The history of Chinese literature extends thousands of years, from the earliest recorded dynastic court archives to the mature vernacular fiction novels that arose during the Ming dynasty to entertain the masses of literate Chinese. The introduction of widespread woodblock printing during the Tang dynasty (618–907) and the invention of movable type printing by Bi Sheng (990–1051) during the Song dynasty (960–1279) rapidly spread written knowledge throughout China. In more modern times, the author Lu Xun (1881–1936) is considered the founder of baihua literature in China.
"Li Sao" is a Chinese poem dating from the Warring States period of ancient China. The early poetic tradition of China survives mainly through two anthologies, one being the Chuci, the other being the formally distinct Classic of Poetry. The poem "Li Sao" is the lead poem and the main inspiration for the Chuci collection. This famous piece was written by the person generally known as Qu Yuan, an aristocrat of the Kingdom of Chu, who died about 278 BCE. In his signature poem "Li Sao", Qu Yuan manifests himself in a poetic character, which is a major landmark in the tradition of Classical Chinese poetry, contrasting with the anonymous poetic voices encountered in the Shijing and the other early poems which exist as preserved in the form of incidental incorporations into various documents of ancient miscellany. The rest of the Chuci anthology is centered on the "Li Sao", the purported biography of its author Qu Yuan, and often its innovative epic poetic lines. In the "Li Sao", the poet despairs that he has been plotted against by evil factions at court with his resulting rejection by his lord and then recounts a series of shamanistic spirit journeys to various mythological realms, engaging or attempting to engage with a variety of divine or spiritual beings, with the theme of the righteous minister unfairly rejected sometimes becoming exaggerated in the long history of later literary criticism and allegorical interpretation. Dating from the time of King Huai of Chu, in the late third century BCE, the poem "Li Sao" is a remarkable example of Chinese poetry.
Ameen Rihani (Amīn Fāris Anṭūn ar-Rīḥānī), was a Lebanese American writer, intellectual and political activist. He was also a major figure in the mahjar literary movement developed by Arab emigrants in North America, and an early theorist of Arab nationalism. He became an American citizen in 1901.
Mohammed Bennis in Arabic محمد بنيس is a Moroccan poet and one of the most prominent writers of modern Arabic poetry. Since the 1970s, he has enjoyed a particular status within Arab culture. Muhsin J al-Musawi states that "Bennis’ articulations tend to validate his poetry in the first place, to encapsulate the overlapping and contestation of genres in a dialectic, that takes into account power politics whose tropes are special. As a discursive threshold between Arab East and the Moroccan West, tradition and modernity, and also a site of contestation and configuration, Muhammad Bennis' self-justifications may reveal another poetic predilection, too."
Arif Dirlik was a US historian of Turkish origin who published extensively on historiography and political ideology in modern China, as well as issues in modernity, globalization, and post-colonial criticism. Born in Mersin, Turkey, Dirlik received a BSc in Electrical Engineering at Robert College, Istanbul in 1964 and a PhD in History at the University of Rochester in 1973.
Gregory B. Lee is an academic, author, and broadcaster. Lee is Professor of Chinese and Transcultural Studies at Jean Moulin University Lyon 3 and Director of the French research Institute for Transtextual and Transcultural Studies. Lee was previously Chair Professor of Chinese and Transcultural Studies at City University of Hong Kong where he established, and was the founding director of, the Hong Kong Advanced Institute for Cross-Disciplinary Studies (2010–2012). He also served as Dean of City University's College of Liberal Arts and Social Sciences. From 2007 to 2010 Lee was First Vice-President of Jean Moulin University Lyon 3. In 2010, Lee was made a Chevalier (Knight) in the French Order of Academic Palms. In 2011, he was elected Fellow of the Hong Kong Academy of the Humanities.
Yoshimi Takeuchi was a Japanese Sinologist.
Jan Ziolkowski is the Arthur Kingsley Porter Professor of Medieval Latin at Harvard University and Director of the Dumbarton Oaks Research Library and Collection. His scholarship has focused on the literature of the Latin Middle Ages. He was elected a Member of the Medieval Academy of America in 2008, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 2010, and the American Philosophical Society in 2017.
Modern Chinese poetry, including New poetry, refers to post Qing Dynasty Chinese poetry, including the modern vernacular (baihua) style of poetry increasingly common with the New Culture and 4 May 1919 movements, with the development of experimental styles such as "free verse" ; but, also including twentieth and twenty-first century continuations or revivals of Classical Chinese poetry forms. Some modern Chinese poetry represents major new and modern developments in the poetry of one of the world's larger areas, as well as other important areas sharing this linguistic affinity. One of the first writers of poetry in the modern Chinese poetry mode was Hu Shih (1891–1962).
Qing poetry refers to the poetry of or typical of the Qing dynasty (1644–1911). Classical Chinese poetry continued to be the major poetic form of the Qing dynasty, during which the debates, trends and widespread literacy of the Ming period began to flourish once again after a transitional period during which the Qing dynasty had established its dominance. Also, popular versions of Classical Chinese poetry were transmitted through Qing dynasty anthologies, such as the collections of Tang poetry known as the Quantangshi and the Three Hundred Tang Poems. The poetry of the Qing Dynasty has an ongoing and growing body of scholarly literature associated with its study. Both the poetry of the Ming dynasty and the poetry of the Qing dynasty are studied for poetry associated with Chinese opera, the developmental trends of Classical Chinese poetry and the transition to the more vernacular type of Modern Chinese poetry, as well as poetry by women in Chinese culture.
Creation Quarterly (创造季刊) was a Chinese literary quarterly magazine founded in 1921 and published between 1922 and 1924.
Contemporary Review (现代评论) was a Chinese literary weekly magazine founded in 1924 and ceased December 1928.
Tattler was an important Chinese weekly journal founded in 1924 and very influential in the establishment of the new literature in China. It later changed into a semi-monthly and finally ceased publication March 1930. It fostered a distinctive "Tattler literary style" (语丝文体).
Joyce Chi-Hui Liu is Professor of Critical Theory, Cultural Studies and Comparative Literature at National Chiao Tung University, Taiwan. Liu is the Chair of the Institute of Social Research and Cultural Studies that she founded in 2002. She is also the director of the International Center for Cultural Studies of the University System of Taiwan.
Liu Yazi was a Chinese poet and political activist called the "last outstanding poet of the traditional school." He married Zheng Peiyi in 1906, and was the father of two daughters, Liu Wufei and Liu Wugou, and of a son, Liu Wu-chi, a literary scholar.
Ale Ahmad Suroor was an Urdu poet, critic and professor from India. He is best known for his literary criticism. In 1974 he was honoured with the Sahitya Akademi Award by the Government of India for his literary critic work, Nazar aur Nazariya. In 1991 he was also awarded the Padma Bhushan, India's third highest civilian award. He was awarded a special gold medal by the President of Pakistan on the centenary of the birth of Muhammad Iqbal.
Fin-de-Siècle Splendor: Repressed Modernities of Late Qing Fiction, 1848-1911 is a 1997 non-fiction book by David Der-Wei Wang, published by Stanford University Press. David Wang's thesis is that modernity was already beginning to appear in fiction published in the late Qing Dynasty of China, defined by Wang as beginning in 1849, around the start of the Taiping rebellion, rather than only appearing after the Qing Dynasty concluded in 1912. This is the first English-language full-length book written by a single author that surveyed late Qing Dynasty fiction.
David Lyle Jeffrey is a Canadian-American scholar of literature and religion, currently a Distinguished Senior Fellow at the Baylor Institute for Studies in Religion. He was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada (1996-). In 2003 he was given the Lifetime Achievement Award of the Conference of Christianity and Literature.
The Professor of Chinese is the oldest endowed position in Chinese in the United Kingdom. The position was endowed in 1845 by, or at least through the good offices of, Sir George Staunton. The position was originally held by Kings College.
Jintian is the title of a Chinese literary journal. Founded in 1978, it was the first non-official literary journal in the People's Republic of China since the 1950s. It ran for nine issues until it was censored in 1980. It was revived in 1990.
