"Who was there to pass down the story of the beginning of things in the remote past? What means are there to examine what it was like before heaven above and earth below had taken shape?" (Hawkes, 1959, p. 46). These cryptic queries, the very first of the "Heavenly Questions" found in the Chuci anthology of the early third century BCE, simultaneously suggest the significant presence and problematic nature of ancient Chinese mythology. The fact that myths—stories of the beginning of things—were an important subject in the life and literature of ancient China is indicated by the tantalizing diversity of mythic episodes and personnel so familiarly alluded to in the Chuci and in other early Chinese literary and artistic works. At the same time, the interrogative format and enigmatic terseness of the "Heavenly Questions" aptly dramatize the overall riddle posed by ancient Chinese mythology.

The Problem of Chinese Myth