Xiqu

At the Song Emperor’s Spring Festival banquet, the talented Liu Yu’e beats all men in a riddle and the emperor rewards her a jade coin. She gives it to her husband Chen Jichang. Su Qincao, an unwilling candidate for the emperor’s harem, infiltrates into the palace as a songtress and seeks help from her cousin Su Dongpo.

Dongpo invites Jichang to Lanting to enjoy the spring landscape. Yu’e makes Jichang vow to the rosewood stick for fidelity and sends Liu Xiang to monitor him in secret. For avenging the insult of the salary-cut punishment proposed by Yu’e at the Emperor’s banquet, Dongpo advises Qincao to be Jichang’s concubine and ask for the jade coin as an engagement token. Liu Xiang discloses all these to Yu’e for a generous reward.

Back home, the infuriated Yu’e beats Jichang with the rosewood stick and orders him to kneel and repent by a willowy pond. Dongpo seeks the chance to instigate Jichang to divorce Yu’e. When she goes to the court for justice, Yu’e’s uncle Gui Yushu tries to punish her for being a shrew. However, he himself is ordered to kneel by his wife.

Jichang and Yushu then go to beg the emperor for help. The emperor orders Yu’e to let Jichang keep Qincao as his concubine but she chooses to take arsenic instead. Fortunately, the Empress has replaced the poison with vinegar. Finally the couple is reconciled and reunited.