Andrew George's "masterly new translation" ( The Times ) of the world's first truly great work of literature A Penguin Classic Miraculously preserved on clay tablets dating back as much as four thousand years, the poem of Gilgamesh, king of Uruk, is the world's oldest epic, predating Homer by many centuries. The story tells of Gilgamesh's adventures with the wild man Enkidu, and of his arduous journey to the ends of the earth in quest of the Babylonian Noah and the secret of immortality. Alongside its themes of family, friendship and the duties of kings, the Epic of Gilgamesh is, above all, about mankind's eternal struggle with the fear of death. The Babylonian version has been known for over a century, but linguists are still deciphering new fragments in Akkadian and Sumerian. Andrew George's award-winning translation has been revised to include many new discoveries of text, and reissued in 2019. It brilliantly combines these into a fluent narrative and will long rank as the definitive English Gilgamesh. For more than seventy years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 1,700 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-date translations by award-winning translators.

Recommended on 1 episode:

How Do We Face Loss With Dignity?

In his latest work, “The Last White Man,” the award-winning writer Mohsin Hamid imagines a world that is very like our own, with one major exception: On various days, white people wake up to discover that their skin is no longer white. It’s a heavy premise, but one of Hamid’s unique talents as a novelist is his ability to take on the most difficult of topics — racism, migration, loss — with a remarkably light touch. “How do you begin to have these conversations in a way that allows everybody a way in?” Hamid asks at one point in our conversation. “How do you talk about these things in a way that’s open to everyone?” What sets Hamid apart is his capacity to do just that — both in his fiction and in our conversation. We discuss: How Hamid experienced what it was like to lose his whiteness after 9/11 What happens to a society when suddenly we can’t sort ourselves by race The origins of modern humans’ fear of death — and how to overcome it Why Hamid thinks future humans will look back at the idea of borders with moral horror Why Hamid believes that pessimistic realism is a “deeply conservative” worldview Hamid’s process for imagining optimistic futures Why Hamid believes that the very notion of the self is a fiction Why we turn to activities like sex, drugs and meditation when we get overwhelmed How America’s policies toward immigrants and refugees should challenge our “heroic” sense of national identity What Toni Morrison taught Hamid about how to read and write And more.

Books recommended:

• 📕  Ficciones by Jorge Luis Borges, Anthony Kerrigan
• 📘  Beloved: Pulitzer Prize Winner by Toni Morrison
• 📗  The Epic of Gilgamesh (Penguin Classics) by Andrew George

Mohsin Hamid Aug. 12, 2022 3 books recommended

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