gilgamesh

Gilgamesh!

I guess you could say I'm on an epic poem kick, although, given the frequency of how often I've actually read an epic poem, perhaps 'kick' is the wrong word. I've got a penchant; a leaning for epic poetry.

One of the things that attracts me to this old stuff is just how old it is! The Gilgamesh stories go back nearly 5000 years! The written copies we have of this story are about 4000 years old. Yes, actual original manuscripts (in the form of clay tablets) in the original language (cuneiform Akkadian).

What's the oldest extant bible we have?* Any bibles in the original Aramaic? Nothing is lost to time** and the more we study and discover the more we can learn about these stories and the people that wrote them. In a word: epicahistoreiffic!

This, The Epic of Gilgamesh, translated by Andrew George, bridges the gap between scholarly and pop culture reading. There is a great introduction of some fifty pages, that helps to set the stage for the epic; it's context in history, myth, religion, and politics. It also helps to trace some of the traditions represented in the epic forward into today's religions and traditions.

In addition, there are also translations of other, older but smaller Gilgamesh stories which were used by Sin-liqe-unninni, the poet of the standard  version of the epic, as source material. These older stories, many written in Sumerian, were used to infill gaps in this translation of the standard Babylonian version, written in Akkadian, where pieces are lost.

What is called 'the standard version' written by Sin-liqe-unninni between 1100 and 1300 BCE, also has its forebears in other, older versions seen in fragments dating the epic back another 500 years or so. The original Gilgamesh stories from which the epic is compiled, date to the Sumerian tablets which are as old as 2000 to 2100 BCE. that is wicked old, dude.

There is a more current translation out that wasn't available at my library and I'm curious to see if it includes new discoveries since this translation from 1999.

Get yourself some Gilgamesh; it's an amazing story. If you haven't got time to read it you should at least read some of the info in the links I've provided. The history is amazing.

Read this book.

* looks to me like 350 CE, or so.
** because the original stories were oral, for hundreds of years prior to cuneifrom writing records, of course information was lost, altered and modified from its original. The point I'm making is that nothing is lost from the time this work was put to clay tablets, due to re-writing, translating, and glossing through the centuries.

da vinci's ghost

Toby Lester, you crazy mixed-up history geek, what were you thinking, taking on Leonardo in a 200 page* book?

Interesting, yes. Did I learn new things? Yes. Has my image of da Vinci changed a little after reading? Yes, yes, yes. But come on; 200 pages? I felt like the story was just getting started.

The story arc, too, was a little herky-jerky. The big idea is that Leonardo was not the first, but the last (and greatest) in a long line of folks, who put Vitruvius's concept of a perfectly proportioned man fitted into both a circle and a square, in picture form. This is a big deal because Vitruvius's work was essentially forgotten for something like 1500 years, and it was only when men started to think about proportion, in art and architecture, in a serious way again during the Renaissance, did men rediscover Vitrivius again.

Only, there weren't that many people--well, maybe that's unfair--there weren't a ton of people that preceded da Vinci's Vitruvian Man, and really only a couple cited in the book that were actually trying to create an illustration of what Vitruvius said in his Roman Era book on architecture. The others were expressing ideas of perfect proportion as a representation of God's design of both man and the universe in his own image. Basically, the two ideas have very similar results, approached from slightly different directions.

Lester's thesis is sound, no complaints there. I may have just been caught up in some hype after hearing him discuss his book on the radio. I was expecting more and I'm a little disappointed that I didn't get it.

Da Vinci's Ghost is carefully researched and amply illustrated but may have been improved with a more linear timeline. Lester's writing is easy, and his enthusiasm is palpable throughout. He also showed me da Vinci as a man who (at least in his early career) was so distracted, that he almost seems to suffer from a kind of ADHD.** It's not an image I enjoyed, and I couldn't help wondering, if Lester had given himself another hundred pages or so, if this might have resolved itself more.


* This book is more like 275 pages, but there is, like, 70 pages of backmatter. Oh, and 15 pages of preface, and a dozen pages of prologue. Aaand, like 40 pages of epilogue. Okay, I'm done.

** After writing this, I did a search for ADHD for a link, and thought: what the heck, maybe he did have it and put that in the search. Sure enough, a variety of internetty sources (albeit, wishy-washy sources) also ask this same question.

as night follows day

As Night Follows Day, is by french writer Pierre Moinot. I read the English translation by Jody Gladding, with Elizabeth Deshays. The French title was Le matin vient et aussi la nuit.

According to the book jacket, Moinot was born in 1920 and has been busy in a variety of fields his whole life; from literature, to politics, to military service. His first collection of short stories were published with help from his friend Albert Camus. He has won a number of literary prizes, and was inducted into the Académie Française in 1982. Good on you, Pierre Moinot.

ANFD is 200+ pages of prose poetry; a love poem written to the past. An ode to simple rural life in France, its simple pleasures, its sense of community, and its ties to nature. Moinot uses stunningly beautiful language in the mouths and minds of his characters to describe their village, its people, animals, houses, gardens and flowers. To provide some contrast to this gush-fest, Moinot gives his pretty little village a problem to deal with: a cold-blooded double murder. yeah, chew on that!

Each of the chapters is written from the point of view of one of the characters, so we get to look inside the thoughts of these varied, but cut-from-the-same-cloth villagers. Many share that powerful sense of community and love of nature, and close, supportive ties to their neighbors, but their personalities overlay these similarities in surprisingly different ways, and through them we hear stories of love, life, regret, longing, wealth, poverty, marriage, stress, pain, strength, innocence, youth, and what it is to grow old.

In the end, the murder mystery is actually a surprising small--even tiny--part of the story.

Its a painting. A song. A diary entry from the not-so-distant past. But not, on the whole, especially compelling as a novel. Lovely, yes, without question.

Save this one for dreamy lazing on the beach, or on a quiet picnic in the country, and pining for Europe's pastoral past.

paladin of souls

This book is apparently a sequel to another by Lois McMaster Bujold called The Curse of Chalion. I didn't know that when I bought it*, but after reading I did feel that it had a good backstory. I hope I didn't read all of the spoilers from the first book as backstory in this one. There may even be another one in this story line...trilogy? Lets check... sure enough, the third is called The Hallowed Hunt.


McMaster Bujold has been at it for a while; she has a bunch of books listed in the front matter of the book I just finished, Paladin of Souls. Paladin follows the story of Ista, a seemingly typical reluctant hero archetype, who pretty quickly steps out of the norm and does a great job carrying this story with a well rounded out character. Each of the main and supporting characters are pretty well fleshed out. McMaster Bujold seems to be very good at that, as well as careful plotting, backstory development, and she is capable of some very fine surprises.


As with many stories that take place in another realm, the character and place names can get a little heavy, but by about halfway through I stopped wishing for a glossary and just got on with it. When I finished, I still thought that it would have been a good idea, and a map would have been helpful too. Thankfully you can now find both of those things here and here. I'll parrot McMaster Bujold's warning however: looking at the map and especially the glossary can be spoiler dangers. I told you


This story is not a Lord of the Rings wannabe, thankfully, and if anything, it reminded me a little of The Abhorsen Trilogy by Garth Nix. I wouldn't say that its similar, but if you liked the Nix books, this would be right up your alley. Some of the things that are similar: strong female hero figure and some spirit-world-type action.


A real treat was the lack of any pasted-on-label good guys and bad guys. McMaster Bujold has painted a picture of a very realistic world where the politics of different nations, kingdoms, or whatever, are very similar to our own. Leaders, soldiers, and common men do much the same things. The bad guys in this story just seemed to make more of the wrong choices than the good guys on the whole, and that's what tips the scale.


Well that, and you know... some hellfire and devil worship, doesn't exactly encourage a lot of invitations to the barbeque. Nah, I'm just kidding. There wasn't a barbeque.


Read it! attend me, rapscallion!


* I bought this book used form the library book sale.

sacré bleu

Sacré Bleu: A Comedy D'Art  is the latest by Christopher Moore of Lamb fame. Moore is up there with Tom Robbins as a favorite comedy writer of mine. They both have streak of raw insanity running through their prose, and while their particular forms of off-kilter-ness are different, they each bring a unique perspective to their writing.

The hardcover comes with a half-jacket that modestly covers la petite femme bleu to the shoulders. i'm sure it said something on it.

I saw this pretty, little hard cover sitting at the quick picks table at the library and snapped in up with greedy, ventripotent--one could even say pleonastic--glee! The last Christopher Moore I read was Fool, which I enjoyed, so I was excited to see this one at the library. But when I say pretty, I really mean pretty. The case is obviously decorated with this beautiful illustration by Aly Fell*, partially covered by a half jacket; the endpapers depict a groovy old tourist map of Paris; the pages are deckle edged; and the entire book is printed in blue! Its crazy, right! Its a love note to book lovers. designed by Jamie Lynn Kerner.

This is a story about blue, and about artists. Specifically: Impressionists in Paris in the 1890s. Sacré Bleu follows the story of a young artist named Lucien Lessard, as he tries to make his way in the art world, make a name for himself, and make his family proud. Lessard is no one, but the artists he knows, learns from, talks with, even takes lessons with, are the giants of Impressionism... you know, sort of.

In the backmatter, Moore has a little essay on what is real and what isn't in this story. Obviously, the names and the places and the world events are mostly true, but he has clearly taken some liberties with some of the finer details with these famous painters--who are no longer around to defend themselves. What this story is really about is their muse. What inspired them; drove them to create some of the most exciting and daring art the world had ever seen, and in some cases, even drove them mad.

This was different from the other two Moore books I've read, in that it isn't a retelling of a well known story, but is a sort of historical-ish, fictiony thing. Not quite as funny as the other two, but very entertaining from beginning to end and some serious belly laughs throughout.  To good, really to simply label as comedy. Its funny, yes, but first, its a good story. Speculative-Historical-Fiction? Go get some.

You can read a sample of Sacré Bleu here on Christorpher Moore's site if you're interested.

* An interesting side bit about Alastair (Aly) Fell and the illustration he did for the cover; it seems that he recreated an old-timey Absinthe poster featuring La Fée Verte in 2010, which he then modified for the book illustration. More here.

scorpion betrayal

My wife gave me this book to read. She just finished it, and went to look up more by Andrew Kaplan, but our library didn't have any. So its on to inter-library loan! This book, Scorpion Betrayal, is actually the second in the series about the Scorpion; not your run-of-the-mill superspy. This guy's got chops! The first book is called Scorpion, and the next one is called Scorpion Winter.

According to his site, Kaplan "is a former journalist and war correspondent covering events around the world. He served in both the U.S. Army and in the Israeli Army during the Six Day War and worked in military intelligence." It certainly sounds like he talks the talk; there's even a glossary in the back to help with the terms and acronyms. Which is good for me, being acronyminally challenged.

Superspy Scorpion obviously has a counterpart who is a superterrorist. Natch. What's nice is that this guy isn't the typical gun-waving, keffiyeh-wearing, cartoon of a man that often shows up in pop culture. Kaplan has carefully crafted a fully developed character whose personality and belief systems just don't match up with his western counterpart. The storyline then, follows a kind of tennis match format: we follow the action back and forth between these two characters as they both work to realize their personal plans and stop the other from doing the same.

The writing is easy-to-read and the story moves incredibly fast, keeping the tension in the story constantly twisting forward. There are hard choices both men have to make and Kaplan does a good job helping the reader to understand how these choices are weighed by his character. There's sex and violence, brutality and tenderness, humor and horror; all in a well planned story, from beginning to end.

My wife is right, lets get those other Scorpion books...

Read this book. And the other ones too, I bet.

alchemist

One of the benefits of reading used books is: I get to sort thru the books available and choose the ones that have done well. Its a kind of a mob-intelligence thing. Yeah, I choose some of my books the way ants build amazing underground cities: by dumbly following each other around and doing what most of the others do.

Baaaa! yes, mixed metaphor. what?

But lots of times it works!

Enter Paulo Coelho and The Alchemist. Simple tale. Short and sweet. Powerful lessons. But with, you know, complete sentences. Coelho is a thoughtful guy, and clearly believes both in God and in faith. Funny thing is, I think you could bring one or the other with you to this story--maybe both, maybe neither--and you'd still get something out of it. Every book is a conversation between the author and the individual reader, and what we bring to the reading makes the conversation, and the ultimate result, different for everyone. So how is it that some books, especially books like this, connect with so many people? That comes from Coelho's simplicity in story telling, and the simple, personal way he describes faith as faith in ones self first. Because his ideas are centered in the self, we all get it. Its a kind of middle-east meets east idea.

Coelho has written a bunch of books, but I haven't read any of the others, and my guess is that I won't. The ideas presented in this book are clear and powerful. So much so that I think its something Coelho has been working on for a while. I'm guessing this book took off because its his best attempt to express these simple ideas. And once you've read it, why bother reading it again? The others will pale in comparison.

Is this feeling completely contrary to what I've just read? Maybe, but then again, maybe not. My conversation with Paulo Coelho is different than yours; but its one you should have.

Read this book.

And support the public library. It still is, what the promise of the internet was. and still could be, by the way.

red tent

I picked up this copy of The Red Tent at my library's on-going book sale. Its amazing how many books I get from the book sale. I hardly ever take out a book from the library. I end up buying them instead, and when I'm done I keep them if they're great, or I return them to the library book sale so the library can make another buck. This seems to work for me for a few reasons. First, it takes me a few weeks to read a book, and if its good I'd like to give to my wife to read as well. This can pretty quickly eat up the 4 weeks on a typical book loan. The current books are typically 2 weeks, with no renewal, which is almost never going to work for me. Second, as I said, if I love a book, I'd like to put on the shelf and maybe go back to it a few years later, or loan it out to the other readers I know. So book sale: love it!

But back to Anita Diamant and The Red Tent. I wonder if Diamant is an anglicized version of the Italian name, Diamante, or vice versa. The Red Tent is one of those books that has become a modern classic in pop culture. I think they may have even made a movie. lets look that up shall we... ah, here we go Not a big budget Hollywood movie at this point, but there is a project underway. A quick look around that website confirms what I was pretty sure of when I picked this novel up...

 

That's not a bad thing, I just feel a little like I walked into the ladies room by mistake. The story bears this feeling out by the way, from the very introduction, which is addresses specifically to women. 'ats alright, I've crashed parties before. Sally forth!

This is essentially a retelling of a biblical story from the point of view of the women in the tale. The narrator is Dinah, grand-daughter of Isaac. you know, spared-from-sacrifice-boy Dinah tells the story of her mothers, the four wives of Jacob, her grand-mother Rebecca and her husband Issac. Dinah also tells the story of her brothers, her marriages, and her son. Her story is one of family, family strife, love, honor and betrayal. Its a story of beautiful and horrible things wound together. Its also a story of Canaan and Egypt. There is a lot going on here, but its sewn together with care and clarity. 

Diamant wonderfully discusses the very different values of everyday life during this time, with a matter-of-factness that adds to the power of the story by diffusing things like multiple wives and polytheism, so that they take their place in everyday life as they did then. This is the shining moment of this tale. Diamant puts into the mouths of the women of Canaan, a real and living history of a family and a place, that few others have been able to do.

Read this book.

mystic river

Dennis Lehane is a horror story writer.

Say what you will, but I've read a couple of his stories now, and about half way through this one--as my stomach rolled with a discomfort that only terrors left better unnamed can cause--when I said to myself, "self, Dennis Lehane is a horror story writer."

Lehane must dig down deep into the things that scare people, way down deep inside himself, and then drag that stuff up and onto the page. And he does it constantly. Lehane's not talking about the boogie man, a slasher that won't die, or a catacomb of vampires* descending on your town. Lehane is talking about the real stuff that could happen to any of us. The kind of things that wake you up in the middle of the night, wanting to weep.

I suppose some would say that talking about things like this is healthy. Better out than in, and all that. But man! sometimes its hard to read.

Regardless of how much they make you squirm and trigger your gag reflex, these stories are tight. Lehane can weave a very tricky story, with very real characters. Obviously he's a very observant writer, and brings that to both his character's, and his sense of place, which almost becomes a character in the story itself. The feel of these old neighborhoods, what they mean to people, and how they can influence their decisions, becomes a critical part of the storyline. Mystic River is no different.

I may take a break from Lehane for a while, but not forever. Lehane is too a good a writer for me to give up on. Its just too dark down there where he's writing for me.

Yeah, read this book.

* Yeah, that's my collective noun for vampires. Whachu think?