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Title: Inanna by Diane Wolkstein ISBN: 0-06-090854-8 Publisher: Perennial Pub. Date: 03 September, 1983 Format: Paperback Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $14.95 |
Average Customer Rating: 5 (12 reviews)
Rating: 5
Summary: Wow! Beautiful and Powerful Poetry to Inanna
Comment: INANNA, QUEEN OF HEAVEN AND EARTH: HER STORIES AND HYMNS FROM SUMER is a wonderful read, especially if you are studying the ancient Mesopotamians. The book, which is authored by Sumerian expert Samuel Noah Kramer and folklorist Diane Wolkstein is divided into two parts. The first part consists of the poems themselves. These are "The Huluppu Tree"; "Inanna and the God of Wisdom"; "The Courtship of Inanna and Dumuzi"; "The Descent of Inanna", which contains "From the Great Above to the Great Below", "The Dream of Dumuzi", and the "Return"; and "Seven Hymns to Inanna." The seven hymns are "The Holy Priestess of Heaven", "Loud Thundering Storm", "The Holy One", "The Lady of the Evening", "The Lady of the Morning", "The Lady Who Ascends into Heaven", and "The Joy of Sumer: The Sacred Marriage Rite." The second half of the book is commentaries. Kramer writes two. I found the first one entitled "Sumerian History, Culture, and Literature" absorbing, but his second essay called "The Discovery and Decipherment of 'The Ascent of Inanna'" just left me cold. Wolkstein's contribution was both fascinating and illuminating. It was "Interpretations of Inanna's Stories and Hymns." Elizabeth Williams-Forte wrote the fourth and last entry "Annotations of the Art." It had some interesting information about the black and white pictures of art interspersed throughout the poetry, but it didn't exactly bowl me over with awe.
In addition there is a Family Tree for Inanna, a map of Sumer, Sources for Inanna's Stories and Hymns, Notes of the Textual Editing, Selected Bibliography, Acknowledgments, Selected Pronunciation Guide, Index, and Index.
The beautiful poetry to Inanna is the most important thing though. I read them aloud. Poetry should be read aloud. They bring the past into the present and they are gorgeous. If you're studying ancient Mesopotamia or if you're into the Goddess Inanna, do yourself a favor and get this book.
Rating: 5
Summary: Inspiring window on the great Sumerian goddess
Comment: The result of a collaboration between Sumerian scholar Noah Kramer and folklorist Diane Wolkstein, this book is a thoughtfully annotated translation of the major Sumerian cuneiform texts devoted to the goddess Inanna-among the oldest religious texts in the world. It is illustrated with black-and-white reproductions of ancient Sumerian art, mostly on clay tablets.
Our understanding of Sumerian culture continues to grow as new texts are found and our perceptions change. This book was published in 1983, and included material unknown to the general public at the time. There are four major stories of Inanna told here: "The Huluppu Tree," "Inanna and the God Of Wisdom,"
"The Courtship of Inanna and Dumuzi," and the extended epic "The Descent of Inanna." Seven hymns to the goddess round out the collection.
In "The Huluppu Tree," we meet the adolescent Inanna, expectantly awaiting the attainment of her queenship. The Huluppu tree, which she has planted and tended as a symbol of her hopeful authority, becomes infested with evil creatures, like personal demons, that will not depart and bring her to despair. She eventually appeals to Gilgamesh to vanquish the demons, and they exchange gifts made from the wood of the tree, bringing them both to greater power.
In "Inanna and the God of Wisdom," Inanna, now sexually mature but still youthful and unproven, is welcomed by Enki, God of Wisdom, who acts the role of proud grandfather, giving a feast in her honor. Enki's magnamity increases as he drinks, and he ends up offering Inanna all the magical keys to human civilization. Inanna, with enthusiastic politeness, accepts the gifts, and then makes a quick exit, getting a head start before Enki thinks better of his generosity and sends his monsters in pursuit of the errant goddess. Inanna, with the help of her trusted companion goddess, gets passed the monsters and arrives in Uruk with
her magical cargo, where she comes into her full power. Enki, apparently wise enough to let go of his greed in the face of fate, acknowledges Inanna's victory and ascendance.
In "The Courtship of Inanna and Dumuzi," Inanna, after some initial resistance, enters into an erotic courtship with Dumuzi the shepherd. This text is strangely alluring, moving with untroubled ease from sexual frankness to touching detail. (The scene where Dumuzi knocks on the door of Inanna's house for the first time feels like it could have come straight from a modern teenager's diary). After the marriage is consummated, Dumuzi curtly informs Inanna that he's going to be very busy being king now-don't wait up, hon. This poignantly rapid slide from courtship to neglect sets the scene for events in the next narrative.
In "The Descent of Inanna," the goddess, now Queen of Heaven and Earth, finds herself drawn to enter the underworld, realm of the dead, ruled by her evil and somehow tragic sister-self, Ereshkigal. One by one, she is stripped of all the symbols of her power at seven gates, to be left naked and alone before the Queen
of the Underworld, who kills Inanna with a single blow and hangs her on a hook to dry. Inanna has planned her own rescue in advance, though, and escapes to the surface, thronged by demons intent on finding someone to take her place. Inanna will not surrender to them her loyal sons, but when she returns to find her husband Dumuzi, not in mourning, but proudly sitting on his thrown and dispensing authority, she strikes him down and sends the demons after him. The tale of Dumuzi's flight is nightmarish and filled with dream imagery. Thanks to the efforts of his compassionate and self-sacrificing sister, and the softening of Inanna's own anger, a Persephone-like bargain is reached, and Dumuzi is allowed to return to the living for half of each year.
The hymns that round out this book are an exciting glimpse of the actual religious practice of the Sumerians. Especially interesting for modern Pagans is the annual ritual wedding between goddess and king.
I'm someone who tends to be rather skeptical about the ancient precedents of modern goddess worship, but these texts caught me off my guard. They are amazingly modern (or is it timeless?) in their content. The goddess actually grows psychologically and spiritually through the series of narratives, and the
portrayal of the sexual dynamic between men and women rings uncannily true across four millennia. Inanna's story is the original heroine's journey. And, unlike most of her male counterparts, she doesn't need to kill anything to attain her spiritual victory. (Well, almost. Dumuzi gets a serious lesson in raw goddess power!). Her character seems to flow from woman to goddess and back again so smoothly, that it is impossible not to feel a living religion in these texts, one in which there was an intimate dialog between the powers of the goddess and the human experience of her priestesses.
These original texts are better than any modern retelling of Inanna's story I have come across, not just because they are more "authentic", but because they are hauntingly moving. Unlike the familiar mythology of the Greeks and Romans, which has come down to us in a more or less "literary" style, these works seem
more spiritual, even liturgical. Repetition is combined with a directness of wording, and the result is often very powerful; there is a primal intensity about them. They disarm you with their open, almost child-like language, and then leave you sitting, mute and amazed, in that timeless central cavern of the human experience.
Rating: 5
Summary: A great look at a lost goddess
Comment: Wow. This book is incredible. If you have any interest in the ancient societies of the Middle East buy this book. The translations are clear and give you a feeling of being a part of something that is bigger than every day life. I can't even pick out a favorite with any ease (though I may lean toward "The Lady of the Morning" and "The Lady of the Evening" for personal reasons). Let me say it again: buy this book.
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Title: Inanna, Lady of Largest Heart : Poems of the Sumerian High by Betty De Shong Meador ISBN: 0292752423 Publisher: University of Texas Press Pub. Date: February, 2001 List Price(USD): $23.95 |
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Title: Sumerian Mythology: A Study of Spiritual and Literary Achievement in the Third Millennium B.C. by Samuel Noah Kramer ISBN: 0812210476 Publisher: University of Pennsylvania Press Pub. Date: 01 April, 1998 List Price(USD): $12.95 |
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Title: Inanna: From the Myths of Ancient Sumer by Enheduanna, Linda Wolfsgruber, Kim Echlin ISBN: 0888994966 Publisher: Groundwood Books Pub. Date: 01 August, 2003 List Price(USD): $19.95 |
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Title: Myths from Mesopotamia: Creation, the Flood, Gilgamesh, and Others (Oxford World's Classics) by Stephanie Dalley ISBN: 0192835890 Publisher: Oxford University Press Pub. Date: 01 September, 1998 List Price(USD): $11.95 |
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Title: History Begins at Sumer: Thirty-Nine "Firsts" in Recorded History by Samuel N. Kramer ISBN: 0812212762 Publisher: University of Pennsylvania Press Pub. Date: 01 October, 1981 List Price(USD): $20.95 |
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