ABSTRACT
Among the adaptations that try to wed William Shakespeare to the Chinese dramatic tradition, two up-to-date productions of Hamlet in mainland China are most influential and applauded: the Peking-opera production in the 2000s and 2010s, and the yue -opera production in the 1990s. This chapter focuses on the analysis that features three major changes in the Peking-opera adaptation, and relates them to correspondent elements in the yue -opera adaptation. The most stunning change in the Peking-opera adaptation is in the presentation of the ghost of Old Hamlet in the opening scene. Shakespeare’s original text starts with an engrossing ghost scene. In the Peking-opera adaptation, there are new soliloquies and asides that give utterance to the characters’ intensions and feelings. Demonstration of martial and acrobatic skills is an additional ingredient in the characterization of Hamlet, Polonius and Panguan. In the popular adaptations of Hamlet, the moral concern is more externalized and stressed, but the Shakespearian ambiguity and opaqueness are left out.
