文化视域:中西悼亡诗中的女性形象——兼谈元稹与弥尔顿的悼亡诗

Cultural Perspective: Female Images in Chinese and Western Elegies——Elegies of Yuan Zhen and Milton

中西方悼亡诗虽然由于文化语境而存在差异,但是二者都是用哀伤的调子唱出的赞美诗。中国古代悼亡诗中的女性形象大多是贤妻良母型的,而西方悼亡诗中的女性形象多纯洁貌美。这源于中西方文化的不同:中国古代文化是道德文化,男性往往追求社会价值,家庭只能退居其次。女性作为家庭的主要牺牲者,只有当她死亡时,男性才能体会其重要性,于是悼亡诗成为彰显妻子美德的颂歌。西方文化是科学文化,这种文化的抽象性和分析性、个体本位的人本主义特性使西方人崇尚理性和自由,注重表现自我情感,女性被看成独立的个体,此外爱美的传统使妇女具有较高的社会地位,因此在西方西方悼亡诗中,女性是爱和美的化身。

Chinese and western elegies are different because of different cultural contexts, but the two are hymns sung with a sad tune. The female images in ancient Chinese elegies are mostly regarded as an understanding wife and loving mother, and the images of women in Western elegies are purer and more beautiful. This is the result of differences between Chinese and western cultures. Chinese ancient culture is the moral culture, men tend to pursue the social value, and the family can only take the second place. As the main victims in the family, only when women died, the men can realize their importance, so the mourning poems become the ode manifesting the virtue for wives. Western culture is a culture of science, the culture characteristics of abstraction and analysis, humanism of individual standard make west-erners advocate rationality and freedom, paying attention to the performance of self emotion, and women are regarded as individuals. In addition to the beauty of the tradition women have higher social status, so in the western elegies, women are the embodiment of love and beauty.