Abstract:

This paper adopts a Chinese - English contrastive method for a study of Chinese grammar. To examine whether there is tense and aspect in Chinese, it selects 14 essays from 11 most influential Chinese writers and makes an exhaustive study of all the words of "le" which appear in them and their various expressions in English translations. It thus provides some purely objective and therefore useful figures for a further study of the topic. This paper also makes a few suggestions concerning a methodology for studying Chinese grammar.

Key words: le, tense and aspect, contrastive study, translation method