JULIEN, Stanislas Aignan.

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Hoeï-lan-ki, First edition of the first translation into a Western language of Li Xingdao's Huilanji, a pearl of Yuan dynasty drama. It offers "a rich mixture of an intriguing plot, lyrical songs, farcical episodes, and larger-than-life characters. Through it all the heroine Hai-t'ang moves, offering a model of Confucian patience and fortitude, to be rewarded finally by the just decision of a wise Mandarin" (Oxford Dictionary of Plays).Li's play tells the story of Judge Bao Zheng (999-1062). "Judge Bao was a real official in the Northern Song dynasty, but he is elevated to a mythical stature in folk-lore and operas as the representative of justice in both the human world and the netherworld. The play is about two women fighting for a five-year-old child, Ma Shoulang, the heir of his murdered father's fortune; both claim to be the biological mother. Judge Bao orders the son placed in the center of a chalk circle, with each claimant holding one of his hands; whoever succeeds in pulling the child to her side, declares the judge, will win parental rights. Judge Bao discovers the true mother, of course, as the one without the heart to pull her son apart" (Denton, p. 581).This translation, by the sinologist Stanislas Julien (1797-1873), provided a platform for future retranslations and adaptations, most notably Klabund's 1923 German rendition, which Bertolt Brecht used for The Caucasian Chalk Circle. "The style of the play indeed now appears quite 'Brechtian', as characters enter a

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