Abstract: There was no systematic “literary theory” in ancient China.“Literary theory” is an academic concept reflecting of modern Western disciplines introduced into China.The modern “seven disciplines” reclassified the traditional Chinese knowledge system to produce “literature” and thus “literary theory”.The form of “history” in ancient Chinese literary theory was created by Chen Zhongfan and completed by Guo Shaoyu,Luo Genze,and Zhu Dongrun through their respective writing practices.Later generations supplemented,integrated,and improved on their basis,but there was no fundamental breakthrough in form.The form of “theory” in ancient Chinese literary theory certainly includes traditional literature research,interpretation and training of terms and concepts,but mainly uses modern literary concepts and scientific methods to interpret,position,determine the nature,compare,analyze,summarize,synthesize,and evaluate ancient Chinese literary theory,that is,the form of “theory”.Among them,Fang Xiaoyue,Zhu Ziqing,and Fu Gengsheng have made great contributions.The fundamental essence of ancient Chinese literary theory lies in “antiquity”,and today’s transformation and reconstruction actually transform “antiquity” into “modernity”,thus losing its essence.The construction of Chinese literary theory should revive the ancient form of expression in ancient literary theory,and continue the original form of ancient literary theory that was interrupted by the May Fourth Movement.The language “retro” in the study of ancient literary theory fundamentally uses the terms,concepts,categories,and discourse methods of ancient literary theory to describe literature.It not only discusses ancient literature,but also modern literature and Western literature.The restoration of language has made ancient Chinese literary theory an applied form,but it does not negate the subjectivity of modern literary theory,but rather makes ancient Chinese literary theory an effective way to supplement and enrich our literary research and criticism.