This volume of essays, posthumously edited by the author's brother Chih-tsing Hsia (1921–2013), a prominent Columbia University professor of Chinese literature, focuses on Chinese literary criticism relating to the work of leftist Chinese writers, most notably Lu Hsün (Lu Xun), as well as Chiang Kuang-tz'u, the "Five Martyrs," and Ch'iu Ch'iu-po. Through a critical overview of the aesthetics and politics of China's leftist literary movement, The Gate of Darkness examines the conflicting dilemmas between leftist authors' own ideals and the strict ideological frameworks imposed by the propaganda policies of the Chinese Communist Party in the early twentieth century.