Altogether 25 dramas will be staged from October 16 to 26 during the festival and compete for the top prize. All of them are written and performed by college students. In addition, dramas from the National Institute of Dramatic Art in St. Petersburg, Russia and Chung-Ang University in South Korea joined the festival.

Students of China's Central Academy of Drama perform during the 2009 Beijing College Students Drama Festival.

Sun Yunke is a second-year student at the Communication University of China. He plays in the drama "No Man's Land", a representative work of his university to compete in the drama festival.

"The play reflects young people's living condition in cities. It gives vent to their pressure and depression by using sarcasm. I play Doctor Wu. He is insidious and envies his underlings who are more talented."

Sun Yunke majors in telecommunication. More than 20 students are involved in his team. It took four months for them to finish the work from writing, performing and stage design.

"It's difficult to perform a drama. I loved art when I was small. I play violin and I think arts can communicate. It's good to know about dramas and to meet people I like. We are from different departments and become good friends."

Students from Tsinghua University, Beijing Normal University, China Agricultural University and other colleges took part in the drama festival.

Shang Ergang is dean of the School of Arts Management in the Central Academy of Drama. He said that the festival was being attended by more students than ever and would be good for them in the long run.

"The drama festival may have a deeper influence on drama majors but I'm glad to find that students in my department are interested in it, too. They were active in organizing the festival. I think they can learn a lot from it. For students studying other subjects, drama performance can serve as a very entertaining and creative activity."

China began to hold college-student drama festivals in 2001. Since then this kind of event has become popular in many cities such as Beijing, Guangzhou and Zhengzhou.