SEMINAR PROFILE

H19 -
Gilgamesh, the Mesopotamian Epic from ancient Iraq

The oldest great poem in the world, reaching its standard form in about the thirteenth century BCE, the poem is the story of Gilgamesh, the Sumerian king of Uruk and his response to the death of his beloved companion Enkidu the Wild Man. The poem is the prototype of epic celebrations of the hero and the prototype of poetic awareness of the cost of heroic pride. We will see that its importance isn't only in it earliness or in the literary resources it's the prototype of but its relevance to the history of the cultures of ancient Mesopotamia and most of all in the heartbreaking power, energy, and pathos of its telling.

Scholar:

David Ferry

Location:

Harvard Hillel

Dates:

11/5/2012, 11/16/2012

H19 -	Gilgamesh, the Mesopotamian Epic from ancient Iraq

	The oldest great poem in the world, reaching its standard form in about the thirteenth century BCE, the poem is the story of Gilgamesh, the Sumerian king of Uruk and his response to the death of his beloved companion Enkidu the Wild Man. The poem is the prototype of epic celebrations of the hero and the prototype of poetic awareness of the cost of heroic pride. We will see that its importance isn't only in it earliness or in the literary resources it's the prototype of but its relevance to the history of the cultures of ancient Mesopotamia and most of all in the heartbreaking power, energy, and pathos of its telling.

		Scholar:	David Ferry
		Location:	Harvard Hillel
		Dates:	11/5/2012, 11/16/2012