The Construction Of The Gong-diao System In Nan-Qu Operas

Shen Jing’s Nan Qu Quan Pu (A Guidebook of Chinese Nan-Qu Opera) has been regarded as a fundamental manual of the Nan-Qu (the southern style of Kun-Qu Opera) studies. Its Gong-diao system has dominated the academia, and all the surface variations appearing in the guidebooks of the same kind have attracted undeservedly close attention from the researchers. Distrusting the system, this thesis will explore the process of its construction. It will argue that the Gong-diao rules in Nan-Qu Operas were groundless, since before Shen, none of Chinese playwrights used the Gong-diao system. By associating the guidebook with those Bei-Qu (the northern style) Opera guidebooks and contemporary works of verse drama such as Pi-Pa Ji (The Story of Lute), it will reveal how Shen completed the invention of the Gong-diao System in Nan-Qu Operas.The Nan-Jiu-Gong (the South Jiu-Gong) System was an imitation of Bei-Jiu-Gong (the North Jiu-Gong), which divided all the Qu-Pais (verse titles) into nine sections, each under a Gong-Diao name such as Huang-zhong and Zheng-gong. Noticing that many a Qu-Pai of the southern style was identical with northern ones, Shen accordingly classified them into the same Gong-Diaos. Afterwards, Shen picked out all the Qu-Pais that shared the same rhyme. As one of them had been allocated a certain Gong-Diao, the others fell into the same Gong-Diao group. While the real-life conditions often contradicted his principles, what Shen succeeded was more like seeking aesthetic patterns from the existing works than setting rules for the future playwrights.The Shi-San-Diao, which categorized Qu-Pais into thirteen sections named Diao, was no different from Nan-Jiu-Gong, and was an imitation of another system (possibly the Zhu-Gong-Diao).A conclusion is thus drawn that the Gong-diao System was created by the scholars in the Ming Dynasty in order to classify Qu-pais. It had no musical attribute, nor did it offer much guidance to real-life playwriting. Nonetheless, the Gong-Diao System should claim the credit for promoting the Nan-Qu Opera in the literary and intellectual circles and founding all the following research in this field.