The 2015 Contest of Baojuan Performers and Academic Conference in Zhoupu and Modernized “Scroll Recitation” in Pudong

The complex and awkward name of “The ‘Zhoupu Cup’ national scholarly invitational scroll recitation contest” (“Zhoupu bei” quanguo xuanjuan xueshu yaoqingsai 周浦杯全國宣卷學術邀請賽) apparently was invented to mean that the performances of “scroll recitation” teams (making use of traditional narratives known as “precious scrolls” [baojuan 寶卷]) invited from different places of the Lower Yangtze region were followed by a short conference on the current state and problems of preservation of the genre. The event took place on November 21, 2015, in the cultural services center of Zhoupu town (originally in Nanhui 南匯 county, now a part of New Pudong City District [Pudong xinqu 浦 東新區] of Shanghai). It is not the first event of this type. Similar scroll recitation festivals/competitions had already taken place in Jinxi 錦溪 town (part of Kunshan 崑山 city, which is under the jurisdiction of Suzhou in Jiangsu) in 2009, 2011, and 2013, inspired by the awards of “intangible cultural heritage” (feiwuzhi wenhua yichan 非物質文化遺產) status to several local traditions of performance. This event in Zhoupu was especially noteworthy as it was related to an attempt to revive scroll recitation in Pudong, where it had almost disappeared by the beginning of the twenty-first century. It also gives us a glimpse of the current situation regarding the transmission, adaptation, and performance of traditional and modernized scroll recitation in the whole region historically known as Jiangnan (south of the Yangtze river). In particular, we can learn from it about special features of modern performances in the greater Shanghai area. Among nine teams of performers participating in the contest, eight came from the suburbs of Shanghai, southern Jiangsu, and northern Zhejiang. Besides scroll recitation in Pudong, they represented this type of performance in Shangta 商榻 town (now in Qingpu 青浦 district of Shanghai); Tongli 同里 town (in the Wujiang 吴 江 district of Suzhou city); Jinxi town; Wuxi 無錫 and Changzhou 常州 cities (both in Jiangsu); and Shaoxing 紹興 city in Zhejiang. The ninth team, from