Epic of Gilgamesh
First writing assignment: Gilgamesh
You will write an 800 word essay on one of the following choices. Remember the meaning of “essay” that I explained in class: an attempt or meditation, which gives me your thought in as much detail as possible. Please do not waste space on generalizations, or on introductions or conclusions not directly relevant to the passages you are writing about.
1) Choose a metaphor or other figure of speech (simile, metonymy, personification etc.) that occurs more than once in the poem (such as, for example, in passages comparing a person to a specific animal species). Demonstrate how the repetition of this metaphor involves changes in meaning or significance.
2) Find some other instance of repetition or parallelism in the text and discuss its significance without simply insisting on “emphasis.”
3) Discuss how the story of the great flood on Tablet XI differs from the similar story as told in other texts with which you are familiar. For this assignment you will need to quote both Gilgamesh and the other text or texts, not simply rely on summaries or paraphrase.
4) Compare / contrast an episode from Gilgamesh to a similar episode from the other versions of the story you find in the back of the book—once again, quoting and analyzing passages from both.
Remember that I am your audience for this paper: someone who has read Gilgamesh and is already familiar with the plot and common interpretations of the poem. Your goal is to persuade me to take a certain perspective on some aspect of the poem, based on the passages you choose to discuss. You may of course use what you have learned from class discussion, but your paper will be more interesting to me if you can also bring in a passage or thought that is not already common knowledge to me or the class. Look at each passage that you quote in as much detail as possible; try to go beyond the “general idea” of each passage.
PLACE THIS ORDER OR A SIMILAR ORDER WITH US TODAY AND GET AN AMAZING DISCOUNT 🙂