Yuan Zhen
The original story was first told in a literary Chinese short story written by Yuan Zhen during the Tang Dynasty. This version was called "The Story of Yingying", or "Yingying's Biography". This version differs from the later play in that Zhang Sheng ultimately breaks from Yingying, and does not ask for her hand in marriage. Despite the unhappy ending, the story was popular with later writers, and recitative works based on it began accumulating in the centuries that followed. Perhaps bowing to popular sentiment, the ending gradually changed to the happy one seen in the play. The first example of the modified version is an oral performance by Dong Liang of the Jin Dynasty. Wang Shifu's play was closely modeled on this performance.