废话文学

What does 废话文学 mean?

Think of a sentence that sounds like a speech and carries zero information: that is 废话文学. The genre collects statements that restate themselves, such as 听君一席话，如听一席话, literally listening to your words is like listening to words. It works as comedy because the grammar is flawless while the content evaporates, which makes it a perfect caption for team meetings, product manuals, horoscopes and customer-service scripts. Nobody means it as an insult, since the format also mocks the person who had to sit through the sentence, including whoever posts it. The dictionary files it next to 栓Q, another way of admitting that words have run out, and beside the newer 窝囊文学, which applies the same deadpan logic to life choices.

Where does 废话文学 come from?

The habit of laughing at empty tautology is older than the label. 听君一席话，如听一席话 twists a classic proverb, 听君一席话，胜读十年书, which claims that one conversation with you beats ten years of reading. In 2021 the flipped version became a caption format on Weibo and Douyin, where users collected the best specimens under the tag 废话文学. Southern Metropolis Daily covered the trend in late September 2021 and China News Service followed that November. The person who first coined the label is unclear, so the phrase entered the dictionary as a collective internet product.

How to use 废话文学

• 听君一席话，如听一席话。这届废话文学大赛，冠军还是上次那个冠军。
  Tīng jūn yī xí huà, rú tīng yī xí huà. Zhè jiè fèi huà wén xué dà sài, guàn jūn hái shì shàng cì nà ge guàn jūn.
  Listening to your speech is like hearing speech. This round of the useless-talk literature contest was won by the same champion as last time.
• 老板在年会上讲了半小时：明年要努力，努力了就一定会努力。同事在群里评论：年度废话文学金奖得主。
  Lǎo bǎn zài nián huì shàng jiǎng le bàn xiǎo shí: míng nián yào nǔ lì, nǔ lì le jiù yī dìng huì nǔ lì. Tóng shì zài qún lǐ píng lùn: nián dù fèi huà wén xué jīn jiǎng dé zhǔ.
  The boss spoke for half an hour at the annual party: next year we must work hard, and if we work hard we will certainly work hard. A colleague commented in the group chat: gold medal in useless-talk literature.