Qu Ming & Wu Ying -- The Liang Shanbo & Zhu Yingtai of Our Times

by BL Huang

I have been thinking about penning an opera about Ming and Ying -- the "butterfly lovers" of our age.  The storyline:  Two Chinese scholars come to the land of the barbarians to impart their knowledge and wisdom in order to liberate the benighted barbarians; their work brings them closer to one another.  They fall in love, and one day, they are slain by a bete noire (who is aided and abetted by the local evil warlords) from South Central.  As their bodies are ferried back to the Celestial Empire, the ship captain notices that two colourful butterflies emerge from the coffins and head skyward...