Career planning for a young shadow puppet practitioner
Author: Sun II
My name is Sun Er, born in 1995, from Huaxian County, Shaanxi Province, after graduating from my undergraduate degree in 2017, I went to the Yongxingfang Food Museum in Xi'an City, Shaanxi Province in 2018 to engage in service work, and in my spare time, I learned shadow puppetry with a few old shadow puppets in the store, and I am also half a shadow puppet. Next I would like to talk about my career plans.
1 Why shadow puppets
My grandfather is an old shadow puppet practitioner, and I grew up around my grandfather, when I was young, I liked to follow my grandfather to the south and north to perform everywhere, so I also had feelings for this arrogant "old style" and "bowl cavity", with our Huaxian dialect, I feel that we Shaanxi Hanzi are heroic and refreshing.
My grandfather told me that he was in his early 20s, often with Grandpa Jiang and Grandpa Song at the east end of the village, Grandpa Zhang and Grandpa Sun at the west end of the village, at that time they were very famous in the whole county, whenever anyone had a red and white happy event, he would take a big "seal" and drive them to perform, at that time shadow puppetry was more popular, there were about seven or eight drama teams in the whole village, but the five of them were the most famous. Of course, there is a reason why they perform well, they have grown up bare-ass brothers since childhood, the family is poor and can't afford to go to school, and the farmer is too young, so they are about to learn a craft together, build a stage together, and survive together.
The accumulation of more than ten years has made them have a deeper and deeper tacit understanding, a look, a cough, they understand what to say and what tools to hand over. They were in a difficult condition at the time, so they studied for about five years before they had this skill. Grandpa's play book has more than 10 books, each of which is densely marked with scripts, what actions to do, what to say, although other work Grandpa will also, but Grandpa is young among them, so he is mainly responsible for a thousand hands. Grandpa said that when he picked up the sign, he couldn't put it down anymore.
After the Cultural Revolution, shadow puppetry is no longer as popular as before, many people have changed careers or moved to other places, and the companions who want to cooperate with them have also changed wave after wave, but Grandpa is not willing to abandon this craft, still going back and forth to Xi'an and Huaxian, barely surviving, unchanged is Grandpa's growing age and more and more trembling hands.
In 2011, shadow puppetry was selected into the Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity, grandpa also ushered in a small spring again, provincial, municipal and county leaders have invited grandpa to participate in conference activities, including performances abroad, Shaanxi Province scenic spots also use shadow puppet performance as a publicity activity for tourists to enjoy, but Grandpa knows that shadow puppetry is no longer the original taste. In order to save money and save trouble, some scenic spots only hire a thousand hands to perform, and other backstage sounds are replaced by recordings, only retaining the picture at the front desk, because the audience does not understand to appreciate or hear anything, just a picture of a happy hehe; our unique "Chinese old tone" has also become a reason restricting its development, because the audience is mostly outsiders, can not understand what we are talking about; in the past, the stories that everyone liked to hear and hear have also become clichés, more photos, and fewer people really look into it; although the performance fee is higher than before, the standard of living has also risen , simply not enough to spend, so practitioners do not want to bother to innovate and engage in tricks, fixed two plays of circular performances, the audience generally did not look back many times to see, are seen and left...
An International Shadow Puppet Culture and Ecological Park was built at home (Huaxian County). Grandpa was strong all his life, and he could never pull down his face to ask for people, so he did not have any title "by strength", so he had to stay in Xi'an to guard this small corner (Yongxingfang Food Museum), and the remaining four new partners of different ages to protect this increasingly weak spark (shadow puppet), fortunately, this is the only place in Xi'an to retain the traditional way of performance.
I am a science of management, not a prestigious school, so it is not very smooth to find a job after graduation. I am thin, can not do physical work, but also really can not bear the hardship, grandpa in recent years has been in poor health, nearly a year sick in the hospital hospitalization, I think grandpa, grandpa also think of me, so after thinking about it I returned to Xi'an, instead of grandpa to stay in Yongxingfang. Several grandfathers who worked with my grandfather before also took care of me, let me play odd jobs here, and when I was idle, they taught me to play shadow puppetry, which was also a passing on this art, watching my grandfathers with tears in their eyes, dry and begging for an heir. I was also moved, probably with a little excitement, and promised on the spot that they would not live up to their expectations, so I stayed, with a monthly salary of 2500 yuan.
2 My career plans
20 years old is the age of a person's struggle, and it is really not willing to be confined to this small Yongxingfang. But life is always full of such helplessness, I have seen the lights of big cities, but my ability can't support such a dream, what can I do? Sometimes it is really not us who have chosen life but that life has chosen us. Returning to Xi'an, although it is my grandfather's wish, there is also a little bit of helplessness for me. I am sometimes confused, is the third-rate school destined to be a third-rate life? I do not know. In my bones, I like shadow puppetry, after all, I grew up in such an environment, influenced by my grandfather, I may have a deeper understanding of others, and I know better than others where shadow puppets are, so I think I should still have the opportunity to do this well. Maybe life is also like this, can not be perfect, but as long as you find a suitable position for yourself should be able to do it. Therefore, I chose to stay, within 5-10 years, I was first prepared to settle in Xi'an and Hua County, learn this technology well, and then go to a professional place to study, improve my level in humanities and arts, and once I have the opportunity, I can try to be a shadow puppet inheritor, then life should be better.
Some things are destined to be forgotten. Because society moves forward, the dross must be discarded. Although the shadow puppet is rough compared to other artistic performances, it cannot be denied that he has his own artistic value. Just like the elderly in the family, although they are old and cannot keep up with the rhythm of social development, their actual significance to the family is not their actual use value but the center of emotional support and family cohesion, and most of the families without the elderly are scattered and distant, because no circle is not enough to become a circle (reunion).
The old art represented by shadow puppetry is the center of the circle of our country's national art, and we cannot categorically abandon and forget. Although shadow puppetry does have a reason for its development: the language (dialect) of shadow puppetry is difficult for people outside Shaanxi to understand. But if it is used as a regional feature of Shaanxi, or more narrowly, the regional representative of Huaxian County is not unavoidable. Although several shadow puppet cultural parks have been established in the province at present, but there is a lack of professionals in both funds and management, which shows that the strength of all parties in society attaches far less importance to it, what we have to do should not be simply maintained but should be an active confrontation, to protect his original ecological state, rather than to catch up with the trend (it is understood that some places deliberately cater to the public in order to increase the publicity effect to make up some spoof stories), I believe that once he is put on the right track, he will be protected and developed naturally.
We should believe that the nation is China and the world, and as long as all sectors of society work together, we will certainly be able to retain the shadow puppets while these old artists are still alive. Life is not only in front of me, my grandson is just a leaf of duckweed in the vast public, thanks to grandpa's blessing to have the opportunity to get close to shadow puppetry, I am willing to be martyred, it is a big deal to end up as poor as grandpa for a lifetime, but I have at least worked hard, I have no regrets!
Attached: The first time node and performance form are all obtained from real research, and are written in the first person in order to better present the feelings.
Source: 33
Original author: Sun Er
Compilation and editing: Huazhou Literature and History Collection