About

What this site is

Historical Anecdote publishes short stories from Chinese history, retold in modern Chinese at three difficulty levels. It is built for people who are learning Chinese and can already read simple texts: you read the story in Chinese, and when a paragraph loses you, you open the English translation right under it. That is the whole idea.

Everything works without an account. There is nothing to sign up for.

How the three levels work

Each story exists in three versions, each with its own page and link:

• Beginner — short sentences, common words, and background explained inside the text. Start here if you have finished a beginner course.
• Intermediate — fuller plots, more connectors, and some cultural vocabulary.
• Advanced — richer expression and more background detail, but still modern, readable Chinese. Classical Chinese is quoted occasionally, never used as the main text.

The levels describe how we edit the texts; they are not a certification of any exam grade. On every story page you can see which level you are reading and switch between levels freely — the URL always tells you where you are.

History, legend, and sources

We care about being trustworthy more than being dramatic:

• Every story lists its sources at the end — usually classical texts such as the Records of the Grand Historian (Shiji), which are in the public domain.
• When a famous detail comes from later tradition rather than early records, we say so in a note. Some of China's best-known stories grew richer over a thousand years of retelling, and part of the fun is knowing which half is history and which half is legend.
• The Chinese retellings and the English translations on this site are our own. We do not copy modern translations or other people's retellings.

What we don't have (yet)

There is no audio, no PDF download, and no progress tracking in this first version. We would rather confirm that reading graded stories is genuinely useful before building more.