In China, Western theatre-goers often have the feeling that they are sitting in a boulevard theatre. At most the higher moral level and a certain didactic quality, together, with political seriousness, seem to distinguish the melodramas, comedies and thrillers from the popular plays of the commercial theatre at home. Reflecting on the different character of Chinese theatre, the European viewer quickly falls back on adjectives like ‘backward’, ‘underdeveloped’, even if he or she would justifiably reject such eurocentric judgments in an economic or political context. I should like to try not just to describe modern Chinese drama but to suggest some historical and social reasons for its specific characteristics.
