Wednesday, February 10, 2010

Gilgamesh- Tablets II and III

After reading Tablets II and III of The Epic of Gilgamesh what I noticed the most was how even though nobody knows each other in the story, everyone act sas if they were life-long friends and they trust each other completely, as we can see when everybody tells Gilgamesh that 'Enkidu the companion will not forsake [him]'. I also imagine that even though he is their ruler and their king, everybody seems to be afraid of Gilgamesh, except Enkidu, which is probably a part of why Gilgamesh trusts him so much; they are so scared of him that they complained to the gods about his power, and asked for help to control him. In a writing related way, I've seen how they repeat many phrases over and over, sometimes in the same 'paragraph'. This might be for emphasis on his points, or it might just be the way they used to write back then, but I find this interesting although sometimes it can get annoying and confusing.
Another point I feel really strongly about is civilization. I put it in Italics because it doesn't really mean anything as a word, it is just and idea and a point of view. To us, to our society, the natives who have lived on land that we invaded and through wars and violence forcefully took from them, the ones who, during collonial times and even today, we captured and enslaved, we treated horribly, we took everything from them and left them with foreign sicknesses and death, those are the savages that need to be civilized. We see an example of this in these Tablets, when Enkidu lays with the prostitute (Shamhat) and is then expulsed from the wild, which is the only thing he has known. He has little choice left than to go with Shamhat to the city, he eats and drinks what they give him bacause it 'is the food and drink men eat and drink', he is clothed and thaught to live a different way than he ever has just because it is not normal for him to 'seek the company of beasts'. I think that sucks.

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