Early Chinese literature does not present, as the literatures of certain other world cultures do, great epics embodying mythological lore. What information exists is sketchy and fragmentary and provides no clear evidence that an organic mythology ever existed; if it did, all traces have been lost. Attempts by scholars, Eastern and Western alike, to reconstruct the mythology of antiquity have consequently not advanced beyond probable theses. Shang dynasty material is limited. Zhou dynasty (c. 1046–256 bce) sources are more plentiful, but even these must at times be supplemented by writings of the Han period (206 bce–220 ce), which, however, must be read with great caution. This is the case because Han scholars reworked the ancient texts to such an extent that no one is quite sure, aside from evident forgeries, how much was deliberately reinterpreted and how much was changed in good faith in an attempt to clarify ambiguities or reconcile contradictions.

The early state of Chinese mythology was also molded by the religious situation that prevailed in China at least since the Zhou conquest (c. 11th century bce), when religious observance connected with the cult of the dominant deities was proclaimed a royal prerogative. Because of his temporal position, the king alone was considered qualified to offer sacrifice and to pray to these deities. Shangdi (“Supreme Ruler”), for example, one of the prime dispensers of change and fate, was inaccessible to persons of lower rank. The princes, the aristocracy, and the commoners were thus compelled, in descending order, to worship lesser gods and ancestors. Though this situation was greatly modified about the time of Confucius in the early part of the 5th century bce, institutional inertia and a trend toward rationalism precluded the revival of a mythological world. Confucius prayed to Heaven (Tian) and was concerned about the great sacrifices, but he and his school had little use for genuine myths.

Nevertheless, during the latter centuries of the Zhou, Chinese mythology began to undergo a profound transformation. The old gods, to a great extent already forgotten, were gradually supplanted by a multitude of new ones, some of whom were imported from India with Buddhism or gained popular acceptance as Daoism spread throughout the empire. In the process, many early myths were totally reinterpreted to the extent that some deities and mythological figures were rationalized into abstract concepts and others were euhemerized into historical figures. Above all, a hierarchical order, resembling in many ways the institutional order of the empire, was imposed upon the world of the supernatural. Many of the archaic myths were lost; others survived only as fragments, and, in effect, an entirely new mythological world was created.

These new gods generally had clearly defined functions and definite personal characteristics and became prominent in literature and the other arts. The myth of the battles between Huangdi (“The Yellow Emperor”) and Chiyou (“The Wormy Transgressor”), for example, became a part of Daoist lore and eventually provided models for chapters of two works of vernacular fiction, Shuihuzhuan (The Water Margin, also translated as All Men Are Brothers) and Xiyouji (1592; Journey to the West, also partially translated as Monkey). Other mythological figures such as Kuafu and the Xiwangmu subsequently provided motifs for numerous poems and stories.

Historical personages were also commonly taken into the pantheon, for Chinese popular imagination has been quick to endow the biography of a beloved hero with legendary and eventually mythological traits. Qu Yuan, the ill-fated minister of the state of Chu (771–221 bce), is the most notable example. Mythmaking consequently became a constant, living process in China. It was also true that historical heroes and would-be heroes arranged their biographies in a way that lent themselves to mythologizing.

Poetry

The first anthology of Chinese poetry, known as the Shijing (“Classic of Poetry”) and consisting of temple, court, and folk songs, was given definitive form somewhere around the time of Confucius (551–479 bce). But its 305 songs are believed to range in date from the beginning of the Zhou dynasty to the time of their compiling.

The Shijing is generally accounted the third of the Five Classics (Wujing) of Confucian literature. The other four are: the Yijing (“Classic of Changes”), a book of divination and cosmology; the Shujing (“Classic of History”), a collection of official documents; the Liji (“Record of Rites”), a book of rituals with accompanying anecdotes; and the Chunqiu (“Spring and Autumn [Annals]”), a chronological history of the feudal state of Lu, where Confucius was born, consisting of topical entries of major events from 722 to 481 bce. The Five Classics have been held in high esteem by Chinese scholars since the 2nd century bce. (For a discussion of the Yijing and Shujing, see below Prose.)

The poems of the Shijing were originally sung to the accompaniment of music, and some of them, especially temple songs, were also accompanied by dancing. (In all subsequent periods of Chinese literary history, new trends in poetry were profoundly influenced by music.) Most of the poems of the Shijing have a preponderantly lyrical strain whether the subject is hardship in military service or seasonal festivities, agricultural chores or rural scenes, love or sports, aspirations or disappointments of the common folk and of the declining aristocracy. Apparently, the language of the poems was relatively close to the daily speech of the common people, and even repeated attempts at refinement during the long process of transmission have not spoiled their freshness and spontaneity. In spite of this, however, when the songs are read aloud and not sung to music their prevailing four-syllable lines conduce to monotony, hardly redeemed by the occasional interspersion of shorter or longer lines.

If there ever was an epic tradition in ancient China comparable to that of early India or the West, only dim traces of it persist in the written records. The Shijing has a few narrative poems celebrating heroic deeds of the royal ancestors, but these are rearranged in cycles and only faintly approximate the national epics of other peoples. One cycle, for example, records the major stages in the rise of the Zhou kingdom, from the supernatural birth of its remote founder to its conquest of the Shang kingdom. These episodes, which, according to traditional history, cover a period of more than 1,000 years, are dealt with in only about 400 lines. Other cycles, which celebrate later military exploits of the royal Zhou armies, are even briefer.

The Shijing exerted a profound influence on Chinese poetry that, generally speaking, has stressed the lyrical rather than the narrative element; a dependence more on end rhymes for musical effect than on other rhetorical devices; regular lines, consisting of a standard number of syllables; and the utilization of intonation that is inherent in the language for rhythm, instead of the alternation of stressed and unstressed syllables as is the norm in Western poetry. The high regard in which this anthology has been held in China results both from its antiquity and from the legend that Confucius himself edited it. It was elevated in 136 bce to the position of a major classic in the Confucian canon.

Meanwhile, another type of poetry, also originating in music and dance, had developed in the south, in the basin of the Yangtze River, an area dominated by the principality of Chu—hence the generic appellation Chuci, or “songs of Chu.” These southern songs, though adorned with end rhymes like the songs of the Shijing, follow a different metrical pattern: the lines are usually longer and more irregular and are commonly (though not always) marked by a strong caesura in the middle. Their effect is thus rather plaintive, and they lend themselves to chanting instead of singing. The beginning of this tradition is obscure because most of the early samples were eclipsed by the brilliant 4th/3rd-century-bce compositions of the towering genius Qu Yuan, China’s first known poet.

Among some 25 elegies that are attributed to Qu Yuan, the most important and longest is Lisao (“On Encountering Sorrow”), which has been described as a politico-erotic ode, relating by means of a love allegory the poet’s disappointment with his royal master and describing his imaginary travels in distant regions and the realms of heaven, in an attempt to rid himself of his sorrow. Qu Yuan committed suicide by drowning himself in the Miluo River, and his tragic death, no less than his beautiful elegies, helped to perpetuate the new literary genre. In contrast to the poems of the Shijing, which had few successful imitators, the genre created by Qu Yuan was cultivated for more than five centuries, and it also experienced later revivals.

Prose

Prior to the rise of the philosophers in the 6th century bce, brief prose writings were reported to be numerous, but of these only two collections have been transmitted: the Shu, or Shujing (“Classic of History”), consisting of diverse kinds of primitive state papers, such as declarations, portions of charges to feudal lords, and orations; and the Yi, or Yijing (“Classic of Changes”), a fortune-telling manual. Both grew by accretion and, according to a very doubtful tradition, were edited by Confucius himself. Neither can be considered literature, but both have exerted influence on Chinese writers for more than 2,000 years as a result of their inclusion in the Confucian canon.

The earliest writings that can be assigned to individual “authorship,” in the loose sense of the term, are the Laozi, or Daodejing (“Classic of the Way of Power”), which is attributed to Laozi, who is credited with being the founder of Daoism and who might have been an older contemporary of Confucius; and the Lunyu (“Conversations”), or Analects (selected miscellaneous passages), of Confucius. Neither of the philosophers wrote extensively, and their teachings were recorded by their followers. Thus, the Laozi consists of brief summaries of Laozi’s sayings, many of which are in rhyme and others in polished prose to facilitate memorization. Likewise, the Analects is composed of collections of the sage’s sayings, mostly as answers to questions or as a result of discussions because writing implements and materials were expensive and scarce. The circumstances of the conversations, however, were usually omitted, and as a consequence the master’s words often sound cryptic and disjointed, despite the profundity of the wisdom.

By about 400 bce, writing materials had improved, and a change in prose style resulted. The records of the discourses became longer, the narrative portions more detailed; jokes, stories, anecdotes, and parables, interspersed in the conversations, were included. Thus, the Mencius, or Mengzi, the teachings of Mencius, not only is three times longer than the Analects of Confucius but also is topically and more coherently arranged. The same characteristic may be noticed in the authentic chapters of the Zhuangzi, attributed to the Daoist sage Zhuangzi, who (as stated in the epilogue of the Zhuangzi)

in paradoxical language, in bold words, and with subtle profundity, gave free play to his imagination and thought….Although his writings are inimitable and unique, they seem circuitous and innocuous. Although his utterances are irregular and formless, they are unconventional and readable….

The first example of the well-developed essay, however, is found neither in the Mencius nor in the Zhuangzi but in the Mozi, attributed to Mo Di, or Mozi, a predecessor of Mencius and Zhuangzi, whose singular attainments in logic made him a forceful preacher. His recorded sermons are characterized by simplicity of style, clarity of exposition, depth of conviction, and directness of appeal.

The prose style continued to be developed by such outstanding philosopher-essayists as Xunzi and his pupil, the Legalist Hanfeizi. The peak of this development, however, was not reached until the appearance of the first expertly arranged full-length book, Lüshi Chunqiu (“The Spring and Autumn [Annals] of Mr. Lü”), completed in 240 bce under the general direction of Lü Buwei. The work, 60 essays in 26 sections, summarizes the teachings of the several schools of philosophy as well as the folklore of the various regions of China.