ASIAN

LITERATURE
WHAT IS ASIAN LITERATURE?
 Asian literature encompasses the rich and widely diverse
cultural and ethnic heritages found in such countries as
China, India, Japan, Vietnam, and Korea.
CHINESE
LITERATURE
CHINESE LITERATURE
profoundly influenced by three great school
of thoughts: Confucianism, Taoism, and
Buddhism.
TYPES OF
LITERATURE
CLASSICAL
Classical Chinese literature is written in their
vernacular or classical Chinese language.
MODERN
 The Opium War brought an end to China's seclusion from
the outside world and caused it to progress to a new period
in its history. With a crisis of politics, economy and
culture, Lin Zexu introduced a more open literary creation.
Founded on the Hundred Days' Movement, advocators
called for a revolutionary style poetry and novel to prompt
people to join in the political struggle. Another group of
writers created novels to denounce the system that was the
cause of so much dissatisfaction among the people.
CONTEMPORARY
 The contemporary period refers to the glorious thirty years
from the May Fourth Movement in 1919 until the
foundation of the Peoples' Republic of China in 1949. With
the development of the New Culture Movement and the
victorious October Revolution in Russia in 1917, new
thoughts refreshed the literary field. They tried to approach
the public with more oral and excellent works as well as
the literary association.
PRESENT-AGE
 Modern China's political arena, thriving economy and culture
provides more freedom and an open atmosphere in which present
day literature takes on a greater brilliance. Poems, essays, fiction
and drama in a broad spectrum of themes and in many forms are
quite popular. Newspapers, magazines, radio, and the Internet, all
give writers of literature much scope for their exertions.
Consequently, for their encouragement, there are literary prizes
such as the Lu Xun Prize, Mao Dun Prize, Spring Prize, Feng Mu
Prize, and Lao She Prize and more besides.
REVERED NAMES
IN CHINESE
LITERATURE
CONFUCIUS
LAO TZU
LI PO
PO CHU I
TU FU
FORMS OF
LITERATURE
SHI POETRY
 Drink, my horse, while we cross the autumn water!-
The stream is cold and the wind like a sword,
As we watch against the sunset on the sandy plain,
Far, far away, shadowy Lingtao.
Old battles, waged by those long walls, Once were
proud on all men's tongues.
But antiquity now is a yellow dust, Confusing in the
grasses its ruins and white bones
 - Wang Changling “At a Border Fortress”
CI POETRY
 Li Yu: to the tune "Lady Yu" (transl. Hans Frankel)

Spring blossoms and autumn moon - when will they end? How much has happened in the past!
On the balcony last night, again an east wind, the moon was so bright, I couldn't bear to look
toward my old kingdom.
The carved galleries and jade steps must still be there, only the rosy cheeks have changed.
I ask you, how much sorrow can there be? It's just like a whole river full of eastward flow in
spring.
MODERN POETRY
 When spider webs seal my stove without mercy
 When ember smoke sighs over sad poverty
 I spread out the despairing ashes stubbornly
 And write with fair snowflakes

 From Believe in the Future by Shi Zhi (translated by Michelle

Yeh)
MISTY POETRY
 Perhaps the final hour has come
I leave behind no testament
Only a pen, to give to my mother.
In a time without heroes,
I only want to be an individual.

The horizon of peace

Separates the order of the living and dead.
I can only choose the heavens
And I will not kneel on the ground
Allowing the executioner to look tall
The better to obscure the wind of freedom.

From the bullet holes of the stars

There will seep forth a blood-red dawn. 
PROSE
DRAMA AND OPERA
FICTION
JAPANESE
LITERATURE
JAPANESE LITERATURE
Oral literature is mostly poetry
Heavily influenced by cultural contact with China
ANCIENT PERIOD (TILL 794
AD)
 Kojiki (The Records of Ancient Matters)
(A.D. 712)
 –Creation of the world, gods and
goddesses, facts about ancient Japan
 Nihongi (The Chronicles of Japan) (A.D.
720)
 –History of Japan in poetry and influence
of China
CLASSICAL LITERATURE
Manyoshu The Pillow Book The Tale of Genji
(The Book of Ten Thousand
Leaves)
- Oldest collection of Japanese - Includes anecdotes, character - Often considered the world’s
Poetry sketches, lists, diary entries, first novel/ psychological novel
conversations, poetry, etc.
MEDIEVAL LITERATURE
 Many civil wars led to the development of
a warrior class, war tales, and histories
(insights into life and death, simple
lifestyles, and Seppuku)
 Tale of the Heike - an epic account of the
struggle between two clans for control of
Japan at the end of the twelfth century
EDO PERIOD
 The Tokugawa Period
 The capital of Japan moved from Kyoto to
Edo (modern Tokyo)
 Scholarly work continued to be published in
Chinese
 Chikamatsu Monzaemon - a kabuki
dramatist, known as the Japan's Shakespeare
 Many genres of literature made their debut
helped by a rising literacy rate among the
growing population of townspeople, as well
as the development of lending libraries
MEIJI PERIOD
 The re-opening of Japan to the West, and a period of rapid
industrialization
 European literature brought free verse into the poetic repertoire. It
became widely used for longer works embodying new intellectual
themes.
 Prose writers and dramatists struggled with a whole galaxy of new
ideas and artistic schools, but novelists were the first to assimilate
some of these concepts successfully
JAPANESE POETRY
 Haiku – 17-syllable poem
in three lines (5-7-5)
 Tanka – 31-syllable poem
in five lines (5-7-5-7-7)
 Choka
 The Moth
 there is no freedom
 escaping from my cocoon
 I must seek you once again
 I am drawn to you
 like a moth to a candle
 circling nearer and nearer
 the deadly flame calls
 now my wings are scorched
 why must my nature be so?
JAPANESE DRAMA
 – National theater, bare
stage, actors wearing
masks, written in a highly
poetic
JAPANESE DRAMA
– a puppet or doll
play wherein dolls
are life-like
JAPANESE
WRITERS
SEAMI MOTOKIYO
MATSUO BASHO
YOSA BUSON
KOBAYASHI ISSA
DAZAI OZAMU
RYUNOSUKE AKUTAGAWA
OE KENZABURO
YASUNARI KAWABATA
JUNICHIRO TANIZAKI
CONTEMPORARY
LITERATURE
MANGA CELLPHONE LITERATURE
INDIAN
LITERATURE
INDIAN LITERATURE
 Oral literature and written literature (appeared in India
around 16th century during British colonization).
 The roots of Indian Literature may be traced to the Hindu
Writings.
HINDUISM IDEOLOGY
 Belief in reincarnation (cycle of being born)
 Three supreme Hindu deities (Hindu triumvirate or trimurti)
 –Brahma (The Creator, creation, knowledge and Vedas)
 –Vishnu (The Preserver, protect humans and to restore order to the world)
 –Shiva (The Destroyer, destroys to recreate and transform the universe)
 Four goals in life:
 –Dharma (appropriate living)
 –Artha (pursuit of material gain by lawful means)
 –Karma (accumulation of good will)
 –Moksha (ultimate liberation from desires)
BRAHMA
VISHNU
SHIVA
SANSKRIT LITERATURE
 Sanskrit (means perfected)– sacred
language of Hinduism, start of oral
literature by Aryans
 Vedas – written in Sanskrit language
which gave birth to literary words as early
as 1500 BCE
 –Rig Veda
 –Yajur Veda (Prayer Book)
 –Sama Veda (Book of Chants)
 –Atharva Veda (Book of Spells)
RIG VEDA
 Ancient Indian collection of Vedic Sanskrit Hymns
 Pre-Hindu Vedic religion
 Oldest of vedas
 Hymns of supreme sacred knowledge
 Regarded as divinely inspired or heard directly from the gods
THE UPANISHADS
 Sitting at the feet of the teacher
 consisted of a group of sketches,
illustrations, explanations, and critical
comments on the religious thought
suggested the hymns of Rig-Veda
 most important doctrine is the existence of
single supreme being, the Brahman, and
its union with the Atman or self
EPICS OF INDIA
 Ramayana (by Valkimi)
 –about Rama, the reincarnation of the creator god Vishnu
 Mahabharata (by Vyasal)
 –about Krishna - God of heavens, fire, lightning, storms (8th reincarnation of Vishnu)
RAMAYANA
MAHABHARATA
CLASSICAL LITERATURE
 Literature was nurtured by caste system
 –Brahman – scholars and priests
 –Kshatriya – warriors
 –Vaisya – merchants
 –Sudra – laborers
PANCHATANTRA (FIVE
BOOKS)
 oldest extant collection of fables in
Sanskrit literature
 originally intended to instruct a young
prince in the conduct that would ensure his
worldly success
THE DHAMMAPADA (WAY OF
TRUTH)
 Anthology of Buddhist teaching in
aphoristic style
 The collection of sayings of the Buddha in
verse form and one of the most widely
read and the best known Buddhist
scriptures.
MEDIEVAL LITERATURE
 Hindu movement
 Devotional poems to Hindu gods and goddesses
BENGALI LITERATURE
 Colonial to independence period of India
 Buddhist hymns from the 8th century
 Gitanjali (Song of Offerings) by Rabindranath Tagore
WRITERS
KALIDASA
 Considered as the genius writer in
classical period
 Raghuvamsa (epic poem)
 Meghaduta (lyric poem about separated
lovers)
 Shakuntala (poetic drama about love)
RABINDRANATH TAGORE
PREM CHAND
RAJA RAO
R.K. NARAYAN
CHINESE
LITERATURE
SHORT BIOGRAPHY OF
ZHANG JIE
 Born in 1937
 She earned a degree in engineering and
worked as a statistician in an industrial
ministry in Beijing
 In 1968, she was sent to a labor camp.
 She published her first story in 1978
 Later, she worked in Beijing Film Studio
where she wrote film scripts
 She is one of China’s first contributors to
feminist action
 She was awarded the Mao Dun Literature
Prize in 1985 and 2005.