THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 14, 2002
Orwell on stage in China
AFP
BEIJING: In an irony that has so far escaped censors, a Beijing theatre is staging a version of Animal Farm - George Orwell's scathing allegory on communist dictatorship - hours after a landmark Chinese Party Congress is set to end.
In Orwell's novel, first published in Britain in 1945, a group of animals seize a farm from humans, intending to run it on terms of equality and for the benefit of all creatures.
But an elite group of pigs corner all power and in the end are seen making merry with the very humans they deposed.
The novel ends with the celebrated words: "The creatures outside looked from pig to man, and from man to pig, and from pig to man again; but already it was impossible to say which was which."
The potential parallels would seem plain with China's current system, where critics accuse a tiny, often corrupt elite of enriching itself in the name of communism while ordinary people suffer.
However theatre director Shang Chengjun rejected the notion that the play, set for Friday evening, had any relevance for modern China.
"China still hasn't reached that last stage, where pigs became humans and the society became unfair," he said. "In the play, the people don't represent capitalists, but laziness and selfishness."
The play is being staged just three kilometres (two miles) north of the Great Hall of the People where more than 2,000 elite cadres in Western suits are gathered for the Party's 16th Congress.
Ordinary people are not admitted, while many of the meetings are being held in secret at tightly guarded luxury hotels.
Shang, a graduate of the Central Drama Institute, said the play was relevant to modern China with its problem of corruption.
"We shouldn't stop reflecting on problems and only focus on money-making. If we see corruption, we shouldn't be lazy and shouldn't avoid speaking up against it," he said.
Shang's wife, Han Jia, said a Chinese edition of Animal Farm first became available in China 15 years ago. It was allowed because the government saw it as a book about the former Soviet Union, then an ideological enemy of China.
Another edition came out last year, but the publisher could not do much promotion, given the book's sensitive content.
"The fact that this play is being allowed to be performed at this time is a good sign," Shang said.
However, his teacher, Su Yu, professor at the National Conservatory of Drama, said the play had yet to get the final green light.
"The screenplay has been approved but the play must receive a final approval from culture inspectors. Among the inspectors, there are some 'experts' and government officials," Su said.
"The problem of Stalinism and revolution is a very sensitive question. That is why the play is being presented as a show for children, very funny, with lots of animals and colourful costumes," he said.
Han said her husband had raised only 300,000 yuan (around 36,000 dollars) of the 600,000 yuan production cost, not because the play is sensitive, but because few investors were interested in theatre, especially political plays.
The 40-odd actors and actresses are volunteers, she said.
Han said it was the first time Animal Farm was being staged in China and the timing was a coincidence, noting that the Congress had been delayed to accommodate Jiang's trip to the United States last month.
However, China has a long tradition of using opera and theatre to make political points.
During the 1960s, controversy over a play raged for years and articles denouncing it were written by elite Politburo Standing Committee members, then dominated by the ultra-leftist Gang of Four headed by late chairman Mao Zedong's wife, Jiang Qing.
Hai Rui Dismissed from Office, depicting an upright official in the Ming dynasty who defends common people from a corrupt magistrate and oppressive landlords and is ultimately dismissed by the emperor, was taken as criticism of the dismissal of a popular marshal, Peng Dehuai.
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