A Comparison Of Chinese And Western View Of Death From Book Of Poetry And Homeric Epics

The view of death is fundamental idea about essence, process, value and meaning of life. In a word, it can be interpreted as a series of attitudes towards death. Different views of death will lead to different behaviors. The inevitability of death stimulates people to start thinking about death since at least the Middle Paleolithic Period. Chinese and Western views of death have been established even in Homeric Epics and Book of Poetry, which respectively play an important role in Chinese and Western culture.Homeric Epics, illustrating the ancient Greek culture from the11th century B.C to the9th century B.C, is source of Western literature. Book of Poetry consisting of305poems dating from the16th century B.C. to the5th century B.C, is the earliest anthology in China. The two great works were written almost in the same period. Both of them reflected varied aspects of social life, and death is supposed to be part of the social life. Therefore, in terms of time and content, the two works are apparently comparable. Scholars from ancient times till now, have made great endeavors on the study of these two great works. However, few comparative studies have been made on them from the aspect of view of death. So this thesis has illustrated views of death in China and the West, and traced the inner differences of those two views and their influences on the latter generations by comparative study on the contents related to death in Homeric Epics and Book of Poetry.The difference of traditional culture between China and West causes different views of death. In Chapter Two, the author analyzes similarities and differences of views of death in Homeric Epics and Book of Poetry, and it can be concluded that each of them bears positive and negative views of death. In Chapter Three and Chapter Four, the author analyzes the root and influence of Chinese and Western views of death, from the perspective of group standard and individual standard. Group standard is one of the most important characteristics in traditional Chinese culture. It considers the individual as a separated member in the whole society. Personal value can be realized only under identification of groups. On the contrary, traditional Western culture considers people as individuals existing in social relationship, and group is composed of individuals. Personal value can be achieved by one’s own effort. The connotation of view of death is quite different due to the differences between Chinese and Western culture. For instance, although both Homeric Epics and Book of Poetry encourage people to die for the sake of their country, Chinese culture values death as a great reputation of the whole family; while Western culture attaches great importance on individual honor.In summary, this thesis is dedicated to expand further comparative study of these two works, and enlighten people to establish a positive attitude towards life.