Reprints six essays (one in its original French language version) exploring transition in Chinese literature during the Han dynasty and the first four centuries of the Christian era. Together
the essays argue that during this period signs of a turning inward and the birth of new forms of spirituality akin to those that also arose in the West in the same period are evident. The
essays explore topics such as Confucius’s attitude to literature and his bending of the Shijing to give canonical authority to his ideas, the challenged authenticity of ten pentasyllabic poems
attributed to Ruan Ji, the changing attitude to literature of the third century as evidenced by the writings of future emperor of the Wei dynasty Cao Pi, and the birth of landscape poetry as
evidence of the transition from Antiquity to the Middle Ages. Annotation c. by Book News, Inc., Portland, Or.
