National Salvation Corporation

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National Salvation Corporation

• Unraveling Fact from Fiction

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The Man Behind the Curtains
Lee Kuo Hsiu Comedian Actor Playwright Director
Money can be saved in a bank, but why should
tears be saved? There are many things in life
that touches you, its just that people tend to
suppress their emotional side. Much of the mess
in society is caused by the suppression of
emotions.
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Theme
Fact vs Fiction Separating one from the other. Or
is it even possible?

Media and Journalism
Police Corruption
Relations with the Outside
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Techniques Style that Li uses to bring out the
theme Usage of Television Flashbacks Stage
Directions Play within a play
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Kuo News is just media report, they read out
whatever we supply them with. To put it bluntly,
we control the media. Youre a fabricated
murderer, and they get fabricated news. Two
wrongs make one right, so fabrications turn real.
The important point is The news satisfies the
public
end of Scene 1

6
Why the TV?

• Perhaps Lis most interesting and appealing
  aspect in the play.
• Instead of having actors coming out to play the
  characters, he uses the television to bind the
  play together.
• QN Why do you think he used the TV and what was
  its impact on the audience?
• blatant, outright attack on the media and its
  professional ethics
• absurdity and incoherence of the reporter, while
  amusing, poses us with the question of whether
  what we see is always real
• connect with his audience because watching tv is
  part of everyday life.
• moves us in and out of the interrogation room to
  sort of get a bigger perspective of how the
  situation is viewed beyond the four walls.

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• Flashbacks
• Flashbacks are very common in books. Writers use
  them to fill in the gaps about different
  characters and situations to complete the book.
  However, while Li uses flashbacks to try and fill
  in the big gaps in the play, we dont seem to get
  this sense of coherence. In fact, it seems to get
  more confusing. In this case it also breaks the
  flow of the play and wanders off to events
  unrelated to the case that they were trying to
  solve.
• Why make it more confusing than it already is?
• to get a sense of uncertainty and unfamiliarity
  with the characters (do you feel esp connected to
  any character?)
• unable to differentiate if what the character
  says is real or not
• reinforces the idea of fact and fiction, if
  these characters are merely making up a
  fictitious account of their past to
  sensationalize who they are.
• this leaves us with the idea of identity and if
  we feel that we know these characters

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Play within a play
Reading of Scene 6 Police Corruption Relations
with Japan Do we plan what we are going to do or
say beforehand? So are we just all acting out
what seems right in society?
Zhang Xue Liang
Nanjing Massacre
Marco polo bridge
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In the end (last scene) It tied together the
entire play by putting a new perspective to all
the chaos that was going on. I think it
encompasses the techniques of a flashback and a
play within a play. Why do you think the
character Li suddenly becomes X at the end of the
play? What were the directors motives for doing
that? Why do you think the title of the play is
National Salvation Corporation? Like flies to
wanton boys are we to the gods, they kill us for
their sport.

Gloucester in

Shakespeares King Lear If like Lees play
suggests, we live in a puppet-like existence,
then are our identities shaped and controlled by
other people or a bigger unknown factor?
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Bibliography

• Definition of Marco Polo Bridge incident, World
  IQ.
• lthttp//www.wordiq.com/definition/Battle_of_Lugou_
  Bridgegt
• Introduction of personality, the Cyber Stage,
  Taiwan.
• lthttp//www.cyberstage.com.tw/artist/people/people
  _page.jsp?id1024typeA448A657gt
• Fastload.org, Zhang Xue Liang. http//www.fastload
  .org/zh/Zhang_Xueliang.html
• Spence, Jonathon. In Search of Modern China,
• New York W.W Norton Company, 1999