G I L G A M E S H A 5 0 0 0 - Y E A R - O L D T O P I C A L I T Y ( 1 9 7 3 ) By Per Nørgård Gilgamesh. An opera in 6 days and 7 nights. The stage for the opera is the entire opera hall; the audience is within the space of the opera, not outside it. The geometric structure of the actual theatre will be part of the composition, and so will the movements of the actors from one area to another. Let me illustrate this: The City, the civilisation represented by Gilgamesh, is called Uruk. Uruk is a primitive construction against a wall somewhere in the auditorium. Gilgamesh s rival is Enkido, the primitive man, who represents the Forest, the antithesis of Uruk. The Forest is a milieu of 12 musicians in amongst the audience, with simple attire that illustrates their relationship to Nature. City and Forest are two vital opposites. Another opposite or contrast to the City (which is regarded as the area of People ) is the area of the Demons and the Gods. Against a wall somewhere in the vicinity of Uruk is a secret tower, the lair of Huwawa, the Demon. Somewhere else stands the Goddess of Creation, Aruru; and in one of the aisles between the spectators, in the Crystal Forest, sits the serving maid, Siduri, Goddess of the Earthly Existence. There she sits under a Crystal Tree playing the celeste... There are other Gods and Demons, too: Ishtar, the Goddess of Love dallies with the demonic Celestial Bull in the tower of the demon Huwawa, while the Scorpion People lead the dead to the Underworld. There are benches at the back of the auditorium upon which those who died on the way to the Underworld sit they are out of the game... The most important figure is certainly Shamash, the Sun-God. The Sun is the coordinating, organising power who else but the conductor himself? And with the path of the sun, the conductor s progress round the theatre, day and night recur. When the conductor reaches Uruk, the sun rises, illuminat- ing the city, the people awaken and the 1 st day (or whichever day it happens to be) dawns. When he returns along the aisle, darkness falls over Uruk and it is night. Man stands between Animal and God. But the way to a God-like life is through the Man of the Spirit, Utnapishtim. He is the biblical Noah who sailed upon the waters of the Flood. The Gods attempted to destroy Mankind. Since Noah survived the Flood, he was obviously not a Man and therefore received Eternal Life. Utnapishtim (a Man-Woman), takes up a position by the wall opposite to Uruk, necessitating Gilgamesh pilgrimage to lead him through the entire length of the theatre in order to seek him out and learn about the Eternal Life. Only the Sun the conductor, has a correspondingly long wandering on his programme! So this is the opera in Space: Uruk with Gilgamesh, the Forest with Enkido; the demon Huwawa in his Tower together with the Celestial Bull and the Goddess of Love, Ishtar; Aruru is the Goddess of Creation in the Crystal Forest and Siduri, Goddess of the Earthly Existence with her celeste, the Scorpion People, who lead the dead to the Underworld; and finally the Man of the Spirit, Utnapishtim, opposite Uruk. On a track connecting the whole, Shamash, the Sun God the conductor. The opera in Time is, as stated, in 6 days and 7 nights in other words it is cyclic, one day having similar features to the next, one night having similar features to the next. As a rule, only Forest music is heard at night, and in the daytime this music is blended with music from the City. The music of the Forest is soft, improvised and rhythmically free, while the music of the city is bud, determined and rhythmically bound. Aruru often appears at night, however, and with her voice she plays upon the sound waves of the Forest music, weaving it to a tide of choral waves (in much the same way as one can hear a tree full of crickets gradually bring forth one united 1
Stage plan for the opera Gilgamesh by the composer (in Danish). Skov = Forest. Solens bane = The path of the Sun. Dødsbänk = Bench for the dead persons. Utnapishtim m. maka = Utnapishtim with wife. rhythm almost as if, hypnotised by each other s rhythm, they momentarily achieve an orgiastic, collective sound). These cycles of Day and Night, however, resemble a spiral, because the change from one day to the next takes the form of a path of movement, (just as the earth s path round the sun creates a spiral by moving simultaneously nearer to Hercules). This path is the plot of the Gilgamesh opera. 1 st NIGHT is the beginning of the opera the Creation: Demons and Gods crowd together. The herb of Life passes from hand to hand from the highest Gods down to the Demons, to the serpent that again passes it to the People and the Animals. Demons and Gods move towards their rightful places whilst the People give all things a name. The Forest commences its eternal music the Night of Creation becomes the first Earthly Night, in which Aruru 2
Model of (an experimental reconstruction of) the temple for the Heavenly God Anu in the city of Uruk, Babylonia, probably the oldest city in the history of our civilisation, around the year 3000 BC) plays contemplatively on the sound waves of the Forest. The sun rises on Uruk and the 1st DAY begins. A peal of bells marks each dayperiod, and the final peal of each day is followed by silence, stillness, twilight and the dreaded Huwawa-howl, that is heard every evening after sundown, 2nd NIGHT, Forest music, Aruru plays on the sound waves in the 1st Night. The sun rises on Uruk and the 2nd DAY begins with a new peal of bells. Time is now interrupted and Gilgamesh is created by Aruru, to stand forth as King of Uruk in the midst of the City, two-thirds God and one-third Man. Shamash gives him beauty and power. Gilgamesh immediately begins to tyrannize the life of the City with crushing vitality and ambition. 3rd NIGHT is a relieve to the citizens of Uruk: Gilgamesh has even silenced the high priest who, as usual, utters his warnings about the Huwawa-howl. 3rd DAY brings the culmination of Gilgamesh tyranny and. As he has now begun to mock the high priest and his warnings, the People stay awake on the following (4th) Night. 4th NIGHT. The people calls upon Aruru to create a rival to Gilgamesh of equal strength, so that Uruk will be at peace. Aruru hears their prayers and creates the primitive Enkido, Lord of the Forest and the Animals, whose rhythm he understands and can therefore command (as can also their maker, Aruru). Uruk selects a hetaera, Ishara, to seduce Enkido. This deprives him of his feeling of unity with the Animals, but Ishara tells him that he is Man and that he is to meet another man, equally strong, called Gilgamesh. Enkido follows her to Uruk. The Sun rises and the new (4th) day begin. 4th DAY. Gilgamesh tyrannises Uruk, but Enkido challenges him to a battle. Neither of them wins, and they embrace as friends. Uruk breathes a sigh of relief, being now at peace. 3
A fragment of a Babylonian version of the Gilgamesh epic. 5th NIGHT. Enkido stays awake all night and tries to recover his identification with the Forest, but he has lost the power. On the 5th DAY, Gilgamesh discovers Enkido s preoccupation and suggest that they both go out and do battle with the Huwawa Demon. They set forth and, with the aid of Shamash, kill the Huwawa, whereupon Ishtar, the Goddess of Love, reveals herself to Gilgamesh, desiring him as her husband. Gilgamesh scorns her as betrayer of his manly strength and, in spurned fury, she sends the Celestial Bull to destroy Uruk. Gilgamesh and Enkido slay the Bull as well and, while Gilgamesh and his men celebrate Enkido dies and are led away to the Under4 world by the Scorpion People, together with Huwawa and the Celestial Bull. Gilgamesh is horrified by Enkido s death, which heralds the long 6th NIGHT, during which the Forest is also silent, as in a winter s night. Gilgamesh decides to seek out the only person who has overachieved immortality Utnapishtim, the Man of the Spirit. The path to Utnapishtim is the path of the dead, and the path of the Sun into the Night, westwards, and it is this path that Gilgamesh now treads. The servant Siduri tries to make him turn back and live a normal, contented life, but Gilgamesh passes her, reaching at last his ancestor, Utnapishtim.
Utnapishtim tells him that nothing is eternal, not even Death, and he relates the story of his own path to immortality and survival by sailing on the waters of the Flood. He offers Gilgamesh immortality through a battle against sleep in which he must stay awake for 7 days. These 7 days are all contained in the 6th Day of the opera: The Inner Light, consisting of the 7 movements of the Symphony of Creation : Sun-Day, Moon-Day, Mars-Day, and (without a break) Mercury-Day, Jupiter-Day Venus-Day Saturn-Day (This sequence is the basis of our Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday) Gilgamesh wakes on Sun-Day, looks around at Moon-Day and discovers that Enkido is sitting there on the bench! Mars-Day signals the start of the action: Gilgamesh runs towards Enkido to embrace him but sees that he is bound to Huwawa and the Celestial Bull. He attacks these two and forces them to the ground, whence Enkido is obliged to follow. Gilgamesh sees the 3 motionless figures lying there and loses all ability to move promptly falling asleep! The Gods gather round him while he sleeps to the Mercury-, Jupiter-, Venus- and Saturn-Day movements of the symphony. The rainbow appears and the 7th colour in the spectra is the White Light. Utnapishtim hands Gilgamesh the Herb of Life; he awakes and reaches out to take it. But the serpent is behind him and snaps it away; it glides up to the Forest, which awakens. It is as in the lst Night everyone is in his original position, Shamash rises over Uruk, Gilgamesh is re-created but is now played by someone else. Shamash raises his baton; the bells begin (for the 7th Day). But that is another story. This description of Gilgamesh in Space, Time and Plot is, in reality, a description of the main, hierarchical plan of the composition; the conception of these relations, spacial and time-wise, are in fact part of the composition the 6 days and 7 nights are just as important for the musical performance as the application of the single, basic tonal spectra for the entire work. The main, hierarchical plan IS these 6 days and 7 nights; to plumb the work further and delve into the tones and rhythms would lead to another whole article. Or two. Or three. Notes An English version of the article Gilgamesh en 5000 årig aktualitet, first printed in Nutida Musik 17, 1973-74 (nr. 1 (primo 1973). The opera Gilgamesh (1971-72) was performed in Stockholm, Sweden in both 1973 and in 1975-76. In Nutida Musik the article was supplied by an Introduction to the Gilgamesh epos (in Swedish, no by PN) and Nørgårds text Om teorien bag operaen Gilgamesh (also in this archive). Per Nørgård writes a further work information, after the article: Note, concerning a picture-frame stage and Gilgamesh: The possibility of transferring the opera Gilgamesh to a traditional stage (with a revolving stage) exists. Gilgamesh s wandering to Huwawa and later on to Utnapishtim can be presented by turning the stage from Uruk, via a wandering landscape to Huwawa and on to Utnapishtim. The 12 Animals and Enkido, on the other hand, will have to be in the auditorium, possibly on a bridge or dais built out into the audience. This problem could be further simplified by putting these players in among at the public, perhaps on the balcony. At all events, the problem can be solved as long as the producer s intentions and imagination are equal to the task. 5