A Study On The Image Of Animal In The Book Of Songs

Image is one of the most important and influential concepts in Chinese andwestern literatures and also a key research point in the field of literature and art theory.Recently the study of image has penetrated into the field of ancient Chinese literature.As a shining pearl on the history of Chinese literature, the “book of songs” hasenjoyed great popularity among researchers. Beast image is non-ignorable among theimage groups in the "book of songs" and plays an important role in the expression ofemotional messages. Therefore, the study of beast image in the "book of songs" bearsgreat significance, which will be elucidated from six aspects in this paper.Chapter one is a general introduction to the beast image in the “book of songs”.To avoid confusions, the concept of image was defined and explained first. Then ageneral introduction of the beast image was given and all the examples of beastimages involved in the “book of songs” were classified and demonstrated.Chapter two talks about the relations between beast image and primitive religionin the “book of songs”. In this chapter, the study of beast image was conducted fromthe perspective of primitive religion, and elucidated from three aspects: the totemworship, offersacrifice and the reproduction worship.In chapter three the relations between beast image and the life of Zhou people inthe “book of songs” are discussed. Beast image is closely related to the life of Zhoupeople. In the first section the relation between beast image and the production andliving of Zhou people including hunting and herding was introduced. While in thesecond section, the relation between beast image and the emotional life of Zhoupeople including love, marriage and homesickness was introduced.Chapter four describes the relation between beast image and “Fu Bi Xing” in the“book of songs”. The beast image is usually used for vivid and accurate descriptionand expression based on the “Fu Bin Xing” expression techniques. Thusly in thischapter the beast image was studied from the perspective of artistic expressiontechniques. In chapter five, the relations between beast image and “praise and satire” arediscussed. As the composing principle of poetry, the “praise and satire” is theexpression of literature playing social functions onto the politics.“Praise and satire”mainly composes two parts: using the beast image for praising people or for satirizingpeople. For cases of using beast images for praising people, the “Chinese dragon” isgenerally used to eulogize the kindness of the noble class;“deer” is usually applied topraise good moral characters of gentlemen;“horse” is employed to represent men’spower and force;“sheep” possesses many characters such as friendly, kind, faithfuland decent, which are all in consistent with the ideal moral standards that the ancientstreasure. While for cases of using beast images for satirizing people,“fat rat” iscommonly used to satire the greedy rulers, etc.Chapter six talks about the influence of the beast image in the "book of songs"on the culture of later generations, from the perspectives of subject matter andemotional connotation. Until now, the beast image in the "book of songs" still exhibitsimportant guiding significance to the literary creation and deserves further study andreference.We sincerely hope that this work could offer some help to scholars studying the“book of songs”, and provide some inspirations in the further exploiting of morefields related to the “book of songs”.