A Comparative Study Of The Cowherd And Weaver Girl And Orpheus Myth

As one of the sources of traditional culture,myths contain unique social customs,behavior standards,and value orientations of different nations in different times.For the primitive people,the myth is a higher reality,and normalizes their lifestyles and habits.It is the most ancient culture created by the people.For the later generations,the myth is a living culture.It is widespread in people's daily life,with strong vitality and rich cultural value.The Cowherd and Weaver Girl and Orpheus myth,as the most classic love myths and astrological myths in China and the West respectively,play a significant role in the social culture and national spirit of their time,and the cultural genes they carry had a profound impact on later literary creation and customs.This thesis attempts to analyze and compare the Cowherd and Weaver Girl Myth and Orpheus Myth from three aspects: the narrative structure,story mode and religious beliefs of myths,and then explores the underlying reasons for the differences between Chinese and Western myths composition.This thesis is divided into four parts.The first chapter outlines the evolution of the Cowherd and Weaver Girl and Orpheus Myth.Through comparison,we can see that the Cowherd and Weaver Girl Myth has continuously been improved with the change of the times.It belongs to the generation accumulation collective creation.While,the formation of the Orpheus Myth is more stable.Virgil's The Georgics laid a foundation for Orpheus' s myth,and subsequent works were all based on this.Finally,two popular versions of the myth are selected as the text for analysis and comparison.In Chapter two,the narrative structure of Cowherd and Girl Weaver and Orpheus myth are analyzed and compared based on the selected myth texts.Using Greimas' s contract theory,we can see that they all show the contract-oriented trinity narrative structure in the story structure,but the partand reunion narrative structure that expresses the laughter,love,pain and sadness of the characters are completely different.These differences are essentially a reflection of the different ways of thinking and national psychology between Chinese and Western cultures.In the third chapter,the Cowherd and Weaver Girl and Orpheus Myth are analyzed and compared from the perspective of story mode,and the theory of gender culture is used to define the characters Cowherd,Weaver,Orpheus and Eurydice in detail.In the analysis,two different story modes,"Fairy Save the Husband" and "Hero Saves the Beauty",are derived.The two story modes are explained from the perspective of gender culture,and it is concluded that Chinese and Western myths are products of different cultural ideals in the patriarchal society.The fourth chapter starts from the folk religious beliefs and explores the construction and recreation of the people's memory of myths in the spread of the myths of Cowherd and Weaver and Orpheus in folk culture.The Cowherd and Weaver Girl was gradually included in the Taoist fairy system in the folk culture.While,Orpheus was worshiped by posterity and evolved into Orphism.It is found that both religions focus on the exploration of life and death and pursue eternity through comparison.The difference is that Taoist culture pursues eternity for earthly ease,while Orphism is for the purification of the soul.