Asian literature


Asian literature is the literature produced in Asia.

Examples

Classical Chinese and Japanese literature

In Tang and Song dynasty China, famous poets such as Li Bai authored works of great importance. They wrote shī poems, which have lines with equal numbers of characters, as well as cí poems with mixed line varieties. Early-Modern Japanese literature developed comparable innovations such as haiku, a form of Japanese poetry that evolved from the ancient hokku mode. Haiku consists of three sections : the first and third segments each have five morae, while the second has seven. Original haiku masters included such figures as Edo period poet Matsuo Bashō ; others influenced by Bashō include Kobayashi Issa and Masaoka Shiki.

Classical West Asian literature

Modern Asian literature

The polymath Rabindranath Tagore, a Bengali poet, dramatist, and writer who was an Indian, became in 1913 the first Asian Nobel laureate. He won his Nobel Prize in Literature for notable impact his prose works and poetic thought had on English, French, and other national literatures of Europe and the Americas. He also wrote the Indian anthem. Later, other Asian writers won Nobel Prizes in literature, including Yasunari Kawabata, and Kenzaburō Ōe. Yasunari Kawabata wrote novels
and short stories distinguished by their elegant and spartan diction such as the novels Snow Country and The Master of Go.