The discipline of Chinese Language and Literature at Zhejiang University is one of the oldest departments in the history of the university, tracing back to the Department of Chinese Literature at the School of Arts and Sciences in 1920 and the Department of Chinese Language at the School of Arts and Sciences in 1928. Despite going through numerous changes, it has always upheld its academic tradition.In November 2021, the School of Literature of Zhejiang University began to be established, and on December 15, 2022, the Fifth Humanities and Social Sciences Conference of Zhejiang University was held, announcing the official establishment of the School of Literature.

The School of Literature adheres to the philosophy of "Cultivate people through culture, understand the past to comprehend the present", and strives to cultivate first-class Chinese talents. The School of Literature has the National Basic Liberal Arts Talent Cultivation and Scientific Research Base, the National Basic Discipline Top Talent 2.0 Program Han Language and Literature Top Base, and the National Talent Cultivation Mode Innovation Experimental Zone of "Big Chinese" Experimental Zone. Chinese Language and Literature (Ancient Literature Direction) was assigned as a part of the national “Plan for Strengthening Basic Disciplines”. Chinese Language and Literature and Classical Literature have been selected as national first-class undergraduate program construction sites, and the two directions of Editing and Publishing and Film and Animation are developing well.

In the course of its long-term historical development, the School of Literature has formed a pattern of balanced development in which literature and language, tradition and modernity, literature and cultural relics, literature and images, codification and research are integrated. The School of Literature has a doctoral program in the first-level discipline of Chinese language and literature, seven second-level doctoral programs in Literature, Ancient Chinese Literature, Modern and Contemporary Chinese Literature, Comparative Literature and World Literature, Linguistics and Applied Linguistics, Chinese Philology, Classical Literature of China, and a post-doctoral station of Chinese Language and Literature. It has important platforms such as the National Key Discipline of Classical Chinese Literature, the Key Research Base of Humanities and Social Sciences of the Ministry of Education, the Research Center of Chinese Language and Literature, and the National Language and Literature Promotion Base, etc., and its education, teaching, and academic research are in the top position of Chinese language and literature disciplines in China.