The Comparison Between Chinese Myth and Greek Myth

The Comparison Between Chinese Myth and Greek Myth 中国神话与希腊神话的对比 The Comparison Between Chinese Myth and Greek Myth Contents I. Introduction...……………………………………..….…….………1 II. The Similarities Between Chinese Myth and Greek Myth……....1 A. The general content of myth of creation of the world………...…………..1 B. The myth of the flood and fire……………..…...………...…………..1 C. The origin of animal and plant………………………………………2 D. The myth of reforming nature and resisting despotic heroes…………..2 III. The Differences Between Chinese Myth and Greek Myth…...…2 A. The system of Gods………………………………………..…………2 B. The image of Gods……………………………………..……….…..3 C. The nature of Gods……………………………………..…………..3 D. Ethnical and moral principles………………………………..…....6 IV. Reasons for the Similarities and Differences Between Chinese Myth and Greek Myth…………………………………………......9 A. Forces of ethnics and powers co-exist………………………...……....9 B. Extent philosophical elements………………………………...…….10 C. Dominating factors………………………………………...……....10 V. Conclusion………………………………………………………….11 Works Cited…………………………………...………………………12 第 1 页 共 12 页 Abstract: Mythology is a story about gods or ancient heroes of deification and is an innocent explanation and a beautiful yeaning about ancient people in the natural and social livelihood. Chinese myth and Greek myth reflect the living and cognitive process of the earlier period. Chinese nation and ancient Greek have their own unique, far-reaching influence myth. The generalities of the reason decide the similarities of basic content. But comparatively, there are great differences in the nature of God, moral principles and the system of God. It’s because the different influences of geographical environment, nationalities’ fusion and traditional ideological culture. This paper, through the contrastive analysis of the differences between Chinese myth and Greek myth, is trying to explore the culture value in them between these two nations. Key words: Chinese myth;Greek myth;similarities and differences;reason;culture value 摘 要:神话是关于神仙或神化的古代英雄的 故事 滥竽充数故事班主任管理故事5分钟二年级语文看图讲故事传统美德小故事50字120个国学经典故事ppt ，是古代人们对自然现象和社会生活的一种 天真的解释和美丽的向往。中国神话和希腊神话都产生于人类的初始阶段，反映了早期 人类生活和认识的过程。中华民族和古希腊民族各有自己独特的、影响深远的神话故事。 二者关于创世纪神话的基本内容相同，神的形象都历经了演变过程，而在此基础上，两 个民族神话中神的性格、伦理道德准则、神系的组成等方面存在着较大的差异，这是由 于各自产生的地理环境不同，以及“历史化”进程中所受的影响如民族融合的影响、传 统思想文化的影响等不同所造成的。此论文通过对比分析中国神话与希腊神话的异同， 尝试探索两国神话的文化价值。 关键词:中国神话;希腊神话;异同;成因;文化价值 第 2 页 共 12 页 I. Introduction Mythology is a story about gods or ancient heroes of deification and is an innocent explanation and a beautiful yeaning about ancient people in the natural and social livelihood. Chinese myth and Greek myth reflect the living and cognitive process of the earlier period. Chinese nation and ancient Greek have their own unique, far-reaching influence myth. The generalities of the reason decide the similarities of basic content. But comparatively, there are great differences in the nature of Gods, moral principles and the system of Gods. It’s because the different influences of geographical environment, nationalities’ fusion and traditional ideological culture. This paper, through the contrastive analysis of the differences between Chinese myth and Greek myth, is trying to explore the culture value in them between these two nations. The origin of the mythology is from a Greek word “mythos + logos”, “mythos” means “word” or “verbal language”, “logos” means “story”. It reflects nature and society of ancient people and it is an original understanding of human beings about origin of world, natural phenomenon and social livelihood. So there are relationship between Chinese myth and Greek myth. II. The Similarities Between Chinese Myth and Greek Myth A. The general content of myth of creation of the world Both Chinese myth and Greek myth were created at the very beginning of human beings and reflected the ancient peoples' life and the procedure of cognition. They are the synthetic forms of the theories by which ancient people recognized the world and human beings. They awe for nature and desire for conquering nature make Chinese myth and Greek myth share same characteristics. Before earth and sea and heaven were created, all things were gathered in one confused and shapeless mass called Chaos. “In Chaos slept the seed of all things” (Thomas 4). And the source of human, in Chinese myth, NV WA makes mortal man out of clay. “In Greek myth, Prometheus used some mud and clay to create humans, Athena gives them soul” (Thomas 31). He creates the original human beings. B. The myth of flood and fire In Greek myth, Zeus wants to punish the sin of human and to destroy the resident of the earth. He lets the flood to swallow the earth. In a moment, everything is destroyed by 第 1 页 共 12 页 rush of water. In Chinese myth, Gong Gong crashes the Mt Buzhou in rage. It leads to great flood disaster. The fire is the symbol of human civilization. From human find the fire to use the fire, we made great efforts. In Greek myth, Prometheus steals the fire from the heavens. Prometheus lit a torch from the chariot and put the fire in a hollow stalk that he concealed under his cloak. Then he stole away without being seen by any of the gods, and brought his fire to earth. Because of this, Prometheus is fastened to the cliff and suffering pain that his liver is eaten by two eagles. And Zeus tortures him for 3000 years. In Chinese myth, the man Sui goes to a faraway place and has gone through all kinds of hardships and difficulties to study the way of making fire and teaches people to master this method. C. The origin of animal and plant In the natural world, animal and plant are the most intimate friends of the human beings. The most metamorphosis of the animal and plant are with human nature in Chinese myth and Greek myth. And it is taken as the metamorphosis of the human beings or the gods. In Greek myth, the beautiful goddess, Daphne changes into a laurel tree to avoid chasing by Apollo. A handsome man changes into the narcissus because of he loves the reflection of his own face in the water. Arachne turns into a spider by the goddess for she dares to challenge the goddess. In Chinese myth, the story about wild goose and so on point out that man changes into the animal or plant under the certain situation. D. The myth of reforming nature and resisting despotic heroes For instance, “in Chinese myth, NV WA Mending the Sky, the Myth of Kua Fu, Jingwei’s Struggles and Yi Arrowing down Nine Suns” (Yi 13). “In Greek myth, the twelve exploits of Heracles, Theseus gets into the maze and kills the beast, Jason goes through all the difficult and hardship to get the gold sheep’ wool and so on” (Hamilton 4). All those heroes risk their lives for the collective benefits. It reflects not only ancient people hope to ease their labor and increase the capability of conquering nature, but also myths of these two countries possess a common point. III. The Differences Between Chinese Myth and Greek Myth A. The system of Gods In Greek myth, “gods are plentiful and systematic, just like a complete world of human beings” (Switch 16). The concept of Heaven and Earth of Greek myths about the 第 2 页 共 12 页 Creation is different to that of China. In Greek myth, the gods all possess the capabilities of supermen, and have fairly low moral standards, even lower than that of worldly people. This shows that what underlies the fundamental consciousness in Greek myth is the worship of powers as opposed to meaning and nature of the powers. In contrast to Greek creation myths, Chinese creation myths are filled with ethical and moral virtues. Chinese gods are “rare”, staying high above in the heaven and not systematic. The gods in them have higher moral standards for everything they do. At the end of the creation myths, the process of toricalization began to appear in the development of mythical system. The process took place so early that systematic creation myths did not take shape before it was replaced by the utilization of legends about emperor and heroes. “Greek myth, as the spoken literature in the early period of human society, represents abundant themes of human nature, presenting the passionate side of Greek spirit” (Green 4). B. The image of Gods The birth of both Chinese and Greek has had a primitive period of blood-related marriage, a totem, which considered a certain animal to have a close relation with a family group and formed a ruling circle of deities with sacred gods as the core. The Greek myth forms a system with Zeus as the core while the Chinese myth takes a still and dispersed shape because its sacred gods. There are many similarities and differences between Chinese myth and Greek myth. They both take heroes as their praising objects. However, the Greek gods are the combination of gods’ and men’s body, with male gods occupying the top position. The Chinese gods are the combination of gods’ and animals’ body, with female gods occupying the top position. This article starts with both eastern and western mythologies, focuses on a simple comparison of the image of gods between Chinese and Greek myths. Through the comparisons of the "soil" and the characteristics of the mythical allusion and so on, this passage points out the origin of the myths of ancient. China and Greece have close relationship with the low productivity of that time, but because of the influence on the different environments, Chinese myth has the color of human life with big river valley and Greek myth has contacts with marine life. C. The nature of Gods From the comparison between the differences of the mythical nature, from the two cultures we see ancient myths are not only the source of Chinese culture, but also the origin and reflection of Chinese national Culture Spirit. The myths reflect the struggling spirit the innovation Spirit and the unceasing spirit of the Chinese nation Ancient myths 第 3 页 共 12 页 are not only the precious artistic works, but also a rich spiritual wealth. Revenge has been a special phenomenon popular all through human social practice. Revenge themes have the most colorful and lively embodiment in Greek myth. According to motives and main bodies of these revenge conducts, together with the value of juristic ethics reflected, we could divide the theme into three patterns, that is, consanguinity revenge, honor revenge and love revenge. The Greek myth is wonderful, pure, and optimistic. It has no rubs and worries of life, and has no sermon on virtue praise and vice punishment. “So it demonstrates the romantic ancient Greece person’s value orientation, which is more important than moral, the Greek myth praises and admires the man’s original desire nature, for example the glorification of the eroticism and the human body, so it manifests the ancient Greece person’s philosophy idea that the human nature and the human rights are” (Gustav 5). It is held in this article that the myths of different nations undergo their own growth course and boast distinctive spirits and values in the light of those social, historical, psychological distinctions. In Greek myth, Gods are characterized by the strong romantic and ideal inclination, while the China’s myth features the incarnated Saints who are mostly prone to be ethical, historical and moralizing. Myth and legends always go ahead with the human being s slow steps through ages, just like the soul of the national culture itself which continuously wandered. The ancient Chinese myth and legends describe the primitive ancestor’s struggles against nature and bad social powers. Faced with all kinds of dangers, such as misery, hardship, misfortune, fright and death, primitive ancestors are gradually and rationally aware of nature’s alien and super-powers, fighting against bad living conditions bravely. Best known in the world for its magnificence and clear genealogy, Greek myth and legend embody the historical development and mixture of different myths and legends from various areas, races and nations in the world. These myths and legends were originally independent and different from one another, but finally resolved themselves into an identical and unbroken pedigree of Greek gods and a systematic legend of heroes through constant cultural exchange and blending and long years of transformation. Myth is an important way to understand the history of the early spirit of mankind .Exploring the spiritual world of the ancients from the angle of ancient Chinese myth has great realistic significance. It not only helps us to grasp the composition and direction of the national culture from the aspect of primitive culture gene, but also to further understand the more subtle sense of self-regulatory mechanism .Meanwhile, the research on myth provides us a reference to understand and interpret other myth. Pangu mythology as Chinese genesis myth is its outstanding feature of humanism in comparison with the genesis myth of other notions. China’s genesis myth, historicized revision, it 第 4 页 共 12 页 originality, nationality serving as reasonable molecules still run through the body of the later culture. The fountain of humanism in the Chinese culture starts from no where but the humanism embodies in the genesis mythology of China. Myth, as a literary style of human childhood, is full of signs because the narration was going on in a state of psychological unconsciousness. It reveals the initial state of human culture and intellectual activities. Greek myth, a residence of esthetics, interprets the philosophical understanding and esthetic cognition of the origin and the form of the universe. Greek myth, in its religious connotation, expresses the extreme concern of ancient Greek. Ancient Greek philosophers had tried to explain the world at the angle of life, but at last it turned out that they either talked about the universe and nature without the society and life or talked about the society and life without universe and nature. However, the ancient Greek myth, which is pregnant with ancient Greek philosophy and which embodies the pursuits of individual value and dignity, mixed fanciful world and world outlook together. The core of free will in ancient Greek myths is the defiance of Gods and heroes to their fates, which concretely presents the struggle against the external while the other against the internal. The former involves the process from defiance to the nature till to tyranny through a series of myths and epics with a might of knowledge, where the earliest western democracy came forth; the latter presents a kind of will which shows itself perfectly in heroic tragedy wherein there is rational contemplation. Ancient Greek myth has artistic charm and unique feature. It not only has abundant content and lively scenario but has integrated narration and vivid personality. To be the headwaters of western literature, many motifs are derived from it. The motif of incest, the motif of revenge and the motif of deserted wife are the best models. These reflect deep-seated and cultural mentality by different aspects and profiles. The comprehension of human about the ultimate meaning of life is expressed also in them. Hellenism is the origin of European culture, and Greek myth, which plays an imperial role in the western history, even in the whole human history, is regarded as the greatest achievement of Hellenism. “Greek myth has a profound influence on the aspects of literature, language, philosophy, religion, arts and so on” (Swear 6). As an English learner, we should know something about the related English culture. Greece is characterized by a civilization of long standing. Greece has already created pretty rich and varied myths about the sea. And it is the mythologies that make the Greek culture more brilliant. Medea is an ancient Greek tragedy which has never been away from the world stage. Some people say that Euripides is the very first writer who discovered women in Greek literature. The reason for this is that in the said play, the playwright made his changes to fairy tales and legends, and through the tragedy of Medea, he became a pioneer to submit acutely 第 5 页 共 12 页 women issues to the social agenda. Since the time the book Medea by Euripides came out of the press, the person Medea was a peculiar female image in the literary world of ancient Greece. Even up to today, she is still a female of much controversy. She has been aimed at either with sympathy or with criticism by ethic-rooted critics of one generation after another. But no critics can deny the tragic coloring on her. The ethical spirit of a nation is the spiritual pursuit of the nation in knowing itself, perfecting itself and pursuing happiness and value of life. It is completely preserved in the literary works of the nation. There exist very important ethical thinking and ethical conception in ancient Greek mythology in addition to its aesthetic value. The various Gods and heroes show strong inner force in affirming themselves, pursuing freedom, demonstrating human nature and pursuing happiness, which represents the whole man. The mythology is a hot issue in literature research nowadays. “At the century of science, reasonableness and logic, the mythology with the non-reasonableness has the special magic on the literature stage” (Armstrong 7). D. Ethnical and moral principles As is known to Chinese scholars, there is no unified or comprehensive mythic system in China, because ancient Chinese culture belongs to the First Civilization, which is spontaneous. It has rarely inherited or absorbed any elements from other civilizations. Ancient China, situated in the Far East separately, obtained little advanced heterogeneous culture from other nations. The process of mythic historicalization and ethicalization is too early and too profoundly to shape. As a result the current pure mythic materials became fragmentary and incomplete, even self-contradictory. Historicalized systematic myths are full of ethical ideology. On the other hand, the ancient unhistorical zed myths of the Chinese nation lack a systematic and coherent context, like that of Pan-gu and NV WA. Some may think creation myths also undertook the process of historicalization, but they do retain the primitive content. For example, Fuxi still has the animal features, having a dragon s body and man’s head. In the stone carvings of the Han Dynasty, there are pictures of Fuxi and NV WA embracing each other, either with mascots in their hands or with their two tails twisting together. They were the relatively static spirits in ancient Chinese myths and later became the icons for local people to worship. “The key function of historicalization of ancient Chinese myths lies in that there are two different kinds of gods, namely the good and the evil” (Shang 8). The concern for good is greatly emphasized, while the concern for beauty and truth are not so much stressed. Fuxi is worshiped because he made nets for catching fish and 第 6 页 共 12 页 animals by imitating the web of spiders. Pan-gu is praised because he turned into a myriad of things when he died. NV WA is respected because she killed the black dragon to save the people of Jizhou, and she blocked the flood, which might otherwise have drowned the land. In short Chinese mythic stories sing the praise’s of labor and creation, justice and love. Furthermore, they worship perseverance and self-sacrifices. One typical example is the story of Gun and Yu trying to harness the floods. It is said that Yu went through countless hardships, remained unmarried until he was thirty, and left his wife only four days after their wedding and later three times passed by his house only to find no time to enter it, but as he was busy fighting the floods. Finally he brought the floods under control. Therefore, good deeds are encouraged in the Chinese mythic stories. Gods are commonly described as living beings with human qualities and human feelings. Most of them are kind-hearted and good-natured, a few of them are heartless and ruthless just like heartless beings. In many myths, gods have inseparable ties with human beings. They appear in human form, desiring to live a mortal life among human beings. In short, Chinese inventors of myths describe gods the way they describe man, or treat them as if they were human, and endow them with human nature. That is why we often feel, while reading mythic stories, that gods are not dreadful ,but lovable, even admirable, that they are not too high above us, but are like us and quite comprehensible. These myth writers may have been motivated by Confucian teachings about humanity and the Buddhist tenet that good will be rewarded with good and evil repaid with evil. They are the cores of Chinese national spirits. Speaking of the dominating ideology in Chinese history, except for a few lesser reigns in South and North Dynasties, it seldom took the religious form Buddhism and did not control Chinese ideology, though Buddhist influence on literature is more or less found, as in The Pilgrimage to the West, unlike the case with the Bible stories in Europe. “Supposing some Buddhist myths or folk Lories were prevalent in some class society in ancient China, they were doomed to be excluded or even ultimately exiled and assimilated within the privileged class” (Ding 9). y contrast Greek religious classics and mythic stories (including epics) play an B eminent role in Greek national culture. Even if in Europe during the Middle Ages, the Europeans, influenced by both Greek culture and Hebrew culture, thought of religious classics and ancient myths and legends as supreme authorities, even protected their superiority at any cost, such as by making full use of blazing fire punishment or gloomy secret religious courts. However, other fields of culture are taken into less consideration, even metaphysics (philosophy), predominant over all the other fields of subjects, had to act as attached to theology. Contrary to Chinese myths, Greek myths, instead of under 第 7 页 共 12 页 going the process of historicalization, did become predominant over other fields of society, and enjoyed ever lasting fame and worship and insinuated fascinating glamour and influence into other fields of culture. Greek people were regarded as less advanced people, possessing the features of the Third Civilization, which was influenced by Egyptian, Minosian and Baby lonian Civilizations. Also because of the innate features of Oceanic Civilization (showing the qualities of succession and open-mindedness), Greek people were expert in comparing various ancient experiences, practicing their own ability of judgment, absorbing cultural elements from other nations. Influenced by the Third Civilization or Oceanic Civilization, the system of knowledge to which arch spirits could be traced back was formed in the ancient world. And unified and comprehensive mythic system was the earliest record and original expression of the features of the Oceanic Civilization. In Chinese creation myths, goodness is eulogized and promoted, and the good is sharply distinguished from the evil. But in Greek creation myths, it is totally a different situation. The Greek Olympian Gods possess various complex personalities. It is fairly hard to generalize them by means of the distinction between good and evil. In those Olympian Gods, obviously, we can feel a tendency of non-ethics. Most strikingly of all, they embody the overwhelming and miraculous powers, and their powers are different from each other. In other words, what the Greek creation myths praised are not noble people who rescued people from hardships and suffering, nor those whoever self-disciplined or strict with themselves, but masters who were able either to order nature about or bring about radical changes in the situations, briefly speaking, they were beings of powers and techniques. In the Greek people’s eyes, good and evil are intermingled, the whole of which are mysteriously inexplicable techniques of the gods or the power of fate, the unfathomable and uncontrollable ocean of desires. “Cronus swallowed his children for fear that one of his children might dethrone him some day” (Switch 10). Zeus punished his cousin Prometheus, even though Prometheus took sides with him when he defeats the Titans. And Hera was jealous of any other woman who had love affairs with Zeus, her husband and finally brought injury to all of them .Therefore, the basic spiritual element in Greek creation myths is the pursuit to find admiration for powers, including powers of Pre-Olympian Gods and of the Olympian gods. The worship for them soon resulted in the explanation of the secret of powers and the curiosity for knowledge, and still the study of how to handle and control the powers. The scope of the powers in Greek myths is different from that of the ethics expounded in the Chinese creation myths. The powers are neither ethical nor counter-ethical ,but non-ethical, beyond the range of either good or evil .The ancient Greek philosophers considered that all the natural powers, social powers as well as 第 8 页 共 12 页 the various other phenomena resulted from the powers that had come from one primitive and purified origin, either the gods or the water, fire, atoms or some concept .At this stage, man should seek after the systematic by means of using knowledge, improve the value of life, so as to become living beings competing with gods. To serve the purpose, such knowledge is supposed to be systematic and interrelated or associated with each other. Generally speaking, the pursuit of and search for the knowledge are not parallel with the principle of ethics or the demarcation between good and evil. “They are categorized rather into man’s awareness of the outer world (including social and natural aspects) than the mere various conflicts of worldly interests against one another” (Hamilton 10). Therefore, the Greek creation myths are unavoidably marked by the sign of “immoral” or “imbalanced” when analyzed with the principle of good and evil. In short, the non-ethical powers converged into the Greek myth of creation myths in a natural way. IV. Reasons for the Similarities and Differences Between Chinese Myth and Greek Myth A. Forces of Ethics and Powers Co-exist Chinese and Greek Creation Myths, as a matter of fact, the aggregated forces of ethics and powers co-exist in a way within one civilization center. As far as the creation myths are concerned, these two tendencies are interdependent on each other, though what is primary is different from what is secondary. In Greek creation myths, there are some ethical notions. For instance, when Deucalion and Pyrrha entered a temple defaced with slime, approached the enkindled altar and prayed for guidance and aid, the oracle answered, “Depart from the temple with head veiled and garments unbound, and cast behind you the bones of your mother” (Cui 47). They heard the words with astonishment. Pyrrha first broke silence, “We can not obey, and we dare not profane the remains of our parents.” At this stage, the myth shows that Deucalion and Pyrrha were respectful to their grandmother, the Earth. In Chinese creation myths, ethics undoubtedly plays an essential part as we have discussed. Nonetheless, there are some parts concerning the concept of powers. For instance, in NV WA’s myth, the black dragon always brought disasters to the local people on the Central Plain. Another instance is that in the myth of Gong Gong knocking his head against the Mountain, Gong Gong fought with Zhuanxu for the throne” (Cui 11). In his rage he knocked his head against Mt Buzhou. Besides, in the myth of harnessing the flood, the Heavenly emperor ordered Zhurong to execute Gun near Yushan Mountain. Gun’s conflict with the emperor and his tragic ending are similar to the 第 9 页 共 12 页 struggling between Cronus and Zeus and Cronus tragic ending in being dethroned. B. Extent Philosophical Elements In Chinese creation myths, there are to some extent philosophical elements, too. From the ethical ideology, we might well find out some tragic conflicts and primitive fighting at close quarters. Every cultural nation possesses its obvious psychological features and expression. Therefore, when it’s national history began to take shape, or before that, their myth began to come into existence. National spirits are contained both in history and myth. In this chapter, national spirits are merely discussed in terms of the expressions in both Greek and Chinese creation myths. C. Dominating Factors From the Greek and Chinese histories of cultural development in ancient times, we can find that the dominating factors contributing to the national spirits are economic ones in Greek culture and political ones in Chinese culture respectively. In other words, Greek myth and Greek national spirits were developed by means of the aggregated forces of economy, power and technology, while Chinese myth and Chinese national spirits resulted from rituals, etiquette and ethics. As a result, two types of myths and national spirits came into existence. Politics is stressed in Chinese history. For three thousand years, as the largest steady political body in the world, the feudal China reached the highest level in feudal society. Thus, Chinese national spirits are characterized by ethical ideology, while Greek national development is supported by its economic, technological and military forces. Therefore, Greek national spirits are featured by power. These different national spirits are reflected and implied in their respective myths. And myths nourished these two types of cultures and national spirits. At that stage, the logic relations between myths and national spirits influenced both of the two people’s way of thinking and living. V. Conclusion As two great resources of ethical culture and accumulation of ethical spirit, Chinese and Greek myths differ from each other with distinctive features. This article compares the mythology of the two great cultures and explores the causes for the differences in the aspects like the images of Gods and men, the attitudes to gods, the changes, the ethical psychology and spirit behind the mythology. Many scholars from domestic and foreign 第 10 页 共 12 页 attempt to analyze the special essence of the Greek myth and its art source from different aspect, but the majority of people have not made essential analysis, thus it lacks the integrity to the Greek myth artistry analysis and lacks the literature and the representative work written by ancient Greek writer. This paper elaborates reasons between Chinese myth and Greek myth from the view of similarities and differences. First of all, there are four aspects in the similarities, e.g., the general content of myth of creation of the world, the myth of flood and fire, the origin of animal and plant, the myth of reforming nature and resisting despotic heroes. Second, the differences also include four points, e.g., the system of Gods, the image of Gods, the nature of Gods, ethnical and moral principles. Third, this paper has three reasons for the similarities and differences between Chinese myth and Greek myth, for instance, forces of ethics and powers co-exist, extent philosophical elements, dominating factors. In a word, this paper, through the contrastive analysis of the differences between Chinese myth and Greek myth, is trying to let more people not only know about the Chinese myth and Greek myth, but also be familiar with them and understand them completely. Works Cited Armstrong. The Short History of Myth. Chongqing: The Chongqing Press, 2005. Green. The Tales of Greek Myth. Shanghai: Foreign Teaching Press, 2003. Gustav, Schwab. The Tales of Greek Myth. Xian: Shanxi Normal University, 2002. Hamilton, Edith. Mythology-Timeless Tales of Gods and Heroes. New York: The New American Library, 2001. Swear, Ancient Greek Myths and Legends. Beijing: The Yanshan Press, 2002 Switch. Greek Myths and Legends. Beijing: The People Literature Press, 1984. Thomas, Bulfinch. The Age of Fable. Beijing: Foreign Language Teaching and Research Press, 2008. Thomas, Bulfinch. The Greek and Roman Myth. Shenzhen: Haitian Press, 2003 崔冠之. 希腊神话与传说[M]. 北京: 学苑出版社, 2002. 丁往道. 中国神话及志怪小说一百篇[M]. 北京: 中国对外翻译出版公司, 1991. 尚燕彬. 中国古代神话与传说[M]. 北京: 北京燕山出版社, 2002. 乙力. 中国古代神话故事[M]. 兰州: 兰州大学出版社, 2000. 第 11 页 共 12 页