The first series of these papers are the writings of Chinese authors, which are included in Literature of the Hundred Flowers, a book published by Hualing Nieh Engle in 1981. These poems, articles, and editorial pieces are typed in the English language. The majority of these manuscripts are dated, with the authors identified. A number of these manuscripts were published in Chinese journals and newspapers during the 1950s and 1960s and those publication titles are included in the box list. During the 1950s and 1960s, Hualing Nieh was living in Taipei, Taiwan, teaching fiction writing at National Taiwan University and serving as editor of the periodical Free China Fortnightly. Some of the titles that appear in the box list were used by several authors and these writings were presumably written for Hualing's courses.

In a description of Literature of the Hundred Flowers, Hualing wrote:

"For a brief period in the 1950s Chinese writers had a freedom of expression enjoyed by writers in no other Communist countries in the twentieth century. This is the first anthology in English (or in Chinese) of actual texts published during the dramatic period from May 1956 to early June 1957. The great bulk are prohibited in China and unavailable in the USA. They are an unknown literature, these short stories, fables, poems and articles, for they have never been collected before."

Series II is comprised of an addendum given the University in 2010, made up of items written by Hualing and iterms written about her and her husband. All of the items in Series II are in Chinese.