Includes bibliographical references.

Cracking a dumb Chan riddle -- The mad drummer: thrice-played Yuyang -- Chan Master Yu has a dream of Cuixiang -- Real puppets -- Sublime jokes from the back of beyond -- Pinning flowers in his coiffure -- A song for a laugh -- Ramblings with magicians in lyrics and songs -- Black and white donkeys -- Zaju from the Studio of Singing on the wind: Ma Zhou drinks alone in a Xinfeng wineshop, Duke Jing of Wei substitutes for a dragon and spreads rain -- Song of Dragon Well Tea -- Appendix: A list of short plays from the period 1400-1850 already available in English translation.

"The high literary Yuan zaju plays and Ming chuanqi plays are well-represented in English translation, but the slightly later short plays (sometimes also called zaju) of the late Ming and early Qing have been long looked down upon and ignored as pedantic closet drama. Research of recent decades has created a quite different image: whereas chuanqi plays tended to strictly conform to genre rules, these short plays offered a space for experimentation, not only in formal aspects, but also in terms of content. Short plays were very much the genre in which Ming literati displayed their daring originality, eccentric personality, and withering criticism of contemporary social conditions, as well as their outrageous wit. A representative selection of these short plays will fill an obvious gap, and the editors see a need for such a volume in courses"-- Provided by publisher.

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