Presenter:
This presentation will discuss the new opera that the presenter is writing with award-winning composer YAO Chen, supported by a Mellon Fellowship and the Gray Center for Arts and Inquiry at UChicago. Entitled Ghost Village, this English-language libretto is inspired by a ghost story in PU Songling’s 17th-century masterpiece, Strange Tales from a Chinese Studio. This was an actual historical event: the Qing dynasty’s bloody crackdown on a local revolt in 1662. The session will emphasize the collaborative process of creating the libretto, and the ways in which this creative experience is transforming the presenter’s approaches to scholarship and teaching.