The epic of Gilgamesh
"The Epic of Gilgamesh is the world's oldest epic masterpiece. More than a thousand years before Homer or the Bible, Mesopotamian poets sang of the hero-king Gilgamesh, who sought to crown his superhuman exploits by finding eternal life. This Norton Critical Edition presents translations by Benjamin R. Foster, Douglas Frayne, and Gary Beckman of the entire Gilgamesh narrative tradition, with some texts now in English for the first time. In addition to the eleven tablets of the great Akkadian epic, written about 1700 B.C.E., the book includes seven Sumerian poems about Gilgamesh, written before 2000 B.C.E., as well as the later Hittite version and other related sources, among them a Babylonian parody of the epic." ""Criticism" provides interpretive essays by William Moran, Thorkild Jacobsen, and Riykah Harris and concludes with a modern poetic response to the Gilgamesh epic by Hillary Major." "A Glossary of Proper Names and a Selected Bibliography are also included."--BOOK JACKET.
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- In addition to the book written by the author of this article, there is another fascinating study about the discovery of the Assyrian archives and the recovery of the Epic of Gilgamesh:
David Damrosch (2007) Buried Book: The Loss and Rediscovery of the Great Epic of Gilgamesh
https://www.amazon.com/Buried-Book-Rediscovery-Great-Gilgame...
- There is an episode on the Epic of Gilgamesh which is absolutely fascinating. Highly recommended.
- I'll check that one out.
John Harris' "Epic of Gilgamesh" podcast is also a good reading of the text, though it's probably not as dramatic.
- Italo Calvino is a likable person, and I'm glad he wrote one of my personal classics: "Se una notte d'inverno un viaggiatore" is an extraordinary book. I've also enjoyed most of his works, especially "Le città invisibili" & "Cosmicomics". If you haven't read any of these, try them or his famous trilogy: they all have that special signature of his, but they're different enough that you might like one and not the other.
About reading the classics too early, I've experienced it, but I also had the opposite feeling. I had little pleasure reading Homer when I was a teenager, but was enthusiastic about the "Odyssey" twenty years later. The translation played a big part in that change of heart, going from prose to rimes, but I believe my age and my larger culture was necessary to fully enjoy it.
On the other side, I read quite a few of Balzac's novels when in high school, and my favorites were "Eugénie Grandet" and "La peau de chagrin". Somewhere in my thirties, I reread the latter and thought it was awful, so pretentious and pseudo-philosophical that I dropped it before the end.
Reading the classics is still the best way to travel for me. I feel I've lived many years in some kind of half-mythical Russia of the last two centuries. I saw the whole Mediterranean world through Herodotus' eyes. My years as a child were heroic thanks to Dumas and Tolkien.
Later on, classics destroyed my condescending attitude to past ages. Reading "Orlando Furioso", I was astonished to read feminist opinions by a man writing around 1500. IIRC, Arioste wrote that a woman sleeping with a man before marriage was no big deal, that they should try a few guys before choosing the best one. Another Italian classic of the same period, "La Gerusalemme liberata", had the same impact on my vision of the late Middle Age, and was an even better read. For another example, as much as I adored Shakespeare as a young adult, when I discovered the Greek theater of Euripides and Sophocles, I saw that having emotional and deep characters was nothing new.
Italo Calvino did not mention a special kind of classics that many people know in an altered way: the religious literature, and especially the Bible (not the King James). Some of these texts are boring to a non-religious reader, but other are fantastic, like Job and Qohelet. To dive in an even older world, "The Epic of Gilgamesh" and a bit of Sumerian literature gave me a strong connection to people that disappeared milleniums ago.
- The book "War" by Sebastian Junger. I don't know the page but that doesn't matter, it is a good book.James Galbraith - The Predator State maybe a bit. Oh and Andrés Reséndez - A Land So Strange - The Epic Journey of Cabeza de Vaca of course!! Robert Dallek - Nixon and Kissinger - Partners in Power (2007), Epic of Gilgamesh, Richard Dawkins - The Selfish Gene, Niel Strauss - The Game.
That about covers it. It took me about an hour to compose the list, the main point it brings across is a very nuanced understanding of what it is to be human, described by the people that often have experienced the what they write about. since I'm the composer, I think it might help to mention that I am rated near genius (just as a rough measure - I know it has downsides - however in my case I far exceed my actual score due to some other knobs and whistles I came pre-equiped with). You're welcome. Cunt. :P
- This comes off as claiming that no one could possibly read Harry Potter if they haven't read The Illiad yet, nor the Illiad if they haven't read the Epic of Gilgamesh.
