Backstaging Modern Chinese Theatre: Intellectuals, Amateurs, and Cultural Entrepreneurs, 1910s-1940s

by Man He

Overview

Modern Chinese theatre once entailed a variety of forms, but now it primarily refers to spoken drama, or huaju. Backstaging Modern Chinese Theatre looks beyond scripts to examine  visuality, acoustics, and performance between the two World Wars, the period when huaju gained canonical status. The backstage in this study expands from being a physical place offstage to a culturally and historically constructed social network that encompasses theatre networks, academies, and government institutions—as well as the collective work of dramatists, amateurs, and cultural entrepreneurs. Early huaju was not a mere imitation of Western realist theatre, as it is commonly understood, but a creative synthesis of Chinese and Western aesthetics. Charting huaju’s evolution from American colleges to China’s coastal cities and then to its rural hinterland, Man He demonstrates how the formation of modern Chinese theatre challenges dominant understandings of modernism and brings China to the center of discussions on transnational modernities and world theatres.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780472905119
Publisher:	University of Michigan Press
Publication date:	07/01/2025
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	358
File size:	2 MB

About the Author

Man He is Associate Professor of Chinese at Williams College. 
 

Table of Contents

List of Illustrations
Acknowledgments
Introduction
Chapter One: When S/He is not Nora: Chinese Theatres and Cosmopolitan Students in Post-World War I America
Chapter Two: Script to See: Spectatorial Subjects and Enlightened Eyes in Chinese Realist Theatres of the 1920s
Chapter Three: Out of the Box-Stage: Huaju’s Relocation to the Rural Modern
Chapter Four: Institutional Theatrics: Techniques, Prompts, and Plays to Serve the Nation
Chapter Five: Canonizing the Backstage: Gossip, Annals, and the Politics of Making Theatre History
Conclusion
Notes
Bibliography
Index

What People are Saying About This

Liang Luo

“This groundbreaking book focuses on the making of modern Chinese theatre as dynamic processes of institutionalization, with keen eyes and ears for the hidden sights and sounds in the backstage. It treats theatre as a democratic institution of high social importance. Such an aspirational approach echoes the desires and sentiments of those theatre practitioners featured in this study. It is the making of theatre, happening in the backstage, that is consistently highlighted in the book’s innovative approach to rewriting modern Chinese theatre history.”

Xing Fan

“Deeply researched, Backstaging Modern Chinese Theatre offers a compelling account of huaju history from the 1910s to the 1940s. Broad vision, provocative arguments, innovative methodology, and passion for theatre enliven this study. It is a must-read for anyone interested in modern Chinese theatre, theatre history, and Chinese studies.”

Siyuan Liu

“With its holistic vision, innovative framing of ‘backstaging,’ and vast original sources from archives and contemporaneous publications, Man He’s monograph will make a substantial impact on the historiography of modern Chinese spoken theatre huaju.”

Wing Chung Ng

"In this major English-language monograph on the history of huaju (spoken drama) in early 20th century China, Man He delivers more than new findings on empirical ground. Her bold intervention, conceptually and methodologically, invites readers to consider a new way of constructing and understanding the history of theatres at other times and in other places."