The undated photo shows the stage performance of Kunqu opera "Meng Jiangnv" by Taiwan's theater academy.

Taiwan's theater academy will stage a new version of Meng Jiangnv, sung in Kunqu opera on Wednesday in Beijing. The academy is among the very few Taiwan artistic troupes to give performances on Chinese mainland.

The China News Service reported on Tuesday that the 10-day performing tour will give an artistic feast to the audience in Beijing, Shanghai, Xiamen and Suzhou. On the tour, academic exchanges on Kunqu opera across the Taiwan Straits will also be conducted. The Kunqu operas are based on Kunqiang melodies and are popular in southern Jiangsu Province, Beijing and Hebei.

Meng Jiangnv is a folklore character, whose husband had been forced to join the building of the Great Wall during the reign of Emperor Qin Shi Huang from 221 B.C. to 206 B.C. He didn't send any message back to home in three years and Meng Jiangnv went to find her husband but found that he had already died on the construction site. She was in a deep sorrow and kept weeping and wailing. Later it is said that the sections of the Great Wall collapsed from her sorrow.

(CRI April 8, 2008)