The study of Chinese literary form, with a long and profound history, has long been at the center of literary scholarship in China. However, under the impact of Western learning during the late Qing and early Republican periods, the tradition of Chinese literary form studies was gradually overshadowed and marginalized. It was not until the 1980s that this tradition began to revive, rapidly developing into the most vibrant frontier of academic growth and becoming a focal point of scholarly attention. In terms of the overall research landscape, there is significant emphasis on the study of the literary form and history of literary forms, yielding a wealth of related achievements. In contrast, discussions surrounding literary form concepts and theoretical exploration remain relatively weak. It is crucial to summarize and reflect on the modern theoretical studies in literary forms over the 20th century, as this will promote the further development of traditional literary form studies and contribute to constructing a literary theoretical discourse system with Chinese characteristics for a new era.
The earliest Chinese poetry is closely linked with songs. Singing promotes the emergence of poetic genres and contributes to the combination of words and the construction of poetic lines. Songs are sung to a regular rhythm and melody. In the early days of humanity, when music was not yet developed, music needed a kind of rhythmic vocal language to accompany it. Meanwhile, people in the early days had a minimal set of words that they needed music to enhance the rhythm of their language. Therefore, music and language complemented each other. The extensive use of interjections in early Chinese poetry directly related to singing. The word combination and artistic embellishment of these poems were continuously refined and evolved in the style of songs. Early poems were artistic creations and employment of rhetorical devices in the form of singing. This characteristic makes early Chinese poetry quite different from the poem composition in written form of later periods. Therefore, studying the language and rhythm of early Chinese poetry should be conducted in the context of singing. The poems in The Book of Songs are divided into three categories: airs (feng 风), court hymns (ya 雅), and eulogies (song 颂) based on their musical attributes. Their artistic forms and language skills were also influenced by singing. The literary forms observed in The Odes of Chu, represented by “The Nine Songs,” “The Lamet,” “Heavenly Question,” “Requiem,” and “Divination,” can be explored from their relationships with singing. During the Han Dynasty, song poetry 歌诗 featured three major forms and styles, each originating from a specific song form of that era. These song forms included the songs of Chu, guchui army songs 鼓吹铙歌, and xianghe songs 相和歌. The songs of Chu continue the syntax and line patterns of “The Nine Songs.” Guchui army songs represent the earliest form of zayan poetry 杂言诗, while xianghe songs predominantly feature poetic lines of five characters. These three song forms led to three literary forms, which underwent a natural evolution in the Han Dynasty.
Throughout its development course, lyric has developed complex relationships with other literary forms, such as classical prose, poetry, and rhapsody, from an objective point of view. Kuang Zhouyi 况周颐 attached great importance to exploring the relationship between lyric and other literary forms when investigating the history of lyric and constructing theories for lyric studies. He introduced the idea that “lyric is a subcategory of prose” from the perspective that lyric has a logical thread. He made detailed analyses regarding the differences and commonalities between lyric and song and the practice of writing operas and songs based on lyric stories in the Jin and Yuan dynasties. Starting from the narrative feature of lyric, he revealed the basic fact that new lyrics are derived from stories, and stories are presented in the form of lyrics. Furthermore, he examined “The Story of Nur al-Din Ali Ibn Bakkar and the Slave-Girl Shams al-Nahar” from The Arabian Nights to analyze the writing techniques used in foreign literature to express the tender feelings between men and women. Based on this analysis, he argued that fiction and lyric share commonalities. As a scholar who committed the most enthusiasm to lyric studies from the late Qing to the early Republican periods, Kuang Zhouyi made many pioneering arguments on the relationships between lyric and parallel prose, lyric writing and zaju 杂剧 opera, lyric and fiction, reflecting the new characteristics of lyric studies in the early Republican period.
Over nearly a century from the early 20th century to the present, scholars have conducted in-depth explorations of the characteristics of literary forms of Yuan sanqu 散曲, arriving at various summaries such as “secular,” “humorous,” “vivid,” and “tart.” Various summaries indicate that our understanding of the characteristics of Yuan sanqu remains insufficient, necessitating further investigation to arrive at a more comprehensive summary that reflects the fundamental spirit of Yuan sanqu. The more comprehensive summary should be ye-yi 野逸, representing a common living state, psychological state, and cultural spirit among literati in the Yuan Dynasty and is manifested in numerous aspects of Yuan literature and art. Historically, people have often recognized the ye-yi of Yuan literati primarily through Yuan paintings, but ye-yi is expressed even more fully in sanqu. The manifestations of ye-yi in Yuan sanqu are diverse, including “unbridled and reckless spirit,” “unrestrained and ingenious spirit with an unconfined mindset,” “rustic and carefree spirit,” “rural tranquility,” “graceful wildness,” “unconventional thoughts and fantasies,” and “vulgar and lowbrow works.”
The huaben 话本 stories of the Song and Yuan dynasties contain a huge amount of verse performances. If jiju 集句 provides an organized form for connecting verses of different origins to construct a complete verse performance, a story can also perform this function. Following this vein, it is possible to get a clearer idea about the relationship between ruhua 入话 and touhui 头回: Ruhua is a non-narrative introduction, while touhui is a narrative introduction, and touhui is derived from ruhua. Fundamentally, the evolution from the non narrative ruhua to the narrative touhui is driven by fully expanding the explanations of the introductory verse(s). From the perspective of verse narration, latent characters and pseudo characters are common in verse performances. An important function for them is to stitch the verses together and present them to the audience rather than tell stories. Verse performances initially come from other forms of folk arts and are finally absorbed by and integrated into huaben stories. During this process, huaben stories gradually establish a more delicate literary form feature in terms of verse narration.
The establishment of the fiction category in the late Qing period represents a crucial transition from the traditional concept of “fiction” to the modern one. It encompasses three dimensions: social status, literary status, and knowledge system position. The process consists of three stages: the separation of literary forms, the incorporation of new ones, and the further separation. It is influenced by various forces, such as social change, literary reform, the reconfiguration of academic systems, and the exchange of Chinese and Western culture. It is based on a literary perspective and situations, incorporating “dramatic fiction” such as Chinese drama scripts and even the early translations of Western dramas into this category. Later, “dramatic fiction” was removed from the fiction category, leading to the establishment of a modern framework of the fiction form. This development is a result of the synergy between the vigorous advocacy for the social and literary status of traditional drama in China and the inspiration from Western distinction between fiction and drama.
Scholars dedicated to establishing and developing the discipline of the study of traditional Chinese literary forms, such as Wu Chengxue, have achieved significant accomplishments regarding research objects, research scopes, research methods, and concept maps. However, within this emerging discipline, traditional Chinese literary form studies and establishing the academic framework are still under exploration, with substantial areas still awaiting further investigation and extension. Inspired by René Wellek’s division of literary studies into three realms: literary history, literary criticism, and literary theory, this article proposes an academic framework of traditional Chinese literary form study, which also encompasses three realms: literary form history, literary form criticism, and literary form theory. Based on a review of the research achievements in the discipline of the study of literary forms and the three sub-fields over the past two decades, this article analyzes the uniqueness of each sub-field and their influence on each other. Furthermore, this article validates the theoretical soundness and rationality of restructuring the academic framework of the study of traditional Chinese literary forms, citing the original and historical forms of these three sub-fields.