In terms of novels, in 1930s, there appeared the novels of New Sensation School represented by Liu Naou, Mu Shiying and Shi Zhecun. This is the first modernist school of China's modern novels. Their novels often express the abnormal and morbid life and characters in modern semi-colonial metropolis at a fast pace, attach great importance to capturing the novel feelings and impressions of urban life with intuition and subjective feelings, and write the subconscious, subtle psychology and abnormal psychology of characters with Freud's psychoanalysis. The creation of Zhang Ailing, a new female writer, is obviously influenced by the New Sensation School and its writers Mu Shiying and Shi Zhecun, but it greatly surpasses the novels of the New Sensation School. A series of her excellent novels, such as The Golden Lock, Love in the Whole City, The First Furnace of Aquilaria Resina, etc. , a first-class psychoanalytic novel in the history of modern novels, has made important contributions to expressing the ideological content of modernism in national forms.
In drama, modernism has never formed a trend, but it is reflected in writers to varying degrees, such as Yuan Ye by Cao Yu, among which there are modernist factors. A large number of illusions, illusions and symbolism are used in the works to enhance the strangeness and mystery.