Literature of the Qin Dynasty

The short-lived Qin brought no new chance for the further development of literature because of the legalist chancellor Li Si’s two notorious policies to suppress freedom of speech and unify all thoughts and political opinions:Burning of Books and Burying of Scholars.Emperor Qin Shihuang ordered that all histories in the imperial archives except those written by the Qin historians be burned out of fear that they undermined his reign，and that scholars using ancient examples to satirize contemporary politics be put to death，along with their families.As a result，the only famous short essay passed down is”Advice Against the Driving Away Guest Immigrants” by Li Si.Thus Lu Xun（1881-1936），father of Modern Chinese Literature，once commented，“Literature of the Qin Dynasty，only LiSi.” The essay mentioned above was composed facing a certain historical context.During the Warring States Period，a persuasive talker from the State of Han attempted to persuade the King of Qin to build a large water project in order to fatigue Qin out of possible attack on itself.

Unfortunately，the scheme was discovered by Qin，which resulted in Qin’s deep distrust of other vassal states.The King issued an order to drive out foreign persuasive talkers.Li Si，who wasthen persuading Qin into unifying other vassal states，was among them.He therefore wrote this essay to suggest a cancellation of such an order.This short essay is characterized by its plentiful use of parallelism，melodious flow of word syllables and good logic.

qingquang

See author's posts