Gilgamesh: A new English version
Author(s): Stephen Mitchell
The poet and translator Stephen Mitchell makes the oldest epic poem in the world accessible.
Product Information
'As narrative verse, this Gilgamesh entrances and enthrals. Its liquid, intimate four-stressed lines negotiate the rapid shifts between everyday pleasures, heroic feats and blazing visions in this mythic world where the sensual and spiritual always intersect. Mitchell manages to slip the mesmerising incantations of the verse into his reader's bloodstream as if they flowed through some poetic intravenous drip.' Boyd Tonkin, Independent 'It was a revelation. The translation is superb.' Harold Pinter 'Stephen Mitchell's Gilgamesh is a wonderful version. It is as eloquent and nuanced as his translations of Rilke. This is certainly the best that I have seen in English.' Harold Bloom 'Reading Stephen Mitchell's marvellously clear and vivid rendering of Gilgamesh makes me feel that I am encountering this ancient poem for the first time.' Elaine Pagels 'This is the most pellucid version of the epic yet to have been written in English, but what is most startling and admirable about it is the fact that Mitchell has not sacrificed a sense of the weird on the altar of readability ... a powerful translation.' The Times 'Mitchell brings a lucid and poetic version of Gilgamesh to a literary rather than academic audience ... [he] allows the ancients a chance to speak for themselves.' Observer 'Beautifully retold and a page-turner in the bargain. Like Seamus Heaney's recent retelling of Beowulf, this book proves that in the right hands, no great story ever grows stale.' Malcolm Jones, Newsweek
General Fields
- :
- : Profile Books Limited
- : Profile Books Ltd
- : 0.212
- : 01 October 2005
- : 198mm X mm
- : United Kingdom
- : books
Special Fields
- : 304
- : 1
- : Paperback
- : Stephen Mitchell