated on the thinking and aesthetic characteristics of the Chinese nation. In order to discuss the artistic characteristics of classical opera characters in depth, we must first define the connotation of imaginative characters.

Imaginative characterization refers to the characterization that unidirectionally expresses certain moral qualities and character traits according to the subjective idea of the actor, following the unique rules of opera. That is to say, according to the intention of the actor, he or she extracts a certain aspect of the character, highlights and exaggerates it, and downplays or even eliminates other aspects of the character that are in opposition to it. In this way, the character image is characterized by typology. For example, Guan Yu's loyalty, Zhuge Liang's wisdom, Bao Gong's righteousness, Cao Cao's cunning, Tang Qin's sinister and so on have the characteristics of the type.

The definition of imaginative typed characters contains the following:11 Imaginative typed characters are the product of the actors' subjective thinking.

The so-called visualization is the objectification of the human subjective spirit. Imaginalization occurs when the opera actor stands one level higher than nature in the spirit of freedom and deals with nature according to his own subjective ideas.

The transcendence of the real world enables opera singers to get rid of the limitations of nature to create highly deformed but extremely vivid and imaginative types of characters. On the stage of opera, whether it is a real-life character or a historical character, it is not a copy of the archetypal character in the objective world, but a product of the subjective thinking of the opera actor. Goethe said that no poet really knows the historical figures he depicts, and even if he does, it is difficult for him to utilize the image he knows. The poet must know the effect he wants to produce and thus adjust the character of the person he is writing about.

On the stage of opera, there are a lot of "bulls, ghosts, snakes, and gods" and other imaginative types of characters. These characters are not simple imitations of objects in the real world, but are products of the subjective imagination of the opera singer. Human imagination is capable of "giving birth to heaven and earth, giving birth to ghosts and gods, creating thousands of characters, and saving thousands of changes from the past to the present." (Tang Xianzu) In order to express their ideas, opera actors dare to go beyond the boundaries of subjectivity and objectivity, and create imaginary characters such as gods, fairies, ghosts and monsters out of nothing. These characters show the great creativity of the actor's mind.

21Imaginative characters are unidirectional in their moral and character traits.

The so-called type characters are the characters with single moral and character traits. When such a single moral and character trait recurs and becomes the characteristic of a certain type of character in people's impression, the character becomes an imaginative type character. People are the sum of social relations. Social relations are complex and varied, and people living in social relations are also complex and varied. When shaping characters, opera actors do not copy the original life to show the richness and complexity of people, but make a simplification of the character image to highlight the essential characteristics of the character. Dana said in "Philosophy of Art": "The purpose of art is to express the basic or distinctive features," the artist "realizes and distinguishes the main features of the thing, and systematically modifies the original relationship of the parts, so as to make the features more distinctive and dominant. " Opera actors are regulated by a moral standard, which strengthens certain moral qualities and character traits of their characters and weakens irrelevant or opposite traits.

Therefore, imaginative types of characters show the unidirectionality of moral qualities and character traits. For example, in order to highlight the national hero Yue Fei's calm character traits, it strengthens the temperament of his majesty, gravity, perseverance, and composure, and weakens the colors of bravery, violence, and arrogance in the character's personality. In this way, Yue Fei's main character traits are more distinct and prominent.

The characters in classical operas are not diametrically opposed to each other in terms of moral factors such as nobility and inferiority, goodness and evil, and they do not have multiple character traits. Some characters have a variety of character traits, but the nature of many characters is still unidirectional. For example, "Zhuge Liang, Guan Yu, Cao Cao, three characters, each of which has a variety of character traits.

But these character traits are all on the same plane. The character traits of Zhuge Liang and Guan Yu belong to the category of -Great Virtue. Cao Cao's character traits belong to the category of "great treachery," "great evil. The character traits of Cao Cao all belong to the category of -great treachery. and -great evil.

Both from a moral and aesthetic point of view, there is no contradiction between the many personalities of each character.

31Imaginative types of characters are in line with the characteristics of the opera business.

In the process of the formation and development of the opera art, the line is gradually formed. With the increasing complexity of character and psychological characteristics on the stage, the division of the line of the opera has become more and more detailed. The line is not only the result of shaping imaginative characters, but also the basis for creating imaginative characters. Each line includes many different types of characters.

The different lines correspond to the character and temperament of different types of characters. For example, the virtuous and dignified Qing Yi, the sensitive and charming Hua Dan, the elegant and solemn Lao Sheng, the heroic and decent Wu Sheng, the straight and rough Hua Face, and the sinister and comical clowns, etc. When an opera performer dresses up a character, he or she can visualize the character. When an opera actor dresses up a role, he must create it according to the characteristics of the opera line. As Li Yu said: "Whether the student is a gentleman, a lady, a lady, the speech should be elegant and elegant. Even if the student is a servant, Dan as Mei Xiang, but also must choose the words to speak, not with the same voice of the pure and ugly. This is because the Shengdan has the body of Shengdan, and the Jingshou has the voice of Jingshou." In opera, each actor belongs to a certain line of work, and each line of work brings together a number of programmatic techniques for portraying types of characters. When portraying an imaginative character, the opera actor first has to see what type of character he is playing, and then classify the character into the corresponding line of work. In this way, actors of different trades can use different program techniques to create different types of characters. On the basis of the type of line, opera actors should seek differences in the same, looking for the different characteristics of the characters, and then carefully portray the personality of the characters, and ultimately achieve the unity of the type and personality. For example, Zhao Yun, Wu Sung, Huang Tian Ba are the same as Wu Sheng line, but there are different characters character and temperament.

On the contrary of the creative method of "from individual to general", the opera follows the creative path of "from general to individual". On the basis of the type of opera, the actors actively look for the specific character traits of the role, and then carry out detailed carving, so as to create both the type of significance and individuality of the character image. It can be said that the imagery of the type of character is a dialectical unity of the moral characteristics, personality traits and the characteristics of the profession.

The Aesthetic Characteristics of Imaginative Characters

11The Beauty of Moral Ideal Although the imaginative characters can not express all the richness and complexity of human beings, they can show the beauty of the simplified moral ideal. The art of opera is ideal, not realistic. The character images expressed in opera are also ideal, not realistic. According to the rational principle of moralization and self-subjective feelings, opera actors generalize and abstract the moral qualities of the characters to make them idealized. When the imaginative character expresses the ideal of the opera singer in a positive way, it reflects the beauty of a moral ideal.

Imaginative characters express the psychological "complex" of the Chinese people, reflecting the collective unconsciousness of the Chinese nation, or the "collective dream". Such as in the Monkey King, Wu Sung, Zhao Zi Long, Mu Guiying, Hua Mulan, Liang Hongyu, Yue Fei, Yang Jiye and other characters, reflecting the Chinese people's "hero complex" and "patriotism complex". In the characters of Bao Gong, Hai Rui, Zhu Geliang, Wei Zheng, etc., it embodies the people's "clean official complex" and "virtuous minister complex". In Zhu Yingtai, Bai Suzhen and other characters, reflecting the Chinese women's chaste and unyielding "love complex". In these "complexes", the moral theme of "goodness" is generally reflected. On the opera stage, whether it is a comedic happy ending or a tragic one, the moral power of "goodness" represented by the positive characters will eventually overcome the power of "evil". Even characters like Dou E, Supplily Guiying, and Li Huiniang are transformed into ghosts after their deaths to promote good and punish evil. Zhu Yingtai even transforms into a beautiful butterfly to realize her own ideal of life - to fly with her lover in the kingdom of freedom. These imaginative characters embody the beauty of a moral ideal that transcends reality, and the moral concepts contained in them are constantly transformed into the collective unconscious and re-accumulated in the blood of the nation, thus strengthening the psychological "complex" of the Chinese people in favor of moral ideals.

The creation of the type of character is mainly influenced by the Confucianism which occupies the mainstream of Chinese culture. In the feudal era, Confucianism not only dominated the social and political spheres, but also penetrated into the blood of the people and became the norm of their daily behavior. Confucian culture made different types of value judgments on people based on moral principles. For example, it divides people and their behavior into two extremes: good (gentleman) and evil (villain). These two extremes contain different personalities and spiritual realms, just as Confucius said: "A gentleman is honest and open, while a villain is always in a state of solidarity." Under the strong influence of Confucianism, opera performers also obeyed this "mainstream" consciousness, and portrayed many typecast characters on the opera stage.

Opera actors often look up when portraying positive characters to make their moral qualities as perfect as possible, while they look down when portraying negative characters to make their moral qualities as despicable as possible. The main reason for opera actors to portray characters with bad moral qualities is to set off the good moral sentiments of the positive characters from the negative side. The worse the moral quality of the negative characters, the more they can contrast the good with the evil, and the ugly with the beautiful, so that the moral quality of the positive characters appears to be more perfect. For example, under the contrast of Qin Hui, Yue Fei's idea of loyalty to the emperor and the country is more noble; under the contrast of Pan Renmei, Yang Jiye's patriotic sentiment is more touching.

21 character distinctive beauty in real life, character is infinitely rich and complex. In a person, different character traits will be expressed in different environments and different character relationships. However, the character on the stage of opera is much simpler. In classical opera, opera actors do not pay attention to the versatility, complexity and completeness of character, but pursue the type and distinctiveness of character. In the art of opera, the charm of characters lies in the expression of real and vivid temperament and temperament, giving the audience a sense of realism. Therefore, the characters performed by some excellent opera singers are called by the audience as "living Zhuge", "living Zhao Yun", "living Cao Cao", "living Wu Song", "living Wu Song" and "living Cao Cao". "live Zhuge", "live Zhao Yun", "live Cao Cao", "live Wu Song", "live Jiang Gan" and so on.

Psychologists believe that people have two kinds of feelings. One is the concrete feeling, one is the abstract feeling. Concrete feeling is a more comprehensive feeling of things, abstract feeling is to directly pick out the most prominent features of the feeling of things, so that it becomes the only or the main content of consciousness. Abstract senses are continuously upgraded according to their own principles, and finally reach a level of purification that is impossible for concrete senses to achieve. Characters created according to concrete senses are easy to become typical characters, while those created according to abstract senses are easy to become types of characters. Opera authors (first creation), actors (second creation) and audiences (third creation) are accustomed to abstract feelings. Influenced by this way of feeling, opera actors will intentionally or unintentionally divide the characters into different personality categories when creating their roles, so that the infinite complexity of the character tends to be simple, and to achieve the beauty of the distinctive character.

The simplicity of characterization does not destroy the authenticity of characters. Because, simplicity is based on authenticity. Opera actors always seize a certain aspect of the character traits, and carry out specific and exaggerated depictions, in order to achieve the purpose of deformation. On the stage of opera, the character traits of Guan Yu, Zhang Fei, Lin Chong, Lu Zhishen, Sun Wukong, Piggy, Mu Guiying, Zhu Yingtai, the White Lady, the Green Snake and other characters are so distinctive and real.