Timeline

• Oct 31, 2025: started reading.
• Nov 07, 2025: finished reading.

Review

I read a more literal translation of this book over a decade ago. The little bit I remember is that it was quite dry and I spent most of my time parsing academic footnotes.

The full title of this edition is “Gilgamesh: A New Rendering in English Verse.” David Ferry, who doesn’t read cuneiform or speak Sumerian or Babylonian, has a pretty straightforward goal with his rendering: based one what we know about the epic and its history, make the most accessible version of this poem for contemporary English readers. As a result, it’s not a translation so much as it is an adaptation. This book is to the original epic what “She’s the Man” is to Shakespeare’s “Twelfth Night.”

Does Ferry succeed? I think he does, for the most part. I certainly felt more affected by this story. The characters felt more alive. The images felt more vivid. In particular, the section where Gilgamesh follows the path of the sun in the dark tunnels under the mountain was very well done.