The Classical Theatre and Art Song of South Fukien.

• Author: West, Stephen H.

This is a work of enormous and unparalleled erudition, a unique combination of textual study and fieldwork seldom encountered in the study of Chinese performing literature. The foci of the book are three rare Ming editions, preserved in libraries in Europe since the early and middle 18th century; but the range of scholarly inquiry ranges from the purely textual - collation of scenes with other extant or lost, but catalogued, plays and performances - to the history of theater - the rise and development of theater in southern Fukien - to a short history of Sino-European contacts that resulted in the collection and preservation of Chinese texts in Europe. The three works under consideration are Xinke zengpu xidui jinju daquan Mantian chun [UNKNOWN TEXT OMITTED] "All-embracing Spring: A Comprehensive Collection of Dramatic Acts and Operatic Arias, Supplemented and Newly Cut on Blocks," the Jifang ju zhuren jingxuan xinqu Yuyan liqin [UNKNOWN TEXT OMITTED] [UNKNOWN TEXT OMITTED] "Elegant Brocades of Precious Beauty: New Arias Selected by the Master of the Abode of Assembled Fragrances," and the Xinkan xianguan shishang zhaiyao ji [UNKNOWN TEXT OMITTED] [UNKNOWN TEXT OMITTED]. The first work is found at Cambridge and the other two in Dresden. All are photo-reproduced in the second part (or first part, depending on which language one begins with) of the book. The free circulation of these texts is a godsend to those who work on regional theater and bespeaks the enlightened scholarly attitude of cooperation between Cambridge and Taiwan; it also represents a sharp contrast to the constipated retentiveness of institutions in...