Peking Opera on Contemporary Revolutionary Theme

Source: Shachiapang, Hoover ML50.Z99 S404 1967ML/50/Z99/S404/1967

Cover of Shachiapang

Staff Person: Ralph Scott

Description:

“Having seen your performance, I wish to express my thanks to you for the excellent work you have done. Please convey my thanks to the comrades of the cast! History is made by the people, yet the old opera (and all the old literature and art, which are divorced from the people) presents the people as though they were dirt, and the stage is dominating by lords and ladies and their pampered sons and daughters. Now you have restored historical truth, and thus a new life is opening up for the old opera. That is why this merits congratulations. The initiative you have taken marks an epoch-making beginning in the revolutionization of the old opera. I am very happy at the thought of this. I hope you will write more plays and give more performances, and so help make this practice a common one which will prevail throughout the country.” – Chairman Mao Zedong — 9 January 1944

Permanent Bureau of Afro-Asian Writers. Shachiapang; model Peking opera on contemporary revolutionary theme. Colombo {Sri Lanka}, Afro-Asian Writers’ Bureau, 1967. 60p. illus. 10 cm. Hoover Collection ML 50 Z99 S404 1967

Audio files of the Peking Opera can be found on the web.