First Published in 2009. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.

Historical Dictionary of Modern Chinese Literature presents a broad perspective on the development and history of literature in modern China. This book offers a chronology, introduction, bibliography, and over 300 cross-referenced dictionary entries on authors, literary and historical developments, trends, genres, and concepts that played a central role in the evolution of modern Chinese literature.

The A to Z of Modern Chinese Literature presents a broad perspective on the development and history of literature in modern China. It offers a chronology, introduction, bibliography, and over 300 cross-referenced dictionary entries on authors, literary and historical developments, trends, genres, and concepts that played a central role in the evolution of modern Chinese literature.

Few ideas in Chinese discourse are as ubiquitous as ming, variously understood as “command,” “allotted lifespan,” “fate,” or “life.” In the earliest days of Chinese writing, ming was already present, invoked in divinations and etched into ancient bronzes; it has continued to inscribe itself down to the twenty-first century in literature and film. This volume assembles twelve essays by some of the most eminent scholars currently working in Chinese studies to produce the first comprehensive study in English of ming’s broad web of meanings. The essays span the history of Chinese civilization and represent disciplines as varied as religion, philosophy, anthropology, literary studies, history, and sociology. Cross-cultural comparisons between ancient Chinese views of ming and Western conceptions of moira and fatum are discussed, providing a specific point of departure for contrasting the structure of attitudes between the two civilizations. Ming is central to debates on the legitimacy of rulership and is the crucial variable in Daoist manuals for prolonging one’s life. It has preoccupied the philosopher and the poet and weighed on the minds of commoners throughout imperial China. Ming was the subject of the great critic Jin Shengtan’s last major literary work and drove the narrative of such classic novels as The Investiture of the Gods and The Romance of the Three Kingdoms. Confucius, Mencius, and most other great thinkers of the classical age, as well as those in ages to come, had much to say on the subject. It has only been eschewed in contemporary Chinese philosophy, but even its effacement there has ironically turned it into a sort of absent cause. Contributors: Stephen Bokenkamp, Zong-qi Cai, Robert Campany, Woei Lien Chong, Deirdre Sabina Knight, Christopher Lupke, Mu-chou Poo, Michael Puett, Lisa Raphals, P. Steven Sangren, David Schaberg, Patricia Sieber.

This biographical dictionary is an indispensable research tool for information about the prominent persons of the past seven decades in China. The book documents nearly 600 Chinese individuals who contributed, for better or worse, to the development of Chinese life and culture since the founding of the People's Republic of China in 1949. Though the book is weighted toward political figures, it includes persons in business, the military, academia, medicine, social movements, the arts, entertainment and athletics. In addition to an objective description of the person's life, an analysis is provided that identifies the individual's contributions and importance.

Chinese literature, one of the world's oldest and richest, and consisting originally of poetry and later of drama and fiction, may be divided into three major historical periods that roughly correspond to those of Western literary history: the classical period, from the 6th century BC to the 2nd century AD; the medieval period, from the third century to the late 12th century; and the modern period, from the 13th century to the present. This book presents an overview of Chinese literature as well as a comprehensive bibliography, primarily of English language sources, accessed by subject, author and title indexes.