A Study On The Image Of Shan Gui

The present paper takes Shan Gui, the character created by Qu Yuan as the subject of research, discusses its cultural connotation and its forms in circulation, and analyzes the reason of its transformation from an image in myth to the subject in painting and music, so as to explore the third form of conversion of the ancient Chinese myth in addition to historization and apotheosization—the trend of development towards the art.The thesis is divided into five sections.The first section is the introduction. Though the image of Shan Gui does not occupy a position in the belief system of the Chinese people, it is favored by many artists, which is a good case to the research of the variation of myth in circulation.The second section is the literature review about the prototype of Shan Gui, presenting and commenting previous scholars’research on Shan Gui as well as the current research on it.The third section is the cultural connotation of Shan Gui. On the basis of the prototype research, the cultural connotation of Shan Gui can be divided into two aspects——the Man-God relationship and the sovereign-minister relationship manifested in it. The present paper combines the two aspects of meaning together, breaks the conventional views about the surface meaning and interior meaning of Shan Gui, and gets the conclusion that the two aspects of meaning tends to get stabilized ultimately.The fourth section is about the conversion of Shan Gui into an art image. Owing to the stabilized connotation of Shan Gui and the influence of Qu Yuan, the presentation of Shan Gui in the form of art gives us some delight in the research about the variation of myth in circulation.The last section is the conclusion. Different from the conversion form of historization and apotheosization widely noticed by the academic circle, Shan Gui, an ordinary god in ancient Chinese myth, is rejuvenated through the efforts of artists generation by generation, who put the image in their works of art. And thus the myth is immortalized through the art.