Utnapishtim Beats

Gilgamesh finds Utnapishtim reclining at home
U is inquisitive
G is afraid fo death and wants an way to escape it ... demanding and emotional

Enkidu story...
Huwawa
Inanna
Bull of Heaven
Enlil
the worm

U denies it's possible
G flattened
U moved to share secrets

Flood story...
council in Shurrupak
Enlil plans to cleanse overpopulation of humans
Council pact to keep from humans
Enki tells the hut to tell Utnapisthim to build a boat
U builds arc
U loads arc
U witnesses the scourge of nuclear annihilation and a deluge of acid rain
Anunnaki mortified by the destruction
U makes land and makes offerings to the gods
Enki praises Ut
Enlil makes him immortal and sets him up in paradise

U challenges G to meditate
G falls asleep
U places six loaves next to him
G wakes up
U has seventh loaf
G is mortified, afraid to move
U sends him to bathe, dive for flower of rebirth
G swims to flower
G wrestles flower loose
G brings to surface
G sees Enkidu in water - reflection
G throws the flower back

Siduri

We see him passing through eternal freezing night along a narrow path to the other side of the mountains and then down into lush green valleys. After the chanting has faded out we begin to hear Siduri signing her song about the cool waters of her well and the relief they bring of all that troubles life. 

Scene 2 Siduri

Gilgamesh arrives at a house in a lush green valley. Siduri has seen him coming and hides in her house.

Gilgamesh:

You inside. Why do you hide? 

Siduri: 

You are a reeking mess and you alarm me. 

Gilgamesh:

Open the door Alewoman. 

Siduri:

I will not. I own this property and I say what goes around here. 

Gilgamesh:

Gilgamesh. I have come far. And I thirst. 

Siduri:

You are pathetic. Your face is drawn and your eyes are hollow yet full of fire. Who are you?

 (she pours him a drink and sticks it through the door. he guzzles and falls to his knees)

There now, Gilgamesh, let Siduri sooth your thirst.

Tell me what evil destiny robs you of your youth? Some wicked sorrow sucks the marrow from your bones. A grueling and horrific journey, I take it. You have been through fire and ice and yet still you find no grace. 

Gilgamesh:

I search everywhere for breath of life and find none. Joy has been ripped from me. My brother, my only true friend, dead. He was my soul’s better half racing wild horses here and catching orange tigers there. He conquered mountains and divine bulls that race across the sky like clouds.

 
What awaits us all caught him first. For one whole week I waited thirsty, to see him rise again in all his splendor… until his body did rot. Then I cried for my own death. I ran from my home to the mountain tops to clean the scent of death from my lungs. Wandering to find that breath again, walking and walking. Could I sit and rest when my best friend has died as I will someday?

(she comforts him holding him both like a child and like a lover, she feeds him a second drink)

Siduri:

Hush, now. You must remember that the Anunnaki  decreed our fates many years ago. They alone live life eternal, while we live lives as frail a memory. We all must die, sweet man.

Gilgamesh:

Perhaps, but first I will see Utnapishtim. If it takes my final breath I will find my way to him. 

Siduri:

You will find your way Gilgamesh. But first you must rest and gain your strength.  Are you in such a hurry to meet your death? No, sit and let me quench your thirst. Let me give you breath for life. 

(she feeds him another glass props him up on a pillow and bathes him with a bowl of water and a cloth – head hands and feet. This is reflective of Shamhat and Enkidu) 

Now is the in your life to relax; to sing and dance. Savor the delicacies of my table. Bathe easily in sweet, refreshing waters. 

(She begins to sing to him a reprise of the earlier song.)

Gilgamesh:

I am so weary of this journey. Perhaps I can stay a short while.

Siduri:

Yes, Stay and I will sing for you. There is nothing you could want that I do not have. 

Gilgamesh:

Nothing at all. 

Siduri:

You should be enjoying your children to whom your love gives life. 

Gilgamesh:

I have many children.

Siduri:

Play joyfully with your chosen wife. 

Gilgamesh:

I have no wife.

(she sings again and feeds him another drink)

Siduri:

You have children but no wife?

Gilgamesh:

My children are the people of Uruk. I am their King! 

Siduri:

It is the will of the Anunnaki that even kings smile upon simple pleasures in the freedom of their short days.

Gilgamesh:

Yes, life is much too short. And death is a thief that lies waiting. 

Siduri:

Yes, my dear. Let me protect you from the thief. 


(feeds him another drink. He has a vision of Enkidu being tamed by Shamhat and awakens in a panic)

Gilgamesh:
How long have I been here?

Siduri:

Not long at all, you have only just arrived.

Gilgamesh:

How long, I say?

Siduri:

Hush sweet king, only a few days, perhaps a week or two. 

Gilgamesh:

You have tricked me! You lured me with your song and made me blind to my own purpose. 

Siduri:

You were thirsty and I gave you drink. You were hungry and you ate. You cried out in pain and I gave you my bosom to rest upon. You were alone and I offer you my life. Am I so evil for loving you?

Gilgamesh:

Enough! I have no time to rest! I go to see Utnapishtim. Tell me Siduri how do I find him? 

Siduri:

He lives across the sea of the dead.

Gilgamesh:

How I get there. How will I find safe passage.

Siduri:

Sweet  Sallum, libbu, no man has ever gone there and lived to say he made it. Only Shamash who guides the sun across the sky can go there. For you must cross the sea. Few have made it half way before they grow too weary and are overcome with the pain and misery of death which surrounds them on every side. 

Gilgamesh:

I am already surrounded with death. My brother will be with me.

Siduri:

Ok, Gilgamesh, suppose you make it through this wild jungle to the sea. When you find the boatman Urshanabi what will you do? Hmm? He carries the dead to the underworld. Deadly snakes are his playthings. Will you approach him like an old friend and kiss him on the cheek? Hey buddy! Hey pal, give me a ride to the other side? Well, if he does befriend you then good. Go with him and find your way. 

Gilgamesh:

Please, forgive me.

Siduri:

If he walks away from you, return to me.

He hacks his way through the jungle. When he comes upon a ring of stone tablets he viciously destroys them in a fit of rage. 

Bull of Heaven

Gilgamesh and Enkidu fight the Bull of Heaven - what is the bull? scale, ability, figure, proportion, figurative or literal? It splits the earth several times so deeply people fall into the crevices. The heros fight it, kill it, quarter it and throw the tail at Inanna. How does the bull break the earth? How does it fly down from heave? How do Inanna and her father fly?

Gilgamesh swims

Gilgamesh swims to the bottom of the river and pulls a flower from the rocks - swimming, water, beach, breath

Gilgamesh drags a corpse

Gilgamesh carries Enkidu's dead body around for weeks in varying stages of decay.

The Heros Fight the Mighty Humbaba

Gilgamesh and Enkidu fight the mighty Humbaba - what is Humbaba? He is seven shields, seven layers of protection. He is a Chimera made of seven animals protected by seven "spirit" shields. Yes, think Anime. Thats the closest understanding I have of him. His misery is what gives him power. And he's miserable because he is an immortal creation who can not find joy because none of his parts serve any purpose other than defense. Never love. And so he is eternally miserable. His voice is a bellow so great when it rolls through the forest it kills those within a day's journey, a wind that sucks all hope from you (Harry Potter, can you name a few more?), specifically the moment when Gilgamesh has been struck hopeless and Enkidu saves his life, killing Humbaba.

Gilgamesh Meets Enkidu

Gilgamesh meets Enkidu - they fight then fall in love, puppet combat, stylized fighting a la bunraku, anime, etc. How do they maintain gravity? later, what does this overlap with? Ninsun asking Aruru for help? Is Gilgamesh speaking to Utnapishtim about what he does while he does it with Enkidu? juxtapositions Fighting without looking silly unintentionally. Intentional control, happy accidents. I would prefer no slap dancing but I'll go there if we're stumped.

Urshanabi and Death's Deep Lake

I am totally fascinated with the physicality in this passage. It will be a puzzle, but should be a lot of fun to figure out. Slashing through the jungle, crushing the stone pillars, crossing death's deep lake in a canoe made of bundled poles pushed across a lake full of death and decay - speed, hands, boat, poles, scale, dynamics.

The text for this passage:

Death's Deep Lake

Gilgamesh:

Urshanabi, the Boatman?

Urshanabi: (Inspecting Gilgaemesh for signs of life and purpose, he finds clues on Gilgamesh's person. he speaks mostly to himself)

Hmmm, you have not seen your home in a very long time.

Gilgamesh:

I’ve come to see Utnapishtim, great father of us all who survived the flood.  




Urshanabi:
No bed, no roof, wandering aimlessly in the wild. You passed through Mashu like a champion, did you not? Yes, we saw you. Yes, hell itself is part of how you look. 

Gilgamesh:

You are the boatman, aren’t you? I can smell the sweet sick of death on you. 

Urshanabi:
Hmmm, an overlord, king... perhaps.

Gilgamesh:

I am Gilgamesh. Take me across this sea of the death. 

Urshanabi:
Ah, yes... you are two parts Anunnaki, one part Adamu. 

Gilgamesh:

I am not a refugee wandering aimlessly. I am High Council of our creator, Enki, and King of his city Uruk. 


Urshanabi:
You have grief dripping from your shoulders. You wreak of despair. 

Gilgamesh:

I grieve for Enkidu,  my companion and true friend. Death has reached him first and left me to weep and wail for his shriveling corpse which scares me. Death now scares me. I’ve wandered so long... I can’t stop pacing and crying.

Urshanabi:
Definitely broken. Hell is definitely a part of you. Your face is pinched and your eyes do not look right... jumping about like a mad man!

Gilgamesh: (grabbing Urshanabi by the clothes)

I am mad. I bleed from weeping. My breath burns with agony. I seek my way to Utnapishtim who lives free, beyond the grasp of death’s deep lake. Now, tell me how to get there so I may learn his secrets and I will bother you no more.

Urshanabi:

All right then. If you seek Utnapishtim, you must activate the portal that carries my ship over the ocean. Just retrace your steps through the jungle until you reach the valley. There you will find a large ring of stones. The instructions are on the stone. Go now and we will be transported to the other side. (Gilgamesh sets him down. Straightening himself...)

Perhaps you saw the stones on your way here. Oh, wait! That’s right. On your rampage through the jungle your axe felled each one of them. (he points) Without the Anunnaki' portal, there is no safe passage. Your blasphemy has undone your purpose. 

Gilgamesh: 

My purpose hasn’t even begun. I am no fool, boat-man. You will take me across in your boat!

Urshanabi:

(aside) Ah... what to do with the living?  

I am the "Ferry-man" if you must.  My vessel travels over the ocean, not in it. Without that portal, you are lost. 

Giglamesh:
Enkidu! (Gilgamesh falls to his knees unable to cry)

Fine. Pick up your ax, broken king. Cut a thousand poles and bind them together to build a boat. And then cut a hundred extra poles to push you across. Be forewarned, do not let the water touch your hands. You can never use the same pole twice. 

Gilgamesh sets sail in a reed boat with nothing but the clothes on his back and his war ax on his belt. Each pole he presses into the water becomes lodged in a mire of hands and spray. With all his superhuman strength he gives the poles, one after the other, a mighty shove before they are swallowed into the water. He skims across the waves of reaching hands, slapping against the hull, fingers grasping at the reeds. Ninety nine, one hundred... with one mighty push he sails toward the shore. Slowing in the greedy tide, Gilgamesh stands and opens his arms, his robes becoming a sail in the wind. 

Gates of Mashu and the Scorpion Guards

Gilgamesh climbs his way to the top of mount Mashu - deliriously cursing his way up the mountain to the gate protected by scorpion guards. Scale, surface to climb, earth moving below, Scorpion guards abilities limitations and scale, character and physiology...

Scene 1  Mashu - the sun’s passage from dusk to dawn through the blackness of night. It is a razor thin ridge across the deepest pit through the internal world of the mind.

Wandering through the wilderness dressed in the skins of animals he has killed along the way, Gilgamesh comes to the sacred mount Mashu, which guides the path of Shamash, the sun. It is the gate into night and tomorrow. We hear his mutterings as he approaches the scorpion guards. 

At the gates on mount Mashu

Gilgamesh:

Curses on the gate that smashed his hand.

Scorps:

One comes toward us.

Scorp 1:

Yes, one comes toward us.

Gilgamesh:

Curses on the Kashiwho discovered him. 

Scorp 2:

But one is partly divine, dear.

Scorp 1:

One partly divine, dear. I would know what brings one on so long a journey before one is devoured. 

Scorps:

Devoured one.

Gilgamesh:

Curses on Shamhat who stole his innocence. Curses on Humbaba who injured him.

Scorp 2:

Subside! One has traveled a great distance and climbed a great height. I am curious. One who looks so near death, what brings one to us? Speak now.

Scorp 1:

Why has one come to Mashu?

Gilgamesh:

Curses on me who brought him to fame. Curses on Inanna for having him killed. 

Why does he lie  dead in the underworld while I live? My brother. My twin. 

Scorp 2:

One’s brother has died?

Gilgamesh:

Kings and Queens kissed the ground he walked upon. The aged men and women of Uruk mourn for him and turn their palms toward heaven in prayer for him. The animals of the wild who were his mother and father weep for him. The rivers Ulay and Euphrates swell with their tears. Everywhere that is touched by the light of Shamash knows of my brother Enkidu. Rugged men and tender children alike shed tears at the loss of his inspiration. And yet I wander alone through the step where he was found through the desert and mountain alike. And now I cry for you Enkidu. Now I scream like some mad woman for you were my family. You were the ax on my belt, the sword in my scabbard, my shield in battle. What devil came and took you from me?

Scorp 2:

  One is quite wretched with grief.  But what brings one to mount Mashu?

Scorps:

Wretched one.

Gilgamesh:

Why? When we met we fought and loved and, with the blessing of Shamash, we humbled the beast Humbaba. My people were joyous. Enkidu was my brother and now he lies in some sleep like spell. And the voice of grief, like a blanket, covers the land. 

Scorps:

Wretched one.

Gilgamesh:

I must find a way to wake Enkidu from this spell. I must save my people from the darkness that poisons their dreamless sleep. I come seeking passage to the lands beyond where I might find Utnapishtim. He is both the master of eternal life and death eternal. His answers will free my people from this plague of grief. He will know how to awaken Enkidu.

Scorp 1:

No mortal has ever come to know what one seeks here. No one has come so far, and none have made this passage through the eternal darkness of night. While Shamash sleeps, the light of his sun shines no where. 

Scorp 2:

The bosom of this mountain rests on the bowels of the underworld. If One fell one would fall all day and all night into the pit before reaching hell! 

Scorp 1:

To where I let no one go, to where I forbid anyone to enter, there is no light and there is no heat. 

Scorp 2:

One passes through eternal freezing night. 

Scorps:

Shamash sleeps.

Scorp 2:

One is quite dejected. Pitiful. 

Scorp 1:

Near death already.

Scorps:

Pitiful one. Dejected. Wretched.

Sorp 1:

Gilgamesh I command one to go and cross the razor ridge of this mountain. I grant you passage. May the Anunnaki  guide you. 

We see him passing through eternal freezing night along a narrow path to the other side of the mountains and then down into lush green valleys. After the chanting has faded out we begin to hear Siduri signing her song about the cool waters of her well and the relief they bring of all that troubles life. 

Crossing Mashu

Mashu - literally a razor thin passage the sun takes through darkness from dusk til dawn, figuratively a psychological passage through the space between the hemispheres of the brain... don't lean to either side or you'll lose your balance. What and how much of his psychological state does the audience get to explore during this passage?

Mashu - the sun’s passage from dusk to dawn through the blackness of night. It is a razor thin ridge across the deepest pit through the internal world of the mind. 

We see him passing through eternal freezing night along a narrow path to the other side of the mountains and then down into lush green valleys. After the chanting has faded out we begin to hear Siduri signing her song about the cool waters of her well and the relief they bring of all that troubles life. 

Until then he climbs along this razor ridge being sure not to lean to far to one side or the other lest he fall into that blackness that takes all day and night and the next day to reach the bottom. 

A List

This is a list of elements, ideas, moments, actions, emotions during the story that I find interesting and want to investigate.

topics:

performance skills

exercises and training in perception and projection - concepts of active versus passive action when translating movement into animation

using actors as set: mountains, alters, boats, aircraft, other technology, water, wind

projection, cutouts, action tracking? 

shadow play surfaces: tent,  costume 

puppet prototypes 

costumes for puppets and performers

challenges:

always... gravity, focus and breath

sky - stars, clouds, air traffic 

temple interactions - cerimonial actions vs. literal communications

antigravity - aircraft, magic or what?

"godliness"
tropes/tropic evasion

characters

Enkidu - animal movement/style vs. man movement, shadow? interactions w/ hunters vs. Shamhat vs. 

Gilgamesh - brooding/selfish/closed/indifferent then bright-eyed/adventurous/driven/in love then sullen/stricken/morose then compelled/agonized/blind then drugged and seduced then rageful rampage then wild/demanding/challenging death then exhausted/collapsing/weak then lost/hopeless/desperate then hopeful

Huwawa - scale, scope, sound, projection, combat

bull of heaven - scale, scope, sound, projection, combat, tail, hoof legs, Centaur?  Minotaur? Flying?

Urshanabi’s boat - crossing the deep lake of death, boat, puppet, poles black light? arms on poles, timing

Mashu - the passage through darkness from dusk til dawn, the space between the hemispheres of the brain

Siduri’s ale house - fabric, costume?, body parts, building structures?, furniture? dream state/seduction/drunkenness relationship dynamics, physicality of emotional dynamics and power dynamics


Ut-Napishtim - like a healthy middle aged man, but 900+ years wise.  speaks with Anunnaki, talks and guides Gilgamesh. Is he serious or also humorous?

Anunnaki-ism - anatomy/physiology/kinesiology, powers, strengths/weaknesses, technology/magic, presence & communications at altars via presence/projection/possession/surrogate? i.e. conversation between Mami (Aruru in Akkadian), the Anunnaki (goddess) of Creation, and her priestess Ninsun. Or between Gilgamesh and Shamash, Anunakki (god) of the Sun. What is the reality of the "gods" and how does it interact with ours? or not?

At Janie's suggestion I am selecting images, snapshots, moments of the story that I want to focus on, moments of the story that have emotional significance. Text will follow at a later time. In the stead, I'll post dialogue or story descriptions, should none exist. This is a logical next step to me since it requires me to communicate in images, both from research and sketches I'll make,  what I see in my head. I'll post research images below, or above, as is the case with blogger, in different posts separated by topic/story moment. We can then each post images and comments and view it all in the lab on my ipad or with a projector.
I'll always be able to record images and actions in workshop so I can post those daily too for everyone's convenience.

Obviously the list of ideas and images grows quickly so I'll prioritize a short list and we can focus on them in order moving ahead as we progress and adapting as we make discoveries.
I've dropped the class I had after lab so I can immediately respond on here to what we do in lab.

I am more interested in process than product as I am learning for myself new approaches to generating material. I have a huge bag of thea-tricks. The real trick is not using them. For me that means learning to, essentially, feel my way through the process this year. For me the workshop/production weeks will be a time to test the theories we come up with. Until then it's time to play.



Gilgamesh climbs his way to the top of mount Mashu - deliriously cursing his way up the mountain to the gate protected by scorpion guards. Scale, surface to climb, earth moving below

Mashu - literally a razor thin passage the sun takes through darkness from dusk til dawn, figuratively a psychological passage through the space between the hemispheres of the brain... don't lean to either side or you'll lose your balance. What and how much of his psychological state does the audience get to explore during this passage?

Urshanabi's boat - crossing the deep lake of death in a boat mad of bundled poles pushed across a lake full of death and the dead. Speed, hands, boat,  poles. I am totally fascinated with the physicality of this passage. It will be a puzzle but should fun to figure out.

Gilgamesh meets Enkidu - they fight then fall in love, puppet combat, stylized fighting a la bunraku, anime, etc. How do they maintain gravity? later, what does this overlap with? Ninsun asking Aruru for help? Is Gilgamesh speaking to Utnapishtim about what he does while he does it with Enkidu? juxtapositions Fighting without looking silly unintentionally. Intentional control, happy accidents. I would prefer no slap dancing but I'll go there if we're stumped.

Gilgamesh and Enkidu fight the mighty Humbaba - what is Humbaba? He is seven shields, seven layers of protection. He is a Chimera made of seven animals protected by seven "spirit" shields. Yes, think Anime. Thats the closest understanding I have of him. His misery is what gives him power. And he's miserable because he is an immortal creation who can not find joy because none of his parts serve any purpose other than defense. Never love. And so he is eternally miserable. His voice is a bellow so great when it rolls through the forest it kills those within a day's journey, a wind that sucks all hope from you (Harry Potter, can you name a few more?), specifically the moment when Gilgamesh has been struck hopeless and Enkidu saves his life, killing Humbaba.

Gilgamesh carries Enkidu's dead body around for weeks in varying stages of decay.

Gilgamesh swims to the bottom of the river and pulls a flower from the rocks - swimming, water, beach, breath

Gilgamesh and Enkidu fight the Bull of Heaven - what is the bull? scale, ability, figure, proportion, figurative or literal? It splits the earth several times so deeply people fall into the crevices. The heros fight it, kill it, quarter it and throw the tail at Inanna. How does the bull break the earth? How does it fly down from heave? How do Inanna and her father fly?

URUK

Gilgamesh as he is typically depicted

His city, Uruk (or Erech depending on who's language recorded the history) lies between the Tigris and Euphrates Rivers. 

Remains of Uruk and the ziggurat  exist today and may even be seen on Google Maps 

Several people have built models of what they imagine the ziggurat to have looked like. 

Temple of Inanna (Ishtar)

goddess Inanna

clay cylinder of the heros fighting Humbaba

Virgin Sacrifice

The virgin sacrifices leading to the death of the chaste and, eventually, non-virgins as well, only became deadly when once the Anunnaki left the planet en mas. Prior to that, the Adamas were accustomed to regularly volunteering their best and brightest to go with the Anunnaki not to be murdered, but to become one of them living on the tenth planet, Niburu.

It would stand to reason that the ziggurats, the flat topped pyramids were built as docking platforms or transportation ports for the smallest of ships or devises. Whereas the larger ships would occupy, say,  the top of a mountain surrounded by sacred forests guarded by a Moreauvian beast named Huwawa. A port of this type on a planet occupied world wide by the same advanced technology would be visited by many ambassadors and business emissaries on a regular basis. These would be the officials and messengers and leaders of the Anunnaki. And so the towers of babel would have good reason to house so many official translators traveling about doing daily business on a planetary level. Once the powerful "gods" were gone, the desperate Adamas would be vulnerable to all the failures of a kingdom that define our written history including the re/misinterpretation of oral and pictographic history and the actions of their forefathers leading eventually to violent bloodletting in most societies. The best and brightest being sacrificed to the organic symbols for technology they didn't understand. A transport beam is described and painted as a pillar of fire and years later substituted by real fire. A flying/sub machine that fires projectiles or ray technology or uses rockets is described as a flying reptile that rules the water and spits fire in the rediscovery of technology would be shrugged off as mythological  mysticism created by the uninformed.

Niburu travels in a solar elipse equal to 3600 earth years. This elipse has a particularly strong impact on earth's polarity and tectonic stability effecting drastic tidal shifts and occasionally causing a rapid ice age. To combat this, each time a seed ship is loaded with all the DNA required to repopulate the planet, Adama caretakers are chosen and they secure the future investments of Earth against gravitational damage from Niburu leaving the solar system. The subsequent recession of oceanic water exposes great cities now sealed in stone. When Niburu is in range of the sun, Earth becomes their home base while they mine the other planets for their resources and replenish their gene pool with healthy sun-drenched bodies for the next 3600 year cycle into deep space. 

After the exodus of the Anunnaki, along with their knowledge, technology and care taking, the Adamas were left with only Enki and his empire to protect the planet. Most of their focus and energy are spent inside Earth keeping it a stable and functioning life producing satellite around the sun. They work with the governments to keep the planet's needs as well as the Adamas evolution in line with the needs of the Anunnaki. 

Where is Enki now? If we were made from his DNA and some junk ape DNA. According to the texts, we look like them. We are made so much in their image that they find us sexy. So Enki and the rest are likely right here with us. Perhaps they are vampiric in a sense that they travel through space in stasis and require the pure blood of a youth not yet defiled by the dirt of lustful pursuit to transfuse life into their space-weary flesh. Regardless, I take the stance that the Anunnaki were not slave owners, but creaters/caretakers of the Adamas who play an important part in their lives. From our perspectives we are our bodies and our lives begin when we are born. We amass an identity from our catalogue of experiences and our lower reptilian/ape brain functionality convinces us that's what we are. If we transcend this mind, and activate the higher brain, the pineal gland and open the conscious awareness enough we realize that while this life is the perspective of this body, this consciousness is also that of our Enki, on Niburu, creator of us all, including Ut-Napishtim (aka Noah) whose name means "father of us all who survived the flood."

Another train of thought involves transit portals/wormholes beneath the oceans and/or cities associated with them may still be the homes or bases of operation for the Anunnaki who continue to manage the human element. The rapid increase in technology over the past couple of centuries could indicate the return of Niburu.

At this point I ask IF Gilgamesh lived about 3600 years ago during a time when the Anunnaki were around and if the Anunnaki left on Niburu which ravels a 3600 year cycle, then has our rapid technological advancement and our subsequent presence in space this past century developed in direct relation to the impending elliptical return of Niburu, the Anunnaki and God the Creator, in all his glory, come to judge the quick and the dead.

To be a sacrificial virgin would needs be an initiate into the heavenly guard, to become god's messenger, an immortal who stands to lose their ignorance and transcend their physical lives as they know it in order to travel thousands of years into deep space. They would have to give up this life in order to gain it. They would have to be reborn into a new understanding of reality. 

So in this production the telling of the story is part of an initiation, the sacrifice of the ignorance of the player of Gilgamesh, the innocence of the virgin player of Enkidu as he is  He has discovered the temple of Enki and he wants in. Once he is in, the only way out alive is to pass through the ritual... to "die" and be reborn. To gain truth, innocence must be sacrificed or there is no change and a callous is developed. The audience and the virgin represent the innocence of humanity in our infantile understanding of the universe and our position in it. 

START HERE

Instead of using the CalArts - Google/Wiki pages, and worrying about passwords I have no access to, I'm using Blogger as the production center for Gilgamesh. If you have access to this now, you are a contributor. You can upload research here. I'll create a Picasa account to post whole groups of files. We can figure out audio and video files as we go.

I first encountered Gilgamesh in my undergrad years. A grad playwriting student produced her adaptation of the old poetic interpretations of the early tablet translations. These were all fit within the rubric of historic mythology rather than history set in stone. The traditional interpretation of history holds that our ancestors were too stupid to understand the world, but in our miraculas jump in evolution and intelligence  we were creative enough to make up vast systems of mythological explanations for the inner workings of the universe. I find the current trend of evidence proving otherwise to be convincing enough to reinterpret Gilgamesh in the Sumarian world as interpreted from their libraries and, as such, in relation to the ancient histories told around the planet.

In this world the Anunnaki, beings from the tenth planet, Niburu, created us by mixing their DNA with that of apes to create a race of beings to work the planet. There is some indication that, aside from their advanced state of development, they were also physically different from living in deep space on a wild elipse. It is possible that Niburu is actually a solar satellite created to connect their system with ours. Niburu travels in and out of our solar system on a 3600 year elipse that travels toward the dog star Sirius and Orion's Belt. According to this tradition, our original planet was Tiamat which  suffered a deep impact event that broke the planet into pieces. The majority of the mass was reshaped into Earth and redeveloped. The plates have been repositioned several times to create balance, however the planet's polarity is unstable and is wobbly because of it. This instability caused them to eventually abandon the planet as a destination, leaving only those needed to manage production of their assets - one "god" and all his "angels" to manage the planet's resources including breeding ape out of the "adamas" (hybrids) before the next return of the Anunnaki. When they return, they will select the best of the stock to bring home.
Gilgamesh was said to live nearly 3600 years ago. According to the Mayan calendar, the world ends as we know it next year. Perhaps global confirmation of their return will bring that change.

According to the post Nicaea bible of modern Christianity, this means those most able to follow rules in a selfless and serene manner. I see the efforts of the men who met at Nicaea to create the "true definition of Christianity as a continuance of evil from this perspective. Evil being defined as that which separates man from god - men subverting people's attentions from god through them in order to maintain power over them. However, Jesus' message of prioritizing one's relationship with the "Creator" over all others and to relate to others as though they were that "god" stands strong through the message of subservience and submission and even supports the concept of the Anunnaki leaving with their planet on their regular 3600 year elipse just after Gilgamesh was alive and leaving one "god" in charge explaining the shift from pan-theism to mono-theism.

In this light, we can approach the legend of Gilgamesh being about a rebellious god/king who sought equality for the adamas - immortality - from an immortal race who were taking their knowledge and power and toys and running away. A race that had the power to heal and even prevent aging and heal deadly ills. The adamas were, after all, made of Anunnaki DNA. As such we would be part of and an extension of our creator and so inexorably connected in ways we barely have language to explain. Interestingly enough, none of this challenges the concept of an undefinable source of life and love that created all things and connects us all. Our understanding of our collective history and relationship to the universe is bound to be challenged as we seek to understand that which is beyond our realm of understanding.