Friday, January 12, 2018
How a Bunch of Americans Preserved a Dying Chinese Tradition
The Theatre Times: Traditional Chinese shadow puppetry is one of the country’s most spectacular folk arts. Behind a large screen, backlit so that it’s translucently illuminated, handmade donkey-hide puppets dance across the stage, acting out a wide range of stories from China’s formidable canon of classics.
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My parents lived in Asia for 6 years before I was born, and for a while when I was young and it was feasible, my parents would bring me to various Chinese and Japanese New Years celebrations happening in Boston. I very vividly remember seeing a shadow puppet puppet show when I was younger, and I remember being mesmerized by it. The tiny detail in the puppets and movement of the puppets behind the screen had me completely encapsulated. It makes me so sad that shadow puppetry is an art form that is dying out. Not only is it a beautiful form of art that is amazing to watch, but it is also an important piece of Chinese culture and history. I am very happy that the Chinese Theatre Works has taken steps to preserve this beautiful performance art and history. If I ever have the opportunity to see a traditional shadow puppet show again, I will take that chance.
I think it is really great how this ancient chinese tradition has been kept alive for so long. WHat is so inspiring is the people who were so passionate about theater and the Chinese arts that without even really communicating were able to keep CHinese puppetry alive. This article really made me think about all the other traditions out there that weren’t so lucky as to be kept alive by passionate theater students. Also what was so interesting about this article was reading about the life of Pauline Benton, an american lover of chinese culture, who adopted the ways of the Chinese in their puppetry theater, being one of the first women to really successfully manage the art form. Chinese puppetry was always considered a male-dominated situation. THen when she passed away her puppets were set aside to be used by someone else, at the time no one knew who. The traveling puppet company was revived and this whol story inspires me to believe that these kinds of traditions are not all lost and teach us some fundamental things about theater.
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