Talk:Li Yuru

Birth Name
Well, she's obviously not nee anything: we use that for maiden names and the modern Chinese don't usually have any such thing.

As for "Jiao"... The Guardian isn't usually a blatantly unreliable source and their author, an emeritus professor on Chinese topics, should be a very reliable one... You really do need another source for her idea that "Jiao" was Li's original surname. Absolutely every Chinese source I can find and ISNI and the Library of Congress and VIAF and WorldCat all don't list it, though they have the name Xue Ying or Li Xueying that's omitted here at the moment.

Now, luckily, I've found one: a text on the history of Chinese opera written by Li Yuru's daughter that repeats the claim. Still, it would be nice to know which "Jiao" character is meant and what the Manchu form of the name was. We're the only people other than The Guardian who know about this, apparently. — Llywelyn II   17:53, 19 May 2016 (UTC)

Found which Jiao... Now just need to know which given name she was born with and we can mention her by name in the section about her early life... — Llywelyn II   23:42, 19 May 2016 (UTC)

And now there was another, previously unnamed, father because of course there would be. — Llywelyn II   22:07, 25 May 2016 (UTC)

Sources for article expansion

 * "Li Yuru: Actress? Mother? Wife?" another article by Li Ruru from 1985.

Note also that these two "sources" "by Eugenio Barba" are an un/intentional misapplication of the (male, European) author of the foreword in place of the actual (female, Chinese) author of the book being excerpted. The foreword, incidentally, is a disjointed four-pages of off-topic rambling on "the other" and "gaze" and the need to view Chinese actors individually... while speaking of 20-odd Europeans and a single Chinese actor (Mei Lanfang)... and that solely in the context of his trip's importance to European theater. It's a shame Ms Li's daughter felt such dreck was necessary to legitimize her own fine work. — Llywelyn II   22:00, 25 May 2016 (UTC)