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| Start and end dates | Ideas | Representative literary style | Representative literary works |
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| Ancient Pre-Qin to 221 BC | The Hundred Schools of Thought in the First Qin Dynasty | Prose, poetry | The State Language, The Book of Poetry, The Book of Zuo, The Strategy of the Warring States, The Prose of the Sons of Chu |
| 221 BC–189 AD | Qin and Han Dynasty | Music and folk songs, Qin Dynasty prose, Han Fu, Han Dynasty prose | Si Feng Xiangru’s “Zixu Fu” in the book; Wu Ming’s “Nineteen Old Poems”; Lu Buwei and his disciples’ “Lu’s Spring and Autumn Annals”; Si Feng Qian’s The Records of the Grand Historian |
| 189 AD–589 AD | Metaphysics in Wei, Jin and North and South Dynasties | Literary criticism, poetry, strange, literary theory, Zhiren novel | Cao Cao’s Short Songs and Lines; Cao Pi’s Essays on the Canon; Tao Yuanming’s Drinking Wine; Liu Yueming’s Wenxin Diao Long; Xiao Tong’s Zhaoming Wenxuan; Gan Bao’s Book of the Searching Gods; Zhong Rong’s Poems; Liu Yiqing's The New Story of the World |
| 581 AD–906 AD | Confucianism, Buddhism, and Taoism in the Sui and Tang Dynasties | Prose, poetry, Tang saga | Du Fu’s Five hundred words of Chanting; Bai Xingjian’s biography of Li Wa; Liu Zongyuan’s Eight Records of Yongzhou; Li Bai’s General Wine; Bai Juyi’s Song of Long Hatred |
| 906 AD–1271 AD | Song dynasty philosophy | Douban fiction, lyrics, poetry, prose | Lu You’s “The Book of Indignation” (poem), “The Three Kingdoms,” “The Story of the Three Tibetan Scriptures,” Ouyang Xiu’s “Autumn Sounds,” Su Shi’s “Song of Water Tunes,” Li Qingzhao’s The Slow Sound of Voices |
| 1271 AD–1368 AD | Yuan dynasty Confucianism and Buddhism | Yuanqu (Yuan prose songs, Yuan miscellaneous plays) | Autumn Thoughts in Tianjing Sha; Guan Hanqing’s Dou’e Injustice; Bai Park’s Wutong Rain; Ma Zhiyuan’s Autumn in the Han Palace |
| 1368 AD–1644 AD | The early Ming Dynasty, Cheng-Zhu Theory, and the late Ming Dynasty, Xinxue. | Words, fiction, poetry, opera, the | Wu Chengen’s “Journey to the West”; Luo Guanzhong’s “Romance of the Three Kingdoms”; Shi Nai’an’s “Water Margin”; Xiaoxiao’s “The Golden Lotus”; “Three Words” and “Two Beats”; Tang Xianzu’s “The Peony Pavilion”; Xu Wei’s Four Sounding Apes |
| 1644 AD–1911 AD | Confucianism is the main school, with complex ideas | Local opera, fiction, opera, prose, poetry | Cao Xueqin’s Dream of the Red Chamber; Pu Songling’s Liaozhai Zhiyi; Wu Jingzi’s Confucianism; Kong Shangren’s The Fan of Peach Blossoms; Hong Sheng’s The Palace of Eternal youth |
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