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The King Who Conquered Death

The Epic of Gilgamesh: Survey 1 Blog Post (35,000 BCE – 0 CE)

The First Story 

The Epic of Gilgamesh is, to this date, the earliest surviving written text. Created sometime around 2000 BCE in the Sumerian language of Cuneiform, engraved on clay tablets with a reed stylus. This Epic poem is the foundation for modern-day storytelling and some of the first-ever use of literary tropes. Yet, they aren’t the aspects that make this story so relevant to the modern-day. To understand why you need to understand Gilgamesh’s journey. So a brief spoiler alert for quite literally the oldest story in history.

An example of the Mesopotamian language of Cuneiform on a clay tablet.

A Pretty Epic Poem

It’s hard to summarize this Epic into so few words, but it starts with the King of Uruk, Gilgamesh. Gilgamesh is a terrible person and even worse king. He’s three-fourths god (no, the math doesn’t add up) and cannot come to terms with his mortality. His people hate him and his tyranny, so they pray to the gods for help. In return, the gods crafted Gilgamesh an equal; his name was Enkidu. Enkidu challenged Gilgamesh to a fight. But, being equal in strength, the battle ceased into a stalemate. Gilgamesh was impressed, and with a newfound respect for Enkidu, they became fast friends. Enkidu taught Gilgamesh to be a better person, and eventually, the horrible ruler became a more beloved king. Together they decided to test their strength against the fearsome giant named Humbaba, and together the new friends slew the beast. Upon their return home, Gilgamesh and Enkidu were by with the goddess Ishtar, who proposes herself to Gilgamesh. He refuses her advances, and the infuriated Ishtar sends the Bull of Heaven to rampage the city and kill both the heroes. Once again, with the power of friendship, they both slay the bull. Unfortunately, the gods are outraged that the Bull of Heaven has been killed and decided someone must pay for this. Enkidu falls sick the next day and dies seven days later to repent for the massacre of the bull. Gilgamesh is stricken with grief that his best friend and equal have passed. He contemplates his mortality and, being unable to cope with being one-fourth human, Gilgamesh ventures out searching for a way to cure his mortality and live forever. He searches long and hard and works himself into sickness. When he finds something, it’s the immortal Utnapishtim; he offers Gilgamesh immortality if he can pass one of the trails. Unfortunately, due to his weariness from his desperate search, Gilgamesh isn’t able to complete the first task but eventually is able to obtain the fruit of immortality. On his journey back, Gilgamesh loses the fruit to a snake and gives up, returning to his kingdom empty-handed and mortal.

Gilgamesh slaying the beast Humbaba.

The Hero’s Journey

The Epic of Gilgamesh was the foundation for storytelling and modern literature. It created a variation of what would come to be known as the Hero’s Journey, a storytelling format, and many common story elements that would become modern tropes in entertainment. Yet, it’s still a debate if Gilgamesh was truly even a hero. Gilgamesh was generally disliked for very valid reasons. Throughout Gilgamesh’s story, he is a terrible person. He was a tyrant and committed multiple unforgivable crimes against his people and the gods. He never did anything to help anyone other than himself and got his only friend killed in the process. Not to mention he failed his most important task, the one thing he cared about, gaining immortality. Some might argue for these reasons he’s not a hero at all; and, they’re probably right. Yet, I don’t think that was the point of the story. It is generally known that Mesopotamians had a very negative view of the afterlife; this is reflected in Gilgamesh’s story. He wanted to escape his human faults and weakness; he wanted to escape death. Gilgamesh wants to be immortal, but once he returns to Uruk empty-handed, he is left with nothing but his human mortality. Gilgamesh may have fallen to his hubris and failed most of his tasks: but, in the process, he gained knowledge. He was undeniably very flawed but recognized his mistakes and grew past them to live a better life till his eventual death. He never conquered death, just the idea of it. He conquered the thought process that made death ruin his life. It was his limitations that made him a human, yet it was these same flaws that defined him as a hero. Which is an old lesson that many people could learn.

Carved statue of the Hero Gilgamesh, created in the late 8th century.
Citations:

Agrawal, Pulkit, and Yanping Zhang. “Harvard Wiki.” The Epic of Gilgamesh – Pulkit Agrawal – Literature 114 (Spring 2014-2015) – Harvard Wiki, The President, and Fellows of Harvard College, 10 May 2015, https://wiki.harvard.edu/confluence/display/k104639/The+Epic+of+Gilgamesh+-+Pulkit+Agrawal.

Bryant, Dewayne. “Epic of Gilgamesh.” World History: A Comprehensive Reference Set, edited by Facts on File, Facts On File, 1st edition, 2016. Credo Reference, https://ezproxy.capilanou.ca/login?url=https://search.credoreference.com/content/entry/fofworld/epic_of_gilgamesh/0?institutionId=6884. Accessed 30 Sep. 2021.

Dixon, Kevin H., and Kent H. Dixon . “The Epic of Gilgamesh.” Sevenstories.com, 5 June 2018, https://www.sevenstories.com/books/4052-the-epic-of-gilgamesh. 

O’Neal, Michael J. ““EPIC OF GILGAMESH”: DOCUMENT ANALYSIS ca. 1300 BCE.” Milestone Documents of World Religions, edited by Grey House Publishing, Salem Press, 2nd edition, 2017. Credo Reference, https://ezproxy.capilanou.ca/login?url=https://search.credoreference.com/content/entry/greymdwr/epic_of_gilgamesh_document_analysis_ca_1300_bce/0?institutionId=6884. Accessed 01 Oct. 2021.

Images Citations:

“The Forum, Unlocking the Mysteries of Cuneiform Tablets.” BBC World Service, BBC, 30 Nov. 2020, https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/w3cszjwd. 

Escabias, M. “‘The Epic of Gilgamesh’. an Epic Poem from 2.500 BC. Incredibly Current.” Actualidad Literatura, Actualidad Literatura, 25 Sept. 2018, https://www.actualidadliteratura.com/en/the-epic-of-gilgamesh-an-epic-poem-from-2-bc-incredibly-current/.

“Harvard Wiki.” The Epic of Gilgamesh – Pulkit Agrawal – Literature 114 (Spring 2014-2015) – Harvard Wiki, https://wiki.harvard.edu/confluence/display/k104639/The+Epic+of+Gilgamesh+-+Pulkit+Agrawal.

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Visual Research II

Neville Brody put together this high-contrast poster for the movie Oceans Eleven. The large number Eleven positioned diagonally on the image draws the viewer’s eyes in first. It is bright red and the only color in an otherwise monochrome poster. The number eleven then moves your focus to the black silhouettes at the top. These figures are set apart from the completely white background. The use of contrast in color, tone, and even size allows the poster to pop giving it clear readability.
This 2019 Yale Architecture poster heavily uses the visual design principal alignment. The poster has many columns of texts all seemingly aligned by invisible grids. This creates vertical rectangles from the words making the overall poster quite structured, which is fitting for an architecture program.
This image was created by a user and seller on Pixers by the name of sarplaninac. They created a very high contrast image of a face using only two tones of black and white. The Gestalt principle of Closure is what allows the viewer to distinguish forms from the white highlighted shapes and fill in the mental blanks of the image from the negative space or black background.
The ad ‘Cognac Bisquit’ by Alphonse Mucha is an example of Gestalt’s Principal of Figure/Ground. The lady looking over her shoulder holding the cognac is the figure. She is the focus of the illustration, while the trees and underbrush surrounding her are the background elements. Even though the foliage isn’t the focus of the poster it adds movement, drawing the viewer’s eye around the image in an ‘S’ shape balancing out the composition. This is a great example of figure and ground as even though the figure is the focus of the advertisement to sell the cognac, the ground element is of almost equal importance to make a visually appealing and successful advertisement.

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Visual Research I

This poster was created by Illustrator and Graphic Designer Josh Hayes. The poster displays the use of geometric shapes that are differentiated by value and tone. Shape is the strongest element as it adds structure and intrigue to the poster.
‘Step Into Your place’ is a 1915 first world war propaganda poster that executed the element of scale. The poster calls to action all men of varying occupations and classes to join the fight. As the line-up of men moves farther away, their outfits change, turning to soldiers and shrink in proportion. This showcases depth and physical scale within the poster.
Created by Saul Bass for the movie Vertigo, this poster emphasizes a feeling of unsteadiness or vertigo with its use of curved lines that draws your eyes to the figures. Line is the strongest element as it creates shape, structure, and a mood that ties back to the movie.

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Project 1 Yearbook Spread

I started my Yearbook Spread Assignment with too many contradicting ideas. Each thumbnail sketch looked as if it could have been made by a completely different person. To nail down a cohesive theme for the spread I made it in similar fashion to my old high school agendas. A series of books I used like a sketchbook or scrapbook. Every week filling the pages with as much information as possible. I crammed in every doodle, scrap of paper, old candy wrapper, funny story, and occasionally an assignment or two.

I began my process with a green watercolor wash. At first, I only used a regular graphite pencil but later realized I needed to add contrast for clarity. I went back over some lines with a softer darker lead and added some more white highlights. I put emphasis on using the pencils and white jelly pens, as they were often what I would be caught sketching between classes with. This allowed me to limit my tools, only using what would have been in my pencil case. It made my layout more cohesive and truer to the theme. I also implemented doodles of space to tie the spread together as it was recurring imagery I used in the old agendas. It reflects myself as I loved and am still fascinated with astronomy. I can at times also be admittedly a bit spacy.

I had fun revisiting my agendas and paying homage to where I started my art journey. I wished I glued in other elements as it would have stuck to the scrapbook feel, and blocked-in shapes, adding more structure and providing some texture. I only used one color, and while accurate to my agendas the color pallet is boring. The design is cramped, and typography can be sloppy as I had no ruler. I’d give myself a 7/10 for the yearbook spread that took me around four and a half hours to complete.