Many students who are studying in the school in Kunming to study Chinese are quite interested in Chinese literature. They collected many books and took part in the Chinese culture class.

The teacher of Chinese language school talked about the origin of Chinese literature in the recent class. The story told by the teacher is quite vivid. In primitive period, when a group of primitive people were working together, one of them cried a word “邪许” to relax his nervous spirit and people around him started echoing him with the same word. They had never known that this simple cry could release their exhausted body, so more and more people jointed in the cry. And the words they cried made their working and actions neat and uniform, as well as made the hard work much more relaxed. People gradually learnt this kind of means and applied this into all kinds of working situations, which formed into a simple pattern.

This simple pattern is the so-called rhythm. And the further step towards body figure will be dance, towards sound will be music and towards written language will be poetry, which is favored by many students who study Chinese literature. Although this rhythmical cry was only a sound without any practical or meaningful lyrics, this natural and healthy rhythm actually is the origin of the poetry and the beginning of every literature as well.

In the tribes headed by the King Ge Tian of ancient China, people held the tails of cattle while singing and dancing joyously with rhythms to sing for working, harvest, heaven and spirit. According to the historical book of the Mandarin language courses in China, this is the simple and pure entertaining means of people in primitive society. This frugal collective artistic activity was conceiving the most original patterns of human languages, senses and body art

After grasping more language skills, especially the strong tool of written language, people started learning to transform these meaningless word “邪许” into significant lyrics so that they got greater motivation from these lyrics. For example, one poem in The History of Wu and Yue introduced by the teachers who teach Mandarin language says, “断竹，续竹，飞土，逐肉。” which describes the complete hunting process of Chinese ancestors and records the social life of hunting age. Although it is short and simple, it has had the rudiment of a poem.

Language unexpectedly has this kind of wonderful function and even the overseas students who learn Chinese in China are surprised for this. The primitive people gradually started worshiping the power of language and they wanted to control the natural disasters with the help of language and even tried to affect spirits in language in order to realize a certain hope of them. Therefore, they always used poetry as incantation in the ancient time.

The record in The Book of Rites found by students who learn Mandarin says, “土返其宅，水归其壑，昆虫毋作，草木归其泽。”Seeing from the tone, this is praying, but it is full of the tone of command. Therefore, this poem has the function of incantation in essence actually.

Using language as weapons, people commanded nature to obey their wishes and realize their purpose in fantasy. However, facing to the powerful nature, primitive people could not make the world they were living in clearly. They were so curious about many questions. How did the sky and earth form? Why do people come to the world? Why will people die? Students who are having Mandarin learning courses must know that these questions used to confuse people from all over the world in ancient time.

When people could not explain these things, a kind of mysticism occupied their mind. They thought that there was an unknown secret power controlling human beings and dominating their destinies. For this reason, every natural power which could not be explained would be sanctified. Later they would create many stories about gods according to their own comprehension in the process of production. This is the origin of myths. After the explanation of the teacher, students of the intensive Mandarin course in China all understood clearly.

For students who have learnt Chinese literature when they study in China, they must know the significance of myth in Chinese literature. Myth is the origin of the imagination of one ethnic and the motivation which is promoting the civilization of human society.