新作坊

Emplacing Dizang Bodhisattva on Mt. Jiuhua with Local Dramas during the Late Imperial and Republican Eras (1368-1949)

摘要：

This article focuses on local dramas of late imperial China that speak to the conflation of Dizang Bodhisattva and Jin Dizang who is a prince-turned-monk from Silla and identified as the earthly incarnation of Dizang on Mt. Jiuhua. Drawing on local legends of Jin that evolved after the Tang period, the article selects four one-act plays that feature Jin to examine how local legends were adapted into the scripts by looking into the storylines, characters, language styles, and place-names associated with Mt. Jiuhua. It also investigates the similarities between these one-act plays and well-known acts of a typical Mulian drama, while taking into account the performative context of those plays in relation to the Dizang cult. It shows that the playwrights vigorously assimilated local religious dynamics in their creation of an onstage persona of Jin as an ascetic Buddhist monk. Lastly, the article discusses the distinctive strategies by which the four plays promoted the Dizang cult on Mt. Jiuhua, analyzes gender issues in the scripts, and further illustrates the dynamics between religion and performative literatures such as local drama.