<P> May Fourth radicalism, combined with changes in the education system, made possible the emergence of a large group of women writers . While there had been women writers in the late imperial period and the late Qing, they had been few in number . These writers generally tackled domestic issues, such as relations between the sexes, family, and friendship, but they were revolutionary in giving direct expression to female subjectivity . Ding Ling's story Miss Sophia's Diary exposes the thoughts and feelings of its female diarist in all their complexity . </P> <P> The 1920s and 1930s saw the emergence of spoken drama . Most outstanding among playwrights of the day are Ouyang Yuqian, Hong Shen, Tian Han, and Cao Yu . More popular than this Western - style drama, however, was Peking opera, raised to new artistic heights by the likes of Mei Lanfang . </P> <P> In the late 1920s and 1930s, literary journals and societies espousing various artistic theories proliferated . Among the major writers of the period were Guo Moruo (1892--1978), a poet, historian, essayist, and critic; Mao Dun (1896--1981), the first of the novelists to emerge from the League of Left - Wing Writers and one whose work reflected the revolutionary struggle and disillusionment of the late 1920s; satirist and novelist Lao She (1899--1966); and Ba Jin (1904--2005), a novelist whose work was influenced by Ivan Turgenev and other Russian writers . In the 1930s Ba Jin produced a trilogy that depicted the struggle of modern youth against the ageold dominance of the Confucian family system . Comparison often is made between Jia (Family), one of the novels in the trilogy, and Dream of the Red Chamber . Many of these writers became important as administrators of artistic and literary policy after 1949 . Most of those authors who were still alive during the Cultural Revolution (1966--76) were either purged or forced to submit to public humiliation . </P> <P> The League of Left - Wing Writers founded in 1930 included Lu Xun among its leadership . By 1932 it had adopted the Soviet doctrine of socialist realism; that is, the insistence that art must concentrate on contemporary events in a realistic way, exposing the ills of nonsocialist society and promoting a glorious future under communism . </P>

How would you describe chinese literature at present