Bruises and Blessings:
Gilgamesh #1
Feraco
Myth to Science Fiction
30 September 2009
Gilgamesh has survived in our world
because a constellation of our emotions is
reflected in it. We could almost say that
anything so profoundly human as the
image of Gilgamesh was bound to
reappear, yet we are still surprised to
learn that one of the very oldest stories
of man is so inherently contemporary…In
an age in which we consume and are
consumed by a superfluity of onedimensional images, this poem calls us to
be profound.
Herbert Mason
A Question for Reflection
 Is it really better to have loved and lost
than to never have loved at all? Is your
happiness worth that pain?
 “The way to love anything is to realize
that it might be lost.”
G.K. Chesterton
There’s More to It
 We’re reading a portion of the Gilgamesh
tales; Mason focuses on this portion “for
reasons of dramatic unity”
 The story, which seems to wander
around in the beginning (forest
creatures! wrestling! bulls!), eventually
centers on Gilgamesh’s quest to
essentially defeat death
 However, Mason points out that there are
many other questions to consider within
the narrative, and there’s one question
(with a billion sub-questions, of course)
that I want to focus on today
The Bigger Picture
 For example, the book isn’t just about
death, but about life and how we greet it
 How do we interact with the world? How
should we? And is life defined by the
risks we’re willing to take, particularly
in our interactions with one another?
 “The eternal quest of the human being is
to shatter his loneliness.”
Norman Cousins
In the Beginning
 Our setting reinforces one of the poet’s
thematic concerns, as we’re introduced
to Uruk, a massive walled city that
Gilgamesh erected in ancient Babylon(ia)
 It’s a place of isolation and interruption,
where citizens resent the king (and for
good reason, which we’ll explore later)
 Gilgamesh lives within his city’s walls,
far from the natural world – and from his
own potential
Build Your Barricade
 The walls serve as an easy symbol for
Gilgamesh’s trapped state
 He’s caught up in the shallow, arbitrary ways
of his world, building up those walls with
feverish intensity before letting them crumble,
charging off into battle in order to feel alive,
forcing himself upon his citizens
 None of these have any sort of meaning,
purpose, or permanence for him
 Gilgamesh’s ruling style ends up reminding us
of a thrashing, dying beast – deeply unstable,
violent, unpredictable – and the city’s decay
symbolizes both the lack of vitality at its king’s
core and the separation between the king and
his people
On the Outside
 Beyond the City lie the Steppe and the Forest –
two natural and largely untamed realms
 Gilgamesh is of the City, Enkidu of the Steppe,
and Humbaba of the Forest
 Life lies outside the City, not just in the form of
the Steppe and Forest, but in the Tigris and
Euphrates Rivers that gush alongside it,
bordering it with symbols of fertility and life
 Things are connected outside of Uruk – men
frolic with animals, gods protect the forest,
and even those in the underworld have found
marriage and love
The Danger in Caution
 This contrast between the natural world and the City
couldn’t be starker, and it highlights one of the book’s
important points
 There is a danger in building the barriers that
surround Uruk, in shutting “invaders” out, in
preventing yourself from feeling something for your
fellow beings
 True, the walls we erect can shut out a lot of things,
including the good…but I’m not sure we can build walls
that can keep out all of the worst aspects of life
 Only when Gilgamesh leaves those walls behind does
the narrative pick up any sort of momentum, because
it’s only once Gilgamesh leaves that he begins living –
acquires something worth losing, something worth
valuing (companionship)
Samsara
 Gilgamesh doesn’t seem to value life; think about how
he spends his time
 He’s overwhelmed by shallow things, acts on base
desires without heed for their impact on others, and
does nothing to change his ways even though they’re
contributing to his misery
 He’s selfish, inconsistent, and crude, cursed with a
“restless heart” by Shamash
 He needs an outlet for whatever’s surging through him,
so he essentially tears at his world instead of tending to
its foundations
 He repeats this cycle of suffering time and again, never
demonstrating any sort of growth nor knowing any
peace…and while he hungers for more, a hunger that
violently manifests itself in his actions, he doesn’t seem
to know how to break the cycle
Only Way to Be Alone
 Gilgamesh is isolated – from his people,
from his gods, from himself
 The only companion he has (save the
women he takes advantage of) is his
mother
 He doesn’t naturally reach out to others;
we can see this in his adventures in the
underworld as well
 The story seems to equate loneliness with
weakness, isolation with instability –
and togetherness with peace
Separated Self
 Meanwhile, it’s easy to miss, but the beginning
of the story features a loss for Enkidu – one
that’s as profound as the one Gilgamesh suffers
once his friend dies
 After his encounter with the prostitute, the
animals shun him, and he feels a great
emptiness and loss of purpose
 Enkidu is essentially cast out of Eden, his new
knowledge of Man (specifically, Man from the
City) polluting him in the eyes of his fellow
friends
 He then sides with the humans against the
animals, driving the lions away and capturing
the wolves
 This betrayal forever isolates him from them; there
is no going back
Break the Cycle
 The gift each gives the other, then, is one of
connection – the thing that breaks the cycle
 Both men are a bit unbalanced; both need to
reconcile their wildness with their humanity
 Enkidu becomes the Young Man from the
Provinces, coming in from the outside to
revitalize Uruk by “curing” the king of his
melancholy
 He removes the king’s isolation and stands
steadfastly by his side, whereas the people of
Uruk only defend him because they must
Bring the Best
 Just as Enkidu relieves Gilgamesh of his
loneliness, the king confers a new
purpose upon his friend; each gives the
other his missing piece of humanity
 One could argue that they bring out the
best in one another, for they aren’t wild
in the same way
 In some ways, Gilgamesh proves more
“savage” than Enkidu
The Role Model
 While Gilgamesh seemingly lives to ravage and
consume, Enkidu lives to preserve and support
 Everything we know about him, save his
wildness, reflects a quality we wish we could
see in ourselves – whereas very little of what
Gilgamesh does seems worth doing
 It’s the latter who understands compassion and
brotherhood, the latter who shows both
courage and caution, and the latter who
honorably sacrifices himself to save his friend
 It’s through his friend that Gilgamesh
rediscovers these human values, and it’s one of
the reasons the story lionizes Enkidu
Never Know
 Gilgamesh won’t engage with the world,
refuses to acknowledge the unity of
things…so the world goes to him in the
form of Enkidu, with all of the triumph
and despair that accompanies it
 If Gilgamesh never makes a friend, he
never feels the pain of loss…but he never
knows happiness
 Is it a worthwhile trade? Is it really
better to have loved and lost than to
never have loved at all…
 …in Gilgamesh’s case?
Lose Yourself
 Is Gilgamesh’s grief selfish – does he mourn Enkidu’s
loss simply because he feels reduced without him?
 It seems odd that a man who lived as Gilgamesh did
would grieve the loss of life so heavily
 Perhaps it’s a matter of meaning; his life was
meaningless before Enkidu arrived, and Gilgamesh has
no desire to return to the way things were
 Perhaps it’s a larger metaphysical/thematic concern:
Jacobson says that Gilgamesh is a “revolt against
death,” that the story essentially posits that a just and
good universe would allow man’s glories to continue
uninterrupted (whereas death merely prevents us
from reaching our potential and discovering our true
meaning)
Is This True?
 Is there meaning in death, or is death
meaningless?
 Does some of life’s urgency come from
that final consequence – the knowledge,
however acknowledged, that life ends no
matter what we do?
 Can one find meaning without pain? Can
one find meaning without risk?
 “You need bruises to know blessings, and
I have known both.”
Frances Shand Kydd