''Shajiabang'' ( Chinese: 沙家浜, also ''Shachiapang''); first produced under the title ''Sparks Amid the Reeds'', is a Chinese

revolutionary opera In mainland China, revolutionary operas or model operas () were a series of shows planned and engineered during the Cultural Revolution (1966–1976) by Jiang Qing, the wife of Chairman Mao Zedong. They were considered revolutionary and modern ...

and one of the eight "model plays" permitted during the

Cultural Revolution The Cultural Revolution, formally known as the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution, was a Social movement, sociopolitical movement in the China, People's Republic of China (PRC). It was launched by Mao Zedong in 1966 and lasted until his de ...

Production

It was first produced as a

Shanghai opera Shanghai opera ( zh, c=沪剧, p=huju), formerly known as Shenqu ( zh, c=申曲, p=shēnqǔ), is a variety of Chinese opera from Shanghai typically sung in Shanghainese. It is unique in Chinese opera in that virtually all dramas in its repertoi ...

entitled ''Sparks amid the Reeds'' (芦荡火种) or ''Emerald Water and Red Flags'' in 1958 by the Hu Opera Troupe. In October 1963, the First Peking Opera Company adapted it as a

Peking opera Peking opera, or Beijing opera (), is the most dominant form of Chinese opera, which combines instrumental music, vocal performance, mime, martial arts, dance and acrobatics. It arose in Beijing in the mid-Qing dynasty (1644–1912) and became ...

Mao Zedong Mao Zedong pronounced ; traditionally Romanization of Chinese, romanised as Mao Tse-tung. (26December 18939September 1976) was a Chinese politician, revolutionary, and political theorist who founded the People's Republic of China (PRC) in ...

saw it in 1964 and asked that the title be changed, as sparks would not set wet reeds alight, so it was named after its setting, the town of Shajiabang ("sands family creek").

Jiang Qing Jiang Qing (March 191414 May 1991), also known as Madame Mao, was a Chinese communist revolutionary, actress, and political figure. She was the fourth wife of Mao Zedong, the Chairman of the Chinese Communist Party, Chairman of the Communis ...

(Mao's wife, a leading figure in the Cultural Revolution), insisted that the role of the

Red Army The Workers' and Peasants' Red Army, often shortened to the Red Army, was the army and air force of the Russian Soviet Republic and, from 1922, the Soviet Union. The army was established in January 1918 by a decree of the Council of People ...

political commissar be expanded. The dance routines were also revised, the opera not reaching its final form until 1970. Wang Zengqi also contributed to it.

Synopsis

Set during the

Second Sino-Japanese War The Second Sino-Japanese War was fought between the Republic of China (1912–1949), Republic of China and the Empire of Japan between 1937 and 1945, following a period of war localized to Manchuria that started in 1931. It is considered part ...

("War of Resistance", early 1940s) in Japanese-ruled territory west of

Shanghai Shanghai, Shanghainese: , Standard Chinese pronunciation: is a direct-administered municipality and the most populous urban area in China. The city is located on the Chinese shoreline on the southern estuary of the Yangtze River, with the ...

. Shajiabang is a town by Yangcheng Lake. Sister Aqing runs a

teahouse A teahouse or tearoom (also tea room) is an establishment which primarily serves tea and other light refreshments. A tea room may be a room set aside in a hotel, especially for serving afternoon tea, or may be an establishment that only ser ...

visited by officers of a Chinese collaborationist group; unbeknownst to them, she is a member of the

Chinese Communist Party The Communist Party of China (CPC), also translated into English as Chinese Communist Party (CCP), is the founding and One-party state, sole ruling party of the People's Republic of China (PRC). Founded in 1921, the CCP emerged victorious in the ...

, and is helping wounded soldiers of the

New Fourth Army The New Fourth Army (N4A) () was a military unit nominally under the banner of the National Revolutionary Army (NRA) of the Republic of China, established in 1937 as part of the Second United Front against Japan. However, in practice, the New ...

who are hiding in the marshes.

Legacy

''Shajiabang'' was made into a film in 1971 by the

Changchun Film Studio Changchun Film Studio Group Corporation () is a Chinese film production company in Changchun. It is one of the studios transitioned from the 1940s, and has been considered one of the cornerstones of the Cinema of China, Chinese film industry. E ...

, and the score has also been performed as a "revolutionary symphony." An exhibition hall of Shajiabang's revolutionary history was opened in 1988, and expanded in 2006.

References

External links

* {{Cultural Revolution, state=collapsed Revolutionary operas Plays set in the Republic of China (1912–1949) Jiangsu in fiction Works about the Second Sino-Japanese War Chinese plays adapted into films Plays set in the 1940s