Lianhuanhua (narrative comics)
So-called lianhuanhua 连环画 (lit. “linked pictures”) are comics in which the story is told in successive panels accompanied by a caption that features narrative and dialogue. They were typically printed as small booklets with one image per page, but also appeared on posters or in magazines where multiple panels were printed side by side.
The media format emerged in the print culture of early 20th century Shanghai but was essentially multimedial, closely associated with cinema and theater culture. Many lianhuanhua were (variously faithful) adaptations of popular films that circulated beyond metropolitan areas,, providing audiences, who could not watch films, access to early Chinese film culture through a “portable” cinematic form. While some reformers championed lianhuanhua as an ideal medium with which to teach literacy and proper types of literature, the format was frequently critiqued because many, if not most lianhuanhua indulged in low and middle-brow taste. Adaptations of martial arts films and novels as well strange and fantastical content familiar to popular Chinese audiences were jarring to cultural elites who wanted Chinese culture to radically modernize. While lianhuanhua may have indeed appeared “traditional,” they were in fact a hybrid medium that borrowed from late imperial book illustration styles as well as from the brand-new technology of cinema. As such, lianhuanhua were a flexible medium that could adapt various genres of literature, cinema, and theater, in ways that were both accessible and exciting to Chinese readers.
In the socialist period (1949-1978), the state print industry embraced the medium as entertainment, a tool for improving literacy, and as a channel for propaganda. The more unruly contents of pre-revolutionary lianhuanhua were disciplined by state publishers who nevertheless printed a diverse catalog of lianhuanhua, including adaptations of films, novels, classic operas, and, during the Cultural Revolution (1966-1976), “model operas.” In addition to small booklets that account for most lianhuanhua publications, the format was also adapted to magazines and posters, including nianhua 年画, or colorful “new year’s prints” that were made specifically to decorate homes for this significant holiday. These variations are considered in various modules about lianhuanhua on the CTC site.
While lianhuanhua were popular throughout the 20th century, the format’s heyday was undoubtedly the early to mid 1980s, when tens of thousands of titles and hundreds of millions of booklets were published. During this time, the rise in lianhuanhua publication was part of a larger cultural thaw and publishing boom that nourished a public starved for new content after the restrictive policies of the Cultural Revolution (1966-1976). By the end of the 1980s, however, the excitement initially provided by the explosion of lianhunahua publication was superseded by widespread television ownership and the influx of a new graphic format, Japanese manga. Today, lianhuanhua are a wholly nostalgic object. Classic titles are occasionally reissued and collectors can enjoy scouring flea markets and auction sites for old editions, but original content is no longer produced.
MODULES ON LIANHUANHUA
- New Year's Print of The Lute《琵琶记》年画连环画 (1958)
- "Reconciling Auspicious and Inauspicious Color Contrasts," a module on the 1958 lianhuanhua (narrative comic) New Year's print of The Lute.
- The Western Wing 西厢记 (1958)
- "How to Make the Poetic Voice Audible in a Silent Medium", a module on the late 1950s lianhuanhua (narrative comic).
- The Lute 琵琶记 (1985/1986)
- "Creating Emotional Atmospheres," a module on a lianhuanhua adaptation of The Lute.
- The Peony Pavilion 牡丹亭 (1986)
- "The Mise-en-Scène of Emotion," a module on a lianhuanhua (narrative comic) adaptation of The Peony Pavilion.