Ming and Qing novels. Ming and Qing Dynasties are the prosperous periods in the history of China's novels. Since the Ming Dynasty, novel, as a literary form, has fully demonstrated its social function and literary value, broken the monopoly of orthodox poetry, and achieved the status of literary history on a par with Tang poetry, Song ci and Yuan qu. The Qing Dynasty was a period when China's classical novels flourished and declined and turned into modern novels.

Novels in the Ming Dynasty include short stories and novels, and short stories can be divided into classical Chinese short stories and vernacular short stories. Novels and vernacular short stories were developed on the basis of the art of speaking in Song and Yuan Dynasties.

According to the theme and ideological content, novels in Ming Dynasty can be summarized as follows: ① Historical romance novels. It developed from the history class in the art of speaking in Song and Yuan Dynasties. Historical Romance is based on historical facts handed down from generation to generation, absorbing the contents of unofficial history's essays and folklore, and expanding it. "Seven points of fact, three points of fiction" is its characteristic. Luo Guanzhong's Romance of the Three Kingdoms at the end of Yuan Dynasty and the beginning of Ming Dynasty is the most typical historical romance novel, and it is also the first historical romance novel in China, which represents the brilliant achievements of historical romance novels. Under its influence, a large number of historical romances appeared, ranging from ancient legends to Han, Jin, Tang and Song Dynasties. The famous ones are Biography of the Countries, Biography of the Whole Han Dynasty, Biography of the Tang Dynasty, etc. Among them, Feng Menglong's adaptation of The New Biography of the Countries has a high achievement and great influence. ② Heroic legendary novels. It was also developed on the basis of history in the Song and Yuan Dynasties. The difference between it and historical romance novels is that it does not stick to the generational evolution of historical events, but mainly uses more fictional elements to describe idealized legendary heroes. Shi Naian's Water Margin in the early Ming Dynasty is his masterpiece, which indicates that the realistic art of China's classical novels tends to mature. After the middle of the Ming Dynasty, there appeared many heroic legendary novels, the most famous of which were Xiong's Biography of the Northern Song Dynasty and Anonymous's The Romance of Yangjiafu. In addition, Guo Xun's "Ming Taizu charged lightly" and Yuan Yuling's "The Legacy of Sui History" are also heroic legends with great influence in the late Ming Dynasty. (3) Ghost novels. This kind of novels are influenced by religion to varying degrees, involving ghosts and gods, and full of strange fantasies. The Journey to the West in Wu Cheng'en is one of the best ghost novels. The Journey to the West was also created by literati writers in Song and Yuan Dynasties on the basis of speaking art and folklore. In addition, Xu's Romance of Gods is also an influential one. Luo Maodeng's The Popular Romance of Three Treasures Eunuchs and Dong Shuo's The Journey to the West are also widely circulated. (4) Love stories. It's a novel about social real life, especially family life, depicting all kinds of human feelings. Take Jin Ping Mei as the representative. Jin Ping Mei is the first novel written independently by a scholar in China. It began to get rid of the shackles of historical stories and legends on novel creation, turned to realistic themes and began to describe daily life in detail, which is of great significance in the history of China's novel development. There are two tendencies in the novels about the world after Jin Ping Mei: one is to promote the thought of karma in the description of the world, such as Xi Zhou Sheng's Biography of Awakening the World Marriage in the late Ming Dynasty. The other evolved into a novel of a gifted scholar and a beautiful woman, such as Yu Jiao Li and Good Biography, written in the late Ming and early Qing Dynasties. ⑤ Case-solving novels. The rise of case-solving novels describing unjust prison proceedings in the late Ming Dynasty is a reflection of social darkness and political corruption. Some of the more famous case-solving novels are Biography of Mr. Hai's Official Case-solving, and The Romance of Bao Baigong's Case-solving. While praising honest officials, this kind of novels also reflected the darkness of social politics and the sharpness of class contradictions at that time to some extent. Case-solving novels generally pursue the bizarre twists and turns of the story, ignoring the efforts to portray the characters' personalities, which are relatively rough in art, and at the same time, the ideological content is often mixed with fascination and feudal preaching. The short stories in Ming Dynasty are mainly vernacular short stories and have made brilliant achievements. The vernacular short stories created by Ming people are the products of imitating the scripts of Song and Yuan Dynasties, so they are called "parody books". The earliest extant anthology of Ming Dynasty is Qing Ping Shan Tang Hua Ben. Among them, there are many vernacular short stories that have great influence on later generations, including Sanyan (Yu Shiming, Tong Yan, Xing Yan) edited by Feng Menglong during the apocalypse of the late Ming Dynasty. These three books include two parts: Song and Yuan editions and Ming editions. Later, Ling Mengchu imitated "Sanyan" and created "One Moment Surprise" and "Two Moments Surprise", which were collectively called "Two Beats". It's all imitations. Sanyan and Erpai are representative works of vernacular short stories in Ming Dynasty. Vernacular short stories in Ming Dynasty reflect social life more directly and widely than novels. Among them, love and marriage works account for a large proportion, which reflects the citizens' progressive view of love and marriage, criticizes the irrationality of feudal ethics and praises the struggle of young men and women for marriage autonomy and happy life. Some works expose the evils and dark politics of the feudal ruling class and describe the sufferings of the people. Others describe the lives and thoughts of small businessmen and craftsmen with obvious characteristics of the times. The parody of books inherited the tradition of Song and Yuan Dynasties, which is generally strong in story, vivid in plot and vivid in emotion. His artistic techniques are more mature, especially his psychological description and detailed description tend to be rich and delicate. Excellent works include Du Shiniang's Angry Box and Yu Tangchun's Meeting a Husband. In addition to San Yan and Er Pai, there are stories of Ming Dynasty, such as Shi Nod, Zuishi and Two episodes of West Lake. Classical Chinese novels in Ming Dynasty developed along the clues of legends in Tang and Song Dynasties. The famous collections of short stories in classical Chinese are: Qu You's Cut the Lamp, Shao's Cut the Lamp, and Shao's Find the Word Lamp. The classical Chinese short stories in Ming Dynasty imitated the legends of Tang and Song Dynasties in writing, and lacked originality in creation, so their achievements were not high and their influence was far less than that of vernacular short stories.

The class contradictions, ethnic contradictions and struggles in the ideological and cultural fields in the Qing Dynasty had a profound impact on novels in the Qing Dynasty. From the early Qing Dynasty to the Qianlong period, it was the heyday of the novel. The works that represent democratic tendencies and truly describe social reality are the mainstream of novels in this period, and A Dream of Red Mansions is its highest representative. From the Qianlong period to the Opium War period, that is, Jiaqing and Daoguang period, a large number of works divorced from reality, advocating famous religion and karma appeared, and novel creation presented a lazy and boring scene. From the early Qing Dynasty to the late Qianlong period (1644 ~ 1795), novel creation has made great progress compared with the previous generation in terms of quantity and quality, content and form, style and genre. Historical Romance and the legend of heroes were particularly prominent in the early Qing Dynasty. His important works include Water Margin, Romance of Sui and Tang Dynasties, Yue Biography and Fairy Biography. , is about history and historical figures, showing the rebellious consciousness of the oppressed people and nations in society at that time. Strange Tales from a Lonely Studio is a collection of China's classical short stories, which inherits the fine traditions of the Six Dynasties and the legends of the Tang Dynasty and is the highest peak of China's classical novels. The Scholars absorbed the nutrition of the satirical art of ancient literature and showed a broad picture of social life. It is a classic of China's ancient satirical literature. The novel A Dream of Red Mansions describes the decline of an aristocratic family, reflecting the irreconcilable conflict between young men and women's demands for personal freedom and feudal system at that time, and flashing the initial democratic spirit. It is the greatest realistic novel in ancient China. In addition, the novel The Wizard of Oz and the story novel The Cup of the World also reflect real life to varying degrees. During the twenty years from Jiaqing to Daoguang (1796 ~ 1840), there were historical romances and the legend of heroes's Biography of the Tang Dynasty, The Romance of Yang Baodi in Wanhua Building, etc., but their ideological and artistic qualities were not as good as those of previous similar works. The continuation of A Dream of Red Mansions, this kind of works all want to change the tragic spirit of A Dream of Red Mansions and make Jia Lin have a happy reunion, which reflects the subversion of the feudal traditional literary thought to A Dream of Red Mansions and is a retrogression. "Dangkou Zhi" takes the continuation of the water margin as a signboard, with the opposite intention to the water margin, showing the author's political stance of hating peasant uprisings and maintaining feudal rule. Good or innovative works in this period include Green Peony, Legend of Leifeng Pagoda, Full Biography of Fenzhuanglou, Romance of Twin Phoenix, Mirror Flower Edge and so on. The characteristics of novels in Qing Dynasty are significantly different from those in Ming Dynasty. Most novels in Ming Dynasty have an evolution process from folklore, drama, script to literati compilation. Qing dynasty novels are different. Writers choose materials, ideas and descriptions according to their own lives and experiences, and fully express their personal wishes and ideals in their works. They are also mature in structure, narration and characterization. General works are original. A Dream of Red Mansions has completely broken the traditional thinking and writing, and is the most outstanding representative of novels in this period.

Shadow of Heroes in the Three Kingdoms (published in Jiaqing period of Qing Dynasty)

Qing Dynasty was the golden age of China's ancient novels. It is not only unprecedented in number, but also diverse in style and genre. The most important thing is that it is very close to real life. It no longer just describes the lost heroic era and legendary heroes, but focuses on secular society and ordinary people. Jin Ping Mei in the Ming Dynasty opened up a new way to pay attention to the real society and family daily life, and it didn't really develop until the Qing Dynasty. The Scholars, Street Lamp, The Wizard of Oz and A Dream of Red Mansions are all people who write about real life, which fully shows the great ability and capacity of novels to reflect real life. In the Qing Dynasty, novels became the mainstream in the field of literature, and their achievements surpassed traditional poems and other literary styles.