The Structure of Chinese Peking Opera
In Beijing opera,play structure is generated by the demands of perfor mance.The structure of every play is designed to display the skills of major per formers through the porrayal of the feelings and reactions of major characters arising from the dramatic situation provided by the plot.Generally the focus is on one skill at any given time, with a second and often a third skill simultane ously displayed in support of the first. As discussed above,when song or speech is the featured skill,danceacting supports it; when combat is the featured skill, it is also supported by danceacting, and occasionally by brief displays of speech or song skill as well.
Many Beijing opera performances are preLiberation China consisted of zhezixi,short plays or selected scenes from longer plays; several zhezixi were performed together as a single bill. Although such performances are no longer as common as they once were,they do still occur,this performance practice is di rectly related to the structure of Beijing opera plays.The short plays have simple plots featuring one basic situation. In civil plays,the major character expresses his or her emotional reaction to the situation;in martial plays,he or she carries out a plan of action arising from the situation.The performer portrays these e motions or actionsthrough several virtuoso displays of skill.The longer plays may have much more complex plots but are also structured to feature one basic situation and a concentrated display of skill in each major scene;these scenes, when excerpted,can stand alone as complete performance pieces.Generally,a bill of zhezixi is composed to feature as wide a range of the four performance skills as possible.
A short play usually consists of one act. In Chinese such a play is termed a xiao xi(lit,“small play"), the same designation used for a light,or comic,play. A longer play,which may consist of from six to fifteen or more scenes,is called a daxi (lit. "great play"), the same designation used for a serious play.Since the introduction of Western dramainto China in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries,a short Beijing opera play may also be referred to as aone act play (dumuxi,lit."single curtain play"), and a long play is often referred to as a fulllength play (quanbenxi) or multiscene play (duochangxi).For purposes of clarity,they will be referred to in this study as oneact plays and multiscene plays,respectively.
All playslight and serious,civil and martialmay be composed in either oneact or multiscene structure.In the following description of play structure, the examples cited are from serious civil plays because these plays feature the au ral performance skillssong and speechmost predominantly.In light civil plays,the same types of structure are used to feature danceacting,speech,and sometimes song; in martial plays,to feature combat and danceacting,and in many instances speech and song as well.
The primary structural features the will be discussed are the use of emo tionalprogression structure (cengcixing buju,lit."progressional composition")and the conceptions of time (shijian de gainian).These features are fundamental to the structure of both oneact and multiscene plays.
