Languages and Literature /Contents

Fiction in Chinese

Ng Pek Hoon and Chong Siew Ling

Mainland China has a long literary history, with novels such as The Water Margin published as early as the Ming Dynasty (1368–1644). In Malaysia, locally written Chinese literature, known as mahua wenxue, or mahua literature, only started to appear in the early 20th century. Relatively few novels have been written, and short story writers have been somewhat more prolific, and perhaps influential, than novelists. The Chinese language newspapers are particularly active in nurturing and promoting locally produced writing.

  • Information in the full article includes
  • Mahua writing
  • Novels
  • The first mahua short stories
  • Post-war short stories
Nong Yan

Nong Yan ('Dense Smoke') by Lin Cantian (1935) was the first Mahua novel.