Eighty years ago, a group of young people who pursued progress and revolution rushed north and north to Yan'an on the yellow earth and came to the foot of Pagoda Mountain. With their youthful years and upward feelings, they have written a magnificent chapter in the combination of literary and artistic workers and the masses of the people to create innovative revolutionary literature and art. Eighty years later, the drama "The Ballad of Yanshui", written by Pu Xun and directed by Fu Yongfan, and produced by Xi'an Drama Theater, premiered in Xi'an, and the artists brilliantly presented the historical path of that generation on the stage.
There are many historical materials and literary works that record the Yan'an literary and artistic movement, but through the drama stage, the historical scenes of Yan'an literature and art 80 years ago are presented in front of modern audiences, and it should be said that the Xi'an Drama Theater has made a good start.
The whole play mainly unfolds the plot through three groups of characters. One group is Wen Huixin from the Drama Department who pursued a new life and art and returned from overseas and Fan Tiefeng, the leader of the Eighth Route Army; one group is Lin Yiping and Zhu Zhiqi from the drama department who went to Yan'an from Shanghai Tang and pavilions; One group was Yang Sanmei from the Drama Department and Xu Yifei from the Literature Department who came north from the Long March in the Jiangxi Soviet Region to Yan'an. The play takes running to Yan'an and taking root in Yan'an as the main line, and through these three groups of characters, the artistic pursuit of a generation of progressive young people and the trend of the times are integrated, and young people with various personality traits and life paths are twisted together, depicting how they achieve their lives and complete the mission of the times on the shore of Yanshui.
In the flames of resistance against Japan, in the furnace of revolution, they went from strangeness to love, from estrangement to integration, among which there were misunderstandings, hesitations, wanderings, and even turning back, and even forged and burst out the spirit of tenacity, fortitude, struggle, and dedication, and finally entered the realm of empathy, empathy, and common destiny, and forged into a steely group of revolutionary literature and art. The fate and feelings of the three groups of characters are kinked and entangled in the main line of Baota Mountain and Yanhe River, intertwined and unfolded, advancing layer by layer, just like the layers of loess displayed in the stage design to ascend towards Baota Mountain.
By appropriating the scene of progressive literary and artistic youths rushing to Yan'an in the thirties and forties of the twentieth century, the choreographer and director have reorganized the aesthetic structure of the drama, so that the symbols and symbolic meanings hidden in life events can be revealed-to run to Yan'an is to run to youth, to run to light, to run to a new era, and to run to a vibrant life.
On the road to Yan'an, the fresh blood of the Chinese nation flows into the torrent of the times, and the confluence is the only choice for one-mindedness, and it is the footprint that moves forward without hesitation. The author combines these characters with different emotional experiences and personalities into the relationship between the characters on the stage, forming an image system. In the intertwined dramatic conflicts, the characters flash different thoughts, personalities, and feelings, with contrasts, progressions, and resonance at the same frequency. In the various connections, the different hidden spaces and spiritual refractions in each inner world are displayed, and the profound and detailed historical changes in this land are reproduced. The wonderful group portrait display and precise personality expression constitute a major feature of this play.
"The Ballad of Yanshui" is written about a group portrait of characters, and the author cannot adopt the traditional "Trinity Law", and it is difficult to focus the dramatic conflict of the whole play on one or two protagonists. The choreographer and director of "The Ballad of Yanshui" explores a poetic and scattered cultural structure with three lines of kink.
The age and professional characteristics of the main characters on the stage, as well as their behavior towards Yan'an, are full of youth and romantic poetry. The choreographer pursues a stylized stage presentation, conveys and strengthens this poetic atmosphere through stage design, lighting and sound effects, through the thematic implication of the northern Shaanxi Plateau layered to the high sky and distant clouds, and through the lyrical infiltration of music and dance.
The cascading mountain cliffs and mountain roads in northern Shaanxi not only provide a varied performance area for the whole play, but also a metaphor for the characters' continuously extended life path and constantly improving spiritual realm, showing the nobility of Yan'an Pagoda, and showing the rugged hardships and rich colors of the loess. During the Yan'an period, the blessing and integration of the music and dance of northern Shaanxi to the dramatic situation and the actions of the characters made the whole play full of poetry. Life has experienced the severe test of fate in it, and realized the grim transformation of personality, but the severity in the bones has evaporated a warm and upward youth and optimism. Isn't this the inner temperament of the Yan'an era and the literary and artistic youth of the Yan'an era?
The whole play adopts a scattered cultural structure, with three clues and three pairs of characters going hand in hand but intertwined and integrated with each other. The choreographer does not want the audience to only appreciate purely objective events, but cares very much about the faint flow of life and poetry in the development of the plot. It not only makes the story and conflict attract the audience, but also pays more attention to the infiltration of poetry and music into the audience, forming an emotional resonance on and off the stage.
(This article is excerpted from the famous cultural scholar Xiao Yunru's review article in "Script" on May 2024)
Xiao Yunru