The Reading Room

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10:30 AM

Q: What is the content of the “monkey tablet” of the Gilgamesh epic?

In an answer to an older question about the Flood in Gilgamesh, Denkof Zwemmen quotes the recent translation (2019) by Stanley Lombardo. The translation's publisher describes this translation as follows: This stirring new version of the great Babylonian epic includes material from the recentl...

IkWeetHetOokNiet

11:16 AM

Looks like the Gilgamesh reading challenge is still running ;-)

@Bookworm This one is for the French literature buffs ;-)

2 hours later…

Rand al'Thor

1:13 PM

@IkWeetHetOokNiet I went and found one, but you beat her to the answer ;-)

2 hours later…

IkWeetHetOokNiet

3:02 PM

One of the answers on a recent Gilgamesh question mentioned Lombardo's recent verse translation. Here is a relevant podcast: The Epic of Gilgamesh w/Dr. Stanley Lombardo.

Bookworm

3:55 PM

Q: What are the main causes of the rise of English novels?

I hope this is the right focus to ask my question. What are the main causes of the rise of English novels? The world wars are considered one of the causes of AFAIK. But what after the WW-II, the development of the novel till today? PS: Couldn't find more relevant tags

mystery-novels epistolary-novel

2 hours later…

IkWeetHetOokNiet

5:58 PM

We currently have a tag for sumerian-literature, which we have used for all questions about epic-of-gilgamesh. However, only five stories are actually in Sumerian, while the "standard version" is in Akkadian.

Napoleon Wilson

Maybe add akkadian-literature, too? ;-)

IkWeetHetOokNiet

I wonder whether we should replace sumerian-literature with mesopotamian-literature, so we have the same tag for all stories about Gilgamesh (and possibly other literature in Sumerian or Akkadian). The alternative would be to create another language-base tag, i.e. akkadian-literature and add that to those questions that are specifically about the version in Akkadian.

However, some translations are an amalgamation of materials in Sumerian and Akkadian. That would mean we would need both sumerian-literature and akkadian-lilterature for practically every question about Gilgamesh.

Napoleon Wilson

Depends what the stark characteristic differences between Sumerian and Akkadian literature are.

Given that I can't quite imagine someone genuinely asking a question about the original texts, a big characteristic seems already have been lost in translation.

IkWeetHetOokNiet

It's quite possible to ask questions just about the older Sumerian texts, which don't build a continuous narrative.

I was obviously a noob on sumerian-literature when I created that tag :-(

Napoleon Wilson

You aren't anymore thanks to this site, though!

IkWeetHetOokNiet

6:11 PM

Well, not a complete noob, at least ;-)

Napoleon Wilson

Before I'd take the time to pause after every page of LotR to ask a proper question and wait for answers I'd probably just go with the flow and figure out the context while reading...

IkWeetHetOokNiet

Well, at least LoTR wasn't written in an ancient language in a hard-to-read writing system on tablets that are available as tens of thousands of fragments that need to be fit together before they can be transliterated and translated.

Napoleon Wilson

Maybe that's why the Gilgamesh questions are more engaging then. ;-)

IkWeetHetOokNiet

Some of those fragments have traces of earthworms that moved through them. Armstrong's translation contains an interesting appendix on the work of an assyriologist.

Maybe some of the manuscripts that Christopher Tolkien edited had some damage by bookworms. I wonder if anybody ever asked him ;-)

Napoleon Wilson

Do bookworms exist?

IkWeetHetOokNiet

6:24 PM

Wikipedia has an article about bookworms. Surely, that's conclusive evidence?

Napoleon Wilson

I see.

IkWeetHetOokNiet

Of course, there is also another type of bookworm that devours books in a less literal sense. Some of them have found their way to Literature Stack Exchange :-P

Gosh, if I choose a new pseudonym again, I think I'll go for Tsundoku.

IkWeetHetOokNiet

6:44 PM

For those who don't want to be noobs: Complete Babylonian (Teach Yourseslf) by Martin Worthington.

IkWeetHetOokNiet

7:14 PM

I'm listening to a podcast about the epic of Gilgamesh. YouTube's subtitling software interprets the name "Uta-napishti" in various ways, including "tunafish tea". Yuk.

user15026

7:30 PM

@IkWeetHetOokNiet I don't think that will be a tea I will add to my tea box any time soon.

Rand al'Thor

11:09 PM

@IkWeetHetOokNiet That sounds like a cross between Sun Tzu and Sudoku.

> The art of war, reinterpreted using boxes with numbers in them.

@IkWeetHetOokNiet It was, before Tolkien translated it ;-)

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