During the period of 1906, there were 66 kinds of newspapers and periodicals published in Shanghai, the largest trading port in China at that time, and the total number of newspapers and periodicals published nationwide reached 239. These newspapers and periodicals publish poems and entertainment articles as well as political news. Later, these contents evolved into "supplements", and the development of supplements led to the emergence and independent publication of literary periodicals.

Among them, Liang Qichao's New Novel (1902), Li's Novel (1903), Wu Woyao and Zhou Guisheng's Novel of the Month (1906) and MoMo Wu's Short Story (1906).

On the one hand, these urban literary publications, which rely on the trading ports, modern cities, printing and publishing industry and mass media system, have established a market and a readership because they have adapted to the requirements of urban citizens' leisure and entertainment, on the other hand, they have provided material conditions for intellectuals who have deviated from the traditional life and professional format of "learning to be an official" for various reasons, and have changed from traditional literati to modern professional writers, making them rely on newspapers and magazines, readers' markets and remuneration to make a living.

When talking about the prosperity of novels in the late Qing Dynasty, History of Novels in the Late Qing Dynasty pointed out: "First, of course, because the printing industry is developed, there is no difficulty in engraving books like this; Because journalism is developed, it needs mass production in application. " After the Revolution of 1911, newspapers and magazines increased greatly. According to statistics, there are 500 kinds of newspapers and magazines in 19 1 year alone. From the late Qing dynasty to the 19 17 literary revolution, there were nearly 30 literary magazines named after novels? The emergence and formation of these numerous newspapers and magazines and the corresponding printing and publishing systems are the products of social modernization, which are isomorphic to the production and consumption system of culture and literature, the public media system and the "cultural public space".

Yuanyang Butterfly School novels appeared after the Revolution of 1911. Relying on this institutionalized newspaper and magazine (cultural industry and cultural public space), they met the cultural consumption needs of urban citizens, so the producers of Yuanyang Butterfly School novels became professional and professional writers who depended on newspapers and magazines, media systems and manuscript fees for their living. (However, although these literati in the late Qing Dynasty and the early Republic of China have turned into professional writers in the historical changes of China's social modernization, they have not consciously realized the modernity changes of their roles, nor have they openly proposed and affirmed the professionalization of literature and writers as a clear goal. ).

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The novels of Yuanyang Butterfly School were once one of the most popular popular books in the literary world before the New Culture Movement. Xu Zhenya's masterpiece "The Soul of the Jade Pear" has been reprinted 32 times, with sales reaching hundreds of thousands.

The famous writer Zhang Henshui's "Crying and Laughing" has also been reprinted more than ten times. Among them, the most outstanding is the Five Tiger Generals, the former is Xu Zhenya, Bao, Zhou Shoujuan, Li and Zhang Henshui, and the latter is the marriage of Yuli Soul, Guangling Tide, Jianghu Chivalrous Legend and Irony.

During the May 4th Movement, another serious criticism of Yuanyang Butterfly School was to attack its monetarist literary view of game entertainment. This is a difference of principle about the function of literature. Literature should have many functions, such as fighting function, educational function, cognitive function, aesthetic function, entertainment function and so on.