Baojuan

Baojuan (宝卷 bǎojuàn), literally precious scrolls, are a genre of prosimetric texts (texts written in an alternation of prose and verse) of a religious or mystical nature, produced within the context of Chinese folk religion and individual Chinese folk religious sects. They are often written in vernacular Chinese and recount the mythology surrounding a deity or a hero, or constitute the theological and philosophical scriptures of organized folk sects. Baojuan is a type of performative text or storytelling found in China that emphasizes worship of ancient deities from Buddho-Daoist sects often recounting stories concerning suffering or apocalyptical scenarios. Due to the fact that Baojuan was not considered a serious art-form for most of its existence, nonlinear records of baojuan make it difficult to credit writers, actors, and other contributors to the genre because very little, if any, mark of these individuals exist.