Who is Li Shangyuan? I feel very strange in the face of Shang Yuan remaining in the series of celebrity hometown search. In the search engine, I entered "Remaining Shangyuan" and found 506 entries, among which "Remaining Shangyuan" was the name of a person, which was associated with Zhang Daofan, Zhao Taimou, Wen Yiduo, Cao Yu, Song Zhi, Shen Xiling, Liang Shiqiu, Shen Congwen, Luo Longji and Xu Zhimo, and the work most closely associated with Remaining Shangyuan was the national drama movement.
I called the Chinese Department of a university in Wuhan and asked: Who was Lieshangyuan who was related to many celebrities in a literary revolution in the 1920s and 1930s? As soon as the other party heard that the person we were looking for was Li Shangyin, they actually replied: There is no Li Shangyin in our department.
When the dust of history drowns the characters in history, only the shining light of the outstanding will enter the eyes of the latecomers and guide them to see the burning track. I saw the light of Yu Shangyuan in Memories of the Literary World written by Mr. Zhao: it was Mr. Yu Shangyuan who achieved modern drama and had the driving force of a generator. At the same time, I learned from The Name of the Republic of China that Mr. Yu is a native of jiangling county, Hubei Province (now Shashi District, Jingzhou City) and graduated from an American university. He used to be a professor at National Beijing Institute of Art, National Southeast University and Guanghua University Drama School, manager of Shanghai Xinyue Bookstore, lecturer of English Department of National Peking University, etc.
In mid-spring, it may be no different. The same grass is growing and the warbler is flying. It was only in the spring of 32 years ago that Mr. Yu came to the end of his life, and I came to his hometown in the spring of 32 years later to find his trace.
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Lie Shangyuan was born in 1897, and likes watching plays since childhood. His family is poor. At the age of seven, he attended a private school run by his roommate Liu Shoulin. /kloc-dropped out of school at the age of 0/2 and worked as an apprentice in a cloth shop. 65,438+05 years old, admitted to Wuchang Wenhua Academy. During the May 4th Movement, he met Chen Duxiu and was introduced to Hu Shi by Chen Duxiu. 1920, Li Shangyuan went to Peking University English Department to study, and after graduation, he went to Tsinghua School to teach. 1923 obtained semi-public funds from Tsinghua University to study in the United States. From 192 1 to 1924, Lieshangyuan took an active part in the New Culture Movement and became interested in drama. On the eve of his visit to the United States, he publicly declared that I loved literature, especially drama, regardless of the traditional prejudice that looked down on actors in society at that time.
The other half of Yu Shangyuan's expenses for studying in the United States are funded by his father's friends, on the condition that he must study politics. After Yu Shangyuan and Xiong Foxi arrived in the United States, they first studied in the drama department of Carnegie University in Pittsburgh, and then went to Columbia University in new york for postgraduate study, specializing in western drama literature and drama art. Li Shangyuan, who refused to study politics, lost financial support and had to return home early on 1925 accompanied by Zhao Taimou and Wen Yiduo.
After returning to China, Li Shangyin, Zhao Taimou and Wen Yiduo set up a drama department in Beijing Institute of Art.. This is the first time that China has set up a drama department in a formal school, and it is also the beginning of Li Shangyin's lifelong efforts for drama education in China. Recalling his uncle Yu Shangyuan, Mr. Wu Zuguang said: His life also proved that he realized his declaration. But he did not take the road of drama artist, but took the road of drama educator; He never lacks the quality and talent as a drama artist, but he looks higher, deeper and farther, and he focuses on a broader drama career. Only those who are full of sacrifice can become real educators.
Yu Shangyuan, who devoted himself to drama education park, founded the National Drama School in Nanjing on 1935 and served as the principal. The school was originally a two-year system and often held performances in combination with teaching. In addition to teaching, Li Shangyuan is also a director. The first batch of students graduated from 1937. The graduation play is Shakespeare's famous play The Merchant of Venice, directed by Yu Shangyuan. After the outbreak of War of Resistance against Japanese Aggression, the drama schools moved and carried out anti-Japanese propaganda performances along the way. From 65438 to 0940, the Theatre Academy was changed to the National Theatre Academy, which lasted for three years. This is the first drama academy in China. In Shangyuan 14, he presided over the National Theatre Academy and supported left-wing dramatists to carry out revolutionary drama activities in schools. In those hard years, I stayed in Shangyuan with the spirit of loyalty, forgiveness and diligence, and did not hesitate to sell books and clothes, insisting on drama education. During the period of 14, hundreds of students graduated from the Theatre Academy, and many famous people in the field of drama, film and television in China have worked or studied in the Theatre Academy. Cao Yu is the dean of the Theatre Academy, and Jiao Juyin, Hong Shen, Ma, Wu Zuguang, Chen Liting, Yang, Huang and others have all taught here. Ling Zifeng, Xie Jin and Liu Housheng studied here.
After liberation, Er Shangyuan taught at Shanghai Hujiang University and Fudan University, but he still cared about drama activities in his spare time. He once directed The True Story of Ah Q for a student troupe. As a special representative of the first Shanghai Literature Conference, Yu Shangyuan visited and studied in Beijing on 1950. At this time, he met Premier Zhou (whom he met in Chongqing during the Anti-Japanese War). The Prime Minister told him that you should return to the team to engage in drama. After 1959, Shang Yuan was transferred to the Department of Drama Literature of Shanghai Theatre Academy as a professor, offered courses on western drama theory, and then entered the research room, mainly engaged in the translation of famous dramas and the compilation of related teaching materials. Thirty years later, Mr. Yu, an old colleague of Fudan University, still remembers the ever-burning lamp in Mr. Yu's study. He said it was Mr. Yu's shining heart.
1955, Li Shangyuan was implicated in the innocence case of Pan and Yang, and was once jailed. John young (Shi Yunhua) was a student of Mr. Yu and worked in a drama school. Later, during the Cultural Revolution, Shangyuan was hit again. 1970 died of cancer failure on April 30, at the age of 74.
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As one of the founders of modern drama in China (Wu Zuguang dialect), Er Shangyuan also made pioneering contributions to drama theory. Drama is a product of the West, and Yu Xiansheng was the first person to introduce and transplant western drama in China. In the 1920s, he and a group of famous writers and artists advocated the national opera movement, which had great influence at that time and later generations. Yu Shangyuan said in the preface of "The Collection of National Drama Sports": China people basically hope that China people will show China's plays to China people with China's materials. This kind of drama is called' national drama'. This is his annotation on China's plays, which is what we call the nationalization of plays.
Mr. Yu is also full of love and profound understanding of the long-standing traditional opera. In the article "Evaluation of Old Plays", he made a detailed analysis of western dramas and China's dramas respectively, and understood China's dramas as emphasizing freehand brushwork as the purest art. In "The Road to China's Dramas", he enthusiastically pinned his unexpected expectations with romantic passion on symbolic China dramas and realistic western dramas. He said: I don't want everyone to stand on an equal footing. Absolute symbolism and absolute realism cannot get the same thing. Fortunately, parallel lines are ideal. When the so-called parallel lines extend to a long length, their endpoints will still intersect. Realism and symbolism are the same, and they tend to be inclined to each other, which is the driving force for their unexpected encounter. When the time is right, the universe, life, art, drama and everything are finally reconciled, then the big dream from ancient times to the present will come true.
The traditional view of drama has always been centered on drama literature, so most of them are playwrights who are famous for their achievements in drama literature. Mr. Yu Shangyuan left a considerable number of dramatic works, including plays, but more of them were translations of drama theory. It is precisely because Li Shangyin and others have done a lot of basic work that the national drama movement was quite conscious and active from the beginning, and there was no rush and hunger when the drama was first introduced. They not only engaged in drama education, but also founded drama magazines, paying attention to drama propaganda; They not only conducted extensive and in-depth discussions on drama theory, but also tirelessly organized drama clubs and devoted themselves to drama practice. The whole national drama movement can be said to be an awakening of China's modern drama concept.
Looking for the trace of Shangyuan in the Yellow Book, I think there are two points that should be mentioned. 1. 1935 Mr. Yu accompanied Mr. Mei Lanfang to visit the Soviet Union and Europe. They visited stanislavski, Danchenko and Bernard Shaw together, visited Shakespeare's former residence and watched many famous plays. Another event was 1948. On behalf of China, Yu Shangyuan attended the annual meeting of the International Dramatists Association in Prague, Czechoslovakia. This is China's first official participation in an international drama organization.
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Yu Shangyuan, the pioneer of China's drama, has received an obvious cold reception in the history of literature and drama for various reasons. A star of China's drama, after completing his historical mission, fell into loneliness. We tried to find some traces of him in his hometown, but it seems that Mr. Yu, who left home as a teenager, has only less than 1000 words in local chronicles. We also looked for many relevant departments and people, and no one knew Mr. Yu. Mr. Yu's wife Chen Hengcui (Chen Hengzhe's sister) once said that Mr. Yu lived in the old shop in Shashi when he was a child. After being instructed by the local people, we came to the original old shop, in Hongmen Road, Shashi District. At that time, there was no home of a cloth shop apprentice.
I want to thank Mr. Yu Shangyuan's student for this trip. He has been paying attention to our interviews and has helped us several times. Although Mr. Yu has made outstanding contributions in his life, and he himself glides across the sky of China's theater like a meteor, his light has been covered up intentionally or unintentionally, but the energy released when he burns continues to this day.