Asian Literature

Chinese Literature Indian Literature

Japanese Literature Hebrew Literature

 Asian Literature
• Asian literature refers to the literature that was
written over a period of thousands of years, in a
variety of countries in Asia.
• Asian literature encompasses East Asian literature
that includes Chinese, Japanese and Korean
literature; Central Asian literature comprising of
Bengali, Indian, Pakistani and Tamil literature;
West Asian Literature that covers Arabic literature,
Persian literature and Turkish literature and South
East Asian Literature that is comprised of
literature of the Philippines.
 Chinese Literature
• Chinese literature is a vast subject that spans thousands of years.
One of the interesting things about Chinese literature is that much of
the serious literature was composed using a formal written language
that is called Classical Chinese.
• The best literature of the Yuan Dynasty era and the four novels that
are considered the greatest classics are important exceptions.
However, even during the Qing Dynasty of two hundred years ago,
most writers composed in a literary stream that extended back about
2,400 years.
• They studied very ancient writings in more or less the original written
language. This large breadth of time with so many writers living in the
various eras and countries makes Chinese literature complex.
• Chinese literary works include fiction, philosophical and religious
works, poetry, and scientific writings. The dynastic eras frame the
history of Chinese literature and are examined one by one.
 Chinese Literature
• Du Fu
– He was one of the greatest realistic poets of ancient China.
– He wrote at least a thousand poems on a variety of subjects from political matters to
natural scenery.
• Li Bai
– Also wrote more than a thousand poems.
– He is thought of as one of the greatest romantic poets of China.
– His poems reflect the hard realities of war, dying people living next to rich rulers,
and primitive rural life.

• Confucius
– Confucius (or Kongzi) was a Chinese philosopher who lived in the 6th century BCE and
whose thoughts, expressed in the philosophy of Confucianism, have influenced
Chinese culture right up to the present day.
• Lao-tzu
– Lao-Tzu (also known as Laozi or Lao-Tze) was a Chinese philosopher credited with
founding the philosophical system of Taoism. He is best known as the author of
the Tao-Te-Ching, the work which exemplifies his thought.
 Du Fu
• Also known as Du Fu, Tu Fu is considered with Li Po to be one of China’s
greatest poets of the Tang dynasty.
• His early poems thread together incidents from his travels and personal
accounts of the hardships he endured; he also wrote poems to or about Li Po.
• Tu Fu is often described as a poet-historian, and his works convey the
emotional impact and import of political and social issues and register a range
of private concerns, trials, and dramas.
• His poems are remarkable for their range of moods as well as contents.
According to one of his translators, David Hinton, “[Tu Fu] explored the full
range of experience, and from this abundance shaped the monumental
proportions of being merely human.”
– Farewell to My Soldier-Friend
– Pounding the Clothes
– Thwarted [Version by Carolyn Kizer]
– A Toast for Men Yun-Ch’ing
 Li Bai
• A Chinese poet of the Tang Dynasty, Li Po (also known as Li Bai, Li Pai, Li T’ai-po,
and Li T’ai-pai) was probably born in central Asia and grew up in Sichuan Province.
• He was married four times and was friends with the poet Tu Fu.
• Li Po wrote occasional verse and poems about his own life.
• His poetry is known for its clear imagery and conversational tone. His work
influenced a number of 20th-century poets, including Ezra Pound and James
Wright.
– Exile's Letter
– Goodfellowship
– The Green Water
– The Jewel Stairs’ Grievance
– The Long War
– A Poem of Changgan
– The Solitude of Night
– Sorrow Untold
– Zazen on Ching-t’ing Mountain
 Confucius
• Confucius has become a larger than life figure and it is difficult
to separate the reality from the myth.
• He is considered the first teacher and his teachings are usually
expressed in short phrases which are open to various
interpretations.
• Chief among his philosophical ideas is the importance of a
virtuous life, filial piety and ancestor worship. Also emphasized
is the necessity for benevolent and frugal rulers, the
importance of inner moral harmony and its direct connection
with harmony in the physical world and that rulers and
teachers are important role models for wider society.
 Lao-Tzu
• The name by which he is known is not a personal name
but an honorific title meaning `Old Man’ or `Old Teacher’
and there has been countless speculation as to whether an
individual by that name ever existed or whether Lao-Tzu is
an amalgam of many different philosophers.
• The historian Durant writes, “Lao-Tze, greatest of the pre-
Confucian philosophers, was wiser than Teng Shih; he
knew the wisdom of silence, and lived, we may be sure, to
a ripe old age – though we are not sure that he lived at all”
(652). If he did exist, he is thought to have lived in the 6th
century BCE.
 Japanese Literature
• Japanese literature, the body of written works produced by Japanese authors in Japanese
or, in its earliest beginnings, at a time when Japan had no written language, in the Chinese
classical language.
• Both in quantity and quality, Japanese literature ranks as one of the major literatures of
the world, comparable in age, richness, and volume to English literature, though its course
of development has been quite dissimilar.
• The surviving works comprise a literary tradition extending from the 7th century CE to the
present; during all this time there was never a “dark age” devoid of literary production.
• Not only do poetry, the novel, and the drama have long histories in Japan, but some
literary genres not so highly esteemed in other countries—including diaries, travel
accounts, and books of random thoughts—are also prominent.
• A considerable body of writing by Japanese in the Chinese classical language, of much
greater bulk and importance than comparable Latin writings by Englishmen, testifies to
the Japanese literary indebtedness to China.
• Even the writings entirely in Japanese present an extraordinary variety of styles, which
cannot be explained merely in terms of the natural evolution of the language. Some styles
were patently influenced by the importance of Chinese vocabulary and syntax, but others
developed in response to the internal requirements of the various genres, whether the
terseness of haiku (a poem in 17 syllables) or the bombast of the dramatic recitation.
 Japanese Literature
• Kakinomoto Hitomaro
– Also called Kakinomoto no Hitomaro (died 708, Japan),
poet venerated by the Japanese since earliest times. He
was also Japan’s first great literary figure.

• Matsuo Bashō
– In full Matsuo Bashō, pseudonym of Matsuo
Munefusa (born 1644, Ueno, Iga province, Japan—
died Nov. 28, 1694, Ōsaka), the supreme
Japanese haiku poet, who greatly enriched the 17-
syllable haiku form and made it an accepted medium
of artistic expression.
 Kakinomoto Hitomaro
• Among his surviving works are poems in the two major Japanese
poetic forms of his day—tanka and chōka. Probably he also
wrote sedōka (“head-repeated poem,” consisting of two three-line
verses of 5, 7, 7 syllables), a relatively minor song form that seems
to have been first adapted to literary purposes by Hitomaro and to
have barely survived him.
• All of the poems accepted as indisputably authored by Hitomaro
(61 tanka and 16 chōka), as well as a large number of others
attributed to him, are to be found in the Man’yōshū (“Collection of
Ten Thousand Leaves”), the first and largest of Japan’s anthologies
of native poetry. These poems, together with notes by the
compilers, are the chief source for information on his life, about
which very little is known
 Matsuo Bashō
• Interested in haiku from an early age, Bashō at first put his literary
interests aside and entered the service of a local feudal lord.
• After his lord’s death in 1666, however, Bashō abandoned
his samurai (warrior) status to devote himself to poetry. Moving to
the capital city of Edo (now Tokyo), he gradually acquired a
reputation as a poet and critic. In 1679 he wrote his first verse in
the “new style” for which he came to be known:
– On a withered branch
– A crow has alighted:
– Nightfall in autumn.
• NOTABLE WORKS
– “The Narrow Road to Oku”
– “The Monkey’s Straw Raincoat and Other Poetry of the Basho
School”
 Indian Literature
• Indian literature, writings of the Indian subcontinent,
produced there in a variety of vernacular languages,
including Sanskrit, Prakrit, Pali, Bengali, Bihari, Gujara
ti, Hindi, Kannada, Kashmiri, Malayalam, Oriya, Punja
bi, Rajasthani, Tamil, Telugu, Urdu, Lahnda, Siraiki,
and Sindhi, among others, as well as in English.
• The term Indian literature is used here to refer
to literature produced across the Indian subcontinent
prior to the creation of the Republic of India in 1947
and within the Republic of India after 1947.
 Indian Literature
• Mahabharata
• One of the world’s longest literary works
• The story of two Indian families struggling for control of a kingdom
• Many long passages of Hindu beliefs and practices

• The Ramayana
• The story of a god, Vishnu, who has taken human form
• Written long after the Mahabharata; contains models for the ideal
ruler (Rama) and the ideal mate (Sita)

• The Panchatantra
– A book of stories intended to teach moral lessons and quick
thinking, was translated into many languages.
 Mahabharata
• The Mahabharata is one of the two major Sanskrit epics of
ancient India.
• The authorship of the Mahabharata is attributed to the great
sage Veda Vyasa (Krsna Dvaipaya)
• 1 hundred thousand verses, long prose passages, or about
1.8 million words in total
• Roughly ten times the length of the Iliad and Odyssey
combined or about four times the length of the Ramayana.
• Called Mahabharata due to the immense size and its dealing
with the story of the people of the race descended from the
ancient emperor Bharata
 The Ramayana
• The Ramayana is an ancient Indian epic, composed some time in the 5th
century BCE, about the exile and then return of Rama, prince of Ayodhya.
• It was composed in Sanskrit by the sage Valmiki, who taught it to Rama's
sons, the twins Lava and Kush.
• At about 24000 verses, it is a rather long poem and, by tradition, is known
as the Adi Kavya (adi = original, first; kavya = poem).
• While the basic story is about palace politics and battles with demon
tribes, the narrative is interspersed with philosophy, ethics, and notes on
duty. While in that other Indian epic, the Mahabharata, the characters
are presented with all their human follies and failings,
the Ramayana leans more towards an ideal state of things: Rama is the
ideal son and king, Sita the ideal wife, Hanuman the ideal devotee,
Lakshman and Bharat the ideal brothers, and even Ravana, the demon
villian, is not entirely despicable
 The Panchatantra
• Panchatantra discusses varied topics like philosophy,
psychology, politics, music, astronomy, human
relationship, etc., in a simple yet elegant style. This
makes it a rare piece of literature, and a unique book.
• It attempts to illustrate how to understand others, how
to choose reliable and trustworthy friends, how to
overcome difficulties and problems through tact and
wisdom.
• Moreover, it illustrates how to live in peace and
harmony even in the midst of deceit, hypocrisy and
other pitfalls in life.
 Hebrew Literature
• Hebrew literature, the body of written works produced in the Hebrew
language and distinct from Jewish literature, which also exists in other
languages.
• Literature in Hebrew has been produced uninterruptedly from the
early 12th century BC, and certain excavated tablets may indicate a
literature of even greater antiquity.
• From 1200 BC to c. AD 200, Hebrew was a spoken language in
Palestine, first as biblical Hebrew, then as Mishnaic Hebrew, a
later dialect that does not derive directly from the biblical dialect and
one that gained literary status as the Pharisees began to employ it in
their teaching in the 2nd century BC. It was not revived as a spoken
language until the late 19th century, and in the 20th century it was
adopted as the official language of the new State of Israel.
• The latter event gave impetus to a growing movement in Hebrew
literature centered in Israel.
 Hebrew Literature
• Bible
– Collection of 66 books but for the Catholics, 72 books
– Dates ranging from 750 BC to AD 100
– Most widely read book in the world