ENG 2131 Lecture 1: LECTURE1

• School: University of Ottawa
• Department: English
• Course: ENG 2131
• Professor: Rosemary Daniels

Document Summary

Ancient poet addressed perennial element for humans which is their fear of death: for gilgamesh, this is what makes the main person go on their journey, 1) how to make their name last forever, when he sees his best friend die, he realizes this is not enough, he does not want to lose this life, he tries to figure out how he can live forever our ability to know that we will die, makes us wonder in what ways are different from animals, gilgamesh even though he was half god had enough humanity in him to know he would not live forever. There are no answers in gilgamesh: gilgamesh does not find the secret to eternal life, makes it almost modern in that contxt, there are monsters, gods, sacrifices but gilgamesh seems modern because he has to accept his death and that human beings are special but in a certain way.