Four Masters of Chinese Storytelling Video Collection: AFC 2004/021 (full view)

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Four Masters of Chinese Storytelling Video Collection

AFC 2004/021

Prepared by Sarah Bradley Leighton

American Folklife Center, Library of Congress

Washington, D.C.

November 2005

Encoded by Judy Ng and Amarantha Dyuaaxchs, August 2006 ; Revised by Nora Yeh

Finding aid URL: http://hdl.loc.gov/loc.afc/eadafc.af006006

Latest revision: August 2009

Collection Concordance by Format

Appendix I: Concordance for Moving Images

Collection Number: AFC 2004/021
Title: Four Masters of Chinese Storytelling Video Collection
Inclusive Dates: 2001-2004
Repository: Archive of Folk Culture, American Folklife Center, Library of Congress, Washington, D.C.
Extent (original): 3.3 linear feet (4 boxes) containing 1 monograph with 408 pages and 361 video compact discs (VCDs).
Collector: Børdahl, Vibeke
Languages: Chinese, Yangzhou dialect; English
Abstract: The entire repertories of four master storytellers, Dai Buzhang, Fei Zhengliang (Fei Li), Gao Zaihua, and Ren Jitang (Ren Dekun) were recorded on video for the project "Large-scale Registration of Chinese Storytelling" from 2001 to 2003 in Yangzhou. In addition, a medium-length repertoire was told by Ren Dekun. Project co-leaders were Fei Li and Vibeke Børdahl, project assistant, co-editor and translator was Huang Ying, Yangzhou University; photographers were Li Xin and Chen Wei, Yangzhou. Yangzhou storytelling (Yangzhou pinghua) is oral narrative, primarily in Yangzhou dialect, performed with gestures and learned through apprenticeship with a professional master storyteller.

Selected Search Terms

The following terms have been used to index the description of this collection in the Library's online catalog. They are grouped by name of person or organization, by subject or location, and by occupation and listed alphabetically therein.

Personal Names

Børdahl, Vibeke. Four masters of Chinese storytelling.
Dai, Buzhang, 1925-2003.
Fei, Li.
Gao, Zaihua.
Ren, Jitang.

Subjects

Folklore--China--Yangzhou Shi.
Oral tradition--China--Yangzhou Shi.
Ping shu--China--Yangzhou Shi.
Storytellers--China--Yangzhou Shi.
Storytelling--China--Yangzhou Shi.
Tales--China--Yangzhou Shi.

Form of Material

Ethnographic--Performance--Videodisc.

Administrative Information

Arrangement

The video compact discs (VCDs) were originally numbered for each storyteller's range of discs resulting in five series of numbers within the collection. During processing, each VCD was assigned a unique moving image (MV) number. A "Concordance for Moving Images" is included in the appendix of this finding aid to document the correspondence between the MV number and the original number of each VCD.

Access

Duplication of the collection materials is governed by copyright and other restrictions.

Acquisition

The VCDs produced during the "Large-scale Registration of Chinese Storytelling" and the monograph, Four Masters of Chinese Storytelling: Full-Length Repertoires of Yangzhou Storytelling on Video (Copenhagen: Nordic Institute of Asian Studies, 2004), were donated to the Archive of Folk Culture at the American Folklife Center by Dr. Vibeke Børdahl in December 2004.

Preferred Citation

Four Masters of Chinese Storytelling Video Collection (AFC 2004/021), Archive of Folk Culture, American Folklife Center, Library of Congress, Washington, D.C.

Related Materials

The collection of VCDs is also on deposit at the library of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences in Beijing, China; Fu Ssu-nien Library, Academia Sinica in Taipei, Taiwan; and Danish Folklore Archives in Copenhagen, Denmark.

Four Masters of Chinese Storytelling: Full-Length Repertoires of Yangzhou Storytelling on Video. Edited by Vibeke Børdahl, Fei Li, and Huang Ying. (Copenhagen: Nordic Institute of Asian Studies, 2004) is available in the Library of Congress general collection.

Scope and Content

This collection is the product of the "Large-scale Registration of Chinese Storytelling" conducted by Dr. Vibeke Børdahl and Fei Li between 2001 and 2003. During this project, the repertories of four masters of Chinese storytelling in Yangzhou - Dai Buzhang, Fei Zhengliang (Fei Li), Gao Zaihua, and Ren Jitang (Ren Dekun) - were filmed on video for a total of 360 hours of storytelling. The videotapes were then converted into sets of video compact discs (VCDs) and donated to research institutions in Asia, Europe, and the United States.

The four masters recorded for the project were Dai Buzhang of the Dai school of Journey to the West, Fei Zhengliang (Fei Zhengliang is the artistic name for Fei Li.) of the Wu school of Three Kingdoms, Gao Zaihua of the Kang school of Three Kingdoms, and Ren Jitang (Ren Jitang is the artistic name for Ren Dekun.) of the Wang school of Water Margin. The collection also includes a medium-length repertory, Emperor Qian Long Goes South, told by Ren Jitang. The collection is accompanied by the monograph, Four Masters of Chinese Storytelling: Full-Length Repertoires of Yangzhou Storytelling on Video, edited by Vibeke Børdahl, Fei Li, and Huang Ying. This book provides summaries of the content on each VCD, biographical information about each of the four masters, and descriptive articles about Chinese storytelling in Yangzhou in both Chinese and English.

Biographical History

Vibeke Børdahl, Ph.D., is a senior researcher at the Nordic Institute of Asian Studies (NIAS) in Copenhagen, Denmark. She has taught Chinese language and literature at the University of Aarhus, the University of Oslo, and the University of Copenhagen, and has published books related to Chinese storytelling listed below. Dr. Børdahl directed the "Large-scale Registration of Chinese Storytelling" project and her work is featured on a web site about Chinese storytelling at http://www.shuoshu.org/

Bibliography
Børdahl, Vibeke. Along the Broad Road of Realism: Qin Zhaoyang's World of Fiction (London: Curzon Press, 1990)
Børdahl, Vibeke. The Oral Tradition of Yangzhou Storytelling (Richmond, Surrey: Curzon Press, 1996)
Børdahl, Vibeke, ed., The Eternal Storyteller: Oral Literature in Modern China (Richmond, Surrey: Curzon Press, 1999)
Børdahl, Vibeke and Jette Ross. Chinese Storytellers: Life and Art in the Yangzhou Tradition (Boston: Cheng and Tsui Co., 2002)

Collection Concordance by Format

Quantity	Physical Extent (original)	Location	Item Numbers

Manuscript Materials
408	pages in the monograph	AFC, Box 1	Not applicable
Moving Images
361	video compact discs (VCDs)	AFC, Box 2-4	MV001-MV361

Container List

CONTAINER	CONTENTS


	Series I: Manuscripts

			BOX 1

FOLDER 1			Finding Aid.
				15 pages.

FOLDER 2			Four Masters of Chinese Storytelling: Full-Length Repertoires of Yangzhou Storytelling on Video.
				Edited by Vibeke Børdahl, Fei Li, and Huang Ying. (Copenhagen: Nordic Institute of Asian Studies, 2004). This book provides a detailed log of the content on each VCD, biographical information about each of the four masters, and descriptive articles about Chinese storytelling in Yangzhou. 408 pages.

	Series II: Moving Images
		To play a VCD with Windows Media Player, insert the VCD in the CD or DVD tray of your computer. Open the Windows Media Player, click on "File" and then "Open." A dialog box will appear, listing the MPEGAV folder. Under "Files of Type," select "Any File." A .dat file should appear in the dialog box. Double click on the .dat file, and the video will launch in the Windows Media Player view window.

			BOX 2

			MV001 - MV100
				Dai Buzhang performing Journey to the West in one hundred days of storytelling. Recorded April 8, 2003 - October 24, 2003.

			MV101 - MV150
				Fei Li (Fei Zhengliang) performing the First Part of Three Kingdoms in fifty days of storytelling. Recorded April 8, 2003 - June 8, 2003.

			MV151 - MV172
				Gao Zaihua performing the Central Part of Three Kingdoms in one hundred days of storytelling. Recorded April 5, 2002 - December 5, 2002.

			BOX 3

			MV173 - MV260
				Gao Zaihua continues performing the Central Part of Three Kingdoms in one hundred days of storytelling. Recorded April 5, 2002 - December 5, 2002.

			MV261 - MV342
				Ren Jitang (Ren Dekun) performing the Wu Song Saga from Water Margin in eighty-eight days of storytelling. Recorded April 5, 2002 - November 15, 2002.

			BOX 4

			MV343 - MV348
				Ren Jitang (Ren Dekun) continues performing the Wu Song Saga from Water Margin in eighty-eight days of storytelling. Recorded April 5, 2002 - November 15, 2002.

			MV349 - MV360
				Ren Jitang (Ren Dekun) performing Emperor Qian Long Goes South in twelve days of storytelling. Recorded November 16, 2002 - December 3, 2002.

			MV361
				The video compact disc that was included with the book, Four Masters of Chinese Storytelling: Full-Length Repertoires of Yangzhou Storytelling on Video, contains selections from each of the four masters on the first day of recording.