The first day of school - how different it looks in the midst of the COVID 19 pandemic. This is what my first day of school looks like today.
I designed two World Literature classes over 10 years ago, and have taught both of them multiple times. If you look back in this blog to 2012 you'll see a blog on Gilgamesh. For the past few years, I have taught British Literature, which is great fun, but I'm happy to be back with my old pals Gilgamesh and Enkidu!
Gilgamesh is the first extant literature, written initially in Sumerian as poetry in 2100 B.C.E., and adapted in Babylonian a few hundred years later. It was very popular during its time, but disappeared sometime in the 7th century B.C.E. If not for an English explorer, Austen Henry Layard, digging up the tablets in the 1850s, and the discovery by George Smith at the British Museum in London that the epic contained a flood account similar to the biblical flood, Gilgamesh may have remained in obscurity. Thank you, gentlemen!
What makes ancient literature so relatable, so endearing, so indestructible? The tropes in ancient literature are echoed in modern-day society. Those age-old themes of man against man, man against himself, man against God/gods, and the quest for immortality, a legacy, a place in history... these are not just ancient. They are very modern. Lin-Manuel Miranda understood this when he wrote the songs to the hit musical Hamilton. Alexander Hamilton sought to make a difference, to be remembered, to live on in his words. He fought against men, against God, and against his own baser instincts. His story is popular today because we can relate. He had his band of close friends - John Laurens, the Marquis de Lafayette, and Hercules Mulligan. Some of the content of the letters between John Laurens and Alexander Hamilton may portend a homoerotic relationship. This is also the case in Gilgamesh!
Gilgamesh and Enkidu - what can I say. They are a mismatched pair, for certain. One is the urban, urbane male. Gilgamesh does have a few, shall we say, character flaws. He sleeps with all the women of Uruk before their husbands can and drafts all the young men into the army. The people complain to the gods, so they create a "companion" for Gilgamesh -- enter Enkidu. "To his stormy heart, let that one be equal" (Foster 22). Gilgamesh and Enkidu have the first "bromance" in literature! Gilgamesh's mother Ninsun tells him his dream about Enkidu means he "will fall in love with him and caress him like a woman" (Foster 29). After Gilgamesh and Enkidu meet, they engage in a fierce wrestling match. My male students tell me many of their friendships started as a fight or a conflict! After Gilgamesh prevailed "they kissed each other and made friends" (Foster 31). Keep in mind, in that culture men kissed as a sign of friendship; they still do in many Middle Eastern countries. Were Gilgamesh and Enkidu friends, or lovers? There are arguments to be made on both sides.
In my next post, we'll look at Gilgamesh's quest for immortality.
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Foster, Benjamin, translater. Gilgamesh. The Norton Anthology of World Literature, Shorter Fourth
Edition, edited by Martin Puchner, et al. WW Norton & Company, 2019.
