The White-haired Girl is one of the most influential works produced after the publication of the Speech at the Yan'an Literary and Artistic Symposium, and the opera, movie, Peking Opera, and dance drama of the same name have become the finest works of art.
In 1945, the Northwest Field Service Group returned to Yan'an from the Jinchaji front and brought back a transcript of the legend of the "White-haired Immortal Nun," which was popular in the Fuping area of Hebei in the early 1940s. Its content describes a persecuted by the landlords of the rural girl fled into the mountains, in the cave insisted on living for many years, due to the lack of sunlight and salt, the hair on the body turned white, and because of the theft of temple offerings, the villagers near the called "White-haired Immortal Nun", and later in the Eighth Route Army's rescue, she was liberated. This is the original background of the play "White-haired Girl".
In 1945, the five-act opera "The White-haired Girl" was created collectively by the Lu Xun Academy of Fine Arts in Yan'an, and was performed for the Seventh National Congress of the Chinese **** Producers' Party in April of the same year. The opera was written by He Jingzhi and Ding Yi, and composed by Marco, Zhang Lu, Qu Wei, Huanzhi, Xiangcun, Chen Zi, Liu Chih, etc. The opera profoundly elaborated the theme of "old society turns people into ghosts, and the new society turns ghosts into people", and it was performed for more than 30 times in Yan'an and received an unprecedented warm welcome. 1946, they came to Zhangjiakou to continue the performance and made changes to the libretto according to the opinions of the general public. In 1946, they came to Zhangjiakou to continue the performance and made important changes to the script according to the opinions of the general public. After that, the perfected "The White Haired Girl" soon spread to the state-run areas, and was highly praised by the progressive literature and art circles. The plot is as follows: On New Year's Eve in 1935, Yang Bailao, a poor farmer from Yanggezhuang, Hebei Province, went out to hide from a debt and was forced to die by Huang Shiren, a landlord, and his daughter, Xi'er, was first snatched to Huang's house and then raped and defiled by him. Xier's fiancé, Wang Dachun, beats the dog-legged Mu Renzhi and defects to the Eighth Route Army. Xi'er will be sold at the time of the second aunt Zhang help to escape to the mountains, three years of suffering, hair white ......1938 spring, Dachun troops came to Yanggezhuang, Xi'er was rescued, revenge and snow hatred.
In the original "White Hair Girl", the image of Joy had retained more traces of old ideas. When she was insulted by Huang Shiren and became pregnant, she once had fantasies about Huang. There was a debate when the play was written as to whether such a plot should be retained. During the performance, the opinions of the public were constantly heard. Some comrades pointed out that it was not in line with the logic of character development for Xier to forget the revenge of killing her father and fantasize about committing herself to Huang Shiren. The opinions of the masses led the playwright to remove these ideological impurities from Joy, making the image more complete and beautiful. 1946 performance in Zhangjiakou added the plot of Zhao Laohan's telling the story of the Red Army, which connected the rebelliousness of the peasants with the influence of the Party, and the whole play took on a more distinctive contemporary character. The script also added important episodes such as the beating of Mu Renzhi by Dachun and Daluo, Dachun's defection to the Red Army under the guidance of Zhao Laohan, and his return to his hometown to carry out anti-hegemony struggles after the liberation of Yangge Village. The original play had in the fourth act of the plot of the cave life of the children, because of the theme is less related to make the plot dragged out of the complexity of many troupes simply do not perform, the author eventually deleted all of this scene.
It should be said that, as far as literary structure is concerned, The White-haired Girl is one of the few works in the history of modern Chinese literature that perfectly and harmoniously integrates the strong spirit of romanticism and the bold romanticism. The transition from the realism of the first half of the play to the romanticism of the second half shows the collective wisdom of the authors, and also reflects the tendency and basic tone of The White Haired Daughter in the process of processing and revision.
The opera adopts the tunes of northern folk music, absorbs the music of opera, and draws on the creative experience of Western European operas, and is the cornerstone of China's new national opera developed on the basis of the new rice-planting song movement. The author uses the cheerful tune of the Hebei folk song "Qing Yang Chuan", which is "The North Wind Blows, the Snowflakes Float", to express the innocence and expectation of Xi'er; he uses the deep, low and high tune of the Shanxi folk song "Picking Wheat Roots" to portray the musical image of Yang Bailao; he uses the Hebei folk song "Little Chinese Cabbage" to express the repressed emotion of Xi'er when she was oppressed by her mother in Huang's house; and he uses the soaring music of the Shanxi clappers to highlight the importance of Xi'er in the Chinese opera. The music of Shanxi Opera highlights Xier's indomitable and longing for revenge, etc. All these artistic treatments are timeless melodies born on the soil of folk music.
The outstanding feature of the play is that it draws on the classical opera tradition of combining singing, chanting and speech. Characters introduce themselves through singing, and in many places they also narrate the course of events in monologue, while the dialogues of the characters are presented in the way of drama.
The play was made into a feature film by the Northeast Film Studio (the predecessor of Changchun Film Studio) in 1950. It was adapted by Shuihua, Wang Bin and Yang Runsheng, and starred Tian Hua, Li Wanli and Chen Qiang. The film was awarded the First Prize for Outstanding Film by the Ministry of Culture in 1957, and won the Special Honorary Award at the Sixth Karlovy Vary International Film Festival in 1951.
The Peking Opera version of the play was written in 1958, adapted by Ma Shaobo and Fan Junhong, and performed by the China Peking Opera Theater (CPO), starring Li Shaochun, Du Jinfang, Ye Shenglan, Li Jinquan, and Yuan Shihai. The play was one of the earliest attempts to use the singing, acting and recitation of Peking Opera to present modern themes, and achieved many oriented breakthroughs. Li Shaochun plays Yang Bailao, wearing modern clothes, sticking on his beard, speaking in rhyme, singing [Erhuang], flipping his hair, and wrestling with a zombie, but it is not hard and awkward. Du Jinfang as Xier, said the Peking opera, singing [Xipi], [Erhuang], [high pizzicato], to set up the cavity, the voice and feelings, slippery step, step and harrier flip and other flexible use of the program skills, are very natural, and appropriately expressed the feelings of the characters.
The Yan Ming Peking Opera Troupe has another production, slightly earlier than the China Peking Opera, starring Zhao Yanman. Xi Xiaobo, one of the four great scholars, also performed this play.
The ballet "The White-haired Girl" is a classic repertoire of national dance drama presented by the Shanghai Dance School in 1965, and was recognized as one of the eight revolutionary model plays during the Cultural Revolution. Artistic director Huang Zuolin, choreographers Hu Rongrong, Fu Aidi, Cheng Daihui, Lin Yangyang, etc., starring Cai Guoying (Mao Huifang), Gu Xiaomei (Shi Zhongqin), Ling Guiming, Dong Xilin. It retains the basic character relationships and dramatic conflicts of the original work, successfully condenses the plot, and makes extensive use of Chinese folk dance and classical dance movements, combining them with the art of ballet, which is loved by the people.