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SPEECH AT THE OPENING CEREMONY OF THE
FESTIVAL OF PEKING OPERA
ON CONTEMPORARY THEMES (June 5, 1964)
LU TINGYI
Comrades, friends,
The 1964 Festival of Peking Opera on Contemporary Themes opens today.
This is the first time so large a festival of Peking opera on contemporary
themes has been held. This is an event of revolutionary significance for
both Peking opera and the rest of China's traditional operas. I wish to
express my warm congratulations on the opening of the festival. I greet
the theatrical workers from the various parts of the country who are taking
part in it and all the comrades who have helped to organize it. I hope
that, by watching the performances, learning from each other and exchanging
and summing up our experience, we will make the revolutionary flower of
Peking opera on contemporary themes bloom still more abundantly.
Socialist art and literature must serve the workers, peasants and soldiers.
Our theatrical art should follow the policy of "letting a hundred
flowers blossom and weeding through the old to let the new emerge".
This policy is well known to all. Since liberation, great progress has
also been made in Peking opera circles. The content of Peking opera has
become healthier, and the technique and skill of its performers have greatly
improved. Most Peking opera artists and workers have raised their level
of political understanding, are conscientiously and industriously serving
the masses and the country, and thus enjoy high prestige both at home
and abroad. Under the guidance and teaching of the older generation of
Peking opera artists, a new generation has emerged.
A socialist society is a society in which there is class struggle. This
is reflected in Peking opera as in other cultural fields. The past fifteen
years have witnessed ups and downs in Peking opera. All of us can remember
that when the bourgeoisie launched a frenzied attack in 1957, there were
some people who dug out and staged a number of harmful operas. This was,
in fact, part of the wild attack launched by the bourgeoisie and the feudal
forces against socialism. Recently, when our country suffered three consecutive
years of natural calamities, when the modern revisionists headed by Khrushchov
withdrew experts and tore up contracts, when the Indian reactionaries
launched armed provocations on our southwest border, when the Chiang Kaishek
bandits under the wing of U.S. imperialism clamoured about "attacking
the mainland", when the landlords, rich peasants, counterrevolutionaries
and bourgeois Rightists seized the opportunity to carry on their activities
in a big way, there again appeared a host of ghost operas and other harmful
operas on the Peking opera stage. This happened in Peking and also in
other cities. With ghost operas appearing in the cities, the villages,
too, had them. Ghost operas helped feudal superstitions to raise their
ugly heads. This was again an unbridled attack against socialism by the
bourgeoisie and the feudal forces. At that time there were some people
in theatrical circles who could not see the situation very clearly. They
were fooled by the talk of "no harm in having ghosts". Now,
they should learn the lesson from this and become more politically aware.
Comrades and friends, you all know that today our country's economy has
made an allround turn for the better. How could we overcome our difficulties
so quickly? It is because we realized very early that in a socialist society
class struggle still exists; and by firmly relying on the working class,
the poor and lower-middle peasants, and by uniting with all those forces
which supported and were for socialism, we waged a resolute struggle on
all fronts. The book On the Correct Handling of Contradictions Among
the People, written by Chairman Mao Tse-tung in 1957, provides the
theoretical basis to guide us in understanding the situation in our country
and in waging struggles correctly. We have overcome our difficulties by
heeding the words of Chairman Mao in our work.
Chairman Mao teaches us that a socialist society is not "a state
of the whole people", not a society without classes, without class
struggles. In a socialist society there are still contradictions between
the productive forces and the relations of production, and between the
superstructure and the economic base, there is still class struggle between
the bourgeoisie and the proletariat. These contradictions are of two different
types: contradictions among the people, and contradictions between the
enemy and us, but mostly they are of the former type. One must distinguish
between the natures of these two types of contradictions and they must
be resolved in different ways. Class struggle in a socialist society rises
and falls, and sometimes becomes very sharp. The development from socialism
to communism takes up a very long historical period. And throughout this
period there exists the danger of reverting back to capitalism.
The modern revisionists are paving the way for the restoration of capitalism,
which is the "peaceful evolution" the U.S. imperialists have
pinned their hopes on. The emergence of the modern revisionists has made
the imperialists beside themselves with joy. They even hope that some
day in China too a "peaceful evolution" will take place. The
bourgeois Rightists in our country, echoing the imperialists and the modem
revisionists, have said that "poverty causes change, change opens
the way, the way leads to wealth, and wealth leads to revisionism".
They use this incantation to try and make the people believe that the
restoration of capitalism in our country will certainly take place. In
view of this we should take a firm stand and work hard to guarantee that
revisionism shall not appear in succeeding generations, and that capitalism
shall never be reinstated in China.
Theatrical art is part of the superstructure. And the superstructure must
conform to the economic base. Socialist theatrical art must serve the
socialist revolution and socialist construction. The greatest and most
glorious task of revolutionary theatrical artists and workers is to educate
the present generation and the coming generations, too, to be revolutionaries
for ever, who will never change their revolutionary outlook, and who will
struggle to the end against the imperialists and their lackeys, against
the bourgeoisie and the feudal forces, against modern revisionism and
modern dogmatism, and for the realization of the lofty ideal of communism.
Clearly, if Peking opera themes are restricted to stories about emperors,
kings, generals, ministers, scholars and beauties, Peking opera will not
be able to conform to the socialist economic base. In that case, serving
the workers, peasants and soldiers, and letting a hundred flowers blossom
and weeding through the old to let the new emerge would then become just
empty talk.
We are never against Peking opera staging good traditional plays such
as those adapted from Romance of the Three Kingdoms, Heroes
of the Marshes, Generals of the Yang Family, and others.
Nor do we oppose the staging of good mythological plays such as Uproar
in Heaven, or Monkey Sun Wukung Defeats the White-Bone Ghost.
We also advocate new historical plays which are written from a historical
materialist point of view and have educational significance, particularly
those with themes from modern history since the Opium War. But these alone
are not enough. Peking opera needs a new revolutionary flower, that is,
plays on such contemporary themes as the revolutionary struggles since
the May 4th Movement, class struggle and production and construction since
the liberation. And this is why the current festival is a very good beginning,
and something to rejoice over. Peking opera artists and workers learning
from the People's Liberation Army, the exemplary soldier Lei Feng, the
spirit of the Taching oil workers and Tachai farmers, have made great
efforts, have both made use of and developed the conventions of Peking
opera, and broken through them, and have thus accomplished what many considered
impossible they have introduced living people of today to the Peking opera
stage. Comrades and friends, I wish again to thank you for your diligent
efforts.
Will anyone oppose such a good thing? Will there again be ups and downs
in Peking opera after this? There will certainly be people who will oppose
this. And there will certainly be ups and downs, because in the last analysis
this is a matter of class struggle.
Now the imperialists and modern revisionists have begun to put their curses
on Peking operas with modern themes. They do this because of their class
instinct even without having seen a single Peking opera of this type.
We are glad of their curses because it shows that we are on the right
track. The fact that we follow this path hurts the imperialists and modern
revisionists. If not, why should they want to curse it and swear at us?
The crux of the matter is that they hope our art will degenerate just
like theirs. But it turns out that our art is developing along a healthy,
revolutionary path. China is a country of 650 million people, and contains
onefourth of the world's population. So it can be imagined how dreadful
it is to the imperialist and revisionist gentlemen to see socialist, revolutionary
art and literature flourish in such a populous country. I suggest that
the Ministry of Culture compile and publish a collection of those articles
in which the imperialists and modern revisionists lay their curses upon
modern theme Peking operas, and distribute it to everyone taking part
in this festival. Let everyone have a chance to see them. Then we will
know that our work is not only significant to our own country, but is
also of international significance.
The imperialists and modern revisionists say that Peking operas with modern
themes are "terrible". We say just the opposite: ''They are
fine." Such operas inspire their audiences with revolutionary spirit;
that is their first good point. By presenting such plays, Peking opera
artists have taken another step forward in remoulding their outlook. They
are learning from and identifying themselves with the workers, peasants,
and soldiers. That is the second good point. The new plays have won great
popularity and received a warm welcome among the people when staged in
various parts of the country. That is the third good point. In short,
they are very good.
Peking opera actors who have taken part in these modem theme operas have
leamt from their own experience that it is necessary for them to go out
among the workers, peasants, and soldiers, and learn from them their noble
qualities, and know what they like and what they are against. This is
a great revolutionary transformation in the Peking opera world. Peking
opera artists and workers, whether of the older or the younger generation,
ought, in full self-consciousness, to make themselves revolutionaries,
and always be revolutionary. They should temper themselves in the tide
of class struggle, stand firm, never surrender to the enemy, never be
revisionists, and never desert the revolution. I hope that all Peking
opera workers, from the playwrights and directors to the rank-and-file
personnel, from those who play main roles to those who take supporting
roles, will respond warmly to the call of the Party and Chairman Mao Tse-tung
and go out among the workers, peasants, and soldiers, plunge themselves
in the class struggle and the struggle for production to remould themselves
and do their work in the socialist theatre well and so make their contribution
to the great cause of socialism.
There is a very bright future for Peking operas with modem themes. The
repertoire at the moment may not be so large. Some of the plays are fairly
mature, others may need polishing. From now on festivals like this may
be held once every few years. By a process of gradual accumulation and
improvement, we hope that there will, in time, be hundreds of excellent
plays on the repertoire of Peking opera with modern themes in various
parts of the country. Since we understand the significance of our work
and know the method of approach, we are sure to succeed, and achieve greater
successes in the future.
I wish this festival success.
I wish comrades and friends good health.
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