Until the end of the 19th century, most scholars placed the origins of China's literature in the middle of the third millennium before Christ. Today it is known that few literary works go back before Confucius (551-479 B.C.). Many supposedly older prose pieces and poems were produced later and given a false veneer of antiquity.
Even so, Chinese literature has a long history. Earliest songs and ballads are nearly 3,000 years old. China's literature is also noted for its continuity, variety of subject matter, exhaustive treatment and the colossal scale of many great works.
A chief source of knowledge about the early Chinese language is provided by the bronze vessels of the Shang-Yin dynasty (18th to 12th century B.C.) These have never been surpassed in form and craftsmanship despite the modern know-how of metal casting. Many of these bronzes bear inscription of some length.
Another source has been supplied by the archeological excavations of the 19th and 20th centuries. Tens of thousands of "oracle bones" were unearthed. These record divinations of the last 300 years of the Yin period on animal bones and tortoise shells. Although these inscriptions include no literary gems, it seems likely that songs and stories were being written then but were committed to writing on materials more perishable than bones, shells and bronzes.
By the time the first surviving songs and literary works were recorded around 1000 B.C., the written language was already highly sophisticated. The Chinese language of monosyllabic sounds was written in up to 5,000 conventionalized graphs based on earlier picture writing. This writing was destined to serve the literature of Korea, Japan and Vietnam as well as China.
During the Chou dynasty (12th to 3rd century B.C.) which succeeded Yin, China entered the iron age. An agrarian civilization based on feudalism flourished. The Chou kingdom had its center of activity in the Yellow River plains. Loosely confederated states were ruled by feudal lords who gave allegiance to the king. Royal and feudal courts were staffed by diviners, historians, musicians and ritualists. Tutors taught the six arts of music, ritual, writing, arithmetic, archery and charioteering.
These were the times in which the Confucian classics were written. The five classics are:
- Book of Changes: Originally a manual of divination based upon the eight trigrams, it was revised by Confucius and his followers as a sort of metaphysical treatise.
- Book of Rites: A restoration of the original Classic of Rites, which was lost in the 3rd century B.C., this is a source book on ancient Chinese rites and court manners.
- Spring and Autumn Annals: Generally believed to have been compiled by Confucius himself, this is a chronicle of events in the principality of Lu, Confucius' native state, from 722 to 479 B.C. Though historically and culturally significant, this work and the others already mentioned have less literary merit than the last two.
- Book of History: A collection of edicts, proclamations, addresses and other official documents affording excellent specimens of early Chinese prose.
- Book of Songs: An anthology of Chinese poems of the Chou period. There are 305 ballads, songs, hymns and eulogies on a wide variety of subjects. Some scholars maintain that there was a much larger collection-more than 3,000 poems-from which Confucius selected the 305, perhaps as a text for his students.
Poetry was an essential part of upper class education in Confucius' time. Officials wrote poems or quoted from those of others to show their erudition. Those who didn't recognize poetic allusions lost face or jobs.
The poems in the Book of Songs set an example for later Chinese poetry. The four-word verse pattern was flexible enough to admit extra words and make lines less monotonous. Some of the poems have a remarkably modern sound. Language is direct and expressive. There are many similes and metaphors. The simplicity is expressed in this example:
I beg of you, Chung Tzu,
Do not climb into our homestead,
Do not break the willows we have planted.
Not that I mind about the willows,
But I am afraid of my father and mother.
Chung Tzu I dearly love;
But of what my father and mother say
Indeed I am afraid.
I beg of you, Chung Tzu,
Do not climb over our wall,
Do not break the mulberry trees we have planted.
Not that I mind about the mulberry trees,
But I am afraid of my brothers.
Chung Tzu I dearly love;
But of what my brothers say
Indeed I am afraid.
I beg of you, Chung Tzu,
Do not climb into our garden,
Do not break the hardwood we have planted.
Not that I mind about the hardwood,
But I am afraid of what people will say.
Chung Tzu I dearly love;
But of all that people will say
Indeed I am afraid.
The Book of Songs was the product of the people of the Yellow River plains, the cradle of Chinese civilization. Tribes south of the Yellow River were ruled by feudal lords. These southern states gradually became more important, notably the state of Chu on the banks of the Yangtze.
By the 5th and 4th centuries B.C., China had two cultural centers. Chinese history had its beginnings in the semi-arid north. Sage-emperors and dynastic rulers first appeared in the northern Confucian literature. Then the mountains, streams and forests of the fertile south began to provide the basis for myths and legends. Blessed with the bounties of nature, the Yangtze people led a comparatively easy life and had time to dream of the romantic and the supernatural. This environment afforded a favorable climate for the development of Chinese mythology.
Of the early southern poets, the best known are Ch'u Yuan (343?-290? B.C.) and Sun Yu (3rd century B.C.). Their poems together with those of later imitators were collected in the Song of Ch'u (Ch'u tz'u) , another important anthology. These songs are more lyrical and romantic than those included in the Book of Songs. The verse form was characterized by rhymed lines of irregular length and the constant recurrence of certain particles.
The two anthologies are equally important in their influence on later writers. While the shih in the Shih ching (Book of Songs) became the principal form of Chinese verse, the Ch'u tz'u evolved as a poetic genre that inspired the highly important fu (prose-poems) of the Han dynasty (206 B.C.-221 A.D.).
Following are two brief selections from the Ch'u tz'u:
The Spirits of the Fallen -
Grasping our great shields and wearing our hide armor,
Wheel-hub to wheel-hub locked, we battle hand to hand.
Our banners darken the sky; the enemy team like clouds:
Through the hail of arrows the warriors press forward.
They dash on our lines; they trample our ranks down.
The left horse has fallen, the right one is wounded.
Bury the wheels in; tie up the horses!
Seize the jade drumstick and beat the sounding drum!
The time is against us: the gods are angry.
Now all lie dead, left on the field of battle.
They went out never more to return:
Far, far away they lie, on the level plain,
Their long swords at their belts, clasping their elmwood bows.
Head from body sundered: but their hearts could not be vanquished.
But truly brave, and also truly noble;
Strong to the last, they could not be dishonored.
Their bodies may have died, but their souls are living:
Heroes among the shades their valiant souls will be.
The Ritual Cycle -
The rites are accomplished to the beating of the drums;
The flower-wand is passed on to succeeding dancers.
Lovely maidens sing their song, slow and solemnly.
Orchids in spring and chrysanthemums in autumn:
So it shall go on until the end of time.
During the same period, significant progress was made in the style, expression, form and content of Chinese historical narratives, philosophical discourses and imaginative essays. Prose was written in a more developed language and in a richer, more vivid vocabulary. A terse, direct style evolved as the standard form of Chinese writing, suitable even today for literary expression.
The period from the 5th to the 3rd century B.C. was one of the most dramatic in Chinese history- enlivened by waifs and military alliances, political intrigues and philosophical arguments. The tradition of the Confucian classics was continued and developed in a number of commentaries on the Spring and Autumn Annals. The Strategies of the Warring States, an historical work of the time, presents a colorful picture of events and personalities in the seven warring states. Although the work may have undergone revision in the Han dynasty, the basic materials obviously came from the original chronicles.
Philosophical writings developed along with historical exposition. The works of Mo Tzu, Mencius and Chuang Tzu (all 5th and 4th century B.C.) are marked by good prose and careful organization of the materials.
Mo Tzu is known for his doctrines of universal love, utilitarianism and opposition to aggression. He was the first ancient philosopher to make effective use of polemics. His writings generally present his ideas clearly and emphatically. Mo Tzu was a logician and introduced methodological reasoning to Chinese prose.
In "The Will of Heaven", Mo Tzu asks what would happen if force became the standard of conduct. He answers:
The great will attack the small, the strong will plunder the weak, the many will oppress the few, the cunning will deceive the simple, the noble will disdain the humble, the rich will mock the poor and the young will encroach upon the old. And the states in the empire will ruin each other with water, fire, poison and weapons. Such a regime will not be auspicious to Heaven above, to the spirits in the middle sphere or to the people below. Not being auspicious to these three, it is not beneficial to anyone. This is called the violation of Heaven. He who follows it is a robber and a thief, not humane and not righteous, unkind as a ruler and disloyal as a minister, unaffectionate as a father and unfilial as a son, and all such evil names in the world are gathered and attributed to him. Why? Because such conduct is in opposition to the will of heaven.
Mencius, who taught the innate goodness of man, is known for his eloquence and facility of style. A veteran debater, he was fond of using comparisons, stories and allegories to illustrate and drive home his points.
Mencius said:
- Men are in the habit of speaking of the world, the state. As a matter of fact, the foundation of the world lies in the state, the foundation of the state lies in the family and the foundation of the family lies in the individual.
- The people rank the highest, the spirits of land and grain come next and the ruler counts the least.
- There are three things that a feudal lord should treasure-land, people and the administration of the government. If he should treasure pearls and jades instead, calamity is sure to befall him.
-It is not so important to censure the men appointed to office; it is not so important to criticize the measures adopted in government. The truly great is he who is capable of rectifying what is wrong with the ruler's heart.
- States have been won by men without humanity, but the world never.
- There are three things which are unfilial, and the greatest of them is to have no posterity. The substance of humanity is to serve one's parents; the basis of righteousness is to obey one's elder brothers.
Chuang Tzu called on anecdotes and allegories to expound mystical Taoist views. A poetic quality helps make his writings entertaining and thought-provoking. As a humorist, he poked fun at man for his near sightedness, smallness and ignorance.
This is one of Chuang Tzu's dialogues on death:
When Chuang Tzu's wife died, Hui Tzu came to the house to join in the rites of mourning. To his surprise he found Chuang Tzu sitting with an inverted bowl on his knees drumming upon it and singing a song.
"After all," said Hui Tzu, "she lived with' you, brought up your children, grew old along with you. That you should not mourn for her is bad enough; but to let your friends find you drumming and singing-that is going too far!"
"You misjudge me," said Chuang Tzu. "When she died, I was in despair, as any man well might be. But soon, pondering on what had happened, I told myself that in death no strange new fate befalls us. In the beginning we lack not life only but form. Not form only but spirit. We are blended in the one great featureless indistinguishable mass. Then a time came when the mass evolved spirit, spirit evolved form, form evolved life. But now life in its turn has evolved death. For not nature only but man's being has its seasons, its sequence of spring and autumn, summer and winter. If some one is tired and has gone to lie down, we do not pursue him with shouting and bawling. She whom I have lost has lain down to sleep for a while in the Great Inner Room. To break in upon her rest with the noise of lamentation would but show that I knew nothing of nature's sovereign law. That is why I ceased to mourn."
By the time of Hsun Tzu and Han Fei Tzu in the first half of the 3rd century B.C., Chinese prose was well established. Hsun Tzu taught ritualism and Han Fei Tzu wrote on legalism. The maturity of the written language enabled them to express themselves more effectively. Their writing was simple, concise and not much different from the literary Chinese still in use.
The Han dynasty rose in glory from the ashes of despotic, short-lived Ch'in (221-205 B.C.). During the reign of Emperor Wu (140-87 B.C.), the empire was extended southward to Annam and northward to Mongolia and Korea. Expeditions to Central Asia led to the opening of the silk route to Europe. The emperor promoted Confucianism as the stare doctrine but at the same time flirted with the Taoist idea of longevity and the existence of an elixir of life.. Men of letters who surrounded the emperor contributed to the development of Music Bureau poems (yueh-fu shih), five-word poems (wu-yen shih), prose-poems (fu) and historical prose.
The Music Bureau was set up in 120 B.C. to provide ceremonial music and songs for the court. About 100 folk songs collected by the bureau have survived as specimens of Han attitudes toward love, separation, poverty, war and other worldly themes.
Most of the Music Bureau poems have lines of varying length. Some have a regular form of five words to the line with rhymes for the even lines': The extra word in each line makes the poems more flexible and melodious than the four-word poems of the Book of Songs. Although the music has been lost, it is known that the poems were written to be sung to the accompaniment of flute, bamboo mouth organ (sheng), drum, zither, harpsichord, etc. The short flute and flageolet of foreign origin were used in some of the hunting and battle songs taken from the nomadic Tartar tribes. These northern tunes introduced a martial note not usually found in Chinese poems.
Another important literary form of the period was the fu or prose-poem. A unique literary style of the Chinese, fu is midway between poetry and prose and contains elements of both. Fu is really a work of prose but with heightened emotion and descriptions that soar into the realms of the poetic.
First introduced early in the 3rd century B.C., fu became popular because of the long Han period of peace and prosperity. This encouraged poetic production and fu was promoted by the aristocracy. Some Han prose-poems are short; others run into thousands of words. This flexibility results from the unrestrained mixture of poetry and prose. Even in a line of poetry, the number of words can vary from four to nine. Usually the main descriptive part is in rhymed verse and the introductory and concluding passages are in prose.
These are the final lines of Chia Yi's famous fu "The Owl":
A merely clever man is partial to self, despising others, vaunting ego;
The man of understanding takes the larger view: nothing exists to take exception to.
The miser will do anything for his hoard, the hero for his repute;
The vainglorious is ready to die for power, the common man clings to life.
Driven by aversions and lured by desires, men dash madly west or east;
The Great Man is not biased, the million changes are all one to him.
The stupid man is bound by custom, confined as though in fetters;
The Perfect Man is above circumstances; Tao is his only friend.
The mass man vacillates, his mind replete with likes and dislikes;
The True Man is tranquil, he takes his stand with Tao.
Divest yourself of knowledge and ignore your body, until, transported, you lose self,
Be detached, remote, and soar with Tao.
Float with the flowing stream, or rest against the isle,
Surrender to the workings of fate, unconcerned for self,
Let your life be like a floating, your death like a rest.
Placid as the peaceful waters of a deep pool, buoyant as an unfastened boat,
Find no cause for complacency in life, but cultivate emptiness and drift.
The Man of Virtue is unattached; recognizing fate, he does not worry.
Be not dismayed by petty pricks and checks!
In Han dynasty historical prose, the outstanding work is the Historical Records (Shih Chi) of 130 chapters and half a million words compiled almost singlehandedly by Ssu-ma Ch'ien around 109-91 B.C. It exceeds previous historical works in scope, length and breadth of coverage. The author's vivid descriptions, direct narrative and skillful use of dialogue contributed to a unique style of Chinese historical prose that had numerous imitators.
The 400 years (3rd to early 7th century A.D.) from the end of the Han dynasty to the beginning of the T'ang saw severe political, social and cultural dislocations., In this age of darkness and affliction, the Confucian ideals of political stability, social order and moral respectability were challenged by Taoist yearnings for immortal life and Buddhist engrossment with the other world. While Buddhism had its best embodiment in sculpture and painting, Taoist romanticism pervaded philosophy and poetry. One group of poet-philosophers known as the "Seven Sages of the Bamboo Grove" sought refuge from politics in the quietness of nature and the oblivion of wine.
Wine, music and nature were romantic influences of the period and gave rise to the "mountain and stream" school of poetry in the 4th century. This was a time when the occupation of the north by barbarian tribes drove Chinese intellectuals to the "embroidered rivers and mountains" of the Yangtze valleys. Landscape painting reached a new high in Chinese art and poetry about nature came to play an important role in Chinese literature.
Poetry of the post-Han era reached its zenith in the works of Tao Ch'ien (365-427, also known as T'ao Yuan-ming), who was known as the "poet of the garden and field" and combined a passion for music and wine, an outlook on life typical of a Taoist recluse and a sensibility to the delights of nature.
This is an excerpt from T'ao Ch'ien's "Peace Blossom Spring", the story of a fisherman who finds a "lost village" of contented people but departs and is never able to find his way back:
The fisherman, marveling, passed on to discover where the grove would end. It ended at a spring; and then there came a hill. In the side of the hill was a small opening which seemed to promise a gleam of light. The fisherman left his boat and entered the opening. It was almost too cramped at first to afford him passage; but when he had taken a few dozen steps he emerged into the open light of day. He faced a spread of level land. Imposing buildings stood among rich fields and pleasant ponds all set with mulberry and willow. Linking paths led everywhere, and the fowls and dogs of one farm could be heard from the next. People were coming and going and working in the fields. Both the men and the women dressed in exactly the same manner as people outside; white-haired elders and tufted children alike were cheerful and contented.
This is T'ao Ch'ien's "Written While Drunk":
I built my house near where others dwell,
And yet there is no clamor of carriages and horses.
You ask of me 'How can this be so?'
'When the heart is far the place of itself is distant.'
I pluck chrysanthemums under the eastern hedge,
And gaze afar toward the southern mountains.
The mountain air is fine at evening of the day
And flying birds return together homewards.
Within these things there is a hint of Truth,
But when I start to tell it, I cannot find the words.
The main literary tendency of the 5th century, however, was toward an ornate, artificial style. Parallel structure adorned verses and poetic allusions were frequent. In a couplet, parallelism called for the words in the first line to be matched or paired with words of the same position in the second line. Writers emphasized sound and rhythm. The theory of matching tones evolved at this time and later was adapted to poetry.
While courtiers and scholars were turning out embellished verses, ordinary people continued to prefer the simple folk poetry of early Han. The south was represented by soft and plaintive poetry but the north poured unrestrained and robust expression into poems reflecting the bleakness of the scenery and 'the harshness of life. Weak men were held in contempt; women were praised for military exploits. (To be concluded)