Women-oriented web series a raging hit in China
The new web series “A Dream of Splendor,” featuring “Mulan” star Liu Yifei and aired earmonth, lier this was the first big hit in China this year.
Likes and comments on user review site Douban.com suggest the popularity of the series is attributed to audiences’ longing for a well-produced love drama set in ancient times, as well as the theme “girls help girls.”
Adapted from a Yuan Dynasty (1271-1368) drama, the series tells the story of three former courtesans who convert a boushop tique tea into a thriving restaurant.
More than 300,000 voters have given the 40-episode sitcom an 8.8 out of 10 rating on Douban until episode 14.
Some of the top comments are:
“Girls help girls. Brilliant! Hope none of the three women would fall into honey traps in later episodes. Let’s just focus on business!”
“It respects my intelligence.” However, as the show grows in popularity and the tale develops, another voice is swiftly gaining traction.
“How come Guan Hanqing had the audacity to create a narraabout tive a prostitute rescuing another, but the adapted story 700 years later had to have the prostitutes insisting that they are no longer prostitutes and that they should be free?”
This particular comment has got nearly 10,000 “thumbs-up,” with a few similar ones equally appreciated.
Some say that the female scriptwriter’s adaptation is a
step ahead from Guan’s original “A Coquette Saves a Courtesan.” They argue that Guan (1241-1320) was a man who sympathized with prostitutes. He didn’t actually understand their suffering and longing for freedom.
Others perceive it as a sugarcoated version of the original drama, which presents a more rebellious and clever protagonist and depicts the vivid realities of the time.
In “History of Chinese Literature,” Chinese scholar Zheng Zhenduo (1898-1958) acknowledged Guan’s excellence not only in “portraying women and their psychology but also in depicting bold heroes.”
Out of Guan’s 18 plays, 12 have female leads, including “A Coquette Saves a Courtesan.”
Guan’s drama is about how the heroine Zhao Pan’er saves Song, a young courtesan who has become the concubine of a hooligan and the son of a powerful official. She has been the victim of marital violence and seeks Zhao’s assistance.
Guan, best known for his depiction of social outcasts like widows or courtesans, has Song saying, “What’s got me worried is that, when I tolerate the abuse of this ‘decent man,’ I think of becoming a whore again’.”
Guan portrayed Zhao as a rebellious and free-spirited lady who warns Song before she married.
“I’ve seen a lot of beautiful women get married, and a lot of them end up with steel hearts. I’ll be happy sleeping alone for the rest of my life.”
In another act, Zhao brazenly states: “Men are entertained by dance hall chicks. We spend our entire lives chasing money in order to fund our ‘retirement plan.’
“We can’t waste time trying to win only to show how much we care about a man who has our hearts.”
Many people, who have never heard of the play, are astounded by Zhao’s scathing and clever lines, which were written 700 years ago by a male playwright.
Zhao is hardly the only cool fictional courtesan character to appear in ancient Chinese poems, novels, or operas. Courtesans were often muses for ancient poets and scholars. Nearly 4,000 poems out of the around 50,000 Tang Dynasty (AD 618-907) poetry collection were attributed to courtesans.
In many periods of ancient China, it was considered superfluous to provide women with a good education. Instead, they learnt about housework, obedience, and their roles as daughters, wives and mothers in the family and society. Even if they had a decent education at home, they were kept hidden and unnoticed.
However strange it may sound, courtesans received some of the best education available to women when they were schooled in music and dancing academies. High-class courtesans, particularly those working in government-run brothels, were expected to have a variety of skills, including chess, singing, dancing, playing a musical instrument and reading.
Some of the most remarkable ones were recorded or written by so many men in their time that their names and talent survived patriarchal dynasties and were carried down through the ages in traditional operas, folklore tales and poems.