Chinese folklore

Chinese folklore encompasses the folklore of China, and includes songs, poetry, dances, puppetry, and tales. It often tells stories of human nature, historical or legendary events, love, and the supernatural. The stories often explain natural phenomena and distinctive landmarks. Along with Chinese mythology, it forms an important element in Chinese folk religion. The main influences on Chinese folk tales have been Taoism, Confucianism and Buddhism. Some folktales may have arrived from Germany when Grimm brothers had contributed some materials for the folktales regard to the country life of the German dwellers since the 1840s; others have no known western counterparts, but are widespread throughout East Asia. Chinese folktales include a vast variety of forms such as myths, legends, fables, etc. A number of collections of such tales, such as Pu Songling's Strange Stories from a Chinese Studio, now remain popular. Each Chinese folktale includes the representation of various objects and animals and uses symbolic messages through its characters and usually strives to convey a message that instills the reader with some sort of virtuous insight. These messages are vital to Chinese culture and through these folktales, they will be passed down to future generations to also learn from. The Great Race is a folk story that describes the creation of the Chinese zodiac calendar that includes twelves animals each representing a specific year in a twelve-year cycle. Chinese folklore contains many symbolic folk meanings for the objects and animals within the folktales. One example of this is the symbolic meaning behind frogs and toads. Toads are named Ch'an Chu () in Chinese, a folklore about Ch'an Chu illustrates the toad imports the implication of eternal life and perpetual. Chinese folklore unfolds the story of a Ch'an Chu (toad) is saved by Liu Hai, who is a courtier in ancient Chinese period. For recompense the gratitude to Liu Hai, Ch' an Chu divulge the secret of eternal life and being immortal to Liu Hai.