Research On Linchuan Theater In Late Ming Dynasty

The Linchuan area is now in Fuzhou City,Jiangxi Province,whereit was once named as Jianchang and Fuzhou in Ming Dynasty.The late of Ming Dynasty is a special era in which great changes have taken place in thought,politics,and economy.The public class has gotten a positive development same as commerce and trade under the stimulation of Yangming's philosophy and the economy.Linchuan,which is on the main road of water and land,whose achievements of literature is remarkable,especially opera art,whichare based on the Confucian tradition of Tang and Song Dynasties.It can be absolutely said that Jiangxi Linchuan is a very important opera center in addition to Suzhou,Nanjing,Hangzhou and Shaoxing.In the middle and late of Ming Dynasty,the self-consciousness of the educated person awakened,and they actively participated in the creation of opera,especially the legendary creation.During this period,there was a group whose members came from the same area was formed around Tang Xianzu who was one of a leaderin the creation of opera.It included Xie Tingliang,Fu Zhanheng and Zheng Zhiwen and so on.And they showed their talents in the drama.Tang Xianzu created the "Linchuan Four Dreams" and first performed by Yi Yi,after that the "Four Dreams" and Yi Yisheng were quickly known at whole china.Xie Tingliang,Xie Tingzan,Xu Fenpeng,Zeng Ruhai,Zheng Zhiwen and others who are close to Tang Xianzu are not only outstanding in their literary talents,but also outstanding in the creation of opera.In the Ming Dynasty,Linchuan drama masters almost had a experience of entering the official,and they had a brilliant quality in treating persons and things.For example,Xie Tingliang and his brothers Tingcai and Tingzan had been gotten down their position for giving some advices to the emperor;Xu Fenpeng used the article "Ancient and ModernAdministration" to criticizesome political affairs.In addition,holding lectures and studying by foot were so popular at that time that Linchuan'opera master had many chances to communicate with others who had more talents in drama in Jinling,Mi,Xiang and other areas.For example,Xie Tingliang had frequently close exchanges with Cao Xueyu,Mei Dingyu,and Qi Xun.In the late of Ming Dynasty,the drama performance was prevailing in some religious activities to sacrifice for gods and ghosts at the thoughts of Buddhism and Taoism.As opera drama entered into golden time,the appreciation of drama not only taken place in official class but more in ordinary people,such as Gods Welcome Competition activity which would be held once there were some serious disease and disaster of drought or flood except for spring and autumn.This kind of activity which was combined religious pray with opera entertainment not made gods happy but also public.Therefore,drama performance became an spirit activity and played an important part in people's daily life after mixing with opera culture,religious culture and folk culture together.The sound chamber of the opera experienced a qualitative change in the eastern part of the province.After the Qingyang cavity,the Xiangyang cavity,the sea salt cavity,the Kunming cavity,etc.were introduced into Linchuan,they absorbed the Linchuan dialect language and combined with the local Taoist culture and the culture of the ancestral culture to promote the “Meng opera”."Minglian" and other religious cultures which have a strong form of opera performance.A group of Jiangxi educated person in the Jianyang,Hangzhou,Jinling and other places to work the selection of the opera,and it is no difficult to find out the regional characteristicsof the late Ming and Linchuan publicationsfrom the "Xin Lin Yi Zhi","Le Fu Yu Shuying","eight can play Jin","Feng Yue(the whole family)tips" and other opera selections.