母题研究是比较文学范畴内的主题学研究中极为重要的一部分。本文拟以中西两位现代主义作家沈从文和舍伍德·安德森的代表作《边城》和《小城畸人》为例,结合中国儒家思想和西方人文主义传统分别对沈从文、安德森的小说创作造成的影响,探讨“忧患”母题在两部作品中的不同表现:乐感的“忧患”和悲感的“忧患”。 Motif research is an extremely important part of the thematic study in the field of comparative literature. This article intends to take two Chinese and Western modernist writers Shen Congwen and Sherwood Anderson’s representative works “Border Town” and “Tortoise” as example, and discusses the influence of Chinese Confucianism and Western humanism tradition on Shen Congwen and Anderson’s novels respectively “Suffering ” motif in the two works of different performance: music “worry ” and “sad ”.