| Content | Description of the work EPOS OF GILGAMES. This is a great Assyro-Babylonian epic written in cuneiform script on clay tablets from antiquity, possibly from the 3rd millennium BC. The story revolves around Gilgamesh, hero and god, and his adventures and struggles with questions of human existence such as friendship, love, death and the quest for immortality. It mentions his relationship with Enkidu, a primitive man of the wilderness, their friendship, Enkidu's death, and Gilgamesh's struggle with understanding death. In the end, Gilgamesh finally accepts the mortality of life.
The text goes on to talk about the 1955 musical setting of the epic, composed by Bohuslav Martinů in Nice, France, and dedicated to Maje Sacher. The piece is scored for flutes, clarinets, trumpets, trombones, harp, piano, percussion, strings, four soloists and chorus, and is divided into three movements: Gilgamesh, The Death of Enkidu and Invocation (Invocation). The German translation was made by Arnold Heinz Eichmann. |