Constructing a Playful Space: Eight-Legged Essays on Xixiang ji and Pipa ji.

This article examines the “playful eight-legged essay” as a form of literary parody and discusses its circulation in printed editions of The Story of the Western Wing and The Story of the Lute in late imperial China. The rise of the playful eight-legged essay was part of a philosophical and literary tradition of “game-playing,” and occurred in the context of publications that appropriated canonical genres for fashionable entertainment. Reading the playful compositions against the generic conventions of the standard examination essay, on the one hand, and the original drama commentary, on the other, the author explores the playful eight-legged essay as an increasingly autonomous mode of critical commentary that was independent from, yet still associated with, the dramatic text. Employing dramatic impersonation, the essays opened up a playful space for the staging of passion and extended the appeal of the original play by involving the reader in its imaginative performance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]