Authorship of Qitingji

The authorship of the version of Qitingji(《旗亭记》) in Qing Dynasty has remained controversial as the author's name was not affixed on the front page when the book was published in the name of Two Dramas of Yayutang.After in-depth textual study of relevant historical records,anthologies and notes,this paper holds that Qitingji was written by Jin Zhaoyan(金兆燕)and polished by Lu Jianzeng(卢见曾).The argument about the authorship shows that scholars in Qing dynasty were generally indifferent to the right of author,and that the crux of the issue is the inequality in social and economic status between the sponsors and their dramatists.