Chūgoku nōson no minkan geinō: Taiko ryūiki shakaishi kōjutsu kirokushū 2 中国農村の民間藝能: 太湖流域社会史口述記錄集 2 (Performing arts in the Chinese village: A collection of oral records of social history in the Taihu Lake Basin, volume 2) by Sato Yoshifumi 佐藤仁史 et al (review)

CHINOPERL Papers No. 31 (2012)©2012 by the Conference on Chinese Oral and Performing Literature BOOK REVIEWS Chūgoku nōson no minkan geinō: Taiko ryūiki shakaishi kōjutsu kirokushū 2 中国農村の民間藝能: 太湖流域社会史口述記錄集 2 (Performing arts in the Chinese village: A collection of oral records of social history in the Taihu Lake Basin, volume 2). By Satō Yoshifumi 佐藤仁史 et al. Tokyo: Kyūko shoin, 2011. ii + 448 pp. 12 illus. Cloth ￥4500. This new book, by Satō Yoshifumi and his co-authors, presents some recent results from their long-term ongoing project on the modern history of rural society in the Taihu Lake basin.1 This particular volume is dedicated to a form of storytelling still popular in Wujiang 吳江 (just south of Suzhou 蘇州 and under its jurisdiction)—“scroll recitation” (xuanjuan 宣卷). This form of performance has certain characteristics that distinguish it from other forms of storytelling in China in general and from other forms popular in the Suzhou area, such as tanci 彈詞 (usually translated as “plucking lyrics” or “Suzhou chantefable” in Western scholarship), in particular. First, it is closely related to the scripts of “precious scrolls” (baojuan 寶卷), which are written in prosimetric style. 1 For earlier publications from this project, see Ōta Izuru 太田出 and Satō Yoshifumi 佐藤仁史, eds., Taiko ryūiki shakai no rekishigakuteki kenkyū: Chihō bunken to genchi chōsa kara no apurōchi 太湖流域社会の歴史学的研究: 地方文献と現地調查からの アプローチ (The Historical Study of Society in Taihu Lake Basin: From the Perspective of Fieldwork Survey and Study of Local Sources; Tokyo; Kyūko shoin, 2007) and Satō Yoshifumi 佐藤仁史 et al., Chūgoku nōson no shinkō to seikatsu: Taiko ryūiki shakaishi kōjutsu kirokushū 中国農村の信仰と生活: 太湖流域社会史口述記錄集 (Beliefs and Life in the Chinese Village: Collection of Oral Records of Social History in Taihu Lake Basin; Tokyo: Kyūko shoin, 2008). These volumes are all dedicated to the research of the modern situation with regards to religion in the Taihu Lake Basin, and present an overview of related sources. CHINOPERL Papers No. 31 212 From the evidence that the volume presents, it is clear that these scripts were a necessary component of performances in the past, even if nowadays many professional performers—“masters of scroll recitation” (xuanjuan xiansheng 宣卷先生)—do not rely on them while they perform: they know the stories by heart and also improvise (pp. 37–38). Second, scroll recitation has strong religious connotations. It is usually performed during religious assemblies and is closely related to folk rituals. Because of this second feature of scroll recitation, it was prohibited by the government in the period from approximately 1950 to 1980, and many scripts in the Wujiang area were destroyed during the Cultural Revolution (1966–1976) (p. 253). However, recently the policy of the PRC government towards scroll recitation has changed. Cultural authorities have proclaimed scroll recitation from Tongli 同里2 in Wujiang to be an “intangible cultural heritage” (fei wuzhi wenhua yichan 非物質文化遺產) of both the city of Suzhou and Jiangsu province. Thus, the government has supported efforts to protect and revive this art. Local scholars have collected and published texts of scroll recitation still performed in Wujiang and its vicinity. Significantly, many of the published texts are edited versions of transcriptions of oral performances.3 But Satō Yoshifumi and his co-authors approach scroll recitation in Wujiang from another perspective. Rather than concentrate on the study of texts, they focus on analyzing the current situation of oral performances of scroll recitation, paying special attention to their social background (pp. 53–54). Although they also make use of texts of baojuan, the primary sources that they have edited, published, and analyzed in the research part of this volume are interviews with various masters of scroll recitation. This method of study makes the volume very valuable. While there are a number of scholarly works devoted to baojuan texts in different languages, studies of modern performances of baojuan are very rare. This volume by Satō Yoshifumi and his co-authors provides rich evidence on the modern state of one local tradition of baojuan performances. The editors have paid special attention to the evolution of scroll recitation in Wujiang, namely, the changes that have taken place since the revival of this art in the 1980s. This volume represents a collaboration of scholars specializing in different...