This Literature Unit Is:

The Epic of Gilgamesh

Introduction

The poet Rainer Maria Rilke, who read this story often, wrote, "Gilgamesh is an immensity." The Epic of Gilgamesh is one of the oldest and most powerful stories that has survived until our day. It is much older than Homer's masterpieces, The Odyssey and The Iliad, dating back to the 3rd millennium B.C. It is the story of a king, part man/part god, who searches for immortality. Along the way he finds friendship and eventually comes to a new understanding of himself and his place in the world.

Edition I Use: Penguin Classics / 127 pages / $9.95
ISBN #: 0-14-044100-X / Buy this edition at Amazon.com

Unit Sections:

Source:

Gilgamesh: A Reader, edited by John Maier, Bolchaey-Carducci Publishers, Inc., Wauconda, Ill., 1997, pg. 320.