The Lute in Lianhuanhua Pictorial
1 media/Pipaji_1985_Comic_1_thumb.jpg 2023-10-05T16:04:33+00:00 Julia Keblinska 8a3e8d98762f87c0579d0d96f52acf9bb4742f98 1 5 Fig. 1: The first page of The Lute as it appears in the 7th 1985 issue of Lianhuanhua Pictorial. plain 2025-01-28T13:54:31+00:00 Chen Quansheng 陈全胜 (art) & Shi Ming 士明 (text). 琵琶记 ("The Lute"). 连环画报 (Lianhuanhua Pictorial), 1987 no. 7.Credit: UC Berkeley’s East Asian Library has this print issue, and the Chinese Studies Librarian, Jianye He, provided the scanned image. Julia Keblinska 8a3e8d98762f87c0579d0d96f52acf9bb4742f98
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The Lute
琵琶记 (1985/1986) 48 plain 2025-01-28T16:04:40+00:00Lianhuanhua (Narrative Comics)
LINKS TO THE LIANHUANHUA
INFORMATION
- Title: “The Lute” 琵琶记
- Year: 1985
- Art: Chen Quansheng 陈全胜
- Textual adaptation: Shi Ming 士明
- Magazine: Lianhuanhua Pictorial 连环画报 1985 no. 7, pp. 14-17.
- Title: The Lute (1986)
- Year: 1986
- Art: Chen Quansheng 陈全胜 & Yue Haibo 岳海波
- Cover design: Feng Yinan 冯忆南
- Textual adaptation: Gen Ai 艮皑
- Publisher: Jiangsu Fine Arts Press 江苏美术出版社
INTRODUCTION
A new comic version of The Lute appeared in the periodical Lianhuanhua Pictorial 连环画报 in 1985. The magazine was devoted to so-called lianhuanhua 连环画, a Chinese format of comic narrative whose most popular form is a small booklet that tells an entire story in around 100 panels. The magazine, in turn, featured shorter pieces: short comic stories, excerpts and abridged versions of longer works, and longer works delivered in serial episodes, thus providing a monthly “reader’s digest” of various comics. The magazine was among the first to resume publication after the publishing hiatus of the Cultural Revolution (1966-1976) and was extremely popular. Throughout the 1980s, a boom period of comic publishing, many of the most artistically accomplished comics that went on to win national awards and establish careers were published in its pages. This module will focus on an adaptation of The Lute that was first printed in Lianhuanhua Pictorial in 1985.
The artist Chen Quansheng’s 陈全胜 (1950- ) 16-panel version of The Lute may not have secured a much coveted national art prize in 1985, but it did catch the eye of the publishing industry. It appeared again, extended to 94 panels, as part of an exquisite boxed set of Chinese drama adaptations published by the Jiangsu Fine Arts Press in 1986. The five plays in the box set range from the Yuan to Qing dynasties; the stylistic variety among the original texts is matched by the distinctive style of each adaptation. They plays include: Meng Hanqing’s 孟汉卿 (ca. 13th-14th centuries) The Moheluo Doll 魔合罗, Li Yu’s 李玉 (1602?-post 1670) Register of the Pure and Loyal 清忠谱, Tang Xianzu’s 汤显祖 (1550-1616) The Peony Pavilion 牡丹亭, Li Yu’s 李渔(1611-1680) The Mistake Caused by a Kite 风筝误, and Gao Ming’s 高明 (ca. 1305-1370) The Lute 琵琶记. While each adaptation was drawn by different artists, each volume’s cover design was created by the same artist, Feng Yinan 冯忆南 (1955-), a Wuxi art school graduate from one of the first post-Cultural Revolution college cohorts. He is one of several relatively young contributors to the collection which showcased fresh talent and new styles.
The 1986 version features a collaboration between the original artist Chen Quansheng and a slightly younger colleague, Yue Haibo 岳海波 (1955-). The illustrators’ playful embrace of traditional aesthetics is made visible in the two simulated “seals,” in this case drawn onto the paper, that appear on panel 84 of the longer version of the comic (fig. 3). They read: “Quansheng” 全胜 (top right, characters read right to left) and “Haibo” 海波 (bottom right, characters read top to bottom). By using first names in their seals, the two artists simulate the intimate signatures of Chinese painters of yore whose work circulated among in-groups of friends and patrons. Indeed, the comic combines elements of traditional Chinese painting with expressive modernist flourishes; its stylized figures and backgrounds are rendered in a uniform style that at once evokes the distant past and feels fresh to post-Cultural Revolution (1966-1976) readers used to the more mimetically realistic look of socialist realist imagery enforced throughout that period.
Rather than adopting a realist idiom, the style leans into a register more familiar to folk tales. In a stark contrast to the adaptation of Peony Pavilion featured in the same box set and analyzed in another CTC module, this comic version of The Lute does not focus emotion through the perspective of a single character. Characters’ faces are never presented in close-ups and rarely drawn in detail; we may read about how individual characters are feeling in the narration, but there is little sense of individual interiority, or inner emotional life, in the visual representation of each character. Instead, emotional turmoil is expressed in theatrical gestures and moody landscapes that interact graphically on the page. Poses of sorrow, defeat, or outrage are mirrored in the trees and rocks that surround the protagonists, embedding them in an affective space that is bigger than any single individual. The emotional weight of the story emerges from the interaction of human and environment, an atmosphere that is mutually created by both the figures and the background of the image.THEME: Creating Emotional Atmospheres
Although the story begins in an idyllic setting, a happy family home in the countryside, visual harbingers of strife appear almost immediately. The family is sitting on the porch of their home. In the comic’s first panel (fig. 4), a tree looms to left of the frame while a big bull balances its visual weight on the far right of the composition. The tree is leafy and the resting bull is plump; both are traditional symbols of longevity and reclusion that also suggest that the homestead is joyful and resources are plentiful. Yet the trunk is a bit gnarly and bends over the roof of home in a slightly menacing pose. The narration below the image informs us that political chaos has soured the family’s son on pursuing an official position. He wants to be a scholar and maintain this idyllic family atmosphere.
Click to expand/collapse Translation Notes
Chinese Captions CTC Translation 东汉末年，陈柳郊区，有一户姓蔡的小康人家。 In the last years of the Eastern Han period, on the outskirts of Chenliu, there was a relatively well-off family named Cai. 老夫妻都已年迈，仅有一子名蔡邕号伯喈。 The old parents were getting on in years and only had one son named Cai Yong, who was also known by the sobriquet Bojie. 蔡邕才富五车，是个饱学之士，生得一表人才，又极懂得孝敬父母。 Cai Yong’s talent filled five cartloads; he was an erudite scholar and had a strikingly handsome appearance—he also deeply understood how to be filial toward his parents. 因朝政混乱，蔡邕不愿做官，只愿做一个学士。 Because the imperial court was in chaos, Cai Yong was not willing to become an official. He was only willing to be a scholar.
A few panels later (fig. 5), when the elder Cai is well into demanding that his son Cai Yong 蔡邕 go to the capital to take exams, the atmosphere has changed. The family is feasting outside, now flanked by two trees that overwhelm the composition. Their gnarled branches loom over the gathering and are shedding leaves. Though several chickens wander at the bottom of the frame, the restful rural life they suggest is clearly threatened by the arboreal storm above.Click to expand/collapse Translation Notes
Chinese Captions CTC Translation 蔡公劝儿子早作进京赶考的准备，不要错过了今年这个大比之年。 Father Cai urged his son to begin preparing for the metropolitan exams early so as not to miss this year’s big competition. 蔡邕说：“爹妈年高，需人侍奉，孩儿岂敢远离？实难从命。” Cai Yong said: “Mom and Dad, you are getting on in years and need someone to attend to you. How can a child like myself dare go far away? The command is difficult to obey.” 蔡公教导儿子，做人要为富国安民多出力，才是忠孝双全。 Father Cai instructed his son that to be a worthy person, one must exert great energy on making the state wealthy and the people safe. Only then can one attain the ideal of being both loyal and filial.
Sitting on the left of the banquet mat, the father is shown gesturing towards the son, the command made visible by the vector of his hand. In the text below, Cai Yong reminds him that his parents are both old and he dare not go far away, so his father’s command is difficult to obey. His father, however, insists that filial piety must be met with service to the nation for his social obligations to be met. The conflict narrated in the caption is redoubled visually above the dining family, engulfing them in a tense atmosphere.Click to expand/collapse Translation Notes
Chinese Captions CTC Translation 不久，朝廷黄榜招贤，郡中把秀才蔡邕的名字也保举上去，而且已有郡吏来召过。 Not long after, there was an imperial edict calling worthy men to service. The scholar Cai Yong’s name was submitted for consideration. On top of that, a provincial official had already come to summon him. 蔡邕甘守清贫，以侍奉双亲为辞，不愿为官。 Cai Yong was willing to live humbly and used his filial obligation to take care of his parents to decline. He wasn’t willing to be an official. 他担心郡吏不肯罢休，还会来召，又怕老夫逼迫，心中闷闷不乐。 He worried that the provincial official would not let it go and would be back to summon him. On top of that, he feared that his father would force him to go. He felt depressed.
In the next panel (fig. 6), the mood has shifted from tension to resignation. Cai Yong is increasingly sure he can’t avoid travelling to the capital for exams. His head hangs down, its defeated pose mirrored in the weeping willow above him. The willow is all the more fitting in this scene because it is a traditional symbol of farewell and departure.Click to expand/collapse Translation Notes
Chinese Captions CTC Translation 蔡公听母子俩这样说，十分气恼，责怪儿子：“我知道你是恋着新婚，舍不得分离！” Father Cai heard the mother and son saying these things and was very angry. He censured his son: “I know that you’re newlywed and you’re reluctant to part.” 张太公也劝道：“秀才，不要贪鸳侣而误了前程。” Master Zhang also urged him, saying: “Scholar, don’t covet marital bliss and neglect your future.”
When he returns home, Cai Yong and his fretting mother continue to beg the elder Cai to reconsider (fig. 7). The family is joined by their neighbor, who has also joined the discussion and sits with them on the porch of their house. Angered by his son’s reluctance to leave, the father rises. His hand is once again pointed, now in clear admonishment, at his son. Behind the family, a gnarly tree branch stretches halfway across the panel in a visual echo of the father’s outstretched hand. Again, landscape and human figure mutually create and reinforce emotional disturbance. Even the folds in the family’s robes echo the lines that represent the texture of the wood, suggesting an emotional connection between these figures and the environment they inhabit.Click to expand/collapse Translation Notes
Chinese Captions CTC Translation 五娘送了一程又一程。 Wuniang sent off her husband, following him further and further along. 五娘哭道：“你这一去，我别的不担忧，只愁公婆年高，我难支撑这重担。” She cried and said, “In terms of you leaving, I don’t have other worries except that father- and mother-in-law are getting on in years. It will be hard for me to shoulder this heavy burden.” 蔡邕一再安慰妻子，也流泪不止。 Cai Yong repeatedly comforted his wife, but he also wept uncontrollably?.
The sorrowful willow in turn, reappears several panels later when Cai Yong heads out to the capital. As in the previously discussed willow scene (fig. 6), the sweeping folds of clothes in this panel (fig. 8) resonate with the sweeping tendrils of the tree. Here too the environment and the characters seem to imbue each other with grief and longing.Click to expand/collapse Translation Notes
Chinese Captions CTC Translation 蔡邕只管哀求两位大人帮助辞婚，不料二人传过圣旨，尽了媒妁之意，就告辞而去。 Cai Yong only cared about pleading with the two eminent men to help him refuse the marriage, but he didn’t expect that having transmitted the imperial edicts and communicated the intent of matchmaking, the two would bid farewell and go. 蔡邕不知如何是好。 Cai Yong didn’t know what to do.
While Cai Yong’s sojourn in the capital is decidedly urban (he visits inns and palaces and lives in a grand home), trees posed as expressively as those that surround his country home continue to play an important function in conveying affect. When, for example, Prime Minister Niu 牛丞相 sends officials from the Ministry of Rites (libu 礼部), as matchmakers for Cai Yong and his daughter, the young man’s conflict with the demands of political life are expressed visually by gnarled trees (fig. 9). Cai Yong stands to the left of the frame, his framed bowed forward and his hands joined in supplication as he entreats the officials to help him reject the math. A tree above him likewise leans right across the panel. The two officials, unable to thwart the Prime Minister’s wishes, return the hand gesture but lean back to distance themselves from his pleas. Their defensive poses are supported by another tree that bends over them. As before, all three characters wear robes whose wrinkles resemble the texture of bark and bends of branches. The branches of the two trees mingle above the characters, visually playing out the back-and-forth discussion. Once again then, Cai Yong’s conflict and relative helplessness against a higher authority appears as much in his own posture as it does in the environment surrounding him.
So far, we have explored how trees and humans serve as emotional mirrors. In one of the original play’s most famous scenes, the comic utilizes other landscape elements to much the same effect. After Cai Yong is forced to marry Prime Minister Niu’s daughter, he gains wealth and political position, but remains deeply distraught.Click to expand/collapse Translation Notes
Chinese Captions CTC Translation 蔡邕在牛府为婿也已三年了，他哪里知道亲母已故，只是每日敬岳父、陪新妻，也不敢提回家之事。 Cai Yong had been in the Niu mansion as a son-in-law for three years already. How could he know his own mother had died? The only thing he did was to pay his respects to his father-in-law and accompany his new wife day in and day out. He did not dare to bring up going home. 这日，心中烦恼，便到水亭操琴解忧。 On this day, he was vexed, so he wanted to go to the pavilion on the water to play the zither and assuage his grief. 琴声悲切、寄托他与五娘重逢无望的悲伤。 The sound of the zither was mournful, containing the sorrow of his hopelessness of ever seeing Wuniang again.
Three years after his marriage, he remains ignorant of the going-ons at home and fears even broaching the topic of return with his father-in-law, Prime Minister Niu. One day, depressed, he ventures to a pavilion on the water in the Niu mansion’s garden to play the zither (qin 琴) and “assuage his grief“ (jie you 解忧) (fig. 10). A giant rock formation looms in the foreground of the image, its strange curves overwhelming the visual composition of the panel. A staircase through the middle of the rock formation leads to a pavilion in the center right of the background. Cai Yong is bent over a lute in the structure. The rocks seem to function in two ways. They clearly represent his turbulent emotional state. They also, however, frame the only passageway to the pavilion, meaning that Cai Yong had to physically pass through this bizarre formation on his way to play the zither. Perhaps then, they have amplified his despair. After all, in “assuaging his grief,” his zither sounds supremely mournful and aggrieved.
Having guessed that her husband is hiding something from her after listening to his song, Cai Yong’s new wife Miss Niu 牛小姐 is herself saddened. She has figured out that he is thinking of another woman. She thus arranges for a servant to bring wine to a cooling pavilion next to the lotus pond in their garden to distract him. Cai Yong is still sorrowful but dares not refuse and joins his wife in admiring the lotuses. In panel 60 (fig. 11), the two sit in a pavilion on the left side of the frame, while floating lotuses sweep from the bottom left to the top right.
Click to expand/collapse Translation Notes
Chinese Captions CTC Translation 牛小姐命丫环在荷塘的凉阁备酒。 Miss Niu ordered her maid to prepare wine for the cooling pavilion. 蔡邕不敢违拗，只得随夫人饮酒赏荷。 Cai Yong didn’t dare disobey, he had to accompany his wife in drinking and admiring the flowers. 牛小姐见荷花怒放，蔷薇盛开，清风送来阵阵幽香、兴致极高。 When Miss Niu saw the flowers, her anger dissipated. Blooming roses and bursts of delicate fragrance wafting on the cool breeze made her very gleeful.
In the image, the arc of Miss Niu’s extended hand matches the sweep of the flowers. She is gleeful as she takes in the lotuses, and the delicate fragrance of blooming roses. Her glee registers in the large lotuses dancing across the page. Yet, this whimsical environment has no effect on Cai Yong. He sits stooped over in the pavilion, seemingly staring into his wine bowl. Indeed, in the next panel (fig. 12), Miss Niu realizes that Cai Yong is still gloomy and leaves to enjoy chasing butterflies with her maid.Click to expand/collapse Translation Notes
Chinese Captions CTC Translation 她见蔡邕仍旧闷闷不乐，未免扫兴，自己站起来带丫环扑蝶游戏，不理蔡邕。 She saw that Cai Yong was still depressed, which unavoidably dampened her spirits. She stood up and took her maid to chase butterflies, ignoring Cai Yong.
Cai Yong sits alone, still stooped over, in the center of the panel. Another rock formation fills the righthand side of the frame. It is menacing, threatening to swallow the pavilion whole. Only a few of the lotus flowers that had danced so gaily a page earlier remain visible. They are on the left of the panel, but just like they were unable to lift Cai Yong’s spirits, they are too slight in stature to visually balance the rock formation. A tormented sorrow overwhelms both the character and the page.AUTHOR
Julia Keblinska
