Mei Lanfang and the Twentieth-Century International Stage: Chinese Theatre Placed and Displaced

This is the first book-length study, in any language, of the influence of Mei Lanfang – the internationally known Chinese actor who specialized in female roles – on the twentieth-century international stage. Focusing on Mei Lanfang’s tours of Japan, the United States, and the Soviet Union, Min Tian investigates – in the twentieth-century transnational political, ideological, cultural as well as theatrical contexts – the presence and placement of Mei Lanfang and the Chinese theatre on the international stage. A critical examination of the intercultural interpretations and appropriations of Mei Lanfang’s art and the Chinese theatre by such key figures as Brecht, Meyerhold, Eisenstein, Tairov, and Eugenio Barba, this book also throws new light on the intercultural formation and construction of the twentieth-century international theatre. In this book, Tian also delves into the Chinese support of and opposition to Mei Lanfang’s tours and the transnational impact of Mei’s tours on the Chinese perceptions and placements of his work.