feathers, sometimes as long as six feet, which form part of their
headdress. The Chinese call them “back-protecting feathers”, because they
are supposed to ward off the blows of the enemy swords. In the same way
the painted faces of the warriors can be traced to originally utilitarian
purposes; about a thousand years ago a famous Chinese warrior whose
scholarly face had a very unmartial appearance painted his face in a
gruesome manner in order to inspire fear in the hearts of his enemies.
The manner in which the faces of traditional heroes of war are painted is
an attempt at a conventionalized reproduction of the facial expression of
these terror-inspiring men as they are described in the books of history
or in novels. Therefore it is not possible to give a definite color or
color scheme for warriors. But in some other respects there is a definite
custom. A face painted pure white denotes a wicked person, while no color
on the face means a good character. Pure red designates an honest and
faithful man, gold a heavenly being, and several colors applied unevenly
a robber. The white nose is the mark of the clown. It is interesting to
note that in Chinese clown has likewise the three connotations given for
the word in Webster’s dictionary: rustic, ill-bred, and buffoonish.
Gods and spirits can be recognized by the horsehair switch they carry
whenever they appear and by the slight tapping of the gong as they
enter the stage. The ghosts of the deceased wear black veils over their
heads, or bundles of strips of paper under their right ears. Whenever
any character from the world beyond, god or ghost, appears, fireworks
are set off by a stage hand; usually this takes the form of large flames
emitted repeatedly from an oil lamp. Monks and nuns carry the same
horsehair switch, perhaps because of their “spiritual” lives. A bride can
be recognized by the red veil she wears on her head. Good officials wear
square hats, while wicked officials wear round ones. The wicked jailer in
his round hat is a frequent figure on the Chinese stage.
A strong wind is indicated by the waving of flags, which recalls the fact
that the flags used in our operatic performances are not made of silk as
are ordinary banners, but of stiff material, giving them the appearance
of banners flying in the wind. A snowstorm is produced by flakes of paper
tossed into the air by a stage hand in full view of the audience. A sick
person is designated by a yellow cloth which covers his face. When a
character has died his face is covered with a red cloth. The head of a
decapitated person is symbolized by some object about the size of a human
head, wrapped in red cloth. Sometimes an execution is portrayed by making
a sword thrust at the victim who then runs off the stage, after which his
head is brought on.
For new or exceptional situations new symbols must be invented. There
is a play called “Chu Fang Ts’ao” taken from the novel “The Three
Kingdoms.” It is the story of a guest who hears his host sharpening a
butcher knife and, as he fears the worst, runs off under somewhat amusing
circumstances. However, his host was the very reverse of a robber; he
was in fact slaughtering the fatted pig in honor of the visitor. The
business of slaughtering the pig is done in the following manner: an
actor with a black cloth thrown over his head and back walks on the
stage in a stooping posture, driven forward by another actor’s stick
and making the various deviations from the right path by which a pig in
real life exasperates the swineherd. The actor-pig finally walks up to a
chair on which he can rest his hands in comfort, while the business of
slaughtering is given in pantomime. After this has been done the cloth
is removed and the man, now neither pig nor actor, walks off the stage
erect.
The above conventions, which have come under my observation in the
course of my attendance in Chinese theaters, do not by any means
exhaust the list, nor do they represent anything permanent. Changes
are continually occurring. One that I have been observing is that the
long conventionalized beards no longer hang down from the upper lip,
covering the mouth; probably because this was found to be inconvenient
for purposes of speaking or drinking tea, and some one hit upon the idea
of having the beard only below the mouth and of painting in the moustache
to match. Incidentally, only good characters have a moustache, while the
villains of the Chinese stage have no hair on the upper lip. One ought
to note, too, that these conventions are not so arbitrary as they might
seem at first glance, but are generally founded on some real element in
Chinese life. The yellow dress denoting the emperor, the red veil marking
the bride, and the black costume signifying the poor man have their basis
in everyday Chinese custom. A mourner on the Chinese stage appears in
white, and the long beards of old men naturally enough have the same
color, both quite as in real life. The symbols are an imitation of real
life more or less stiffened into conventions. Of course, the origins of
the conventional signs are sometimes a bit difficult to trace, especially
in the case of ghosts and gods.
From the instances cited above it is plain that the Chinese theater
contains much that from our point of view tends to “destroy the
illusion.” Another factor in this process is the “property man”—made
known to Americans through “The Yellow Jacket”—who is ever on the stage
in the midst of all action. When the heroine must kneel before the judge
a coolie in a dirty blue cotton gown rushes forward to place a pillow
on the floor lest the actor’s costly embroidered gown be soiled. An
actor is frequently handed a cup of tea by another such attendant; some
actors to-day even equip their servants with thermos bottles for these
occasions. A general preparing for combat by removing his outer coat is
aided in this operation by ordinary stage hands, not by servants forming
part of the _dramatis personae_. From all the above it would seem that
human nature does not demand any particular kind of realism on the stage,
but is quite able to adapt itself to any illusion whatsoever.
[Illustration]
CHAPTER EIGHT
MEI LAN-FANG—CHINA’S GREATEST ACTOR
Every traveler who comes to China hears of the fame of Mei Lan-fang. He
is told that in his visit to Peking he ought not to miss the opportunity
of seeing this male actor of female rôles interpret the gay or tragic
events of the lives of coy Chinese maidens. When the Chinese Government
entertains a distinguished foreign visitor, General Joffre or Secretary
of the Navy Denby, for example, Mei Lan-fang gives a performance which
forms the _pièce de résistance_ of the Oriental splendors shown to the
visitor by way of hospitality. Americans who in turn entertain Chinese
friends in Peking generally resort also to a play by this actor. In 1919
a group of American bankers paid Mei Lan-fang four thousand dollars (I
have the information from the man who wrote out the check) for half an
hour of acting and singing; it is true that in this case an especially
large price was paid by way of gaining that imponderable Oriental asset
known as “face”, because shortly before this a group of Japanese bankers
had tried to impress their Chinese guests by paying Mei Lan-fang one
thousand dollars for an evening’s entertainment. The common masses among
the Chinese also appreciate this actor, and a manager who succeeds in
inducing Mei Lan-fang to sign a contract with him is always sure of a
crowded house. For five years I have had the opportunity of observing Mei
Lan-fang’s work and I have come to the conclusion that he justly deserves
his fame and his popularity.
Perhaps some who have heard Mei sing in his falsetto voice and have seen
him act a “slow” play, or opera, if you will, in the conventionalized
Chinese manner, to the accompaniment of a screeching violin and
ear-splitting brass cymbals, feel that they would have been willing
to pay a good sum to be excused from the performance. There is, to
be sure, a long list of martyrs who with lavish Oriental hospitality
were treated to interminable sessions of Chinese drama; General Wood,
for example, recently suffered two hours of it. I should like to say
that in my opinion, keenly as I appreciate the Chinese drama and its
interpreter, Mei Lan-fang, I realize fully that it does not present such
a finished product as is found in our theater. The Chinese have no great
tragedies to place by the side of Shakespeare’s; they have no profound
comedies such as Molière’s; their plays are never so closely knit as are
our “well-made” plays; while in staging they are centuries behind us.
The Chinese drama is a case of arrested development; it is childish,
medieval, and very trying to our ears. Yet it is typically Chinese.
No other art is so popular in China as that of the theater, which
presents the old legends of the nation, the famous novels read by the
masses, intrigues such as occur on every hand, the music of the various
provinces, and the moral ideals of the four hundred millions in general.
In fact, the Chinese consider the theater fit for the gods; for whenever
they wish to thank their deities or reconcile them, they give theatrical
performances for the pleasure of the gods and that of the entire village
as well. As Mr. R. F. Johnston remarks in his characteristic manner,
designed to shock the ultra-pious, the taste of the gods as regards
the drama seems to coincide in a remarkable manner with that of the
villagers. Since the theater is in a manner the mirror of the Chinese
nation, and is also of intrinsic interest to the student of the drama,
it is well worth some attention on the part of any Westerner at all
interested in the Orient. Furthermore, because Mei Lan-fang is the most
widely known actor, and because he is an extremely intelligent and
progressive artist, it is perhaps best to approach this exotic drama
through him.
Since Mei Lan-fang is an actor and his ancestors were actors before
him, he comes from the lowest class of society. In the otherwise
extremely democratic organization of the Chinese empire, where the
poorest boy could rise to wealth and fame by virtue of passing the
literary examination in the capital, sons of prostitutes, lictors, and
actors, as has been said, were barred from competing for government
posts. This system of examinations was abolished in 1907, but the
social disqualification was felt by Mei Lan-fang, for he is now just
thirty years old. His youth was tainted also by his being subjected to
unspeakable immoral practices which were openly tolerated in Peking
until the Revolution in 1911. Quite aside from this, the childhood of an
actor is no bed of roses in a land where the struggle for existence is
so desperate, and ninety per cent. constantly hover near the starvation
line. In the Southern City of Peking one meets frequently a long line of
boys, with prematurely old faces, ranging from eight to sixteen years,
marching along seriously and apathetically under the stern eye of a
preceptor—the pupils of an actors’ training school. Or if one takes the
morning canter along the city wall on the smooth stretch to the south of
the Temple of Heaven, one may see the boys at their interminable lessons,
which begin at sunrise. They must learn to sing in the shrill, artificial
falsetto voice characteristic of the Chinese theater, under a master
whose cruel discipline would make Dotheboys Hall seem a pleasant place
for week-ends. When there is a sharp wind blowing Peking dust in a gale,
the boys are taken to sing against the storm in order that their throats
may become properly hardened. The competition for a livelihood as actor
is deadly. Three boys’ theaters are training hundreds of boys, while
about two thousand actors are already out of work in Peking or are being
hired by the day with about twenty coppers’ reward for their long hours
of labor. In such an environment Mei Lan-fang grew up facing a drab,
dismal existence such as the vast majority of Orientals suffer cheerfully.
But Mei Lan-fang’s originality and talents brought him to the highest
position in his art. He had been trained, because of his slender build,
girl-like face, and high voice, to act the type of _hua-tan_, the
_hetaera_. This figure appears regularly in Chinese plays in the rôle of
servant girl, lady’s maid, or demi-mondaine. The method pursued by most
tyro actors is to attempt to approximate down to the minutest mannerisms
the style of the actor at the top of their special class. Mei Lan-fang,
however, decided to copy nature instead. He introduced into his acting
female traits and foibles observed in the women about him, and this
freshness in his style pleased his audiences. He was gradually accorded
more and more prominent parts until twelve years ago he was voted the
most popular interpreter of female rôles in the capital. The actors
selected as the best “lovers”, “warriors”, “old men”, “old women”, and
the various other conventional types can count their fortunes as made.
After he had been chosen as the most popular actor of female rôles, Mei
Lan-fang commanded fifty to one hundred dollars for one regular daily
performance, and for private performances some such amounts as were
mentioned in the first paragraph of this chapter. He organized his own
company, made a triumphal tour through Japan, and began to fill annual
engagements in Shanghai, the “Paris of China” so-called.[25]
Let us suppose that in wishing to see Mei Lan-fang you have done as
many Pekingese do—sent your servant to the theater to hold a seat for
you. Your menial has been enjoying an afternoon’s work by grabbing a
good seat in the almost empty theater at one o’clock and warming it
until five-thirty, at the same time drinking tea, chewing watermelon
seeds, smoking cigarettes, gossiping blandly with his neighbors, and
occasionally watching the actors on the stage. Now comes the hour for
the star, and you, with many sleek Chinese merchants, displace coolies
whose figures—in blue cotton—shrink inconspicuously toward the exit.
The moment you sit down a waiter with the inevitable teapot is at your
elbow, depositing on the table before you a cup containing one grimy
thumb. The tea and watermelon seeds are, as they say in the Moulin Rouge,
“_obligatoire_”, but you are free to refuse threescore flies resting on
a bar of candy, eggs of uncertain age whose whites have become black, or
apples just the proper softness with which to pelt actors. At the tables
all around you men are audibly sipping tea or eating dishes of steaming
viands, after which they wipe face and hands on hot towels which the
waiters are passing. Bundles of towels continually soaring overhead may
remind you of bats under the rafters, or if you are medically minded you
may exclaim, “Look at them throwing the smallpox around!”
[Illustration: MEI LAN-FANG
In European Dress
Ch’ang-O’s Flight to the Moon
Burying the Blossoms
A Young Nun Seeks Love]
The indifferent actors have been on the stage for hours, impersonating
famous emperors of the time of Attila, cunning counselors as old as
Alcuin, or sages contemporary with Pope Sylvester. One short play or
part of a play after the other—each lasting about thirty to forty-five
minutes—has been going on without intermission since noon. The fact that
no pause is made between the plays often leads foreigners to believe
that Chinese plays are of serpentine length, while in reality they are
no longer than the separate numbers of our continuous vaudeville. The
orchestra leader merely beats a few short notes on a gong and the stage
is set for the next play—that is to say, Chinese drama has no stage
settings whatever. A brightly colored curtain forms the background of the
bare stage; in other words, the scenery is left to the imagination, as it
was in Shakespeare’s theater.
When the hour for the star has finally come, a special fluteplayer takes
his seat as leader of the orchestra and sends out soft, wistful notes
that contrast gratefully with the brass din of the preceding battle
scene. With tense interest Mei Lan-fang is awaited, for to-day he is to
play “A Young Nun Seeks Love.”
With light, mincing step he enters in a long nun’s gown of white silk,
over which he wears a white coat dotted with a diamond pattern in light
blue. Long black tresses and a narrow black belt set off the delicate
shades of the light colors. The exquisite color combination is enhanced
by his soft, clear voice and the emotional play of his facial expression.
The theme of the forty-minute monodrama is similar to Browning’s “Fra
Lippo Lippi”, a story which Mei alternately sings and recites to
orchestral accompaniment.
A pitiful existence is that of the nun with the shaven head! At
night only a lone lantern consorts me to sleep. Time quickly
pursues one to old age, leaving only the memory of a monotonous
youth.
Sent to the convent at a tender age, she finds her life at sixteen a
dull round divided between the burning of incense and the reading of
monotonous Buddhistic sutras. The abbess has deprived her of the ornament
of her hair and forces her to carry water from the well at the foot of
the hill. On these excursions she has stolen long looks at a handsome
youth playing outside the city gate, and he seems not indifferent toward
her.
For the price of a little sympathy I would be willing to go
to the palace of Yen Wang, the god of Hell, to be ground up
in the mortar, cut into bits by the saw, crushed between the
millstones, or to seethe in burning oil. My love is deep enough
to outweigh the punishments of all devils.
Her childhood at the home of her pious parents had been an interminable
droning of the sacred syllables, “_O mane padme hum, o mane padme
hum_”, beating of drums, ringing of bells, blowing of horns, tinkling
of cymbals—all to drive away the devils. Her heart, hungry for a bit
of brightness, feels cramped in her cell and she decides to enter the
large hall filled with the statues of five hundred saints and Buddhas.
Since the stage is absolutely bare, Mei at this point goes through the
pantomime of opening a door and closing it again behind him. After some
quaint meditations before the various ascetic _lohans_ and the figure
of the “laughing Buddha”,[26] who seems to say, “Why waste the precious
days of sweet youth?”, the young nun decides to risk all for the sake of
finding love. In a graceful, rhythmic dance Mei moves off the stage. The
young girl has gone into the “black world”, as the Buddhist nuns call
life outside the convent walls.
Another favorite among Mei Lan-fang’s plays is “Burying the Blossoms.” A
young girl, tormented by jealousy and doubt of her lover’s good faith,
finds the garden path covered with fallen blossoms. In these flowers,
broken from their stems and lying crushed on the ground, she sees the
image of herself, a girl whose parents are dead and who is neglected by
every one. She takes pity on the flowers, and, placing them in a silk
bag, buries them under a tree. As she is shedding tears over the little
mound her lover comes upon her. The explanation that follows effects a
deepening of their love.
In Professor Giles’ translation (“Chinese Literature”, page 368) we have
the sentiment of the play expressed (_Cf._ Moore’s “The Last Rose of
Summer”):
Farewell, dear flowers, forever now,
Thus buried as ’twere best,
I have not yet divined when I,
With you shall sink to rest.
I who can bury flowers like this
A laughing-stock shall be;
I cannot say in days to come
What hands shall bury me.
See, how when spring begins to fail
Each opening floweret fades;
So too there is a time of age
And death for beauteous maids;
And when the fleeting spring is gone,
And days of beauty o’er,
Flowers fall, and lovely maidens die,
And both are known no more.
But not only such pale, wistful themes are found in Mei’s repertoire. The
“Three Pulls”[27] is a tragi-comedy of bourgeois life where Mei presents
a delightfully coquettish wife. This is a four-act play in which a large
company appears in gorgeous costumes of embroidered silk studded with
the little mirrors characteristic of Chinese stage apparel. The various
characters wear historically correct dress, the well-known Manchu robes.
But as an example of the extreme incongruities in the mixture of the
Oriental and the Occidental now taking place in Peking I should like to
mention an incident that occurred when the play was staged for the first
time at the Chen Kwang Theater. This new playhouse has a large European
stage and various other modern conveniences as yet not fully understood
or appreciated by the Chinese, for I observed that the petition written
by the husband and later flaunted in court was written on a three-foot
strip of toilet paper!
[Illustration: BURYING THE BLOSSOMS
The setting in this amateur production shows more stage properties than
are customary in most Chinese theaters.]
The very best-beloved of Mei Lan-fang’s plays is “Yang Kuei-fei Tsui
Chou” (Yang Kuei-fei’s Spree). Yang Kuei-fei, the famous concubine of
the Emperor T’ang Ming-huang, of about 900 A.D., as has been stated,
lives on in Chinese poetry as a charming beauty of absolutely bewitching
qualities. In connection with this play one ought to say that drunkenness
is rare in China and is not considered a vice or a disgrace. On the other
hand a genial spree is looked upon as an exploit. A Chinese gentleman
will tell you “I was roundly drunk last night”, much as an American might
beamingly confide his triumphs at golf. K’ang Hsi, perhaps the greatest
emperor China ever had, used to urge his guests to drink heartily,
assuring them that if they drank too deep he would have them taken to
their homes in a dignified manner.
The plot of the play is a short episode in the imperial palace. Yang
Kuei-fei learns from two eunuchs that the emperor is supping with a rival
beauty, and in her jealous rage she orders one bumper of wine after the
other. As the wine begins to take effect, she performs some charming
dances in which other court ladies join, to the end that a beautiful
inebriated ballet is performed. The effect of the dancers in the ancient
Chinese dress, the style with the long sleeves taken over by the Japanese
as the kimono, is much like a vision of fluttering, multicolored
butterflies. Later Yang Kuei-fei, in a low-comedy scene, uses her charms
first on one and then on the other of the servants, who prefer to run
away rather than be found in a compromising position with the favorite
concubine. Finally Yang Kuei-fei leaves the stage alone, singing, “Now
lonely I return to the palace.”
One specialty of this play is the manner in which Mei Lan-fang drinks
the wine. He grips the cup with his teeth and bends backward very slowly
until his head touches the ground. Such “stunts” are fairly frequent in
Chinese plays and are used just as traditionally as some of the byplay
in French masterpieces staged at the Comédie Française. The great T’an
had a very famous trick which no actor has been able to imitate; in the
play, “Seeing the Ancestral Portraits”, he would kick off his shoe in
such a manner that in falling it would always strike exactly on his head.
Mei Lan-fang is not stressing these acrobatic and other tricks, but is
placing the emphasis on the interpretation of the emotional content of
the scenes.
A little farce that Mei presents in a droll manner is the “Ch’ing Shang
Lao Shüeh” (Slave Girl Plays Tricks on the Old Schoolmaster). This play
presents the perennial theme of the impertinent servant. The make-up of
the old scholar in Ming costume is comical to the last degree. The slave
girl receives instruction, together with her mistress. When asked to
recite she does so with the swaying body motion commonly found in our
urchins when they “say their piece.” She catches a fly off the teacher’s
face, and in mixing ink, spits in his eye. When he sets out to beat
her, she catches the switch, and as he pulls, lets go, with the result
that teacher falls back into his chair and rolls over on the floor with
a tremendous crash. After suffering many similar tricks the pedagogue
decides to teach in that house no longer. As he leaves the room the
audience sees that the slave girl has pinned on his back a picture of a
turtle—than which there is no greater insult in all the Middle Kingdom!