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A HISTORY OF
CHINESE LITERATURE

BY
HERBERT A. GILES, M. A., LL. D. (Aberd.)
PROFESSOR OF CHINESE IN THE UNIVERSITY OF CAMBRIDGE
AND LATE H. B. M. CONSUL AT NINGPO

NEW YORK AND LONDON
D. APPLETON AND COMPANY
1927

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Copyright, 1901,
By D. APPLETON AND COMPANY.

Printed in the United States of America

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PREFACE

This is the first attempt made in any language, includingChinese, to produce a history of Chinese literature.

Native scholars, with their endless critiques andappreciations of individual works, do not seem ever tohave contemplated anything of the kind, realising, nodoubt, the utter hopelessness, from a Chinese pointof view, of achieving even comparative success in ageneral historical survey of the subject. The voluminouscharacter of a literature which was already inexistence some six centuries before the Christian era,and has run on uninterruptedly until the present date,may well have given pause to writers aiming at completeness.The foreign student, however, is on a totallydifferent footing. It may be said without offence thata work which would be inadequate to the requirementsof a native public, may properly be submitted to Englishreaders as an introduction into the great field whichlies beyond.

Acting upon the suggestion of Mr. Gosse, to whom Iam otherwise indebted for many valuable hints, I havedevoted a large portion of this book to translation, thusenabling the Chinese author, so far as translation willallow, to speak for himself. I have also added, here andthere, remarks by native critics, that the reader may be[vi]able to form an idea of the point of view from which theChinese judge their own productions.

It only remains to be stated that the translations,with the exception of a few passages from Legge’s“Chinese Classics,” in each case duly acknowledged,are my own.

HERBERT A. GILES.

Cambridge.

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CONTENTS