The Tale of Sinuhe: and Other Ancient Egyptian Poems 1940-1640 B.C.

Parkinson describes how the four papyri containing “The Tale of Sinuhe,” “The Tale of the Eloquent Peasant,” and “Dialogue of a Man and His Soul” were preserved for millennia in the tomb of a high-ranking official buried sometime around 1800 BCE. Egyptian hieroglyphics were not translated by Western scholars until the 1820s CE. The literary tradition of fiction writing, which seems to develop in the early Middle Kingdom period, exists alongside a larger tradition of mainly religious literature. Parkinson speculates that the tone of lament that pervades the fiction marks its roots in the genre of funeral elegies.

The textual tradition represented in this volume is situated within the historical context of their time. In particular, audiences of the Middle Kingdom, whose kings ruled the once-separate kingdoms of Lower and Upper Egypt, were wary of previous civil unrest, the developing bureaucracy of the government, and the continual threat of invasion from without. The surviving written literature existed in relationship with a thriving tradition of oral literature, and Parkinson suggests that, given their monologue structure and tone of instruction, the included works were designed to be read to an audience.

Parkinson defines and discusses the three genres represented in this volume as narrative tales and two versions of wisdom literature, the discourses and the teachings. All demonstrate that the purpose of fictional narrative was didactic: “Man’s ethical life is their central concern” (9), Parkinson asserts, not his character or feelings, which is a convention of modern literature. So are titles; those assigned here are all modern inventions as well. Parkinson notes that the literary language is archaic and stylized, tending towards the epigrammatic and exhibiting rhetorical virtuosity and metrical skill (although the metrical rules of Egyptian poetry are still debated).

The formal structures and moral tone suggest the audience were elites. Maat, or truth, was the ordering principle of society as well as a philosophical ideal. The literature’s formulation of the Egyptian worldview, particularly its emphasis on hierarchies and loyalty, speaks to cultural and political values more than it does personal concerns (See: Background). The reflective modes do not seem inherited by New Kingdom literature, where the tone and subject matter tends to be more colloquial. Though many poems take up a debate, Parkinson says, a resolution is always offered that supports existing cultural values, often in symmetrical ways: “Poetry transforms an imperfect world into ‘perfect speech’” (17). Despite their ancient sensibility, Parkinson suggests that these poems can be read not simply as historical curiosities, but for pleasure and their value as art.