Category: Gilgamesh

Circulation, again

sophushelle

In my response to a set of articles on circulation, I use the travels of Gilgamesh—both the text and the character—as a framing device to explore the rhythm of movement and return that shapes the concept of circulation. I argue that textual circulation consists of an alternation of difference and sameness at a number of different, interwoven levels, from the copy that repeats, returns to, and unavoidably differs from its Vorlage to the translation that both is and is not the same text as its source. To study circulation is thus to study a rhythm of sameness and difference as it unfolds simultaneously at various different levels, yielding “galaxies” of textual multiplicity.

“Gilgamesh Returns.” Articultations, by Temporal Communities. June 2024. Link.

Tales on tablets

sophushelle

For the volume on cuneiform narratives I co-edited, I wrote about the episodic nature of Babylonian epics. Akkadian narrative poems were often divided into a series of tablets, and those tablets—I argue—shaped the story told upon them. In Gilgamesh, divisions between tablets often correspond to physical borders in the story, in a conflation of form and content; and in Enuma Elish, the events of Tablet I take on a very different tenor if they are read in the isolated context of that Tablet, instead of the epic as a whole.

“Tablets as Narrative Episodes in Babylonian Poetry,” in The Shape of Stories: Narrative Structures in Cuneiform Literature, edited by Sophus Helle and Gina Konstantopoulos, Cuneiform Monographs 54 (2023, Leiden: Brill), pp. 93–111. Link.

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“A bird called back”

sophushelle

In a short response to Adam Miglio’s insightful article on bird calls in Gilgamesh, I argue that the birds find a larger thematic resonance in the epic’s exploration of the outermost borders of humanity: the birds in Gilgamesh are repeatedly shown perching on the messy border between the human and non-human.

“Commentary,” in Journal of Near Eastern Studies, vol. 81, no. 1 (April 2022), pp. 179–80. Link.

Gilgamesh in English

sophushelle

The book includes a translation of Gilgamesh, and five essays that introduce readers to the world of the epic. The translation is a fresh take on the ancient epic and seeks to bring out the poetic power, clarity, and enchanting cadence of the original text. The essays discuss the epic’s long history, its literary form, its depiction of emotions (especially the homoerotic bond between the main characters), its engagement with death and the power of narrative, and its social context, including the role of women and of the natural world.

Gilgamesh: A New Translation of the Ancient Epic. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2021. Link.

The two-act structure

sophushelle

The majority of Babylonian epics are organized according to the same narrative structure: the story is divided into two acts, where the second act mirrors and expands the first. The essay shows that this structure applies to Atra-hasis, Enuma Elish, Gilgamesh, Etana, and more, for a total of nine texts.

“The two-act structure: A narrative device in Akkadian epics,” Journal of Ancient Near Eastern Religions, vol. 20, no. 2 (2020 [April 2021]), p. 190–224. Link.

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Thresholds in Gilgamesh

sophushelle

The essay explores the representation of time and space in Gilgamesh. The figure of the threshold is a key aspect of the epic, separating highly different, but internally homogeneous kinds of time and space—a structure that also affects its depiction of characters and textuality.

“The chronotope of the threshold in the Epic of Gilgamesh,” Journal of the American Oriental Society, vol. 141, no. 1 (April 2021), p. 185–200. Link.

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A subversive foundation

sophushelle

Why has Gilgamesh achieved a much more solid place in the modern canon than any other work of ancient Near Eastern literature? The essay proposes that the epic’s modern canonicity is specifically due to the fact that it can be read as both subversive and foundational.

“Gilgamesh: A subversive foundation,” in Antike Kanonisierungsprozesse und Identitätsbildung in Zeiten des Umbruchs, edited by Marcel Friesen and Christoph Leonard Hesse, Wissenschaftliche Schriften der WWU Münster 28 (2019, Münster: Westfälische Wilhelms-Universität), pp. 27–41. Link.

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The uncertainty of death

sophushelle

In a monologue on mortality from the tenth tablet of Gilgamesh, the sage Uta-napishti depicts death through a set of poetic paradoxes: death is both certain, since it cannot be avoided, and uncertain, since we cannot know anything about it. The essay studies how Uta-napishti represents what he claims to be unrepresentable.

“Babylonian perspectives on the uncertainty of death: SB Gilgamesh X 301-321”, Kaskal, vol. 14 (2017), pp. 211–19.

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Emotions in Gilgamesh

sophushelle

My MA thesis examines the depiction of emotions in Gilgamesh. It focuses first on the love between Gilgamesh and Enkidu, then on the grief that afflicts Gilgamesh when Enkidu dies. I argue that the affective bond between the two heroes leads to a dynamic interplay of difference and identification.

“Emotions in Gilgamesh: Desire, grief, and identity in the Standard Babylonian Epic of Gilgamesh.” Unpublished MA thesis, University of Copenhagen (August 2016).

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