English 2331 - Survey of World Literature
Welcome to the course. The main purpose of the site is to provide you with .pdfs of all the readings in the course. You are, of course, welcome to purchase the texts or print them out, but if you find yourself digitally adept, feel free to simply use the .pdfs. A brief word of caution on that, however, is that there are times when a web address for the .pdf moves or is removed. The page will also feature assignments and maps and stuff. Lots of stuff!
Week 2: Love, Death, and Dangerous Gods
Apropos of almost nothing unless you're a They Might Be Giants fan. It does give you a fine visual to go with Gilgamesh though it is a bit of an ear worm so proceed with caution.
The Epic of Gilgamesh: A New Translation. Trans. and Ed. Andrew George. Penguin, 2000
Oh, the things you'll miss if you don't read the full .pdf. You are only required to read I, II, VII, and XI. So if and when you skip:
Tablet III: The elders give Gilgamesh and Enkidu advice for their journey. The two heroes visit the goddess Ninsun, who enlist the help of the Sun God, Shamash,and the aid of his wife, Aya. Ninsun adopts the orphan Enkidu. Gilgamesh gives instructions for the governing of Uruk in his absence. The heroes depart.
Tablet IV: Every three days in the course of their journey Gilgamesh and Enkidu pitch camp on a hillside and conduct a ritual to provoke a dream. Each time Gilgamesh wakes from a nightmare, but Enkidu reassures him that his dream is favorable after all. After at least five such dreams the heroes draw near to the Forest of Cedar. Shamash advises a speedy attack in order to catch unawares the ogre Humbaba, who guards the cedar cloaked in seven auras. As the heroes anxiously try to allay each other's fears as they arrive at the forest.
Tablet V: After admiring the mountain dense-grown with cedar, the heroes draw their weapons and creep into the forest. Humbaba confronts them, and accuses Enkidu of treachery. Enkidu urges swift action. Gilgamesh and Humbaba fight, and Shamash sends thirteen winds to blind Humbaba and win victory for his protege. Humbaba pleads for his life. Enkidu again urges haste telling Gilgamesh to kill Humbaba before the gods find out. Humbaba curses the heroes,who promptly kill him and begin felling cedar in sacred groves. From one especially magnificent cedar Enkidu vows to make a great door to adorn the temple of the god Enlil.
Tablet VI: Back in Uruk Gilgamesh's beauty provokes the desire of the goddess Ishtar and she proposes to him. Gilgamesh scorns her, reminding her oft he fates suffered by her many former conquests. Ishtar is enraged and rushes up to heaven. She persuades Anu, her father, to give her the fiery Bull of Heaven (the constellation Taurus) so that she can punish Gilgamesh with death. The Bull of Heaven causes havoc in Uruk, but Gilgamesh and Enkidu discover its weak spot and kill it. They insult Ishtar further and return to the palace in triumph to celebrate their victory.
Tablet VIII: Gilgamesh offers up a great lament for Enkidu. He summons his craftsmen and makes a funerary statue of his friend, and from his treasury he selects the grave goods that Enkidu will take to the Netherworld to win the goodwill of the deities who dwell there. As part of the wake a great banquet is held, and then treasures are offered to the gods of the Netherworld and ritually displayed in public.
Tablet IX: In mourning for Enkidu, whose death has brought home to him his own mortality, Gilgamesh leaves Uruk to wander the earth in search of the immortal Uta-napishti, whose secret he covets. Pressing onto the end of the world he comes to the mountains where the Sun sets and rises and asks the help of the scorpion-man who guards the way under the mountains. Unable to convince Gilgamesh of the danger he courts the scorpion-man allows him to pass, and Gilgamesh races against time to complete the Path of the Sun before the Sun can catch up with him. He reaches the far end of the tunnel just in time and finds himself in a garden of jewels.
Tablet X: Beyond the garden, by the sea-shore, lives a wise old goddess. She spies a forbidding figure in the distance and, taking him to be a hunter, bars the door of her tavern. Gilgamesh hears her and threatens to break in. She asks who he is. He tells her how his friend has died and how much he now fears death, and he asks her aid in crossing the sea to Uta-napishti. She warns him of the futility of his quest and the dangers of the Waters of Death, but at length tells him where to find Uta-napishti’s ferryman, Ur-shanabi, with his crew of Stone Ones. Gilgamesh rushes down on the ferryman and his strange companions. When the fighting is over he explains his quest to Ur-shanabi and asks his aid in finding Uta-napishti. Ur-shanabi reveals that Gilgamesh has hindered his own progress by smashing the Stone ones, but he instructs Gilgamesh to make punting-poles of immense length as an alternate means of propulsion. They embark on the boat with the poles. When the poles are all gone Gilgamesh uses the ferryman’s garment to make a sail, and they cross the Waters of Death. Having landed Gilgamesh tells his story to Uta-napishti. Uta-napishti reminds him of the duties of kings and discourses on the inevitability of death and the fleeting nature of life.
A map you need to know: Syria, Iran, Jordan, Iraq, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Uruk, Tigris, Euphrates, and Persian Gulf.
History to Know and A Few Other Texts
ca 3000 BC Mesopotamia - Sumerians writing in cuneiform
Egypt - Egyptians writing with hieroglyphics
Indus Valley - Indians writing with Indus or Harrapan script
2700 Gilgamesh is King in Uruk
ca 2575-2230 Egyptians build the Great Pyramids and Sphinx (or aliens did (or Egyptians were building grain silos)).
ca 2200 Minoans on Crete
2000 Legends of Gilgamesh appear on clay tablets
1900 Hebrew migration from Mesopotamia begins
ca 1800 Hammurabi's Code of Laws in Babylon. Famously paraphrased as "An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth." This of course only is a paraphrase. What it leaves out is that if you were a higher class and took an eye of a lower class...well...just a fine then (and a relatively small one).
ca 1700 Shang Dynasty with writing on tortoise shells for divinity and on shields.
1600 Epic of Gilgamesh takes shape
1500 Egyptian Book of the Dead (funerary pieces (think spells))
The oldest of 4 Vedas (Rig Veda) and Sanskrit emerges
1375 Akenhaten "Hymn to the Sun [God, Aten]
Part I
When in splendor you first took your throne
High in the precinct of heaven,
O living God,
Life truly began!
Now from eastern horizon risen and streaming,
You have flooded the world with your beauty.
You are majestic, awesome, bedazzling, exalted,
Overlord over all earth,
Yet your rays, they touch lightly, compass the lands
To the limits of all your creation.
There in the Sun, you reach to the farthest of those
You would gather in for your Son.
Whom you love;
Though you are far, your light is wide upon earth;
And you shine in the faces of all
Who turn to follow your journeying.
1300 Gilgamesh written down
1238 Leiden Hymns and Love Poems (Egyptian)
Hymn Example: [When Being began back in days of the genesis]
When Being began back in days of the genesis,
It was Amun appeared first of all,
Unknown his mode of inflowing;
There was no god come before him,
Nor was [another] god with him there
When he uttered himself into visible form
;
There was no mother to him, that she might have borne him his name,
There was no father to father the one
Who first spoke the words, "I Am!"
Who fashioned the seed of him all on his own,
Sacred first cause, whose birth lay in mystery,
Who crafted and carved his own splendor—
He is God the Creator, self‐created, the Holy;
All other gods came after;
With Himself he began the world.
Love Poem Example: [I think I'll go home and lie very still]
I think I’ll go and lie very still,
Feigning terminal illness.
Then the neighbors will all troop over to stare,
My love, perhaps, among them.
How she’ll smile while the specialists
Snarl in their teeth!—
She perfectly well knows what ails me.
1200 Moses does his thing
1150 Troy destroyed Achaeans (major tribe of the Greeks)
1000 Torah assembled (first five books of the Bible: Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy)
Week 3: Gods (Oh, and How is it Week 3 Already?)
The button to the left will take you to Chadbad.org and Bereishit - Genesis - Chapter 1. Please do three things. 1. Make sure you show the content in English and Hebrew. 2. Turn on Rashi's commentary. 3. Read chapters 1-3.
From Classic of Poetry
CCXLV. She Bore the Folk
She who first bore the folk--
Chiang it was, First Parent.
How was it she bore the folk? --
she knew the rite and sacrifice.
To rid her of sonelessness
she trod the god's toeprint
and she was glad.
She was made great, on her luck settled,
the seed stirred, it was quick.
She gave birth, she gave suck,
and this was Lord Millet.
When he months had come to term,
her firstborn sprang up.
Not splitting, not rending,
working no hurt, no harm.
He showed his godhead glorious,
the high god was greatly soothed.
He took great joy in those rights
and easily she bore her son.
She set him in a narrow lane,
but sheep and cattle warded him.
She set him in the wooded plain,
he met with those that logged the plain.
She set him on the cold ice,
birds sheltered him with wings.
Then the birds left him
and Lord Millet wailed.
This was long and this was loud;
his voice was a mighty one.
And then he crept and crawled,
he stood upright, he stood straight.
He sought to feed his mouth,
and planted there great beans.
The great beans'leaves were fluttering,
the rows of grain were bristing.
Hemp and barley dense and dark,
the melons, plump and round.
Lord Millet in his farming
had a way to help thins grow:
He rid the land of thick grass,
he planted there a glorious growth.
It was in squares, it was leafy,
it was planted, it grew tall.
It came forth, it formed ears,
it was hard, it was good.
Itstassels bent, it was full,
he had his household there in Tai.
He passed us down these wondrous grains:
our black millets, of one and two kernels,
Millet whose leaves sprout red or white,
hefted on shoulders, loaded on backs,
he took it home and began this rite.
And how goes this rite we have? --
at times we hull, at times we scoop,
at times we winnow, at times we stomp,
we hear it slosh as we wash it,
we hear it puff as we steam it.
Then we reckon, then we consider,
take artemisia, offer fat.
We take a ram for the flaying,
then we roast it, then we sear it,
to rouse up the following year.
We heap the wooden trenchers full,
wooden trenchers, earthenware platters.
And as the scent first rises
the high god is peaceful and glad.
This great odor is good indeed,
for Lord Millet began the rite,
and hopefully free from failing or fault,
it has lasted until now.
Sappho [Like the very gods]
Like the very gods in my sight is he who
sits where he can look in your eyes, who listens
close to you, to hear the soft voice, its sweetness
murmur in love and
laughter, all for him. But it breaks my spirit;
underneath my breast all the heart is shaken.
Let me only glance where you are, the voice dies,
I can say nothing,
but my lips are stricken to silence, under-
neath my skin the tenuous flame suffuses;
nothing shows in front of my eyes, my ears are
muted in thunder.
And the sweat breaks running upon me, fever
Shakes my body, paler I turn than grass is;
I can feel that I have been changed, I feel that
death has come near me.
1000 BC While The Torah is being assembled, in China they were assembling the Classic of Poetry (finishing sometime around 600). The text to the left is part of that collection: She Bore the Folk.
900 The Sanskrit Upanisads, dialogues and meditations of philosophers, are created on the Indian subcontinent.
“You are what your deep, driving desire is. As your desire is, so is your will. As your will is, so is your deed. As your deed is, so is your destiny. [ Brihadaranyaka IV.4.5 ]” ― Anonymous, The Upanishads
800 Greek Alphabet
776 First Olympic Games
753 Rome Founded
750 Carthage Founded
700 Homer Illiad and Odyssey
Also Kingdoms and Republics emerge in Northern India
600 Sappho and Aesop’s Fables
Draw Write Assignment: Don't Start Doing This Until We Talk About It!
Step One: Pick a passage
Pick a passage from any of the texts for the week that is short-ish and full of detail that you can talk about in relationship to the larger theme of the text. Think roughly a paragraph. Note that this should NOT be a paragraph you used in the discussion threads. Don't pick too much or these short two page papers suddenly become more and more. Yes, look at what you wrote. It should be around two pages.
Step Two: Draw it
Draw the paragraph. Every single detail in it. All of them. All the details. If there is a duck, draw a duck. If the duck is missing a leg, make sure you draw a one legged duck. If a monkey is riding the duck, draw a monkey riding the duck. If it is raining, draw it raining. If the monkey is sad because it is raining during his duck race, them make him sad. He may be sad that he entered a duck race with a one legged duck. Draw all the details.
Don't freak. You're not going to be graded on your drawing skill AND you get to tell me what things are in your writing if your drawing is as bad as mine, you'll need that ability.
Step Three: Write about it
A. Start your text with the full quote that you are drawing. Type it out at the top of the page. I'll need to know this to give you credit for drawing all the things.
B. After that quote, write: Simple Claim
C. Then write the simple claim. In two to three sentences, tell me how this paragraph fits the theme of the text (sound familar?)
D. Then go through and tell me what you drew. Tell me why the detail is important to the text. Tell me how these details fit into the overall theme you are arguing for in the text. Do this for all the details. You should often be doing a paragraph on a detail. Think about why the detail is important. Maybe a blue curtain is just a blue curtain. It probably isn't. Details matter. All these details add up.
Week 4: Home, Intelligence/Wisdom, and a Cyclops
Homer. The Odyssey. Trans. Samuel Butler. Orange Street Press, 1998. Print.
Read I,II, IX, XXIII, and XXIV
What you have to know on the map:
Mediterranean Sea, The Black Sea, Greece, Troy, Sicily, and Italy (It's not labeled on the map and I'm hoping you'll know).
Aesop's Fables, translated by Laura Gibbs (2002)
152. THE MERCHANT, THE DONKEY AND THE SALT
A merchant who owned a donkey heard that salt was cheaper by the seashore, so he decided to go into the salt business. He went and loaded his donkey with salt and then headed back home. At a certain moment, the donkey accidentally lost his footing and fell straight into a stream. This caused the salt to dissolve, making his load lighter. The donkey was thus able to rise easily to his feet and enjoy a less taxing journey home. The merchant sold what was left of the salt and led the donkey back again to load him with an even greater cargo than before. As the donkey made his way with difficulty back to the stream where he had fallen before, he sank to his knees on purpose this time. Then, after his cargo had dissolved in the water, he leaped nimbly to his feet, delighted to have turned the situation to his advantage, or so he thought. The merchant realized what was happening and decided that the next time he would bring back home a big load of porous sponges. On their way back across the stream, the wicked donkey fell down on purpose as before. This time the sponges grew heavy with water and the cargo expanded. As a result, the donkey had to carry a burden that was twice as heavy as it had been to begin with.
Note: An epimythium probably added by a later editor reads: 'It often happens that the same things which brought us luck can also get us into trouble.' Aelian, Characteristics of Animals 7.42, tells this same story about a mule who tries to trick Thales, one of the legendary seven sages of Greece.
Æsop. (Sixth century B.C.) Fables.
The Harvard Classics. 1909–14.
The Fox and the Crow
A FOX once saw a Crow fly off with a piece of cheese in its beak and settle on a branch of a tree. “That’s for me, as I am a Fox,” said Master Reynard, and he walked up to the foot of the tree. “Good-day, Mistress Crow,” he cried. “How well you are looking today: how glossy your feathers; how bright your eye. I feel sure your voice must surpass that of other birds, just as your figure does; let me hear but one song from you that I may greet you as the Queen of Birds.” The Crow lifted up her head and began to caw her best, but the moment she opened her mouth the piece of cheese fell to the ground, only to be snapped up by Master Fox. “That will do,” said he. “That was all I wanted. In exchange for your cheese I will give you a piece of advice for the future—
“DO NOT TRUST FLATTERERS.”
Technically Week #7
The Analects of Confucius
The Analects of Confucius: An Online Teaching Translation. Trans. Robert Eno. Indiana U, 2015. Web. 4 Feb 2015.
Only Book I and II
A History Note and Key Terms to Know
551-479 Confucius and The Analects
Ren -- A comprehensive ethical virtue. Think of benevolence, goodness, and so on. The term resists simple definition and The Analects show the disciples trying to pin Confucius down throughout (never happens).
Junzi -- An ideally ethical and capable person.
Dao -- Teaching/Skill path or way to some action: art, self-perfection, rule.
Li -- Ritual institutions. The body of religious, political, and common ceremonial forms, as well as, daily etiquette.
Wen -- Refinements of culture.
Tian -- Literally "sky" but suggests a supreme diety and thus often seen as "Heaven."
Loyalty -- Loyalty to superiors and peers but also to office and social group as a whole.
Respectfulness/Attentiveness -- Alertness and action in respect of subordinate to superior.
Filiality -- A traditional cultural imperative, obedience to parents, raised to a subtle level of self-discipline and character building.
Week 8: Not Your Father's Karma
History to know
ca 550 BC "The Ramayana of Valmiki"
400BC-400AD "The Mahabhrata" ("The Bhagavad Gita" is added in the 1st century BC)
Know the countries: Afghanistan, Pakistan,China, Nepal, and India, as well as, the two seas: Arabian Sea and Bay of Bengal
