In The Story of the Pipa, Zhao Wuniang plays the pipa and sings for her living all the way to the capital to find her husband.
Tips
history
After passing the imperial exam, the scholar 蔡伯喈 is forced to marry the chancellor's daughter and stays in the capital. At home his wife 赵五娘 keeps his parents alive through a famine, buries them, then sets off to find him with their portrait, earning her way by singing to the pipa.
culture
高明 reworked a folk play in which Cai abandons his wife and is struck dead by lightning, turning him into a dutiful son trapped by circumstance. The play became the model for the long southern dramas of the Ming.
