Jo Riley | |
|---|---|
| Born | Josephine Riley (20th century) |
| Occupation | writer, translator,theatre actor,schoolteacher |
| Citizenship | British |
| Education | PhD |
| Alma mater | University of Cambridge |
| Subject | Chinese theatre,theatre arts |
| Notable works | Chinese Theatre and the Actor in Performance (1997) |
Josephine Riley is a British writer, translator, theatre actor, and schoolteacher. Dr. Riley has written and translated several books abouttheatre arts, especiallyChinese theatre. She currently teaches film and drama atMunich International School in Germany.
Riley reads, writes, and speaksMandarin Chinese, and is better known for having in the early 1980s widely traveled in China and learned to act in theChinese theatre[1] as one of the first foreign students at theCentral Academy of Drama in Beijing,[2] eventually writingChinese Theatre and the Actor in Performance (1997,Cambridge University Press), a reference book that "gives an 'inside' view of Chinese theatre and the actor in performance for the first time [...] from her personal observations of, and dialogue with, Chinese actors and her first-hand experiences of the theatre world of China in general, none of which was possible before 1980."[3] She also made the first English translation ofThe Other Shore byNobel Laureate in Literature playwrightGao Xingjian.
Jo Riley graduated from theUniversity of Cambridge.[2] After working for a number of small touring companies, she went to Asia to explore a different kind of theatre. In the early 1980s, after learningMandarin Chinese, she was one of the first foreign students at theCentral Academy of Drama in Beijing,[2] where she learned to act in theChinese theatre (example pictured at right).[1]
She has since then helped teach and direct traditional Chinese theatre in Salzburg, Mainz, and Bayreuth.[2] She's also been at intercultural workshops with Cardiff Laboratory Theatre and Pan Projects at Goldsmiths College, London.[2] In addition, she has written articles and books on Chinese theatre, especiallyChinese Theatre and the Actor in Performance (1997, see Works section), and has edited or translated several plays or books on European andintercultural theatre.
She currently teaches film atMunich International School[2] in Germany.
In 1997,Cambridge University Press published Riley'sChinese Theatre and the Actor in Performance, a book often cited on the topic ofChinese theatre. It covers not onlyjingju (Beijing opera or Peking opera,example pictured at right) but also Chinese puppet theatre andshadow play, as well as Chinese exorcism and ancient animation rites at the tomb, to explore how the Chinese create presence on a stage.[3] In a 1999 review for theAsian Theatre Journal, China specialist Prof.Colin Mackerras (author ofThe Cambridge Handbook of Contemporary China, brother ofMalcolm Mackerras) noted how the book "looks at the skills of the Chinese actor from the insider's point of view – not that of the Westerner or the student of China."[1] Indeed:
Jo Riley is one of the few people in the West qualified to undertake such a study because she not only knows Chinese but has learned to act in the Chinese theatre. She has traveled widely in China and examined the various styles of regional theatre that are so abundant and important in China. Although nobody can really divorce himself from his own culture, nor is it sensible to try, Jo Riley does speak as an insider of the Chinese theatre in a way few non-Chinese can match.[1]
Riley also made, under the titleThe Other Side (1997), the first English translation of the controversial playThe Other Shore (1986) byNobel Laureate in Literature playwrightGao Xingjian.
Edited or co-edited publications include:
Publications include:
Translations include:
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