The Columbia Anthology of Yuan Drama - (Translations from the Asian Classics) by C T Hsia & Wai-Yee Li & George Kao (Paperback)

Book Synopsis

This anthology features translations of ten seminal plays written during the Yuan dynasty (1279-1368), a period considered the golden age of Chinese theater. By turns lyrical and earthy, sentimental and ironic, Yuan drama spans a broad emotional, linguistic, and stylistic range. Combining sung arias with declaimed verses and doggerels, dialogues and mime, and jokes and acrobatic feats, Yuan drama formed a vital part of China's culture of performance and entertainment in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries.

To date, few Yuan-dynasty plays have been translated into English. Well-known translators and scholars have supervised the making of this collection and add a short description to each play. A general introduction situates all selections within their cultural and historical contexts.

Review Quotes

A joy to read.-- "Journal of Asian Studies"

A landmark in the translation of Chinese literature. Not only are the renditions exceptionally lively, engaging, and beautifully crafted, but the thematic range of the ten plays--each accompanied by an informative introduction--illustrates the richness of the early corpus of Chinese song-drama. Meticulously annotated and responsive to the complexities of the textual history, the translations will enchant scholars, undergraduates, and general readers alike.--Patricia Sieber, Ohio State University

A much broader representation of Yuan zaju drama than previous translations offer. What's more, the editors do a marvelous job providing ample historical sources for the plays. These rich and detailed annotations make it especially useful for teaching purposes and for general readers.--Tian Yuan Tan, School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London

This magnificent collection represents the great variety in subject and style on the early Chinese stage. Almost all the translations are based on the early-seventeenth-century versions of these plays prepared by Zang Maoxun (d. 1621), who provided his contemporary readers with carefully prepared and lavishly produced editions. Eminently readable, these editions have ensured the place of Yuan drama in late-imperial and modern literature, and for almost four centuries they have shaped Chinese and foreign readers' image of these dramas.--Wilt L. Idema, Research Professor of Chinese Literature, Harvard University

About the Author

C. T. Hsia (1921-2013) is professor emeritus of Chinese at Columbia University. His books include The Classic Chinese Novel and A History of Modern Chinese Fiction. He is also the coeditor, with Joseph S. M. Lau and Leo O. Lee, of Modern Chinese Stories and Novellas, 1919-1949.

Wai-Yee Li is professor of Chinese literature at Harvard University. She is the author of Enchantment and Disenchantment: Love and Illusion in Chinese Literature; The Readability of the Past in Early Chinese Historiography; and Women and National Trauma in Late Imperial Chinese Literature. She is also the translator, with Stephen Durrant and David Schaberg, of Zuozhuan.

George Kao (1912-2008) was a Chinese American author, translator, and journalist who served as director of the West Coast office of China's Government Information Office and as editor in chief of the Chinese Press.