/lit/ - Literature

[Anonymous No.14714987]

Just finished reading the epic of Gilgamesh.

Do you guys think a man named Gilgamesh really was king of Uruk at some point in history? What is so special about him that he deserves fame everlasting? (Assuming of course that the stories of his exploits are fictitious/exaggerated)

[MKULTRA CHAD: Default Whitman,(...) No.14715072]

BASED GILGAMESH POSTER

[Anonymous No.14715088]

>>14714987
>Do you guys think a man named Gilgamesh really was king of Uruk at some point in history?
That's a profoundly irrelevant question.
>What is so special about him that he deserves fame everlasting?
Being a character in an old and very good book.

[Anonymous No.14715116]

>>14715088
You obviously aren't super familiar with the poem. The "epic" itself is a babylonian poem over the life of Gilgamesh and Enkidu, but there are several other poems about his exploits both earlier and later. He was an extremely popular literary character and many different scholars wrote about him in different ways. I could be wrong but such a thing doesn't really exist now outside of folk heroes like Paul bunyan and pecos bill

[Anonymous No.14715293]

>>14715116
I'm familiar enough with the book, considering the fact that I've read it. The things you say don't really prove why the question is relevant.
It is actually very common for a historical figure, especially in older and folk literature, to morph from anything resembling historical truth into a literary convention, a motif that travels and lives through various texts and has layers upon layers of new meaning and mythology added to it. At that point we're not talking about historical facts that lie in the core of the character, but the literary, the meaning that the character emits.
That's likely how, say, the stories about the Trojan war, king Arthur, and most myths in general, have formed - repetition of historical facts with variation and embellishment, soon "devolving" into art.

[Anonymous No.14716169]

>>14714987
Do you think the scribes have Gilgamesh an existential fear of death ironically, anticipating that the character would live on forever in text, or do you think it came from a common fear that Sumerians shared?

Obviously searching for immortality is a very common theme throughout history. But the fact that he is one of the longest lasting characters in history with this debilitating fear is very interesting

[MKULTRA CHAD: SUPERCHRIST PONT(...) No.14716566]

>>14716169
dude
its death.
wtf
is that a Sumerian problem?
just sayin