The use of literature in chuanqi drama (Tang Xianzu, Mei Dingzuo, Wu Bing, Li Yu, China)

In the main body of the dissertation, I basically do closing readings of six chuanqi plays from the perspective of intertextual relations and analyze the intertextual interactions of these chuanqi plays with the genres of fiction and poetry as well as with other chuanqi plays. First, I study the discourse in which Tang chuanqi fiction, a form of short romantic tales in classical Chinese, is rewritten in Ming chuanqi drama, using Tang Xianzu's Zichai ji (The Purple Hairpin) and Mei Dingzuo's Yuhe ji (The Jade Box) as representatives. This study of the textual transformation from the Tang tales to the Ming plays is focused on the reinscriptions of romantic lovers, gallant men and dramatic resolution, to foreground a different idea of romanticism of late Ming dramatists from that of Tang fiction writers.; Second, I discuss the chuanqi plays' presentation of romantic characters as creative readers of literature, interpreting and composing poetry to perceive and to fashion identities. Constructed or mistaken identities form a common element in chuanqi plays, which reveals a concern over knowing and an impulse toward fashioning. I analyze Lü mudan (Green Peony), a late Ming play by Wu Bing, and Fengzheng wu (The Kite's Mistake), an early Qing play by Li Yu, to highlight the textual construction of identities. These plays draw on and parody the conventionalized language and imagery of classical Chinese poetry, especially in terms of the representation of love and gender. The plays reveal the elite's privileged feeling of individual power for self-fashioning and, at the same time, an ironic awareness of cultural presence.; Third, I examine the meta-theatrical consciousness of chuanqi drama through an analysis of the plays-within-plays. As a self-conscious theatrical genre, chuanqi drama contains substantial meta-theatrical elements, but I focus the examination on the integration of plays in Bimuyu (Paired Sole) by Li Yu and Taohua shan (The Peach Blossom Fan) by Kong Shangren. All the inner plays in these two early Qing works are real chuanqi plays. Both Bimuyu and Taohua shan show efforts to surpass the convention of chuanqi form and to create novelty with a delightful surprise. One of the issues that the two playwrights want their audiences to think about by observing their theatrical criticism of the earlier plays is the role that theater plays in constructing and effecting social moralities. Relating to the role of theater, the polarity of real and illusory constitutes the major theme of both plays. (Abstract shortened by UMI.)...