亚瑟·韦利（Arthur Waley）是20世纪英国著名的汉学家和文学翻译家，他对中国古诗词有着深刻的研究和翻译。他翻译了大量中国古诗，包括《诗经》、汉魏古诗、寒山与白居易的诗、宋明诗词等，对中国文学在西方的传播起到了主要浸染。
在其《A Hundred and Seventy Chinese Poems》（《中国诗一百七十首》）一书，韦利对中国文学的局限性给予了阐述，并总体评价中国文学没有出身主要的史诗和戏剧作品。
作者对中国古代文学的批驳紧张包括以下几点：
1. 缺少史诗和戏剧文学：中国文学没有像荷马、埃斯库罗斯、莎士比亚或托尔斯泰那样主要的史诗和戏剧作品。中国文学有小说作品，且可圈可点，但小说不敷以造诣伟大的作者。
Those who wish to assure themselves that they will lose nothing by ignoring Chinese literature, often ask the question: “Have the Chinese a Homer, an Aeschylus, a Shakespeare or Tolstoy?” The answer must be that China has no epic and no dramatic literature of importance.（中国文学没有像荷马、埃斯库罗斯、莎士比亚或托尔斯泰那样主要的史诗和戏剧作品。中国文学有小说作品，且可圈可点，但小说不敷以造诣伟大的作者。）
2. 哲学文学的局限性：中国的哲学文学在思想上过于传统和虚无，缺少探索和冒险的精神。
Her philosophic literature knows no mean between the traditionalism of Confucius and the nihilism of Chuang-tzŭ. In mind, as in body, the Chinese were for the most part torpid mainlanders. Their thoughts set out on no strange quests and adventures, just as their ships discovered no new continents. To most Europeans the momentary flash of Athenian questioning will seem worth more than all the centuries of Chinese assent.（中国哲学文学在孔子的传统主义和庄子的虚无主义之间没有中间地带。无论在思想上，还是在身体上，中国人大多数是迟缓的大陆居民。他们的思想不会去进行奇怪的探索和冒险，就像他们的船只没有创造新大陆一样。对付大多数欧洲人来说，雅典期间短暂的质疑和哲学探索的彷佛比中国人几个世纪的认同更有代价。）
3. 理性和宽容的水平：中国文学在理性和宽容方面有值得西方倾慕的地方。
Yet we must recognize that for thousands of years the Chinese maintained a level of rationality and tolerance that the West might well envy. They had no Index, no Inquisition, no Holy Wars. Superstition has indeed played its part among them; but it has never, as in Europe, been perpetually dominant.（然而，我们必须认识到，几千年来，中国人保持了一种西方可能会倾慕的理性和宽容水平。他们没有禁书目录（Index），没有宗教裁判所（Inquisition），没有圣战（Holy Wars）。迷信确实在他们当中起了一定浸染；但与中国不同，它从未像在欧洲那样长期霸占主导地位。）
4. 诗歌的特点：中国诗歌在推理和哲学深度上不如西方，但在反思和自我剖析方面有独特的力量。
It follows from the limitations of Chinese thought that the literature of the country should excel in reflection rather than in speculation. That this is particularly true of its poetry will be gauged from the present volume. In the poems of Po Chü-i no close reasoning or philosophic subtlety will be discovered; but a power of candid reflection and self-analysis which has not been rivaled in the West.（从中国思想的局限性可以推断，这个国家的文学该当更善于于反思而不是推理。这一点在它的诗歌中尤为明显，从本卷可以判断。在白居易的诗中，你不会创造严密的推理或哲学的奇妙；但会创造一种坦率的反思和自我剖析的力量，这在西方是无与伦比的。）
5. 情绪表达的差异：与欧洲墨客比较，中国墨客更看重交情而非爱情。欧洲诗歌险些专注于爱情的表达。相较于中国墨客更方向于展现自己为“朋友”，欧洲墨客更乐意以“情人”的身份展现自己的浪漫。
Turning from thought to emotion, the most conspicuous feature of European poetry is its pre-occupation with love. This is apparent not only in actual “love-poems,” but in all poetry where the personality of the writer is in any way obtruded. The poet tends to exhibit himself in a romantic light; in fact, to recommend himself as a lover.（从思想转向情绪，欧洲诗歌最显著的特点是对爱情的专注。这不仅表示在真正的“情诗”中，也表示在所有以某种办法突出作者个性的诗歌中。墨客方向于以浪漫的办法展示自己；实际上，是将自己推举为一个情人。）
The Chinese poet has a tendency different but analogous. He recommends himself not as a lover, but as a friend. He poses as a person of infinite leisure (which is what we should most like our friends to possess) and free from worldly ambitions (which constitute the greatest bars to friendship). He would have us think of him as a boon companion, a great drinker of wine, who will not disgrace a social gathering by quitting it sober.（中国墨客有一种不同但类似方向。他不是将自己展示为一个情人，而是作为一个朋友。他自称为一个有闲情逸致的人（这是我们最希望我们的朋友拥有的），并且没有世俗的野心（这构成了对友情的最大障碍）。他希望我们认为他是一个有益的伙伴，酒量好，不会在聚会上复苏地离开而让朋友绝望。）
To the European poet the relation between man and woman is a thing of supreme importance and mystery. To the Chinese, it is something commonplace, obvious—a need of the body, not a satisfaction of the emotions. These he reserves entirely for friendship.（对付欧洲墨客来说，男女之间的关系是极其主要和神秘的。对付中国人来说，这是平凡而显而易见的——是身体的须要，而不是情绪的知足。他们将情绪完备保留给了友情。）
6. 对女性和爱情的态度：中国墨客将女性视为生养工具，而非情绪的伴侣，这与欧洲墨客对爱情的空想化形成光鲜比拟。
It has been the habit of Europe to idealize love at the expense of friendship and so to place too heavy a burden on the relation of man and woman. The Chinese erred in the opposite direction, regarding their wives and concubines simply as instruments of procreation. For sympathy and intellectual companionship they looked only to their friends. （欧洲文学常日空想化爱情的同时捐躯友情，因此过于看重男女关系上的表达。中国人则犯了相反的缺点，他们将自己的妻子和小妾仅仅视为生养的工具。对付共情和精神上的陪伴，他们只向朋友寻求。）
7. 文学创作的三个阶段：中国墨客的生活经历常日包括在都城与朋友交往、被流放到远方省份、以及退休后回到家乡，这些经历在他们的诗歌中有反响。
But these friends were bound by no such tie as held women to their masters; sooner or later they drifted away to frontier campaigns, remote governorships, or country retirement. It would not be an exaggeration to say that half the poems in the Chinese language are poems of parting or separation.（迟早他们会漂移到边陲的战役中，迢遥的官职，或者村落庄的退休生活中。说中文里有一半的诗歌是关于离去或分离的，这并不夸年夜。）
8. 女性墨客的地位：在早期的几个世纪中，女性墨客霸占主要位置，但她们的主题常日环绕着被丈夫抛弃的悲剧。
Love-poetry addressed by a man to a woman ceases after[7] the Han dynasty; but a conventional type of love-poem, in which the poet (of either sex) speaks in the person of a deserted wife or concubine, continues to be popular. The theme appears to be almost an obsession with the T’ang and Sung poets. In a vague way, such poems were felt to be allegorical. Just as in the Confucian interpretation of the love-poems in the Odes (see below) the woman typifies the Minister, and the lover the Prince, so in those classical poems the poet in a veiled way laments the thwarting of his own public ambitions. Such tortuous expression of emotion did not lead to good poetry.（男性向女性表达爱意的爱情诗歌在汉朝之后便不再盛行；但是，一种传统的爱情诗歌形式却持续受到欢迎，这种诗歌中，无论墨客是男性还是女性，都会以一个被摈弃的妻子或小妾的口吻来说话。这种主题在唐宋墨客中险些是种执念。在某种模糊的意义上，这样的诗歌被认为是寓言性子的。就像儒家对《诗经》中爱情诗歌的阐明一样，女性代表大臣，而恋人代表王子，以是在那些古典诗歌中，墨客以隐晦的办法表达自己对未能实现的公共抱负的哀叹。这种弯曲的情绪表达并没有产生好的诗歌。）
9. 修辞手腕的节制：中国墨客在利用比喻、隐喻等修辞手腕时比西方墨客更为克制。
The long Homeric simile, introduced for its own sake or to vary the monotony of narrative, is unknown to Chinese poetry. Shorter similes are sometimes found, as when the half-Chinese poet Altun compares the sky over the Mongolian steppe with the “walls of a tent”; but nothing could be found analogous to Mr. T. S. Eliot’s comparison of the sky to a “patient etherized on a table.” Except in popular poetry, puns are rare; but there are several characters which, owing to the wideness of their import, are used in a way almost equivalent to play on words.（中国诗歌中没有那种为了自身目的或为了冲破阐述单调而引入的长篇荷马式比喻。偶尔会创造较短的比喻，比如半中国血统的墨客斛律金将蒙古草原上的天空比作“帐篷的墙壁”；但是找不到类似于T.S.艾略特将天空比作“桌子上被麻醉的患者”这样的比喻。除了在民间诗歌中，双关语很少见；但是有一些汉字由于其含义的广泛性，在利用上险些等同于笔墨游戏。）
10. 过度依赖古典典故：后期的中国诗歌过度依赖古典典故和优雅的同义词，这终极导致了诗歌的衰败。
Classical allusion, always the vice of Chinese poetry, finally destroyed it altogether. In the later periods (from the fourteenth century onwards) the use of elegant synonyms also prevailed. I have before me a “gradus” of the kind which the later poet used as an aid to composition. The moon should be called the “Silver Dish,” “Frozen Wheel,” or “Golden Ring.”... The sun may be called “The Lantern-Dragon,” the “Crow in Flight,” the “White Colt,” etc.（古典典故一贯是中国诗歌的弊端，终极完备毁了它。在后期（从14世纪开始）的诗歌中，同义词的利用也很普遍。我手头有一个“梯度表”，这是后来的墨客用来赞助创作的。玉轮该当被称为“银盘”、“冰轮”或“金环”。……太阳可以被称为“灯笼龙”、“飞行的乌鸦”、“白马”等等。）
