Searching the academy: a Chinese Opera and the rule of Law

Abstract

This paper contributes to the emergence of chinese-language material in law and literature scholarship by exploring the legal issues in a canonical cantonese opera, Searching the Academy. At the center of the opera is the confrontation between a Confucian scholar-official, and a military officer in imperial china over who has the right of possession over a young bondswoman and hence, the right to decide whether she has committed an offence in law. The legal narrative deals with a fundamental 'rule of law' issue: the foundation of a system of rules from which it derives legitimate force that, in turn, has impact upon its everyday administration and enforcement. To elaborate the opera as historical discourse on the rule of law in a Chinese context, I will discuss the opera's beginnings in imperial China, its canonization in the early years of the People's Republic, and recent restaging in post-1997 Hong Kong.