Originally posted August 21, 2017
The Gilgamesh Project began for me last year. I have been wanting to tell one of the great Epics for many years, but wasn't ready. I had been working on Beowulf, but it wasn't speaking to me. Ironic, as it is one of my favourite stories. I have over seven different translations, retellings!
My son had been studying mythology at high school. It bothered me that so much was omitted in some of the stories. Characters were missing. What I thought were essential plot schemes were absent, and to me, it seemed wrong. I understand these books cannot contain the full stories. One book with all these myths and legends would be too big to lift, but still. When my daughter began to study Ancient Civilization I decided to learn Gilgamesh, to tell at her school. I saw one version they were learning from and saw huge parts missing again. I read other parts added - not in any version I have seen and read! I wanted to create a telling of the story which stayed faithful to the original. I dove in and found a story I connected with and fell in love with.
Learning a story like this means, for me, immersing myself in it. I re-read the two books I had, one a translation by John Gardner and John Maier, the other being N. K. Sandars. Sandars does not work from the original cuneiform, but from German, French and English translations he had available. I then found Stephen Mitchell's wonderful poetic retelling, which captured a magical part of the story I had not felt, up to that point. I then invested in Andrew George's 1999 translation. Since these books have been produced, another tablet was discovered in 2015. I read about that, and what it contained. I then set to work.
Several months later I had a working story which stayed close to the translations I was working from. I did not use the children's retellings, but stuck with the full versions. I wanted to present the story authentically to middle school aged people and their teachers. I felt I had to make a few small changes. The last thing I wanted to do was have agitated parents calling me up, or schools getting upset. The part where Ishtar's priestess Shamhat "couples with Enkidu" for seven days straight became 'the priestess and Enkidu stayed together and danced for seven days.' In other versions written for young people, this is missed out all together. I feel that Shamhat tames Enkidu, so that Enkidu can tame Gilgamesh. We need to know this event happens. These are the sort of changes I have made. I used semantics to disguise what was happening in places. The story retains its gore, but this is not any worse than the six o'clock news or what is seen on people's devices and apps like SnapChat.
I was able to present my retelling of Gilgamesh to the entire 6th grade at my local middle school. About 175 students and all their teachers (Mathematics, English, Science etc. as well as Social Studies) attended. It was well received. In fact some of the boys wanted more gore! Of course.
Over the summer I worked on the book form with the idea of making it available for teachers, using my telling, and the books I have, as resources. This telling is, I hope, engaging to the younger reader and accessible to the youth of today. It is not inappropriate and remains authentic to the original cuneiform tale. At the back of the book there is a bibliography, a character list, a vocabulary word list/lexicon, and some activities for readers, which Social Studies and English teachers might enjoy using.
There will also be an audio available of the book. This is script read, and not a live storytelling, which I normally do, from the book. I am hoping all this will be out, released and in the big, wide world by the end of September 2017 at the latest.
Watch this space!
Peace,
Simon
21st August, 2017
I think Shamash will go into hiding today for a brief time!
Artwork by Aidan Brooks