(East-West Question) Dong Chun: How did Hugo’s drama shine in Sino-French literary and artistic exchanges?
China News Agency, Paris, February 24th: Dong Chun: How does Hugo’s drama shine in the Sino-French literary and artistic exchange?
On the occasion of the 220th anniversary of the birth of French writer Victor Hugo, China News Agency “Dongxi Wen” interviewed the famous translator Ms. Dong Chun in Paris to explain how Hugo’s plays shine in the Sino-French literary and artistic exchanges.
As a representative of French romantic literature, Hugo created a large number of works in his life, including poems, novels, plays, essays and political essays. Chinese people know Hugo from the novels “Les Miserables”, “Notre Dame de Paris” and “93”, and Hugo’s plays are considered to reflect the high achievements of French romantic drama aesthetics. Therefore, it is very meaningful to let the Chinese people know more about Hugo’s drama.
Dong Chun said that 2002 was the 200th anniversary of Hugo’s birth. Laster, President of the French Hugo Literary Society, invited her and her husband Shen Dali to watch Hugo’s “The Laughing Man” stage play. After watching the performance, she felt that the play had a profound idea, especially the novel artistic design, which successfully stimulated people to have a “spiritual resonance” and was worth introducing to the Chinese audience, so she translated the stage performance book of “The Laughing Man” into Chinese, Recommended to the China Youth Art Theatre, who has worked with her for many years.
In December 2019, the exhibition “Victor Hugo: The Heart of a Genius” jointly organized by Shanghai Pearl Art Museum and Paris Museums Union (Paris Hugo House Museum) attracted audiences.Photo by Chen Yuyu issued by China News Agency
According to Dong Chun, Hugo’s novel “The Laughing Man” was completed in 1869 and took four years to create. In this work, he used romantic contrasting techniques to vividly portray many characters, revealing the universal social phenomenon of “alienation of laughter”, expressing Hugo’s anger at the injustice of the established order of human society and his disgust at the toiling masses. The desire for freedom and happiness. The creation of “The Laughing Man” marked Hugo’s major step toward realism.
With the joint efforts of Dong Chun and Shen Dali, Hugo’s “The Laughing Man” was put on the stage of the National Theatre of China in 2012, using the Chinese performance version co-translated by them.
Dong Chun said that “The Laughing Man” has won the joint support of the cultural departments of both China and France to move “The Laughing Man” to the Chinese theater stage. The French theater director brought her team to China, including stage art, lighting, stage design, sound engineering, etc. A complete set of team, in order to maintain the “strong Baroque and singular characteristics” of the work in terms of clothing and other aspects, has become a precious crystallization of Sino-French cultural exchanges and cooperation. The then French ambassador to China, Bai Lin congratulated this Hugo play on the performance in China, saying that he was very happy to see this play cooperated with the National Theatre of China, which had made great contributions to the promotion of French plays in China, and performed at the seventh “” Premiere at the Chinese-French Cultural Spring” Art Festival.
The direct introduction of French artistic talents to promote the success of the Chinese version of “The Laughing Man” is what Dong Chun and her husband are pleased with about this Sino-French exchange: when the curtain opened, the French stage designer, based on Hugo’s scenery The painting “The Sea” depicts the turbulent scene in the storm at sea; the French lighting designer according to Hugo’s “light and shadow” contrast philosophy, with the stage background, “shows a dignified picture of the confrontation between purity and evil against black and white”, and This is all done and realized in Beijing.
In August 2019, the French musical “Notre Dame de Paris” was staged at Beijing Tianqiao Art Center. This musical, adapted from the classic handed down by French writer Hugo, was a sensation when it first appeared in Paris in 1998, and continued to flourish for the next 21 years.Photo by China News Agency reporter Du Yang
Dong Chun revealed to reporters that at that time, the National Theater of China invested a lot of effort in the performance of Hugo’s drama, and the then president Zhou Zhiqiang, vice presidents Yan Fengqi, Wang Xiaoying and others personally invested and guided. Zhou Zhiqiang and others went to Paris to implement the cooperative rehearsal plan with the French side. Hugo’s classic novels, French screenwriters and directors, and China’s powerful art team, such “unprecedented and far-reaching Sino-French cooperation is based on our admiration and love for Hugo”.
When the Chinese version of “The Laughing Man” premiered at the Mandarin Theater, the audience was full. The Chinese audience resonated deeply with the characters on the stage. When “The Laughing Man” Gwenplain saw the death of the blind girl he loved, Di E was in despair. Some viewers burst into tears when they committed suicide by jumping into the River Thames, a great success. The play was then staged again in the 5th International Drama Season of the National Theatre of China, “Celebrity Europa”.
Dong Chun then translated Hugo’s “Freedom Drama” “Thousand Yuan Bounty”. She said that Hugo looked forward to solving the major social problems of the people in the 19th century. In 1866, he wrote the four-act play “The Thousand Dollar Bounty” in less than two months, which directly touched the social reality of France at that time.
In Dong Chun’s view, Hugo flexibly used the “distancing effect” that was not systematically theorized by Brecht until the 20th century in the social criticism of “The Thousand Yuan Bounty”. The dual roles are not only the core of the plot development, but also the author’s spokesperson, expressing the author’s insights into all aspects of social life and resonating with the audience.
The portrait of the French writer Hugo created by the famous Chinese translator, writer and painter Gao Mang.Photo by China News Agency reporter Zhang Qin
Dong Chun said that Hugo’s romantic dramas have long been introduced in China. Zeng Pu and others have mentioned Hugo’s “free drama”, but they have never been put on the Chinese drama stage. In 2002, Chen Yong, a famous drama director, expressed his desire to rehearse a Hugo drama for performance in China. Dong Chun visited Molinari, the then female curator of the “Hugo House” in Paris, and she recommended this “Hugo House”. Thousand Yuan Bounty”.
Dong Chun said that compared with “The Laughing Man”, “Thousand-Yuan Bounty” is more humorous and a more relaxed play. “Thousand Yuan Bounty” premiered in the auditorium of Beijing Normal University, and then performed at the Drama Festival held in Shenyang, Liaoning Province and won an award.
Dong Chun believes that there are various forms of literary and artistic exchanges between the East and the West, such as literary works, songs, and movies, and drama has a very special status in related exchanges. The theater stage presents “human drama” to the public in a more vivid and intuitive form. The introduction of Hugo’s drama on the stage of Chinese drama, the direct interaction between the performers and the Chinese audience, allows the Chinese people to further understand the authentic French literature and art, which will undoubtedly help to deepen the exchanges between Chinese and French literature and art.
On the evening of November 1, 2005, the Peking Opera “Les Miserables”, which was adapted from the French Hugo’s novel of the same name by the Chinese Opera Academy, made its debut in Beijing. The play integrates the essence of Chinese and Western culture and art, uses and exerts the different characteristics of Chinese and foreign stage art performances, and presents foreign literary works in the form of traditional Chinese Peking Opera art performances in front of Chinese and foreign audiences.Photo by China News Agency reporter Qian Xingqiang
Dong Chun told reporters that cultural exchanges are first of all spiritual dialogues, and all art is the representation of people’s minds. In a certain sense, engaging in cultural exchanges is a work that touches and moves people. The French romantics represented by Hugo abandoned “vulgarization” and “vulgar culture”, and called on people not to be captured by material desires and face up to the reality of today’s society. From this point of view, Hugo’s plays have a profound meaning for Chinese audiences, and inspire people to think about today’s society. (over)
About the Author:
Dong Chun, born in 1942, graduated from Beijing Foreign Studies University, and has been engaged in Sino-French cultural exchange writing and literary translation for a long time. She is a member of the Chinese Writers Association and an honorary member of the French Journalists Association. She was invited by the French international TV station TV5 Monde as a current political commentator on the “Focus Forum” program. He has won the Lu Xun Literature Award “Foreign Literature Translation Award”, the French Republic Knights of Arts and Letters and the French Gold Red Cross. Bai Lin, the former French ambassador to China, said that Dong Chun and Shen Dali are both senior Chinese translators of French works and tireless transmitters of Chinese and French cultures.
Dong Chun has published dozens of translated works, including works in Chinese translation such as “Su Manshu’s Novels” and works in French translation such as Goncourt’s novels. Her translations of French plays include Hugo’s “The Laughing Man”, “The Thousand Yuan Bounty” and Claude Purin’s “Blood Beauty”, which were performed in Beijing by the China National Theatre and the China Youth Art Theatre.Return to Sohu, see more
