中秋节介绍英文分析.ppt

The Mid-Autumn Festival The Mid-Autumn Festival，also known as the Moon Cake Festival, is a popular harvest festival celebrated by Chinese people, dating back over 3,000 years to moon worship in China’s Shang Dynasty. The Mid-Autumn Festival is held on 15th day of the eighth month in the Chinese lunar calendar, which is usually around mid or late September in the Gregorian calendar. It is a date that parallels the autumn and Spring Equinoxes of the solar calendar. The traditional food of this festival is the moon cake, of which there are many different varieties. Traditionally, on this day, Chinese family members and friends will gather to admire the bright mid-autumn harvest moon, and eat moon cakes together. Other Food One of the most famous stories about the Mid-Autumn Festival is Houyi and Chang’e. There are many versions of this story. The following is one of them. Chang’e and Houyi were immortals living in heaven, One day, the ten sons of the Jade Emperor transformed into ten suns, causing the earth to scorch. Having failed to order his sons to stop ruining the earth, the jade emperor summoned Houyi for help. Houyi, using his legendary archery skills, shot down nine of the sons, but spared one son to be the sun. the Jade Emperor was obviously displeased with houyi’s solution to save the earth. As a punishment, he banished Houyi and Chang’e to live as mere mortals on earth. Seeing that Chang’e felt extremely miserable over her loss of immortality, Houyi decided to travel on a long, perilous quest to find the pill of immortality so that the couple could be immortals again. At the end of his quest, he met the Queen Mother of the West, who agreed to give him the pill, but warned him that each person would only need half a pill to regain immortality. Houyi brought the pill home and stored it in a case. He warned Chang’e not open the case, and then left home for a while. Like Pandora in Greek mythology, Chang’e became curious. She opened up the case and found the