Why "The Teahouse" is a classic of contemporary drama

The play The Teahouse was written by Lao She between 1956 and 1957. It is the finest theatrical creation of the writer's life, and as Mr. Cao Yu said, it is "an unprecedented example in the history of Chinese drama". ***In the 17 years after the establishment of China, Lao She wrote very few novels but a lot of plays. Before writing "Teahouse", he wrote the play "Spring and Autumn" in 1955, and the play "Looking West at Chang'an" in 1956; after "Teahouse", he wrote "Red Courtyard" in 1958, "Shopgirl" and "Family Portrait" in 1959. ...... "Teahouse" and these works, which were related to the current affairs, were all the same in terms of themes, styles, and creative modes.

In fact, the story is very different from these works, in terms of subject matter, style and mode of creation. He rewrote the "old stories" that he had been used to writing before the liberation of China.

In fact, when Lao She wrote "The Teahouse", he originally wanted to match the current political propaganda. The first constitution of the People's Republic of China was announced in 1954, and the author felt a lot of emotion in retrospect, and felt that it was time to write a play to illustrate the difficulty of obtaining the new constitution, and use it to educate young people. So, in 1956, he wrote a 4-act, 6-scene play, the play has many characters, from the Guangxu years until the liberation of the eve of the Beiping students "anti-starvation, anti-persecution" campaign, the main characters in the play are three brothers. Lao She took the first draft of the play to the Beijing People's Art Center and read it to the director, Cao Yu, and the chief director, Jiao Juyin, for comments. Cao Yu felt that the best part of the work was Act 1, Scene 2, which took place in an old teahouse, and felt that this scene should be used as the basis for a new play depicting the social landscape of the olden times. Lao She accepted this suggestion and immediately said: submit the script in 3 months! When the deadline came, a new production of "The Teahouse" was born. After a lot of work with the director and the actors, the new work was really finished. The final draft of the script completely abandons the positive scenes of the revolutionary struggle, and becomes a social drama that combines the images of the city life in the old days.

After the play was published, Lao She wrote an article titled "Answers to Questions about the Teahouse", in which he wrote: "A teahouse is a meeting place for the three religions and the nine streams of society, and it can accommodate all sorts of characters, and a big teahouse is a small society. Although this play has only three acts, it has been written over fifty years of changes. There's no way to avoid political issues in these changes. But I'm not familiar with the high officials in the political arena, so I can't depict their promotion or demotion. I don't know much about politics either. I only know a few minor characters. These are the people who frequent the teahouses. So, if I gather them in a teahouse and use the changes in their lives to reflect the changes in society, won't that reveal some political news?"

This passage confirms that Lao She wrote this play, took the idea of "avoiding political issues", he wanted to use this play to write specifically about the changes in Chinese society "in the past fifty years"; the writer said, "avoiding political issues", because he himself had to "avoid political issues", because he had to "avoid political issues". The writer said, "avoiding political issues", because he has always been "not very understanding of politics", so the best effect can be achieved is to use the minor characters "changes in life to reflect social changes", "side by side to reveal some political news". The best way to do this is to use the little people to "reflect the changes in their lives" and "to reveal some political news".

Writing "The Teahouse", Lao She redirected the subject matter to the old times he was familiar with, saying that the play could only "reveal some political news in a sideways way", - a conception that, if placed in a very "leftist" literary line, would not have been possible. I am afraid that this idea would have been labeled as "political" if the literary and artistic line had been very "leftist". However, social development at this time gave Lao She an opportunity: in 1956, the country basically completed the socialist transformation of agriculture, handicrafts and capitalist industry and commerce, the center of gravity of the work of the Communist Party of China (CPC), from the launch of the large-scale class struggle in the form of a storm to the relative stability of the economic and cultural construction, in order to promote the cause of science, culture and the arts, proposed In order to promote the cause of science, culture and art, the policy of "let a hundred flowers blossom and a hundred schools of thought contend" was put forward, and a relatively relaxed creative environment was created in the literary world for a period of time. The Teahouse came out in this climate. Before and after that, the social conditions were not favorable, so he could only write some "Spring and Autumn", "Looking West at Chang'an", "Red Yard", "Shopgirl" type of works.

The Teahouse*** is a 3-act play, with each act taking place in the same scene - a large teahouse called "Yutai" in old Beijing. The author has mobilized his own observation and accumulation of the old Chinese social life, using the clever idea of "a big teahouse is a small society", the three eras of the three religions and nine streams of people of all kinds, to beckon to come and go, not only highly refined but also a vivid demonstration of the basic conditions of the old China, a living picture of the era of the sick reality. The sick reality of that era.

When he wrote "The Teahouse", Lao She had already thought enough about the old times, and he had improved his ability to reflect on the old China's world and social evolution by applying the materialistic view of history, and he had also gained a deep understanding of the laws of social development that are buried deep in the historical process. This ensures that he can scan the hologram of social changes in old China with great vigor and great strokes, and hit the essence of history with a pinpoint accuracy.

However, to write a good play, you not only need to have a penetrating vision of history, but also need to find the right part of the social life, and cut an artistic window that is convenient to show the historical picture in an image. This window was also found by Lao She as if he was searching for something, that is, the "big teahouse" in the play. The old-fashioned teahouse, where almost all people can freely come and go regardless of their status, position and line of work, is the most sensitive point that can make people recognize the pulse of the society; the teahouse is just like the spiritual bond of the five lines and eight lines of work, which naturally reveals the living condition of all people. Lao She relied on the teahouse in the concentration of social life focus on the key position, the rare stage of life, artfully superimposed on the stage of the play, so that it comfortably carries the history of the history of the reappearance of history, such creative planning, can be said to be extraordinary, the footsteps of the empty mountain.

To express three historical periods in just three acts is a serious challenge for the author. Ink like gold, Lao She, general writers do not have a masterpiece, only about 30,000 words, the play was written in the spirit of complete breath. In the three historical process of social cross-section of a character and a pile of events, after careful screening, are very typical, these people and events to create a kind of synergy, explaining a unified answer, that is: that the unbearable old system, has long been rotten, ridiculous and dirty to the extreme, that kind of world, can not be tolerated to come back. Under the semi-colonial and semi-feudal social nature of old China, there were many different kinds of contradictions intertwined. And so many contradictions, in Lao She here, but easily be distilled into a vivid sketch of life.

The three acts of the play focus on different aspects of history. Act 1, focusing on the depiction of the "Qing Empire" the night before the end of the sick and dying social scene, with a little, but also explains in front of the sharp decline in society, the aspiring innovators and patriots, as well as some of the instinctive expectations of the life of the ordinary people, the heart of the remaining a trace of the quest; to the second act, the Qing dynasty has collapsed, the tiger and wolf like evil evil feudal warlords, the Qing dynasty, the Qing dynasty has been dismantled. The feudal warlords, but with the foreigners to the guns, caused years of war and social unrest, but for a few days of peace and quiet of the common people, are afraid, despite the change of the times, all the ugly, reactionary forces, as in the end of the Qing Dynasty, rampant, and let the public to avoid; to the third act, the scene is the most bleak, the people have managed to get rid of the "outlaw" life, and the people have been able to get rid of the "outlaw" life, and the people have been able to get rid of the "outlawed slaves". In Act 3, the scene is the most miserable, people have managed to get rid of the life of "the slave of the country", but fell headlong into the unprecedented dark reality, always with good expectations, do not dare to relax for a moment of the struggling Chinese people, have come to the end of their destiny, and even the excellent traditional culture can not escape from the crisis of being sentenced to death.

The entire Teahouse faithfully depicts the deteriorating social situation in the half-century from the end of the 19th century to the middle of the 20th century.

Underneath the historical umbrella, the entire plot of the play appears in the form of silhouettes of characters and events. Take Act 1 for example, before and after including such relatively independent plot units: the first paragraph, the "pigeon" dispute - the capital mansion for a pigeon, almost fighting a group fight, the flag man Chang Si masters sent a few words of emotion, recruited the good fighting battalion beaters Erdezi provocative, but in turn, by the good fighting camp. Provocation, but was "eat foreign teachings," Ma Wuji a sentence to suppress; this section of the play, showing the end of the Qing Dynasty, the luxury of the rich and arrogant hooligans, but the top of the powerful have to be counted in collusion with the foreigners, "Ermaozi". The second paragraph, farmers sell their daughters - years of famine, bankrupt farmers Kang six have no choice but to sell their 15-year-old daughter, traffickers Liu Mazi take advantage of the opportunity to profiteer, the side selling small objects of the poor old man by chance to see, a word to the point: "These days, people are not as good as a pigeon it! " It is a contrasting technique to show the seriousness of the polarization between the rich and the poor. The third paragraph, Qin Chang dissent - teahouse landlord Qin Ershi came, he hesitantly want to gather capital to set up industries, to save the country, but his attitude towards the poor people begging for food in front of him is very cold, and the old-fashioned warm-hearted Chang Sifu generous alms, the two people then should be a bowl of meat noodles to the poor people, to express a different opinion; this section of the play writes the national crisis, some Chinese people still have no conscience, but also the Chinese people have no conscience. There are still some Chinese people who have not lost their conscience and want to help the people as much as they can, but the enthusiasm of both Mr. Qin and Mr. Chang is limited by history. The fourth paragraph, Qin Pang fight - the spokesman of the court on the hard-line, the chief of the inner circle, Eunuch Pang came to the teahouse to buy farmers' daughters, and bumped into the tendency of the new Qin Ershi, the two of them, each not to show weakness, about the suppression of the Hundred Days' Reform Act, causing the teahouse customers to talk about these people on the improvement of reforms either insensitive, or hate This section of the play wrote out the arrogance of the stubborn, but also let people see the movement away from the people, the bottom line is not enough. In the fifth paragraph, the fourth master was arrested - the fourth master witnessed the tragic situation of selling his son and daughter, and sighed: "I see, the Qing Dynasty will be finished!" Two spies, using Eunuch Pang's presence, arrest Master Chang and the tea-drinker, Master Song, on the grounds that "a flag person who is a traitor is guilty of an additional offense." This episode depicts the darkness of the world, where secret agents are everywhere and the good people will suffer if they are not careful. Sixth paragraph, the eunuch to buy a wife - the old, dim-witted, psychopathic eunuch Pang came to look at Liu Ma-zi for him to buy a peasant girl, he is old and ugly, on the spot to the peasant girl Kang Shun-zi fainted, at this time, suddenly ringing in the ear of the chess player's Tea Guests a shout: "will! You're finished!" This is the end of the scene, meaning that, although the end of the feudal era is still quite impressive, it has long since withered away to the end. Act 1 consists of six interlocking episodes, interspersed with Wang's subtle attitude towards the matter at hand, and the ugly behavior of the dregs of society, such as Tang Tiezui and Fatty Huang. The whole play, full of content, the story of this and that, life is very strong, every step of the plot to see a deep historical connotation, although the play is short but unlimited meaning, the whole of the end of the Qing Dynasty social contradictions, darkness, absurdity, helplessness, are all embodied in a brain.

All the miasma and suffocating social status quo in the play depend on the existence of the old system of darkness, which the audience of "Teahouse" understands at a glance. Lao She wrote "Teahouse", respect for the audience's mind, he abandoned political sermons, relying exclusively on living art images to speak, the political views that want to express, easily sent to the audience's heart. At the beginning of Act 2, Li San, an old teahouse boy, still refuses to cut off his pigtails after more than ten years of the Qing Dynasty's demise, and he has his own "sayings": "Improvement! Improvement! The more you change, the better, cold! ...... I still keep my pigtails, in case the Emperor changes back!" This is the lowest level of society, no culture, no political awareness of the mouth of the small people out of the "political news", see the emperor is gone, but the world is worse than the former Qing Dynasty, the more the powers that be shouting "social improvement", that is, the time for the ordinary people to suffer again! Soon, he judged from simple experience, maybe one day will change the old court back to it, he might as well protect this "foresight" of the good! These three or two sentences can not be more commonplace civilian chit-chat, the more one smacks the more flavor, the middle of the "side disclosure" of the "political news", is not both heavy, profound, but also very persuasive? Act 1, by the secret agent Song Enzi, Wu Xiangzi captured Chang Sifu, in Act 2 and these two people ran into, he found that these two guys actually to the warlord as a secret agent, a little bit of a surprise, but the secret agents but the bold words: "When there is the emperor, we give the emperor, there is President Yuan, when we give President Yuan service; now now! ......" "Whoever feeds us, we'll feed them." The fourth master pressed the question: "What if the foreigners give us food?" The secret agents were not ambiguous: "I'm telling you, Mr. Chang, those who want us to work for them are backed by foreigners! How can we fight without foreign guns and artillery?" This conversation also reveals important political information: the feudal dynasty is gone, but the feudal forces still dominate everything, and the foreigners' guns and cannons are still very useful. Isn't this tantamount to telling the audience that the semi-feudal and semi-colonial nature of Chinese society has not changed at all? The play "The Teahouse" is full of places like this, where political information is revealed from the side. Lao She transformed the theories written by political scientists in textbooks into the off-the-cuff remarks of the lower-class people, and into one handy detail in the play, which was subliminally injected into the audience's enjoyment of the play, and the effect received was at least similar to that of a political textbook.

Unlike general theatrical works, "Teahouse" is not a play to tell a specific story, but to express the overall image of semi-colonial and semi-feudal society represented by three historical eras. In Lao She's words, the purpose of writing this play is to "bury the three eras". In the three-act play, Lao She's profound look back and reflection on history is written in a solid way, which makes the contemporaries of the writer, as well as people who came to the world later than he did, look at the play and their hearts will be shaken. If a work can achieve such a function, its ideological value is not to be underestimated.

When the Teahouse was first staged, some people thought that its storytelling was not strong enough, and suggested that the plot should be developed by using the story of Kang Shunzi's encounter and her son Kang Dali's participation in the revolution. Lao She declined the suggestion, saying, "In that case, my purpose of burying three eras would be difficult to achieve. I'm afraid that by sticking to one thing, the teahouse will collapse before it's taken over." ("Answer to several questions about 'Teahouse'") In the 1950s, Chinese authors, readers and viewers, almost without exception, felt that the only task of writing about the old times should be to express the sharp class struggle and to glorify the victory of the revolution, and that it would not be possible to do otherwise. Lao She politely explained that if the old teahouse had become a revolutionary fortress, its life would not last for a few days, so why let it witness the three dark ages. As to why can not reflect the revolutionary struggle as the theme of the work of art, Lao She at that time is not willing to talk about it, also impossible to talk about it.

The play "Teahouse" had already attracted some criticism before the Cultural Revolution began because of its originality. Some people have written that "Teahouse" is "nostalgic" and promotes "the present is not as good as the past" and "does not reveal the earth-shattering waves of the times,"" "did not point out the inevitable victory of the people and their lofty ideals", "in the final analysis, it is closely related to the writer's worldview, class position and creative method." During the Cultural Revolution, "The Teahouse" became the "proof" that Lao She was falsely accused of being a "reactionary writer". Now, there is no need for us to refute the accusations against "Teahouse" one by one. People can not help but think of, "Teahouse" Act 3, Wang Lifa inexplicably asked: "'strike' changed its name, called 'riot'?" The secret agent, Song Enzi, immediately seized on this remark and said, head on, that Wang Lifa and the striking students "are all the same thing!" The old teahouse owner, who had been through life's battles, didn't let him fool him, but just muttered to him: "Me? You are too high praise me!" It seems, by pointing to the deer to frame people, in our land, traditionally not difficult to meet.

Today, decades later, many of the so-called good works that came out at the same time as "The Teahouse" have long since gone up in smoke.

The Teahouse has also been performed in Germany, France, Switzerland, Japan, Hong Kong and Taiwan on behalf of the Chinese drama art, appreciated by audiences of different races, different experiences and different values, and has been called the "miracle on the Oriental stage.

The Teahouse was intended to dramatize the social changes in old China for the audience. However, Lao She was not familiar with politics, which limited his ability to write directly about social and political changes. Therefore, the writer avoided the familiar and used the social and cultural changes he knew so well to reflect the subtleties of the social and political changes. We all know that the culture and politics of an era are subordinate to the superstructure of society, and between them, there is an intrinsic connection, the political nature of society will always be either explicitly or implicitly play a role in its culture, and all sorts of cultural phenomena can often be implicitly all kinds of political information, passed on to the people. Therefore, to reflect the politics of an era through writing the cultural phenomenon of the era becomes a feasible way for art works to reflect the society.

The Teahouse

is a manifestation of the artistic advantage Lao She gained by choosing this way of creation.

The Teahouse is to express the darkness of old China, and to show the painful struggles and tragic end of the people who are in the dark society and can't escape from it in order to seek for survival, justice and development. Lao She did not put this heavy theme into a specific story, he decided to use the society, "how the little people live and how to die, to illustrate that era's ridiculously colorful" ("talk about" Teahouse ""),to express his own disgust and spit on the whole of the old times of the ideological tendency. Sick society, deformed culture, strange life ...... composed of "Teahouse" inside the bizarre social picture. Lao She's pen is like a probe in the surgeon's hand, every time he picks a scab of the rotten society, he teaches people to see a stream of dirty pus and blood gushing out, the ulcer of the society from the outside to the inside to such a terrible point, to teach it to change with a big change, of course, is the most reasonable.

The audience of "Teahouse" had to keep their eyes open at all times to see the absurdity of the world on the stage: the eunuch Pang, who is said to be "serving the Empress Dowager, so red that even the bottles of vinegar in the house are made of onyx", and who is so old that she has a female voice, shamelessly declared in front of the public that she was about to finish her "marriage", and that he was going to get married. Two deserters, with not enough money and wanting to fulfill their physical needs, had to pool their money to buy a suitable wife from the traffickers, forming the unimaginable "friendship of three"; in the midst of war and warlordism, with the public at risk and full of grievances, some people are "thankful for this year! "For Tang Tiezui, who specializes in selling divination and cheating people for a living, he said, "The more chaotic the year is, the better my business is! In these years, who lives and who dies are all subject to luck, so how can we not do more fortune-telling and face reading!" These small episodes with a taste of anomaly, but also with a few funny colors, are all rare scenes born in the ridiculous years, displayed together by the playwright, confirming the absence of social justice in an era, it is inevitable that the normal society can not understand the strange things, endless variations. This is like the Dream of Red Mansions, "full of ridiculous words, a handful of bitter tears", "Teahouse" in these people to make people "laugh and cry in all sorts of colors", so that the audience, every time they think of, can not help but sigh again and again.

The Teahouse is an expression of a world in decline.

"Teahouse" shows that the world is in a state of decay. The work adopts the arrangement of "hereditary succession" for most of the ugly characters in the occupation between father and son, in three acts, human trafficker Liu Mazi and Xiao Liu Mazi, the conman Tang Tiezui and Xiao Tang Tiezui who sells and pretends to be a god, Song Enzi and Xiao Song Enzi who work as a detective, Wu Xiangzi and Xiao Wu Xiangzi, and the ruffian hitman Erde Zi and Xiao Erde Zi are all of the father's generation, The audience can see some social changes through the shameless and slightly changed words and behaviors of this group of social dregs. Act 1, Liu Ma-zi use of social differences between rich and poor, selling people, quite happy; but in Act 2, he was not up, not the rich and poor division of society has improved, but a worse reality called his bad luck, he complained: "so a revolution ah, but the bitter me! Now, people's chiefs and sub-chiefs, regiment chiefs and division chiefs, want to marry aunts to sing the kunjiao, theater female celebrities, a cost of 3,000 to 5,000 yen! I'm just watching, I can't feel the door!" Doing the old-fashioned business Liu Mazi, vision, vigor, can not catch up with the speed of "social development", the chaos of the Lords of the new social nobility, evil far beyond the former Qing dynasty nobles, they chose the standards of the aunt and a throw of money temperament, so that Liu Mazi, the road to the fiber field veterans are left to dry see the part of the world is going down the drain in this can be seen! Carry on. To the third act, it is the turn of small Liu Mazi this fiber field newcomer to show his face, he summed up his father's "life is not very good" lesson, to meet the times of the turbid current, collusion with the overbearing bureaucrats of the Kuomintang, to create the whole city of Beiping dancers, open prostitution, secret prostitution, jeep girls and waitresses all organized "The Bao Yuan Er" company, to serve the American soldiers and bureaucrats. Little Liu Ma-zi's ambition and cunning, can really call his dead father a small witch to see a big witch, human traffickers line of fancy new, the peak of the extreme, more confirmed what kind of years, naturally, what kind of world style. Look at Tang Tiezui father and son: the first two acts, Tang Tiezui flaunted the market, although the years of war and chaos to help him sell soothsaying and cheating, he ultimately failed to make a fortune, drinking a lifetime of residual tea in the teahouse, and even the Wang shopkeeper dared to squeeze him; however, to inherit the mantle of the liar of the generation of the small Tang Tiezui, was sealed into the cult of the "Three Emperors" of the "Heavenly Master", the "Heavenly Master", the "Heavenly Master", the "Heavenly Master", the "Heavenly Master", the "Heavenly Master", the "Heavenly Master", the "Heavenly Master", the "Heavenly Master" and the "Heavenly Master". "Tianshi", small Tang Tiezui said: "I and small Liu Mazi ...... we are born of luck, living in this era, really like a fish out of water!" In the ugly world, in addition to small Liu Mazi, small Tang Tiezui this group of scoundrels, social scum, there will no longer be any decent people "like a fish out of water", a society is a society, as long as we look at the net of which is what kind of people "like a fish out of water". Can be clear, this is also known as the "survival of the fittest" it. Liu Ma-zi and Tang Tie-zui masters and children, in fact, are a kind of "cultural symbols" of the times, they represent the most unseemly kind of "culture", only in the most unseemly society can eat well.

On the one hand, ugly things are breeding and spreading everywhere. On the other hand, the valuable things in the traditional culture of the nation could not survive in those years, and were even going to be destroyed. In Act 3, Zou Fuyuan, a famous opera singer, Wei Fuxi, a Peking Opera actor, and Ming Chef, a famous chef in a restaurant, each describe their own art and skill, which they cherish as if their lives were on the line, but they are all in a precarious situation. Master Ming is a person who can "do one or two hundred tables of full-meat feasts", but in the end, for the sake of livelihood, sold all the kitchen utensils and household goods, to the prison inmates to steam the dumplings to go, because "nowadays is the prison people ah!" Zou Fuyuan out of these artists and craftsmen's extreme bitterness: "This year is the evil years, the serious things all have to be even rooted out rotten