"Say Yue Quan Chuan"

Author: (Qing) Qian Cai
Publisher:
Publish Date: 1998-05-01
Features: The Complete Story of Yue Fei (full title: The Story of Yue Fei with Loyalty and Filial Piety or The Complete Story of Yue Wang), is a historical novel depicting the story of Yue Fei, a heroic figure who resisted the Jin forces during the Southern Song Dynasty, and his army. After Yue Fei's martyrdom, his story quickly spread among the people. During the Xianchun period of the Southern Song, the storyteller Wang Liudafu used this story to narrate The Legend of the Great Generals of the Reunification. Subsequently, in the Song and Yuan dynasties, there were Southern drama scripts such as The Crime of Qin Tai in the East Window by Song Yuan. In the Hongzhi era of the Ming Dynasty, Zhou Li edited Yue Fei's Victory Over the Barbarians in the East Window. Later, Ming Dynasty writers created the opera script The Story of Loyalty and Filial Piety and the vernacular novel The Popular Narrative of the Reunification of Great Song. In the late Ming Dynasty, Tang Zichui wrote The Continuation of Loyalty and Filial Piety, also titled The Little Hero. During this time, folk arts also produced long narrative performances such as The Ten Generals' Defeat at Longmen, The Mad Monk Scatters Qin, and The Story of Loyalty and Filial Piety in Storytelling, among others. Based on the long-standing and widespread popularity of the Yue Fei story in the, Qian Cai of the early Qing Dynasty absorbed the essence of folk literature to create The Complete Story of Yue Fei. The profound social influence of this book is unmatched among similar novels. In the 1980s, the Liaoning writer Wang Yinquan adapted this story into a storytelling performance titled The Legend of Yue Fei, narrated by Liu Lanfang, which led to the phenomenon of "The Legend of Yue Fei" broadcasting, and the entire city emptied its streets." This marked the pinnacle of the dissemination of Yue Fei's story in history.