Literature

The majority of Thai literature is produced in the Thai language and is the creation of the Thai people. Prior to the 19th century, poetry constituted the majority of Thai imaginative literature. Only historical accounts, chronicles, and legal papers were written in prose. As a result, the Thai language has a large number of sophisticated poetical forms. The body of pre-modern Thai poetry is substantial. Thailand still has a huge number of epic poems or lengthy poetic tales, some of which have original storylines and others of which have stories adapted from foreign sources, despite the fact that many literary works were destroyed with the fall of Ayutthaya in 1767.

Thus, there is a clear contrast between the literary traditions of Thailand and other East Asian countries like China and Japan, where epic poems are few and lengthy poetic narratives are more common. The literature of surrounding countries in mainland Southeast Asia, particularly Cambodia, Laos, and Burma, was greatly influenced by Thai classical literature.