Yao Ke (1905 – 18 December 1991), born Yao Chenglong and also known as Yao Xinnong, was a playwright, screenwriter and translator. He was born in Xiamen, Fujian, to a family of imperial officials from Shexian, Anhui, received a traditional education followed by a Western one, and graduated from Soochow University in Suzhou before furthering his studies in drama at Yale University. After 1931 he edited for the World Book Company and English-language newspapers in Shanghai and edited the English monthly T'ien Hsia. In 1936 he joined Mingxing Film Company as deputy head of its screenwriting committee and wrote his first screenplay, The Qingming Season, along with The Lucky Star. His best-known work is the four-act historical play Qing gong yuan (Grievance in the Qing Palace), built around the tragic love of the Guangxu Emperor and Consort Zhen; staged in Shanghai in 1942 with a three-month run, it caused a sensation and was later adapted into the film Sorrows of the Forbidden City (1948, directed by Zhu Shilin for Yonghua). He wrote more than twenty scripts, including the historical plays Xi Shi and Chu Bawang, and a book on staging drama. In 1955 he was hired by International Film Distribution (forerunner of MP & GI) as one of four script readers, working alongside Eileen Chang, Stephen Soong and Sun Jinsan, and wrote for films such as A Strange Woman (1950) and The Secret Life of Lady So Lee (1953). He taught at the Chinese University of Hong Kong and New Asia College, moved to the United States in early 1969, and lectured on modern Chinese literature and the history of Chinese philosophy at the University of Hawaii, the University of California and San Francisco State University while specialising in the poetry of Li He. He returned to Hong Kong briefly in 1976 as a drama adviser to Rediffusion Television and an instructor to its screenwriting class, and died in the United States on 18 December 1991.
Yao Ke brought the historical court drama to serious stature with Grievance in the Qing Palace, whose film adaptation, Sorrows of the Forbidden City, became a landmark Hong Kong Mandarin picture of the late 1940s. He also introduced Chinese literature to Western readers as editor of the English monthly T'ien Hsia, and fostered screenwriting as one of MP & GI's script readers.
Achievements
- 1936 · Joined Mingxing Film Company as deputy head of its screenwriting committee and wrote his first screenplay, The Qingming Season.
- 1942 · His four-act play Qing gong yuan was staged in Shanghai for three months and caused a sensation.
- 1948 · Sorrows of the Forbidden City, adapted from his play, was released by Yonghua Film Company.