Chinese Literature: A Very Short Introduction is a bite-sized book which adds China's literary history to the eclectic list of topics covered in a series, from the OUP, marketed as providing “stimulating ways into new subjects.” Here, author Sabina Knight travels from Shang dynasty oracle bones to Shanghai Baby in just 120 pocket-sized pages; three millennia of written words in five brief chapters.

Knight opens in bold fashion with Climbing Stork Tower by Tang dynasty poet Wang Zhihuan. The lesson drawn from this eighth-century work is that one can see further, and clearer, from a height; that, from a lofty perspective, the “continuous river” (p. xv) of Chinese culture can be seen to “form a meaningful course” (p. xvi). To which end, Knight seeks to demonstrate the function of literary culture in “supporting social and political concerns” (p. xvi), arguing that Chinese literature is properly understood not in a narrow, modern sense, but as part of a tradition which connects poetry, prose and drama with philosophy and history; a convergence of ethics and aesthetics.

From this expansive viewpoint, the story Knight chooses to tell follows a broadly chronological path, from ancient to modern times. Chapter one covers antiquity and the classics, while chapter five focuses largely on the 20th century. In between are three chapters on poetry, classical narrative, and pre-modern vernacular drama and fiction. Rather than producing a strictly linear account of the evolution of literature, however, each chapter is a thematic discussion, placing texts in the context of changing realities across the ages.

Themes are drawn, as in the opening, from literature itself. Considering classical narrative, for example, Knight traces a path from the Analects to Pu Songling's Strange Stories from a Leisure Studio to demonstrate evolving attitudes towards writing and the uses (and value) of fiction. Attention is given throughout to individual texts, and these – poetry, prose, and plot summaries – are undoubted highlights. The discussion of Du Fu's Spring Contemplation (pp. 45–48), for example, is accompanied by the poem in both Chinese and English, lending the poet's lament some historical and literary context, while also ably suggesting the complex nature of translation.

In the main, the compressed format is well served by Knight's approach. Despite the need to include a daunting amount of information, this is often an engaging text. The structure also, however, presents challenges. Individual works and writers (and eras and dynasties) appear in multiple places, creating a sense of repetition, and fragmenting what is already (perhaps necessarily, but sometimes confusingly) sparse information. Given that the target readership is expected to have little or no pre-knowledge, a dynastic timeline would have been a helpful addition. Indeed, it felt at times that, as a first venture into the subject, this book would be best read with a reference work close at hand.

It would be beside the point to argue too much over the inclusion or otherwise of individual works. This is, after all, a whistle-stop tour not a history, and Knight steps lightly over an astonishing amount of ground. A short suggested reading list offers further guidance. A book this brief, however, cannot avoid questions of emphasis. The final chapter is a case in point. Twentieth-century literature – from Lu Xun to Su Tong – is tackled through analysis of Gao Xingjian's 1983 play Bus Stop. This holds the narrative together, but also risks leaving a rather skewed first impression of the century. On another note, the story ends abruptly with comment on some recent successes by Chinese authors outside China. To come up to the present, 21st-century developments in the literary scene inside China should surely have merited a paragraph or two.

There is certainly room in the market for entry-level works on Chinese literature written for a non-specialist/new-student audience, and this is a welcome addition to a sparsely populated field. Creative use is made of a snappy format and the end result is a work which has the tone of an introductory lecture. Knight's ambition was to offer “glimpses of a powerful tradition” (p. xvii). The glimpses are certainly there. It is, as this book makes clear, for the reader to build a tower from which to view them.