Pu-po

Some book report online ritual specialists (locally a sort of Taoist priest-shaman called shihkung) among the Chuang traditionally used written texts to record the outlines of mythic epics and historical epics. Braille Book Review | The Online Books Page These narratives, sometimes lasting for hours, were performed at huge song festivals (ko-hsü) held at various times during the lunar calendar year and at social events such as house raisings and weddings. The texts were usually written in t'u-su-tzu—Chinese characters employed to represent Chuang pronunciations without regard for their semantic significance. Several of these texts were translated and edited in the 1950s and again in the early 1980s after the Cultural Revolution. According to the folklorist Ch'en Chu, some Chuang and Han scholars, including Huang Yung-sha and Lan Hung-en, collected a large number of texts in the form of handwritten chapbooks in the 1950s, and then selected several texts to translate. The major mythic tale on which they worked concerns Pu-po, a mythic giant who fights with the sons of the Thundergod to make life on earth better for humans. In the process of compiling a text for publication, they combined several versions of the story in order to flesh out the plot. The names of several gods and characters were listed at the beginning of the story. The researchers put the presentation of these names in the format of the antiphonal singing once common among rural Chuang people, in which small groups of singers ask and answer questions in song. Certain other alterations were made to increase the artistic power of the narrative while preserving the essential content. The narrative was also enhanced by consulting Chuang ritual specialists on the texts and reviewing oral versions of the story.