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Gilgamesh: Book Talk Summary by BB

Seven of us met to discuss Gilgamesh.  Our hostess/book sponsor passed around pages of cuneiform and pictures of ancient statues of Gilgamesh and Humbaba, then read from the text.  

We marveled over the story line—Gilgamesh’s initial self-centeredness, the civilizing effect of love-making on Enkidu, the deep friendship between the two men and their adventures in the Cedar Forest and with the Bull of Heaven, Enkidu’s death which plunges Gilgamesh into mourning and causes him to seek immortality, and finally at the end of his quest his acceptance of the human condition.  

Our discussion took many tangents—BC/AD versus BCE/CE, homoeroticism, blessings and curses, gender roles in the ancient world.  (What would be Rachel Lloyd’s take on the cult of sacred priestess/prostitute?)  But ultimately we kept returning to the text to read aloud from Stephen Mitchell’s beautiful rendition of the poem.

By the way, the March 4 issue of the New Yorker contains “Summer of ‘38” by Colm Toibin—whom we know as the author of Brooklyn—which deals with family secrets, the subject of our last month’s post-meeting conversation over birthday cake.

Gilgamesh Modernized

Interested in what critics had to say?  New York Times review

   My Gilgamesh

At Barnes and Noble

this past Sunday night

after I thought

I had spent

a profitless day

looking at

Easter hats

in front of

St. Patrick’s Cathedral

I found Stephen Mitchell’s

translation of Gilgamesh

telling of one who had

seen all

who had felt all

who had journeyed

to the edge of the world

who carved his trials

on stone tablets

who restored the

holy Eanna Temple

sacred to Ishta

and slew Humbaba in

the cedar forest then lost

the marvelous plant

which was the antidote

to the fear of death

and finally resolved his grief

with a walk on the wall of Urek

observing its gleaming ramparts

its glorious palaces and marketplaces.

My eyes ran with this verse

I was like the watcher of the skies

who sees a new planet swim into view

and I was like the beguiled poet who read

Chapman’s Homer first time.

Gail Tuch

Reminder that the March book is not just any old Gilgamesh...it is the version by Stephen Mitchell.  Don't show up with your old college version and think you can talk myths at the March meeting. ( February's review of  In the Garden of the Beasts is below."

In the Garden of the Beasts: Meeting Notes

Not one, not two, but three cakes were brought to celebrate a member's birthday.  Unbeknownst to each other, three book clubbers decided to remember a birthday--including the birthday celebrant herself.  The white cardboard boxes were lined up on the counter waiting for  the meeting to be over to reveal their deliciousness.   Short story fodder?  Think O'Henry?  Reader you will have to wait until the meeting notes to find out more about the cakes.

The meeting was all positiveness about the book--one of the most positive group reactions in recent memory (which granted is not very long nowadays).   The presenter encouraged the group to not only talk about the content--Hitler's early Nazification of Germany but also the technique that the author used to make this nonfiction so appealing.

Several members initially had low expectations for their enjoyment of a book on a very familiar topic;  yet once they started In the Garden of The Beasts they were enthralled by it and its revelations. So much so that some members felt that what they were reading was fictionalized despite all of the footnotes.  Don't skip them, by the way!

The main characters  William E. Dodd, ambassador from America to Germany--and his daughter Martha (his wife and son are minor players) are naive Americans who share the negative view held by the majority of  their fellow Americans towards Jews and towards getting involved in foreign wars.  (No chance they would enter a foreign war to stop persecution of Jews.)  In short, the Dodds are imperfect, flawed characters.  Dodd will not do anything extraordinary or history making.  Just like many others Dodd meets with Hitler and comes away believing in the villain's desire for peace; although by the end of his tenure Dodd understands the beast for what he is.  Martha is remarkably free and independent; she falls for the beauty of the Nazi youth as she falls for a long line of men.  (Slut one member called her; which led to a side chat about the sexism of the term.  Can a man be a slut? Yes? No? Can you be a slut if Carl Sandburg is your lover and sends you poetry?)

As to technique; one member used this metaphor:  Erik Larson structured his book much like a Downtown Abbey episode--focusing on one angle, person or story; leaving them to go on to another and another before returning. Pulling the reader in and moving them along, keeping them hooked.  Even the use of chapter titles smacked of fiction writing.

Now for dessert:  Two cakes from Little Red Hen--one chocolate; one apple pie.  One chocolate cake from Sweet Melissas.  (I should have heated it; tasted better that way!  Yes I had another slice.)  So much left that we briefly considered freezing them and bringing them back to every book group meeting until they were eaten. Briefly.

Oh:  Don't forget Gilgamesh next month.  Not just any edition--see earlier entry.  And if Gilgamesh is   the search term that is getting hits from porno sites--it is getting deleted.