Gilgamesh
Joan London, 2003
Grove/Atlantic
272 pp.
ISBN-13: 9780802141217
Summary
Gilgamesh is a rich, spare, and evocative novel of encounters and escapes, of friendship and love, of loss and acceptance, a debut that marks the emergence of a world-class talent. It is 1937, and the modern world is waiting to erupt.
On a farm in rural Australia, seventeen-year-old Edith lives with her mother and her sister, Frances. One afternoon two men, her English cousin Leopold and his Armenian friend Aram, arrive-taking the long way home from an archaeological dig in Iraq—to captivate Edith with tales of a world far beyond the narrow horizon of her small town of Nunderup. One such story is the epic of Gilgamesh, the ancient Mesopotamian king who traveled the world in search of eternal life. Two years later, in 1939, Edith and her young son, Jim, set off on their own journey, to Soviet Armenia, where they are trapped by the outbreak of war.
Rich, spare, and evocative, Gilgamesh won The Age Book of the Year Award for Fiction and was shortlisted for the Miles Franklin Literary Award alongside Richard Flanagan's. (From the publisher.)
Author Bio
• Birth—July 24, 1948
• Where—Perth, Western Australia
• Education—B.A., University of Western Australia
• Awards—Age Book of The Year (Australian) (twice)
• Currently—lives in Fremantle, Western Australia
Joan London is also the author of two collections of stories, Letter to Constantine and Sister Ships.
She has twice won The Age Book of The Year Award for Fiction, for Gilgamesh and for her story collection, Sister Ships. Gilgamesh was also a finalist for the New South Wales Premier's Christina Stead Prize and the Western Australian Premier's Award for Fiction. It was also short-listed for the Miles Franklin Literary Award with Tim Winton's Dirt Music and Richard Flanagan's Gould's Book of Fish.
The Good Parents, her second novel, was published in 2008. (From Wikipedia and the publisher.)
Book Reviews
An engrossing story that bristles with local detail, whether in rural Australia, England, or the Caucasus. Stoutly eschewing sentimentality, London reveals her contrasting characters as flawed beings that thieve, betray, and hold deep grudges; however, the love that holds together Edith, Leopold, and the Armenian’s son overcomes all.
Canberra Times (Australia)
London’s narrative is continuously articulated by unobtrusive yet carefully plotted references to titanic off-stage events. . . . These background events serve to emphasize the self-centered and individual aspects of her heroine’s quest. . . . Her prose is likewise unforced, adroit and understated, the equivalent of a classical string quartet rather than an Eroica Symphony in the Romantic mode. . . . Given the increasingly democratic nature of Western societies, how to elevate ordinary lives to a heroic or tragic level has been a noticeable preoccupation of literary writers for more than a century. . . . It is part of the overall restraint of London's work that she raises this central question but does not force a dogmatic answer upon the reader.
Tim Gibbons - West Australian
To get a sense of what Gilgamesh is like, imagine one of those Outback bodice-rippers put on a strict diet, pared down to essentials, purged of the excess water weight of set pieces involving eroticized sheep-shearing and adorable kangaroos.
Francine Prose - New York Times Book Reviw
Joan London's glancing, iridescent, intelligent first novel doesn't do anything so crass as suggest a moral. But if it did, it might come close to the truth old Frank glimpsed hazily on his deathbed: Whatever "the point of it" is, it still has to be worked out anew in each generation. Gilgamesh and his story are there to remind us that this is as close to immortality as we may ever get.
Elizabeth Ward - Washington Post
A compelling debut....The epic scope of the novel is complemented by an extraordinary sensitivity to detail. From the intractable Australian outback to a shabby-genteel London rooming house, from the Orient Express to the Armenian city of Yerevan simmering under Soviet occupation, the settings glow with a dream like intensity, evoking both the allure of adventure and the ambivalent embrace of home.
Amanda Heller - Boston Globe
This novel by Australian Joan London was a finalist for several major prizes in her native land, and it's easy to see why. Its story—of a 17-year-old girl living in a remote corner of the country who bears a child by a briefly visiting Armenian and then follows him to his native land, in the Soviet Union on the brink of WWII—is riveting in its strangeness and immediacy, evoking with stark power a world almost inconceivably isolated and remote. Right from the start, when Frank, a veteran of WWI, brings his nurse and inamorata Ada with him to live on his farm in southwestern Australia, we are in a vividly realized and elemental landscape. And when their daughter Edith is seduced by the strange Aram (the driver for her mother's British friend), gives birth to baby Jim and a few months later sets off to seek the boy's elusive father in his remote country, one has entered the realm of the legendary and epic journey conjured by the book's title. The chapters covering Edith's sojourn in Soviet Armenia, threatened by both Germans and Russians, are unforgettable, brought to life in myriad brilliant details. Only when Edith returns to Australia after the war and gradually picks up the threads of her old life does the story begin to lose its grip. London's stark prose and command of a wonderfully maintained brooding atmosphere, however, make this an adventure to remember. London is the author of two story collections, but this novel marks her U.S. debut. It can be confidently handsold to admirers of Tim Winton and Kate Grenville.
Publishers Weekly
Edith Clark is only 17 when two strangers pierce the insular world she has inhabited since birth. Full of stories both real and fabricated-including that of Mesopotamian King Gilgamesh and his partner, Enkidu-British cousin Leopold and his Armenian friend Aram introduce Edith to a life in which adventure is routine and opportunity abundant. Against a backdrop of pre-World War II anxiety, Edith and Aram bond, and Edith becomes pregnant. Although Aram leaves Edith's rural Australian home before she discovers the pregnancy, the book never descends into soap opera. Instead, it follows Edith as she struggles to raise her son while simultaneously satisfying her need for self-fulfillment. The novel, short-listed for Australia's The Age Book of the Year Award, explores numerous themes, including friendship, loyalty, mental illness, and the role of mourning in daily life. It also examines race, class, and gender, but with such subtlety it feels accidental. London (daughter of Jack and author of two story collections, Sister Ships and Letter to Constantine) writes with power, vision, and poignancy. Highly recommended. —Eleanor J. Bader, Brooklyn, NY.
Library Journal
First novel, as well as a first US appearance, for Australian author London: the story of an Australian woman who travels halfway around the world in pursuit of the man she loves. Edith Clark grew up in the outback of southwestern Australia, but her roots-and heart-were elsewhere. Her parents were English immigrants who sought a new start after WWI, but Edith's father Frank knew nothing of farm life and failed badly at it. He died while Edith was still a girl, leaving her, her mother, and sister to fend for themselves. The genteel Ada, descended into chronic depression, while Edith's sister Frances, swallowed up in a religious mania, became a preacher. Edith, more conventionally, fell in love with a bad man: Armenian archaeologist Aram Sinanien, a friend of Edith's cousin Leopold, who visited the Clarks on his return from a dig in 1937. An ardent nationalist, Aram left Edith pregnant in Australia to return to his homeland (under Soviet control) to fight with the underground independence movement. Edith gave birth to his son, then set off, baby in tow, to find him in Armenia. A difficult trip in the best of times, this was almost a suicide mission after the outbreak of WWII. But Edith crossed the Soviet borders with surprising ease and quickly made contact with friends of Aram's, who agreed to help her search for him. She was able, too, against all odds, to travel mostly unmolested with her infant son through the war zones. Perhaps she should have doubted her own luck a bit, or stopped to wonder whether she was being used as bait by the NKVD. But such considerations were lost on Edith, who (like all true lovers) never stopped to weigh the pros and cons of her quest. London's story gradually works up a head of steam and by the end becomes quite engrossing—even if the two-souls-caught-in-the-maelstrom-of-history theme comes across as a poor knockoff of Dr. Zhivago.
Kirkus Reviews
Discussion Questions
1. Today, in a time when suspicions, misperceptions, and acts of aggression among cultures have led us to war, the issues of the novel Gilgamesh are peculiarly relevant, even urgent. Think about and talk about the crossings of cultural boundaries in the story. Russia, England, Australia, Armenia, Iraq, Syria—all are explored by the characters. When is there a real understanding of another culture? When is a character blocked by the entrenched differences?
2. In Gilgamesh there are cycles of quests, with younger generations recapitulating earlier journeys. Cite some of these quests and revisitings by the characters. Leopold? Aram? Edith? Jim? Even Irina and Ada? In what ways does the past continually become present?
3. The Babylonian epic Gilgamesh provides the thematic analogue for the novel (you can find information on-line, and Penguin has a good translation). The epic, acknowledged to be our oldest literary masterpiece, prefiguring incidents and themes in Homer and the Bible, is truly a work in progress as ancient cuneiform tablets continue to be discovered, particularly in Iraq. It is the story of the quest for wisdom, for ways to lead a meaningful life, and for ways to confront mortality. It is a story of friendship, of family, and of learning from the gods. London interweaves the tale among characters whose concerns and behavior often echo the epic. Do you derive enough information from the novel to appreciate the author's double vision? How does the book, the printed epic itself, become almost a character?
4. Prostitutes play an explicit role in the epic, and in the novel adultery and a threat of life in brothels is alluded to more than once. When does illicit sexual behavior become an issue? What is the result?
5. One of the primary themes of the epic, probably the central theme, is a human being's struggle with the fear of death, his search for immortality. How do characters in the novel confront or even conquer this fear? Are there different kinds of “death” in the book? Consider Frank and Ada, their private despair. Think of other characters' struggle with the loss of identity.
6. Aram and Leopold are quite different—in origin, temperament, and destiny. Yet together they form a complementary whole (as do Gilgamesh and Enkidu, the wild man, in the epic). How do they provide Edith with two parts of a whole? “Aram was stronger and more deft, Leopold had more knowledge” (p.31). What does Edith seek and derive from the pair?Not only does Leopold open Edith's eyes, and make her more curious about the world, but he also confers on her the grace of listening. “Before he came it was as if she'd never learnt to speak” (p.31). How does this respect of Leopold, given and received, remain important throughout the book?
7. Edith reveals a slyness that pushes the borders of propriety. Indeed she becomes a petty thief in Australia. Are we to assume that in her push for freedom, as in war, all's fair? Do the ends justify the means? How is this issue carried forward into her journeys to England and Armenia? Can there be moral absolutes for people living under oppression?
8. In the epic, Enkidu dies and “Gilgamesh sets off like an outcast or a holy man” (the story is recounted on pages 174-175). Edith wonders why she had heard the name “Gilgamesh” in a cafe in Yerevan. Leopold responds, “He's a mythical figure. He belongs to everyone, everywhere. Take us, for instance. Aren't we on a heroic quest?” Is this inclusiveness surprising for a story out of the Middle East? Do we need to go back to myths that seem to overarch the rigidity of some organized religions?
9. “Why did you come “
“Because I was needed.”
“Nobody ever engulfed her like this. He was a country she'd come home to.” (p. 171)
How do we ultimately assess or explain the relationship between Edith and Leopold? They do not fit any conventional mold of male-female romance. How do they transcend the conventions?
10. For most of the novel, Jim has no voice of his own; he is interpreted by either Edith or the narrator. Does this distance contribute to his blending in with the epic myth? With his dark foreign looks he is always other, strange, “odar” in Australia. In Armenia at first, his language sets him apart. Is his final journey to the Mideast a search for roots and home? And Leopold as a surrogate father? Who else in the novel is perceived as “other”?
11. Dark hearts, unforgiving spirits, appear in Frances, Irina, and Nevart. Are there others? Do you see redeeming traits in any of these characters? Do they evolve?
12. Edith goes through a number of identities. Are there certain traits or occupations that keep coming back for her? What are they? At one point, approaching Batum on the coast of Georgia, Hagop gives Edith a black headscarf. It is meant as protective coloration, but the disguise appears otherwise to her. “In the salt-smeared window of the saloon she caught sight of herself and Jim. They looked dwarf-like and lost, like a snapshot of somebody's children” (p.123). How does this moment serve as a metaphor for the whole journey?
13. Iraq is viewed as a goal and a refuge both culturally and personally. How is this true for Leopold? For Jim, ultimately? For Edith, the sanctuary is temporary, but significant. Along the Euphrates, the self-styled family of Edith, Leopold, and Jim enters into ancient life in the villages. “They were so tired that time seemed to slow, almost stand still. This was how they lived in villages along the Euphrates five thousand years ago, Leopold said. People raised goats and ate fish while great civilisations came and went” (p.177). Do you feel as if the travelers are entering into prehistory, into the myth?
14. “Comrade Stalin loves little children” (p.125). How does this notion aid Edith and Jim? There is other pervasive evidence of Stalin's repression in Yerevan. Cite some examples.
15. When Frances pulls away from the greedy religious sect, she feels deficient that she has loved the land more than God. Explain. She begins to regard religion as a dangerous dark attraction, one she may have inherited from her father. “An appetite for moral judgment that she was always seeking to appease. She always felt watched. By whom? God or her father?” (p. 201). How does this propensity affect her relationships with others? Here and elsewhere in the novel, what is Joan London asking us to examine about appetites “for moral judgments”?
16. Various characters serve as touchstones for Edith. Who are they, and what assumptions of Edith do they test?
17. At one point Edith deposits her child and strikes out on her own, to move, to breathe unencumbered. She soon reverses and returns to her responsibility, but is the moment later repeated in some form? When does Edith feel deficient in her duty to other characters besides Jim?
Do you find it credible that Edith chooses to put herself and her child into certain danger in her voyage to Armenia? Is her motivation—doing it for love—enough to explain her journey, one that could be described as reckless? What were her options at home?
18. Wartime and covert operations inevitably set the stage for moral ambiguities. Which characters exemplify hazy gray areas of behavior? Which ones belie surface appearances? Who seems to be torn by split loyalties? Who remains cloaked in unanswered questions?
19. How does Leopold's calling as an archaeologist provide insight, even poignancy, as we follow current events in Iraq?
20. Pragmatism and idealism lie in uneasy balance in the novel. Which characters might be described as idealists? Which are pragmatists or even cynics? Does anyone represent a fusion of these traits? What is the result?
21. What does Edith derive from her journeys? Do you see fundamental changes in her as the novel progresses? What are they? Do others see changes in her? Although she would dispute it, she is called “brave” by both Irina and Mr. Five Percent. What are the circumstances for their saying that?
22. Later in the novel Edith worries that Jim is wretched. She “searched and searched the past. What if despair was inherited?. . . His Armenian grandparents had been murdered. Aram had seen his mother die. Did Aram's actions in Armenia amount to suicide? Did he die in despair?” (p. 244). How would you respond to Edith's questions? Think, too, about the Holocaust and its multigenerations of victims. Have you observed examples of what seems to be inherited despair? Do we have hope in the novel that the cycles of despair may be broken?
23. Same-sex relationships including friendships are explored in various ways in the novel. Whose? The pederasty onboard ship is clearly exploitative, but the relationship Frances finally forges with Lee is a rich, mature one. What about Leopold and Aram? Jim and Gareth?
24. How is escape a salvation in the book? “She had only just saved herself and Jim by running away” (p.74). What is at stake at Matron Linley's? When else in the novel is escape a lifeline? Is it the visiting boys who inspire Edith to feel “as detached and free as a traveler herself” (p. 46)?
25. Loss is a recurrent lament in the book. For instance, even though war news (rockets on London, Hitler and the Jews, the Russian front) penetrates Syria, “for Miss Anoosh it was still the Turks murdering Armenians. In this Miss Anoosh was like every Armenian Edith had ever met, starting with Aram. How you became aware of the place in their lives of loss, lost family, lost land. Of buried anger, for monstrous crimes unpunished, for the world's indifference. It was always there, as if the end of grieving would be the final loss” (p.185).
How is this theme of loss important throughout the novel? For Ada? Frank? Irina? Edith? Others?
(Questions issued by publisher.)
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