At Confucius’ hometown, at the night of the sacred land. On the evening of September 26th, 2017, with the drawing near of the opening of the 8th World Confucian Conference Young Doctor Forum, the guests of the forum gathered at the International Lecture Hall of Confucius Research Institute to watch the crosstalk drama Confucius Says, the actors of Du Songtao, Gao Rui gave the audience a performance full of delight and cultural connotation.
The producer saluted to Confucius with this original crosstalk drama Confucius Says by telling Confucius’ life story with the creational idea of “using the language skill of modern art of crosstalk drama and combining the humanistic feelings of the actors”, insisting on the principle of “never profaning the sage, never misinterpreting the classics”.
This crosstalk drama started the dialogue between art and academy, broke the traditional way of spreading Confucius culture, showed the traditional culture with jaunty artisitic form, making the audience learn Confucius and the Confucian culture, enjoy a cultural feast while watching the crosstalk performance full of delight.
After the show, the audience spoke highly of it, and discussed on the spread of the traditional culture and the combination of culture and art. The specially expert of Confucius Research Institute, Taishan scholar of Shandong province, professor of China University of Political Science and Law Lin Cunguang, the specially expert of Confucius Research Institute and Nishan Scholar Cheng Qili pointed out that as Confucius had multiple identities of statesman and thinker, we could understand him from many different angles. This crosstalk drama opened a new road in carrying forward Chinese excellent traditional culture, exceeded our expection of the artistic works. They hoped that some scenes could be further improved so as to better show Confucius’ image.
Dean of Confucius Research Institute said that we must both promote the traditional culture and bring it down to earth. In the current background of carrying forward Chinese excellent traditional culture, we must explore “the multiple-culture spread of Confucianism”. In showing Confucius with artistic approach, we must make the tradition get vivid in the public’s life. It is a great innovation to show Confucius and his thought to the public; the producer realized the creative transformation and innovative development in its creational idea and principle, brought the distance with the public close, catered to the taste of both the old and the young. We must interpret the tradition accurately, clarify the misunderstandings about Confucius, exhibit the true image of Confucius and spread the positive energy of the society in showing the traditional culture with crosstalk art.
This is the second time that we hold the “Confucian Night Talk” since the inaugural meeting of the World Confucian Conference. The first one was held on September 27th, 2015.
