The Research On TangYing's Improvement On Kunqu

The middle Qing dynasty was an important turning point in the drama history of China. The 'Kun drama' which belonged to the 'Ya drama' overwhelmed the places, such as Beijing, Suzhou and Yangzhou and was favoured and supported by the upper class during this period; while the 'Hua drama' sprung up and was popular in the whole country at the same time, and there appeared the jollification situation of the rivalry between 'Hua drama' and 'Kun drama' in the drama circle.TangYing created dramas in QianRong dynasty, when was the period of 'Kun drama' prevailed for several thousand years turning decline from popularity, and of 'Hua drama' being in the ascendant. At that time, most literators and scholar-bureaucrats looked 'Kun drama' as orthodox and excluded the local dramas. As one of the dramatists who created 'Kun drama' belonging to 'Ya drama', TangYing not only was fond of 'Kun drama' and insisted in inventing the"Kun drama', but also didn't exclude the 'Hua drama' and adapted its plays actively. It can be said that his dramas embodied the mixture and infiltration between elegant and common dramas. We could see that TangYing assimilated and absorbed the 'Hua drama' and syncretized 'Hua drama' into 'Ya drama' in TangYing's ten 'Hua drama' adaptations and seven 'Ya dramas'. In TangYing's ten adaptations of"new words but old drama", the civilian and mundane themes and characters, the informal and natural languages, the confluence and thrumming and the singing way of the 'Kun drama', the role arrangement of breaking through the routines and the emphasis on the stage effect, which reflected that TangYing tried to syncretize the elegant culture with the common one. While in the seven players created by him, TangYing made many breakthroughs in terms of the beginning system, the ways of singing, actions and musical instruments.However, TangYing's improvement not only didn't have a great influence on dramas then but also couldn't been seen in the stage lately. The creative thoughts of driving up the moralization, the adaptive ways of returning commonness to elegance, the collective tendency of declining gradually, which resulted in the failure of TangYing's improvement on the 'Kun drama'. But we can not deny TangYing's value and status in the history of drama according to this. The consciousness and strength of TangYing's improvement exceeded the 'Kun drama' which belonged to 'Ya drama' in the same period and we should notice the TangYing's inheriting of the 'Hua drama' and the promotion of syncretizing between the 'Hua drama' and the 'Ya drama'. In conclusion, as a 'Ya drama' literator, TangYing could introduce 'Hua drama' into 'Ya drama' with courage and associated with these dramas, which had the value and contribution to the start of combining 'elegant drama' with 'common drama'.