Ur-Narrative and the Sun Myth

Abstract

Ur-narrative can be briefly defined as the earliest narrative about the movement of the sun that also gives birth to sun myth. This chapter will examine the relationship between Ur-narrative and sun myth, analyze the traces of Ur-narrative in sun myth, and explore the initial formations and causes in order to enhance our understanding of the origins and evolution of narrative. Ur-narrative has a far-reaching influence on the cognitive development of humans: the movement of the sun from east to west in the daytime and the imagined movement from west to east at night provided the deep structure and basic conflicts for the early men’s storytelling. From the sun’s cyclical movement arose the circle theory that brought people to presume that “the circle is valuable”, and Yi Jing (or, The Book of Change), a book also based upon the circle theory, and all of these played a significant role in the development of narrative in later ages. By criticizing Northrop Frye’s otherwise impressive work on sun myth, we can pin down the functions of Ur-narrative in the history of narrative development. The reasons why ancient people kept telling sun stories is that these stories could increase their sense of mastery of the world by consolidating their faith in the order and rules of the universe. In a world where the sun rises every day and light triumphs over darkness, man is not supposed to lose his faith in his own destiny. In constructing a Chinese Narratology with its own features and system, Ur-narrative should have a very important role to play, because Chinese people think of themselves as being the descendants of Yandi and Huangdi who are actually gods of light.