Gilgamesh: A New Rendering in English Verse

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Our Price: $11.00

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Description: This is one of the more recent translations of the Babylonian Epic of Gilgamesh, about the hero-king of ancient Mesopotamia whose adventures--searching for eternal life, surviving a worldwide deluge in an ark filled with animals, to name a couple--make up one of oldest pieces of literature on record. David Ferry's version attempts to provide the most readable rendering of the epic, artfully finding a poetic voice that's particularly accessible to the modern ear, as well as working to smooth over the gaps in the poem caused by the fragmentary record of the original clay tablets.

Genre: Gilgamesh; Sociology; Poetry; American - General; Folklore and Mythology - Mythology; Poetry / General; Adaptations;

Average Review: 4 stars

Review: An Amazing Story : I first encountered the tale of Gilgamesh in my college mythology class in which we used this version by David Ferry. As has been said before it is a very good translation of an epic story. Now some might not like the idea that Ferry took some poetic liberties with the story, but by keeping it a literal translation you lose the power and beauty of the story, and basically the main point of the mythos.