品味的競逐與意義的協商：晚明清初坊刻戲曲散齣選本作為大眾文本

The Contestation of Taste and the Negotiation of Meaning: Commercial Editions of Selected Scenes as Popular Texts in the Late Ming and Early Qing

晚明清初商品經濟發達，市鎮崛起，坊刻出版盛極一時。讀物從文人的書齋走向廣大的消費群眾。包括戲曲在內的通俗文藝，在內涵、形式和傳播方式各方面都有突破性的發展。坊刻戲曲散齣選本在此時期大量出現，成為一種代表大眾文化的文本。提供我們觀察消費語境下，廣大的選本消費者（／讀者群，包含文人），在面對藝術的喜好上，如何表現包容開放的態度，展現品味和意義協商並存的面貌，豐富了戲曲多元的價值。
本文首先說明晚清初商品經濟條件下，坊刻戲曲散齣選本大量出現的背景，確立出版的內涵和關鍵訊息，指出其作為大眾文化文本，如何凸顯對新奇、時尚的追求，表現通俗性和龐雜性等特質。接著，強調「形式」帶來的力量，闡述「散齣」如何去除「全本」的敘事框架和既定主軸，消解文人傳奇的階層意識及其對表演行當的限制。諸聲腔對文人傳奇的「改調而歌」，使劇本變形，創造新的內涵和意義，不同的聲腔之間，除了互文，更展開價值觀與詮釋的對話和辯證。
就藝術品味形塑的根本而言之，明代中後期聲腔的高度發展，提供了戲曲藝術分眾的條件，文人對崑山腔的推崇和對諸聲腔的貶抑，讓我們看到藝術的區隔性，以及諸聲腔不同於崑山腔的價值取向。散齣選本卻能兼容並蓄，既對充滿生命力的諸聲腔另眼相待，亦重視高雅的崑山腔。而龐大的多樣的副文本，更令人目不暇接，各式新內涵不斷被注入到大眾文本之中。讀者們透過創造性閱讀，各自建構其與日常生活和社會的聯結，表現散齣選本多元的藝術品味，體現階級的複雜性和流動性。

In the late Ming and early Qing periods, the development of the commodity economy and the rise of market towns led to a flourishing of commercial publishing. Reading materials expanded beyond the confines of scholars’studies to reach a broad consumer base. Popular literature and art forms—including drama—underwent groundbreaking transformations in content, form, and modes of dissemination. During this period, a large number of anthologies of selected scenes began to appear, becoming a form of text representative of popular culture. These anthologies offer valuable insights into the consumption context of the time, allowing us to observe how a wide range of consumers (including the literati) expressed a tolerant and open attitude toward artistic preferences, revealing a cultural landscape in which taste and meaning were negotiated—a process that enriched the multifaceted value of drama.
This article first outlines the background behind the mass publication of anthologies of selected scenes under the conditions of a thriving commodity economy in the late Ming and early Qing periods, establishing their publishing context and key messages. It highlights how, as texts of popular culture, these anthologies reflect a pursuit of novelty and fashion, and exhibit traits of accessibility and complexity. The discussion then turns to the power of“form,”explaining how the format of“selected scenes”breaks away from the narrative structure and fixed thematic focus of complete plays, dissolving the hierarchical consciousness of literati chuanqi and their restrictions on role-type. The adaptation of literati chuanqi by various vocal styles—“altering the tune to be sung”—transformed the scripts, generating new meanings and content. Between different vocal styles, not only do intertextual relationships emerge, but also a dialogic and dialectical interplay of values and interpretations.
From the perspective of the formation of artistic taste, the advanced development of vocal styles in the mid- to late Ming period provided the foundation for the segmentation of theatrical audiences. The literati’s admiration for Kunshanqiang and their disparagement of other vocal styles reveal not only a clear differentiation in artistic values but also the distinct aesthetic orientations embodied by non- Kunshan vocal styles. Yet anthologies of selected scenes demonstrated a remarkable inclusiveness: they granted renewed attention to the vibrant and expressive non- Kunshan styles, while still valuing the refined elegance of Kunshanqiang. These anthologies were further enriched by an overwhelming array of paratexts, which continuously infused new meanings into popular cultural texts. Through creative acts of reading, individual readers constructed personal connections between the texts and their own everyday lives and social experiences—revealing the pluralistic artistic sensibilities embedded in the anthologies, and reflecting the complexity and fluidity of social class.