“Ibsen in China 1908-1997 : a critical-annotated bibliography of criticism, translation and performance” (Publication, 2001)

Henrik Ibsen : Rezeption in China.
Tam Kwok-kan : Ibsen has been considered by many literary historians as the most important source, besides Goethe, of Western influence in modern Chinese literary thinking. Most of Ibsen's major plays have been translated and staged in China, and scholars in the field of modern Chinese intellectual history fully acknowledge the contribution Ibsen made to the May 4th movement that marked the beginning of modern Chinese culture.
To the European critics, Ibsen belongs to the present and is mainly a dramatist, not a social critic. But in China, Ibsen is often considered a revolutonary figure and has been variously represented in Chinese politics in the past ninty years.
The 19th-century critics tended to think of Ibsen's plays as stage reproductions of actual experiences in life. In the reception of Ibsen in both the East and the West, there have been different emphases, each of which employs the use of a different interpretive strategy. The two kinds of interpretation, Marxist-socialist on the one hand and aesthetic-formalist on the other, are the result of not only a difference in reception strategies, but also a difference in politics.
In regarding Ibsen as a dramatist or as a social critic, the difference lies in the critics' choice of strategy whether or not there is the belief of correspondence between a dramatist's works and social reality.
Ibsen's works were introduced to China much later than they were in Japan and in the countries in Western Europe and North America. China's nation-wide reception of Ibsen occured around the end of the 1910s and was necessarily affected by the coexistence of the moralist and socialist-Marxist codes in European interpretations of Ibsen. From the beginning, the modern Chinese theatre was a social and political theatre. Although there were no distinctively formed Ibsenite groups in China, there were dramatists, such as Hong Shen and Tian Han, who openly professed themselves 'Chinese Ibsens'. Ibsen's influence in China is manifested in two aspects : sociopolitical and artistic (both literary and theatrical). Ibsen was regarded by the Chinese critics and dramatists both as a social-realist and as a romantic playwright. The history of the reception of ibsen in China can be divided roughtly into four major periods : 1908-1927, 1928-1948, 1949-1976, and 1977-present. In the first period, Chinese interpretations of Ibsen were closely associated with social movements and were greatly influenced by the moralist code then prevalent in Europe. Ibsen's social influence was first seen in the advocycy of individualism and iconoclasm in the writings of Lu Xun and Hu Shi. The social movements in China gave the interpretation of Ibsens's plays a new political context by which the critics conveyed their messages to Chinese readers. Ibsen was hailed as a champion of individualism, uncompromising moralist, and advocate of feminism. The iconoclastic elements derived from Iben's plays were most valued in this period as a means of resistance against the traditioal moral system deeply rooted in China's confucian collectivism. One of the major reasons for introducing Ibsen to China was that the messages derived from his plays constituted a powerful attack on the conventional moral institutions in China. Ibsen was hailed as a figure of hope and new values. Chinese dramatists werde more attracted to his explosive themes than to his dramatic subtlety. Almost all the social problem plays in the early 1920s were modelled after Ibsen's plays, without considering the appropriateness of such an approach to the theatre. The influence became so powerful that even well established Chinese dramatists could not resist the temptation to imitate Ibsen, which at that time was considered by some critics as an act of contempt equivalent to plagiarism.
The second period in the reception of Ibsen was accompanied by the gradual maturity of modern Chinese drama and literary criticism. Ibsen attracted the attention of more and more serious Chinese dramatists and critics, such as Xiong Foxi and Chen Zhice. Chinese dramatists gradually shifted their interest to the artistry in Ibsen's dram in the late 1920s when the zeal for social reform in China was in low tide. In the late 1920s and 1930s some Chinese critics called for a reconsideration of Ibsen from the perspective of art, still the general tendency was to moralize him, which was supported by the practical view that Ibsen's drama was useful for social reform in China. Unfortunately the war between China and Japan broke out and destroyed the hope of developing Chinese drama along a normal artistic path. Political considerations and the nationalist responsibility of saving China from disgrace and sufferings again became the first concern of serious, patriotic writers. The Chinese interest in Ibsen revived during the war years because of the need for a new dramatic form that could arouse the reader's emotional response. In a new context of oppression and invasion, the theme of A doll's house already interpreted as 'exploitation of women' was redefined as 'exploitation of Chinese women under foreign invasion'. Almost all the Chinese stage productions of A doll's house in the years from 1937 to 1945 were adaptations to serve as a nationalist discourse for the patriotic cause.
The third period in the reception of Ibsen in China started in 1949 and ended around 1976. In these years, Chinese interpretations followed closely the footsteps of the Soviet bloc. Friedrich Engels's analysis of Ibsen's plays in terms of 'class struggle' and the redefinition of the 'Ibsenian concept of majority', which were considered necessarily reactionary with reference to 'the bourgeois class in the 19th-century semi-feudal Norwegian society'. Although social and political events similar to those depicted in Ibsen's social plays did not exist in China in these thirty years, Ibsen was still revered in terms of his historic importance as a critic of the bourgeois social system and thus was taken as politically useful to the new socialist system. The well-made dramatic conflicts in Ibsen's plays were taken as reflections of class struggle in capitalist society. Hence, for the Chinese Marxists every reading of Ibsen's social plays was a lession on the evils of capitalism. For Chinese dramatists, Ibsen's plays, redefined in the light of socialist realism, were excellent examples to learn how to reproduce class struggles as dramatic conflicts on the stage.
The new social and political reality in China after 1976 allows Ibsen readers to see that there are alternatives to the vulgarized political doctrines in the interpretation of literature. There was in effect little literary criticism in the first thirty years of the People's republic. Government intervention in the interpretation of an author allowed little freedom beyond politics. The new political and social environment has given rise to the influx of the one-condemned 'Western bourgeois literary criticism' into socialist China. Chinese critics thus have an opportunity to come into contact with contemporary Western orientation in literary studies, resulting in the gradual adoption of the easthetic-formalist code.
One of Ibsen's contributions to the Chinese theatre is the inception of a realistic stage. For many years, illusionistic acting in the fashion of Stanislavsky's style and Ibsen's realistic drama has been the main-stream in the modern Chinese theatre. Ibsen's first and obvious impact on the Chinese stage was upon the style of acting, the use of props and stage design : the first elements of external realistic technique.
Ibsen was regarded as a realistic playwright in China mainly for the social implications of his plays, very seldom for the true-to-life presentation of his themes and even less often for the dramatic techniques, which enable his plays to be realistic. With regard to the stage conventions in contemporary China, Ibsen's social problem play and 'the fourth wall' mode of presentation, together with Stanislavky's acting style, have become the mainstream in Chinese theatre, which also affects the perspective of drama critics, who have gradually and unconsciously formed a fixed view of drama that excludes other possibilities of stage style.
In the reception of Ibsen, the Chinese views had been subjected to influences from both the Anglo-American and socialist sources. While the socialist views emphasized social reference and class struggle, the Anglo-American views tended to stress the aesthetic values of Ibsen's works.

Elisabeth Eide ; Neither Hu Shi nor Lu Xun ever evaluated Ibsen from an aesthetic point of view. Ibsen was constantly regarded as an ideological writer whose characters might be transformed into positive or negative stereotypes. The complexita of Ibsen's characters had to be reduced to schematically idealized stereotypes in order to function in the Chines society as generative models. The role of Nora could not be invested with sufficient positive elements to serve as an emblem for female emancipation in China.
Realism is one of the elements that was underlined in the transmission of Ibsen's ideas, but it must not be regarded as originating with Ibsen. Ibsen was regarded as a bourgeois author, and Chinese writers who took up his views also set them in a bourgeois context. They emphasized elements in Ibsen's creative works that are associated with a liberal bourgeois society such as freedom and liberation. Hu Shi introduced his concept of Ibsenism in drama as well as in intellectual debate.
The Chinese recrated the world that Ibsen had created and adapted it to Chinese circumstances. Ibsen's role was always that of an iconoclast. He was regarded as a representative of the new thought needed to transform the Chinese world. His dramatic version of topics such as heredity were taken as science dramatized.
Ibsen represented ideology more than aestheticism in so far as his plays were evaluated from the point of view of what model or ideal his characters might serve in the formation of a new, liberal policy in China.

He Chengzhou : The development of Chinese modern drama has been closely associated with the reception of Ibsen, which has undergone a process of widening vision of Ibsen from a realist, to a romantic and then to a symbolist.

Lu, Xun. Mo luo shi li shuo = On the power of Mara poetry. [ID D26228]. [Auszüge].
Lu Xun erwähnt George Byron, Percy Bysshe Shelley, Thomas Carlyle, William Shakespeare, John Milton, Walter Scott, John Keats, Friedrich Nietzsche, Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, Henrik Ibsen [erste Erwähnung], Nikolai Wassil'evich Gogol, Platon, Dante, Napoleon I., Ernst Moritz Arndt, Friedrich Wilhelm III., Theodor Körner, Edward Dowden, John Stuart Mill, Matthew Arnold, John Locke, Robert Burns, Aleksandr Sergeevich Pushkin, Adam Mickiewicz, Sandor Petöfi, Wladimir Galaktionowitsch Korolenko.

Lu Xun schreibt :
"He who has searched out the ancient wellspring will seek the source of the future, the new wellspring. O my brothers, the works of the new life, the surge from the depths of the new source, is not far off". Nietzsche...
Later the poet Kalidasa achieved fame for his dramas and occasional lyrics ; the German master Goethe revered them as art unmatched on earth or in heaven...
Iran and Egypt are further examples, snapped in midcourse like well-ropes – ancient splendor now gone arid. If Cathay escapes this roll call, it will be the greatest blessing life can offer. The reason ? The Englishman Carlyle said : "The man born to acquire an articulate voice and grandly sing the heart's meaning is his nation's raison d'être. Disjointed Italy was united in essence, having borne Dante, having Italian. The Czar of great Russia, with soldiers, bayonets, and cannon, does a great feat in ruling a great tract of land. Why has he no voice ? Something great in him perhaps, but he is a dumb greatness. When soldiers, bayonets and cannon are corroded, Dante's voice will be as before. With Dante, united ; but the voiceless Russian remains mere fragments".
Nietzsche was not hostile to primitives ; his claim that they embody new forces is irrefutable. A savage wilderness incubates the coming civiliization ; in primitives' teeming forms the light of day is immanent...
Russian silence ; then stirring sound. Russia was like a child, and not a mute ; an underground stream, not an old well. Indeed, the early 19th century produced Gogol, who inspired his countrymen with imperceptible tear-stained grief, compared by some to England's Shakespeare, whom Carlyle praised and idolized. Look around the worls, where each new contending voice has its own eloquence to inspire itself and convey the sublime to the world ; only India and those other ancient lands sit motionless, plunged in silence...
I let the past drop here and seek new voices from abroad, an impulse provoked by concern for the past. I cannot detail each varied voice, but none has such power to inspire and language as gripping as Mara poetry. Borrowed from India, the 'Mara' – celestial demon, or 'Satan' in Europe – first denoted Byron. Now I apply it to those, among all the poets, who were committed to resistance, whose purpose was action but who were little loved by their age ; and I introduce their words, deeds, ideas, and the impact of their circles, from the sovereign Byron to a Magyar (Hungarian) man of letters. Each of the group had distinctive features and made his own nation's qualities splendid, but their general bent was the same : few would create conformist harmonies, but they'd bellow an audience to its feet, these iconoclasts whose spirit struck deep chords in later generations, extending to infinity...
Humanity began with heroism and bravado in wars of resistance : gradually civilization brought culture and changed ways ; in its new weakness, knowing the perils of charging forward, its idea was to revert to the feminine ; but a battle loomed from which it saw no escape, and imagination stirred, creating an ideal state set in a place as yet unattained if not in a time too distant to measure. Numerous Western philosophers have had this idea ever since Plato's "Republic". Although there were never any signs of peace, they still craned toward the future, spirits racing toward the longed-for grace, more committed than ever, perhaps a factor in human evolution...
Plato set up his imaninary "Republic", alleged that poets confuse the polity, and should be exiled ; states fair or foul, ideas high or low – these vary, but tactics are the same...
In August 1806 Napoleon crushed the Prussian army ; the following July Prussia sued for peace and became a dependency. The German nation had been humiliated, and yet the glory of the ancient spirit was not destroyed. E.M. Arndt now emerged to write his "Spirit of the Age" (Geist der Zeit), a grand and eloquent declaration of independence that sparked a blaze of hatred for the enemy ; he was soon a wanted man and went to Switzerland. In 1812 Napoleon, thwarted by the freezing conflagration of Moscow, fled back to Paris, and all of Europe – a brewing storm – jostled to mass its forces of resistance. The following year Prussia's King Friedrich Wilhelm III called the nation to arms in a war for three causes : freedom, justice, and homeland ; strapping young students, poets, and artists flocked to enlist. Arndt himself returned and composed two essays, "What is the people's army" and "The Rhine is a great German river, not its border", to strengthen the morale of the youth. Among the volunteers of the time was Theodor Körner, who dropped his pen, resigned his post as Poet of the Vienne State Theater, parted from parents and beloved, and took up arms. To his parents he wrote : "The Prussian eagle, being fierce and earnest, has aroused the great hope of the German people. My songs without exception are spellbound by the fatherland. I would forgot all joys and blessings to die fighting for it ! Oh, the power of God has enlightened me. What sacrifice could be more worthy than one for our people's freedom and the good of humanity ? Boundless energy surges through me, and I go forth ! " His later collection "Lyre and sword" (Leier und Schwert), also resonates with this same spirit and makes the pulse race when one recites from it. In those days such a fervent awareness was not confined to Körner, for the entire German youth were the same. Körner's voice as the voice of all Germans, Körner's blood was the blood of all Germans. And so it follows that neither State, nor Emperor, nor bayonet, but the nation's people beat Napoleon. The people all had poetry and thus the poets' talents ; so in the end Germany did not perish. This would have been inconceivable to those who would scrap poetry in their devotion to utility, who clutch battered foreign arms in hopes of defending hearth and home. I have, first, compared poetic power with rice and beans only to shock Mammon's disciples into seeing that gold and iron are far from enough to revive a country ; and since our nation has been unable to get beyond the surface of Germany and France, I have shown their essence, which will lead, I hope, to some awareness. Yet this is not the heart of the matter...
England's Edward Dowden once said : "We often encounter world masterpieces of literature or art that seem to do the world no good. Yet we enjoy the encounter, as in swimming titanic waters we behold the vastness, float among waves and come forth transformed in body and soul. The ocean itself is but the heave and swell of insensible seas, nor has it once provided us a single moral sentence or a maxim, yet the swimmer's health and vigor are greatly augmented by it"...
If everything were channeled in one direction, the result would be unfulfilling. If chill winter is always present, the vigor of spring will never appear ; the physical shell lives on, but the soul dies. Such people live on, but hey have lost the meaning of life. Perhaps the use of literaure's uselessness lies here. John Stuart Mill said, "There is no modern civilization that does not make science its measure, reason its criterion, and utility its goal". This is the world trend, but the use of literature is more mysterious. How so ? It can nurture our imagination. Nurturing the human imagination is the task and the use of literature...
Matthew Arnold's view that "Poetry is a criticism of life" has precisely this meaning. Thus reading the great literary works from Homer on, one not only encounters poetry but naturally makes contact with life, becomes aware of personal merits and defects one by one, and naturally strives harder for perfection. This effect of literature has educational value, which is how it enriches life ; unlike ordinary education, it shows concreteley a sense of self, valor, and a drive toward progress. The devline and fall of a state has always begun with is refusal to heed such teaching...
[The middle portion of this essay is a long and detailed description of Lu Xun's exemplary Mara poets, including Byron, Shelley, Pushkin, Lermontov, Michiewicz, Slowacki and Petöfi].
In 18th-century England, when society was accustomed to deceit, and religion at ease with corruption, literature provided whitewash through imitations of antiquity, and the genuine voice of the soul could not he heard. The philosopher Locke was the first to reject the chronic abuses of politics and religion, to promote freedom of speech and thought, and to sow the seeds of change. In literature it was the peasant Burns of Scotland who put all he had into fighting society, declared universal equality, feared no authority, nor bowed to gold and silk, but poured his hot blood into his rhymes ; yet this great man of ideas, not immediately the crowd's proud son, walked a rocky outcast road to early death. Then Byron and Shelley, as we know, took up the fight. With the power of a tidal wave, they smashed into the pillars of the ancien régime. The swell radiated to Russia, giving rise to Pushkin, poet of the nation ; to Poland, creating Mickiewicz, poet of revenge ; to Hungary, waking Petéfi, poet of patriotism ; their followers are too many to name. Although Byron and Shelley acquired the Mara title, they too were simply human. Such a fellowship need not be labeled the "Mara School", for life on earth is bound to produce their kind. Might they not be the ones enlightened by the voice of sincerity, who, embracing that sincerity, share a tacit understanding ? Their lives are strangely alike ; most took up arms and shed their blood, like swordsmen who circle in public view, causing shudders of pleasure at the sight of mortal combat. To lack men who shed their blood in public is a disaster for the people ; yet having them and ignoring them, even proceeding to kill them, is a greater disaster from which the people cannot recover...
"The last ray", a book by the Russian author Korolenko, records how an old man teaches a boy to read in Siberia : “His book talked of the cherry and the oriole, but these didn't exist in frozen Siberia. The old man explained : It's a bird that sits on a cherry branch and carols its fine songs”. The youth reflected. Yes, amid desolation the youth heard the gloss of a man of foresight, although he had not heard the fine song itself. But the voice of foresight does not come to shatter China's desolation. This being so, is there nothing for us but reflection, simply nothing but reflection ?

Ergänzung von Guo Ting :
Byron behaved like violent weaves and winter wind. Sweeping away all false and corrupt customs. He was so direct that he never worried about his own situation too much. He was full of energy, and spirited and would fight to the death without losing his faith. Without defeating his enemy, he would fight till his last breath. And he was a frank and righteous man, hiding nothing, and he spoke of others' criticism of himself as the result of social rites instead of other's evil intent, and he ignored all those bad words. The truth is, at that time in Britain, society was full of hypocrites, who took those traditions and rites as the truth and called anyone who had a true opinion and wanted to explore it a devil.

Ergänzung von Yu Longfa :
Die Bezeichnung Mara stammt aus dem Indischen und bedeutet Himmelsdämon. Die Europäer nennen das Satan. Ursprünglich bezeichnete man damit Byron. Jetzt weist das auf alle jene Dichter hin, die zum Widerstand entschlossen sind und deren Ziel die Aktion ist, ausserdem auf diejenigen Dichter, die von der Welt nicht sehr gemocht werden. Sie alle gehören zu dieser Gruppe. Sie berichten von ihren Taten und Überlegungen, von ihren Schulen und Einflüssen. Das beginnt beim Stammvater dieser Gruppe, Byron, und reicht letztlich hin bis zu dem ungarischen Schriftsteller Petöfi. Alle diese Dichter sind in ihrem äusserlichen Erscheinungsbild sehr unterschiedlich. Jeder bringt entsprechend den Besoderheiten des eigenen Landes Grossartiges hervor, aber in ihrer Hauptrichtung tendieren sie zur Einheitlichkeit. Meistens fungieren sie nicht als Stimme der Anpassung an die Welt und der einträchtigen Freude. Sobald sie aus voller Kehle ihre Stimme erheben, geraten ihre Zuhörer in Begeisterung, bekämpfen das Himmlische und widersetzen sich den gängigen Sitten. Aber ihr Geist rührt auch tief an die Seelen der Menschen nachfolgender Generationen und setzt sich fort bis in die Unendlichkeit. Sie sind ohne Ausnahme vital und unnachgiebig und treten für die Wahrheit ein… Nietzsche lehnt den Wilden nicht ab, da er neue Lebenskraft in sich berge und gar nicht anders könne, als ehrlich zu sein. So stammt die Zivilisation denn auch aus der Unzivilisation. Der Wilde erscheint zwar roh, besitzt aber ein gütmütiges Inneres. Die Zivilisation ist den Blüten vergleichbar und die Unzivilisation den Knospen. Vergleicht man jedoch die Unzivilisation mit den Blüten, so entspricht die Zivilisation den Früchten. Ist die Vorstufe bereits vorhanden, so besteht auch Hoffnung.

Sekundärliteratur
Yu Longfa : Lu Xun befasst sich zwar nicht ausführlich mit Friedrich Nietzsche, aber auf der Suche nach dem 'Kämpfer auf geistigem Gebiet', dessen charakteristische Eigenschaften, besonders die Konfiguration des Übermenschen, macht er ausfindig. Lu Xun ist überzeugt, dass die Selbststärkung eines Menschen und der Geist der Auflehnung kennzeichnend für den Übermenschen sind. In Anlehnung an den Übermenschen zitiert er aus Also sprach Zarathustra : "Diejenigen, die auf der Suche nach den Quellen des Altertums alles ausgeschöpft haben, sind im Begriff, die Quellen der Zukunft, die neuen Quellen zu suchen. Ach, meine Brüder, die Schaffung des neuen Lebens und das Sprudeln der neuen Quellen in der Tiefe, das dürft wohl nicht weit sein !"

Tam Kwok-kan : Earliest reference to Henrik Ibsen. This is the first Chinese article that discusses in a comprehensive manner the literary pursuits of the Byronic poets. Lu Xun ranks Ibsen as one of these poets and compares the rebellious spirit exemplified in Ibsen's drama to Byron's satanic tendency. Lu Xun had a particular liking for the play An enemy of the people, in which Ibsen presented his ideas through the iconoclast Dr. Stockmann, who in upholding truth against the prejudices of society, is attacked by the people. Lu Xun thought that China needed more rebels like Ibsen who dared to challenge accepted social conventions. By introducing Ibsen in the image of Dr. Stockmann, the moral superman, together with the satanic poets, Lu Xun believed that he could bring in new elements of iconoclasm in the construction of a modern Chinese consciousness. As Lu Xun said, he introduced Ibsen's idea of individualism because he was frustrated with the Chinese prejudice toward Western culture and with the selfishness popular among the Chinese.

Chu Chih-yu : Lu Xun adapted for the greater part of Mara poetry his Japanese sources (Kimura Katataro), he also added some of his own comments and speculations.

Guo Ting : Given Lu Xun's leading position in the Chinese literary field at that time, his defense of Byron was powerful and set the overarching tone for the time of Byron when he was first introduced to Chinese readers.

Liu Xiangyu : On the power of Mara poetry itself is an expression of Byronism to 'speak out against the establisment and conventions' and to 'stir the mind'. Lu Xun criticized traditional Chinese culture and literature.

[Zhou, Zuoren] Zhong, Yao. Bai nian lai xi yang xue shu zhi hui gu [ID D26252].
Zhou Zuoren schreibt : "In the past one hundred years, Norway produced two writers : one is Ibsen, and the other Björnson. Ibsen is a great naturalist. His works are full of social criticism."

Yu, Shangyuan. Guo qu er shi er xi ju ming jia ji qi dai biao zuo [ID D26242].
Yu schreibt : "In the seventeen popular Ibsen plays, there are three categories : first, historico-mythical plays ; second, verse plays ; third social plays. There are six plays in the first category, three in the second and eight in the third. The most famous of course are the eight social plays, but the one most typical of Ibsen's spirit and his technique is A doll's house. Firstly, it is a tragedy of marriage and also a spiritual pillar of the modern women's movement. We have said before that the central idea of Ibsen's tragedies lies in heredity - for example Ghosts - and Ghosts is a sequel to A doll's house. Helmer is representative of 'the pillars of society', whereas Nora is of the spirit as exhibited by Selina, Mrs. Alving, and Rebecca. Secondly, the play has establised a model for the form of modern drama."

Tam Kwok-kan : Yu Shangyuan puts Ibsen's plays into three categories : the historico-mythical, verse, and social. He thinks that Nora is the most representative of the eight social plays, because the play shows every aspect of the techniques of modern playwriting. The play is treasured first of all for its feminist theme : "It is a tragedy of marriage and also a spiritual pillar of the modern women's movement. The central idea of Ibsen's tragedies lies in heredity – for example, Ghosts – and Ghosts is a sequel to Nora. Helmer is typical of the falsehood described in The pillars of society, whereas Nora is of the rebellious spirit portrayed in Selina, Mrs. Alving and Rebecca". Yu also introduces the play as a structural model for modern Chinese drama.

Aufführung von Nora von Henrik Ibsen durch die Er shi liu ju she 26 (26 Drama Society) in Beijing mit Wu Ruiyan als Nora und Wan Laitian als Krogstad. The performance was supported by the anti-warlord revolutionaries and was interrupted by the police, who claimed that it was immoral to have actors and actresses on the same stage.

Zheng, Zhenduo. Shi jiu shi ji Sikande'naweiya wen xue [ID D11275].
Tam Kwok-kan : Zheng ranks Ibsen as "the greates European dramatist in the past 150 years. All his contemporaries are no match to him. His place in literary history is comparable to that of Aeschylus, Shakespeare and Corneille". Zeng illustrates the influences Ibsen has exerted upon such dramatists as Strindberg, Hauptmann, and Shaw.

Aufführung von Guo min gong di = En folkefiende von Henrik Ibsen durch die Nankai zhong xue (Nankai Middle School) in Tianjin unter der Regie von Zhang Pengchun mit Cao Yu als Tochter von Dr. Stockmann.

Liu, Dajie. Yibusheng yan jiu [ID D12433].
Liu schreibt : "Disappointed by the illusions of life, Ibsen gabe up his dreams and regretted his failures at love. The difficulties in life brought him close to society and nature. He began to turn to the ordinary people immediately before him. Be they pastors, merchants, soldiers, beautiful girls, or young poets, he put all of them in his works. His purpose was to reflect faithfully the sorrows of life and wickedness of society. Thus he gave up verse and took up the prose form in his play.
Tam Kowk-kan : In discussing Ibsen's plays, Liu Dajie follows the usual tripartite scheme in grouping the works into the romantic, realistic, and symbolist.

Yu, Shangyuan. Yibusheng de yi shu [ID D26243].
Tam Kwok-kan : Yu states that Ibsen is basically an artist rather than a philoospher, thinker, and idealist. He points out Ibsen's achievements in dramatic tehnique. The greatness of Ibsen lies in his artistic presentation of a complex idea. He accounts for Ibsen's success by his realistic treatment of contemporary issues. Ibsen's realism in characterization, dialogue, and setting is particularly powerful. "Ibsen's greatness lies in his use of life as subject-matter and realism as a means for artistic achievement, and the use of technique as a medium to blend and balance thought and art." "In modern China, Ibsen is among those who have had the bad luck of being misinterpreted."

Jiao, Juyin. Lun Yibusheng [ID D26218].
Jiao schreibt : "Ibsen was a thinker, a satirist, and last but not least an artist. If you study carefully his ideas, you may find that in many places Ibsen deviated from modern ideology, yet his greatness lies in his art. Even he himself admitted that he as a poet and not a sociologist. In recent years there have been many discussions of Ibsen in China. Many people have taken Ibsen primarily as a thinker. Of course we need thoughts, but we also need art. Our choice of art works surely may take on Soviet Russia's politcy towards foreign films, but we cannot deny a person's art because we deny his thought. By the person's thought because of his art.
Whether or not Ibsen's philosophy is suitable for China, I cannot tell. At least I can conclude that present-day China does not need egotism - nevertheless, the kind of individualism Ibsen believed in is beneficial to our society because it means exactly the spiritual liberation and purification of the self. In China, there are many people who have lost their souls. Without a spirit, there cannot be a liberation, a purification of the self."

Tam Kwok-kan : Jiao's essay covers Ibsen's Scandinavian background, biography, plays, and ideological inclinations. Jiao affirms that Ibsen is greater than his Norwegian contemporaries and that his success and popularity all over the world are due to the universal significance of his plays. Jiao stresses the philosophical, artistic, and satiric aspects of Ibsen’s drama. He regards Ibsen as a master who contributes to the perfection of realism as a dramatic technique in his problem plays, in which there is an effort to present the social issues rather than to provide a solution for them. According to Jiao, Ibsen as a thinker wrote his plays as an emotional relief of his own personal obsessions. Jiao recapitualtes the social evils rooted in the family, law, religion, traditional morals, and society.

Xiong, Foxi. Lun Qun gui [ID D26238].
Xiong schreibt : "Ibsen thinks that all those people opposing Nora are ghosts. The corrupt ideas and false morals are also ghosts. Although Mrs. Alving has fulfilled her duties as a good wife and mother, she ruins her life. For fear that the hypocritical and corrupt power will spread, Ibsen advocates a thorough clearance and thus brings out the problem of heredity in Ghosts. By the heredity of syphilis Ibsen implies that social corruption and hypocrisy can also pass to the next generation.
Ghosts is a great tragedy of world significance, but it is not a Greek tragedy. Nor is it a Shakespearean tragedy. It is a modern tragedy. The classical tr4agedies are not free from the tricks of fighting and killing, just as in the works of the Greeks and Shakespeare. Only in a modern tragedy is this changed. There is no fighting or death. To the modern dramatists, death is not miserable. Real tragedy lies in the state of 'being neither able to die, nor able to live'. Therefore on the modern stage there is seldom 'death'. We find only inner conflicts, psychological wars, and spiritual battles and miseries that make people 'being neither able to laugh nor able to cry'. Psychological depiction is an essential element in modern tragedy. Ghosts is the first one of this kind.
Ibsen likes to criticize and argue, but he talks in a reasonable way and never says anything redundant. Every sentence has a meaning and every word is necessary. There is plenty of dialogue in Ghosts, but none of it is nonsense. Here lies both the weakness and strength of Ibsen. Yet on the modern stage too much dialogue is really boring, discusting and makes people sleep. Especially in China, people do not like plays with too much dialogue. Our audience need to think and need patience when they watch Ghosts.

He Chengzhou : On the occasion of the production of Ghosts Xiong published the essay Lun Qun gui. One central idea in that essay is that Ghosts is one of the greatest tragedies in the world, and a pioneering work of its kind in modern Drama.
Tam Kwok-kan : Xiong Foxi thinks that Ibsen used 'ghosts' as a metaphor for those people opposing Nora, as well as for corrupt ideas and false morals. Althought Mrs. Alving has fulfilled her duties as a good wife and mother, she ruins her life. For fear that the hypocritical and corrupt power will spread, Ibsen proposes a thorough clearance and thus brings ou the problem of heredity in Ghosts.

Aufführung von Lun Qun gui = Gengangere von Henrik Ibsen durch die Beijing yi shu xue yuan (National Beijing Academy of Arts) unter der Regie von Xiong Foxi.
According to Xiong's comments, the performance was successful in terms of its stage technique. Even though this was a commercial performance, the cast was composed of student actors, all up to professional standard. Xiong's interpretation of the play, particularly on the point of heredity, is illuminating and it gives the audience a sense of how to approach the play.

Chen, Xiying. Yibusheng de xi ju yi shu [ID D26205].
Kam Kwok-kan : Chen Xiying's essay is one of the most profound and provocative Chinese analysis of Henrik Ibsen's dramas. Putting Ibsen in the cultural context of European literature, Chen reevaluates his art by considering the contributions he made to the establishment of modern drama. He also traces the new elements in Ibsen's plays to Eugène Scribe and Emile Zola. Ibsen, according to Chen, is greater than his predecessors as he has modified and perfected the technique of the well-made play. His social dramas add new life to the well-made play. Illustrating his arguments with textual references from The pillars of society, Nora, and Ghosts, Chen provides an excellent analysis of the development in Ibsen's method of playwriting. Nonetheless, contrary to the popular opinion in which Ghosts is recognized as Ibsen's geatest work, Chen claims that both The wild duck and Rosmersholm are much superior in regard to technique.

Chen, Zhice. Yibusheng de Qun gui [ID D26207].
Chen schreibt : "It is comparatively easy to discuss Ibsenism, or Ibsen's ideas and causes, for what one has to do is to read one of Ibens's plays and pick out a few key sentences, then one can write a full essay. As for me, I would like to talk about his dramatic techniques - those used in Ghosts. This is a difficult task for me, but since Ibsen is a dramatist, we should focus on his dramatic accomplishments, and only in this way will we not insult the artist. Ibsen's method differs from that of other playwriths in that, first, an ending becomes a beginning in his plays ; second, instead of chronological presentation, Ibsen uses retrospective exposition ; third, Ibsen gives up the conventional pattern of development ; all the three acts are expositions and the final unravelling comes at the end of the plays."

Kam Kwok-kan : Chen Zhice states that it is comparatively easier to discuss Ibsenism, or Ibsen's ideas, for in so doing all one has to do is to read one of Ibsen's plays and pick out a few key sentences, than to talk about his dramatic techniques, especially those used in Ghosts. Chen believes that any study should focus on Ibsen's dramatic accomplishments, for only in this way can one do justice to the artist. Chen's statement is a critique of the popular view that Ibsen is a social revolutionist rather than a dramatist. Chen points out, Ibsen's success lies foremost in his technical innovations.

[Lavrin, Janko]. Yibusheng yu Xiao Bona. Zhang Menglin yi [ID D26220].
Lavrin schreibt : "Shaw, being an active 'extrovert', is directed towards external life problems ; the brooding 'introvert' Ibsen, on the other hand, concentrates first of all upon that internal problems of life which can perhaps be solved only upon a supra-logical or religious plane. The whole inner tragedy of Ibsen was due to the fact that, endowed with a profound moral instinct. Devoid of religious consciousness, he was bound to have recourse to purely intellectual solutions, to various philosophical and sociological creed, which led him to scepticism and proved eventually mere illusions, mere 'ghosts' ; for however plausible they be on the plane of logic and reasoning, they were helpless on that plane which is beyond reasoning ; consequently they could not save him from his impasse. Ibsen needed religion as the ultimate justification of his own moral sense, which was strong enough to keep him spell-bound to the end by the uncompromising 'all-or-nothing', and to weigh him down by his continuous feeling of guilt - the feeling of individual responsibility for the evils of all life.
It is interesting to compare in this respect the creative methods of Shaw and Ibsen. For apart from the difference which exists between a comedy and a 'serious' drama, there are certain similarities in the inner constitution of Ibsen and Shaw. Both of them are nonconformist in character, which means that they are stimulated by protest and by fighting against the tide ; both are reformers, both are intellectuals, and both write 'plays of ideas' ; that is, they start with some problems or other, which could not be said in plain philosophic terms, and they prefer to solve my means of their art.

Kam Kwok-kan : Lavrin gives an illuminating study of Ibsen by constrasting him with Shaw. The latter is often treated as a disciple of the former. But with regard to their temperament, artistic concerns, and psychology, Lavrin shows that there are a number of fundamental differences. Ibsen is a moral idealist and his works are in one sense a representation of the conflicts between his ideals and the reality in which he lived. Lavrin affirms that Ibsen writes from an inner inevitability, which is the chief incentive of his works. His own spiritual fighting and experience, which he tries to embody in his plays, are the real cause. For Lavrin, what makes Ibsen different from his contemporaries, is that he does not have religion as a last resort in his moral struggle. Without such a belief, all evils of life become the responsibility of the individual. Ibsen's uncompromising principle of 'all-or-nothing' is an attempt at seeking the support of religion as 'the ultimate justification of his own moral sense'.
Lavrin's remarks were especially useful to Chinese critics and readers alike in the 1930s, who were experiencing a new form of drama different from their own tradition.

Lu, Xun. Mo luo shi li shuo. In : Henan (Japan) ; no 2-3 (May-June 1908). = Lu, Xun. On the power of Mara poetry. Transl. by Shu-ying Tsau and Donald Holoch. In : Modern Chinese literary thought : writings on literature, 1893-1945. Ed. by Kirk A. Denton. (Stanford, Calif. : Stanford University Press, 1996).
摩罗诗力说

Zhong, Yao [Zhou, Zuoren]. Bai nian lai xi yang xue shu zhi hui gu. In : Xue bao ; vol. 1, no 19 (1908). [A review of Western scholarship in the past one hundred years ; Erwähnung von Henrik Ibsen und Bjornstjerne Martinius Bjornson].
百年來西洋學術之回顧

[Ibsen, Henrik]. Guo min zhi di. Tao Lügong [Tao Menghe] yi. In : Xin Qing nian ; vol. 4, no 6 ; vol. 5, no 1-4 (June-Okt. 1918). Übersetzung von Ibsen, Henrik. En folkefiende : skuespil i fem akter. (Kobenhavn : Gyldendal, 1882). = Ibsen, Henrik. Ein Volksfeind : Schauspiel in 5 Aufzügen. (Leipzig : Reclam, ca. 1883). = Ibsen, Henrik. An enemy of the people. (London : W. Scott, 1890). [Uraufführung Christiania Theater, Oslo 1883]. [Teilübersetzung].
国民之

[Ibsen, Henrik]. Xiao Aiyoufu. Wu Ruonan yi. In : Xin Qing nian ; vol. 4, no 6 ; vol. 5, no 3 (June, Sept. 1918). Übersetzung von Ibsen, Henrik. Lille Eyolf. (Kobenhavn : Gyldendal, 1894). = Ibsen, Henrik. Klein Eyolf. (Berlin : S. Fischer, 1895). = Ibsen, Henrik. Little Eyolf : a play in 3 acts. (London : William Heinemann, 1895). [Uraufführung Deutsches Theater Berlin, 1895]. [Teilübersetzung].
小爱友夫

[Ibsen, Henrik]. She hui zhu shi. Zhou Shoujuan yi. In : Xiao shuo yue bao ; vol. 11, no 4-12 (1920). = Vol. 1-2. (Shanghai : Shang wu yin shu guan, 1921). (Shuo bu cong shu ; 4, 5). Übersetzung von Ibsen, Henrik. Samfundets stotter : skuespil i fire akter. (Kobenhavn : Gyldendal, 1877). = Ibsen, Henrik. Stützen der Gesellschaft : Schauspiel in vier Aufzügen. Unter Mitwirkung von Emma Klingenfeld veranstaltete deutsche Originalausgabe der "Samfundets stötter". (München : T. Ackermann, 1878). = Ibsen, Henrik. The pillars of society. (London : W. Scott, 1888). [Uraufführung Odense Teater, Dänemark 1877].
社會柱石

Yu, Shangyuan. Guo qu er shi er xi ju ming jia ji qi dai biao zuo. In : Chen bao fu kann ; 9-31 October 1922. [Twenty-two famous dramatists and their representative works ; enthält Henrik Ibsen].
過去二十二戲劇名家及其代表作

[Ibsen, Henrik]. Shao nian tong meng. Wu Qirui yi. In : Chen bao fu kann ; 5-26 Jan. (1923). Übersetzung von Ibsen, Henrik. De unges forbund : lystspil i 5 akter. (Kobenhavn : Gyldendal, 1869). = Ibsen, Henrik. Der Bund der Jugend : Lustspiel in fünf Aufzügen. (Berlin : Paetel, 1872). = Ibsen, Henrik. The league of youth. (London : W. Scott, 1890). [Uraufführung Christiania Theater, Oslo 1869].
少年同

Lu, Xun. Nuola zou hou zen yang ? (1923) = Lu, Xun. After Nora walks out, what then ? : a talk given at the Peking Womens Normal College = Beijing shi fan da xue on December 26, 1923. In a new translation by Wen-Chao Li.
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[Ibsen, Henrik]. Ye ya. Yang Jingci yi. In : Chen bao fu kan ; 11 Febr.-8 March (1924). Übersetzung von Ibsen, Henrik. Vildanden : skuespil i fem akter. (Kobenhavn : Gyldendalske, 1884). = Ibsen, Henrik. Die Wildente : Schauspiel in fünf Aufzügen. (Leipzig : P. Reclam, 1887). = Ibsen, Hendrik. The wild duck. (London : W. Scott, 1890). [Urauffährung Den nationale Scene, Berngen 1885].
野鴨

[Ibsen, Henrik]. Kui lei zhi jia ting. Ouyang Yuqian yi. In : Guo wen zhou bao ; 19 Avril, 26 Avril, 3 May (1925). Adaption und Übersetzung von Ibsen, Henrik. Et Dukkehjem : skuespil i 3 akter. (Kobenhavn : Gyldendal, 1879). = Ibsen, Henrik. Nora oder ein Puppenheim : Schauspiel in drei Aufzügen. (Leipzig : Reclam, 1889). = Ibsen, Henrik. Nora. (London : Griffith, Farran & Co., 1882). = Ibsen, Henrik. A doll's house. (London : T.F. Unwin, 1889). [Erstaufführung Det Kongelige Teater, Kopenhagen 1879].
傀儡家之庭

[Lavrin, Janko]. Yi shu jia de Yibusheng. Jiao Juyin yi. In : Chen bao fu kann ; no 16-17 (1927). Übersetzung von Lavrin, Janko. Ibsen as artist. In : Lavrin, Janko. Ibsen and his creation : a psycho-critical study. (London : W. Collins Sons & Co., 1921).
藝術家的易卜生