Has anyone here read Gore Vidal's _Creation_?
Phil A. Willems
think of it? Are there any major problems in his picture of the major
civilizations at the time of Darius and Xerxes? Or of their creation myths
(besides the glaring absence of any discussion of the Hebrew world view)?
I am particularly taken with his elaborate descriptions of rituals,
architecture, and belief systems, and wonder how much basis they have in
established knowledge.
--
-Phil
Jona Lendering
I read it, and I loved it. And perhaps I can answer several questions.
(1) There is only one serious impossibility: the dating of Zarathustra. In the
texts of the Zoroastrians, Zarathustra is mentioned as a contemporary of one
Hystaspes, but there were several Hyspaspeses and modern scholars tend to
think that Zarathustra's Hystaspes is not the father of Darius. The idea that
Zoroaster, Buddha, Lao Tse and Confucius were more or less contemporaries is,
of course, intrigueing, but unfortunately untrue. The first one to point to
this similarity was Jaspers in a book *Achsenzeit* (this title is correct, but
I am not sure about the author), and it has been popular for quite a while.
(2) The Jews are absent, indeed. But actually, I don't know who Vidal should
have introduced: perhaps Nehemia. Besides, Vidal is not much interested in
Jewish and Christian antiquities: read his *Messiah*, his *Life from Golgotha*
and his *Julian* to see how he thinks about it. Best read on this subject:
Vidal's essay "Monotheism and its discontents", to be found in his collected
essays, *United States*.
(3) There are several minor mistakes. E.g., Vidal (or a translator) has
misread Herodotus' description of the statue that Xerxes had removed from
Babylon's ziggurat: Vidal thinks this is a statue of the god Marduk, which is
certainly untrue. I don't think it is fair to look for details.
(4) Vidal's novels are all great, and from a litterary point of view, I can
make only one remark: it is a bit unlikely that one man meets Zoroaster,
Goshala, Buddha, Lao Tse, Confucius, Darius, Xerxes, Pericles. In an essay on
his novel *Lincoln*, Mr Vidal says that he does not like these constructions;
I wonder why he has used it in *Creation*. On the other hand, it gave us one
of Vidal's most entertaining stories.
(5) This year, Pierre Briant, a famous French historian, will publish his *De
Cyrus a Alexandre*: it is said to be an excellent synthesis of the results of
the historical research to the Persian empire that took place since Vidal
published *Creation*. Those who are interested in the subject will find
everything they like to know in Briant's book; of course it is unfair to judge
Vidal by these standards.
Jona Lendering
Amsterdam, The Netherlands
PS: does anybody know how to contact Mr Vidal? I like to interview him on his
book *Lincoln* and his autobiography *Palimpsest*. (Reply by e-mail)
Phil A. Willems
Jona Lendering <lende...@jet.let.vu.nl> wrote:
>
>I read it, and I loved it. And perhaps I can answer several questions.
>
>(1) There is only one serious impossibility: the dating of Zarathustra. In the
>texts of the Zoroastrians, Zarathustra is mentioned as a contemporary of one
>Hystaspes, but there were several Hyspaspeses and modern scholars tend to
>think that Zarathustra's Hystaspes is not the father of Darius. The idea that
>Zoroaster, Buddha, Lao Tse and Confucius were more or less contemporaries is,
>of course, intrigueing, but unfortunately untrue. The first one to point to
>this similarity was Jaspers in a book *Achsenzeit* (this title is correct, but
>I am not sure about the author), and it has been popular for quite a while.
>
>(2) The Jews are absent, indeed. But actually, I don't know who Vidal should
>have introduced: perhaps Nehemia. Besides, Vidal is not much interested in
>Jewish and Christian antiquities: read his *Messiah*, his *Life from Golgotha*
>and his *Julian* to see how he thinks about it. Best read on this subject:
>Vidal's essay "Monotheism and its discontents", to be found in his collected
>essays, *United States*.
>
Gore Vidal's attitudes towards early Judaism are one thing, but in
a book that deals with major world creation myths, the exclusion of a world
view that was 1) practiced within the Persian Empire, 2) eventually to be of
great influence, and 3) had comparable numbers of adherents as other
religions discussed (there were not many Zoroastrians back then, or Buddhists
or Confucians in those very early days) is an omission of some weight.
>(3) There are several minor mistakes. E.g., Vidal (or a translator) has
>misread Herodotus' description of the statue that Xerxes had removed from
>Babylon's ziggurat: Vidal thinks this is a statue of the god Marduk, which is
>certainly untrue. I don't think it is fair to look for details.
>
>(4) Vidal's novels are all great, and from a litterary point of view, I can
>make only one remark: it is a bit unlikely that one man meets Zoroaster,
>Goshala, Buddha, Lao Tse, Confucius, Darius, Xerxes, Pericles. In an essay on
>his novel *Lincoln*, Mr Vidal says that he does not like these constructions;
>I wonder why he has used it in *Creation*. On the other hand, it gave us one
>of Vidal's most entertaining stories.
>
Actually, _Myra Breckenridge_ is not so good, but I agree on the
whole that his novels are great. As for having Cyrus Spitama meet all these
great thinkers, I agree it is unlikely, but as a literary device it is not
unsound. Is there a better way to get 'first person' accounts from all these
people into one book? I am not surprised that he did this. I am surprised
that he claims not to like them.
>
>Jona Lendering
>Amsterdam, The Netherlands
>
--
-Phil
Jona Lendering
>>In the texts of the Zoroastrians, Zarathustra is mentioned as a
>>contemporary of one Hystaspes, but there were several Hyspaspeses and
>>modern scholars tend to think that Zarathustra's Hystaspes is not the
>>father of Darius. The idea that Zoroaster, Buddha, Lao Tse and Confucius
>>were more or less contemporaries is, of course, intrigueing, but
>>unfortunately untrue.
>
Answer: I don't remember exactly, but I recall that there were linguistic
arguments that the holy texts of the Zoroastrians antedate the Persian
language of Darius's Behistun inscription (519 BCE) too much to identify
Zoroaster's Hystaspes with Darius' father.
> Gore Vidal's attitudes towards early Judaism are one thing, but in
>a book that deals with major world creation myths, the exclusion of a world
>view ... is an omission of some weight.
I am not Gore Vidal and I do not share his opinions on all subjects, but I
guess that Mr Vidal wanted to attack the Biblical creation myth, and that he
thought that ignoring it was his strongest weapon. Perhaps Mr Vidal would
answer that his aim in *Creation* was to show that the oriental cosmologies
are truly important and deserve attention, and I guess he would add something
like "and this cannot be said of the cosmologies of the sky-godders"
(Vidalian for: Jews and Christians).
From a historian's point of view, I think you are right that in a collection
of creation myths the Bible cannot be ignored; but as a novellist, Mr Vidal
has all freedom he needs.
BTW: there are some indications that the Biblical account of creation has
some borrowings from Zoroastrianism. The Biblical myth was written when the
Jewish elite was in Babylon.
>
>> ...from a litterary point of view, I
>>can make only one remark: it is a bit unlikely that one man meets
>>Zoroaster, Goshala, Buddha, Lao Tse, Confucius, Darius, Xerxes, Pericles.
>>In an essay on his novel *Lincoln*, Mr Vidal says that he does not like
>>these constructions; I wonder why he has used it in *Creation*. On the
>>other hand, it gave us one of Vidal's most entertaining stories.
>>
> Actually, _Myra Breckenridge_ is not so good,
Yes, you are right.
> ...but I agree on the
>whole that his novels are great. As for having Cyrus Spitama meet all these
>great thinkers, I agree it is unlikely, but as a literary device it is not
>unsound. Is there a better way to get 'first person' accounts from all these
>people into one book?
Again, Phil, you are right.
Guy B. Creep III
:
: (4) Vidal's novels are all great
Off-topic(?) alert: "Burr" and "Julian" were okay, my favorites are the
older ones (like "The City And The Pillar"), "Kalki" was my idea of an
Impossible Dream, and the Breckenridge series was cheap, stupid and gross.
I wish he'd run for President.
TheDavid(TM)
--
micro$oft tea is totally tubular
MICRO$OFT TEA IS TOTALLY TUBULAR
Phil A. Willems
Jona Lendering <lende...@jet.let.vu.nl> wrote:
>In article <4gdqml$i...@gap.cco.caltech.edu>, p...@cco.caltech.edu says...
>>
>>In article <4gcpmk$5...@trst.cca.vu.nl>,
>>Jona Lendering <lende...@jet.let.vu.nl> wrote:
>
>> Gore Vidal's attitudes towards early Judaism are one thing, but in
>>a book that deals with major world creation myths, the exclusion of a world
>>view ... is an omission of some weight.
>
>I am not Gore Vidal and I do not share his opinions on all subjects, but I
>guess that Mr Vidal wanted to attack the Biblical creation myth, and that he
>thought that ignoring it was his strongest weapon. Perhaps Mr Vidal would
>answer that his aim in *Creation* was to show that the oriental cosmologies
>are truly important and deserve attention, and I guess he would add something
>like "and this cannot be said of the cosmologies of the sky-godders"
>(Vidalian for: Jews and Christians).
Weren't the Babylonians 'sky-godders?' I tend to agree with you that
for some reason Vidal considered Judaism unworthy of inclusion, but rather
than comment on the importance of the Babylonian religion, he tends to mock
it (at least from Cyrus Spitama's perspective). Then again, he also has
very little comment on the Egyptian world view- maybe he just wanted to keep
the book from getting too long!
>
>From a historian's point of view, I think you are right that in a collection
>of creation myths the Bible cannot be ignored; but as a novellist, Mr Vidal
>has all freedom he needs.
>
This brings me to another question I have about the events depicted
in _Creation_. Gore Vidal includes some very detailed descriptions of
rituals throughout the book. For example, Cyrus Spitama and Xerxes
participate in various sex cults in Babylon, Cyrus has a wedding in Magadha,
he witnesses the horse sacrifice, again in Magadha, and he attends a
funeral in Ch'in with a lot of human sacrifices. How much of this is based
on record, and how much is the speculation that necessarily goes with
fiction of this type?
>BTW: there are some indications that the Biblical account of creation has
>some borrowings from Zoroastrianism. The Biblical myth was written when the
>Jewish elite was in Babylon.
>
How are these borrowings distinguished from independent development?
I thought that the Babylonians were not Zoroastrians.
>Jona Lendering
>Amsterdam, The Netherlands
>
--
-Phil
marduk
>
> Has anyone here read Gore Vidal's _Creation_? If so, what do
you
>think of it? Are there any major problems in his picture of the major
>civilizations at the time of Darius and Xerxes? Or of their creation
myths
>(besides the glaring absence of any discussion of the Hebrew world
view)?
>I am particularly taken with his elaborate descriptions of rituals,
>architecture, and belief systems, and wonder how much basis they have
in
>established knowledge.
>
>
>--
> -Phil
Actually, as an Assyriologist who specializes in the Neo-Babylonian
period, I can state that his description of the financial activities of
The famous and powerful Egibi family of Babylon is really quite well
done....on the other hand, i cannot stand vidal's smarmy writing
style...kinda reminds me of lisa aronson, in fact.
Joe Bernstein
mar...@idirect.com (marduk) wrote:
Sorry for all the quoting; I've been away and missed the start of this
discussion, so saw no reason to hide what previous poster had left intact.
Vidal's treatment of India at that time was dead on. He obviously assumed
(technical issue here) that the ARTHASASTRA of Kautilya was genuine, ergo
that India was far more advanced at that time than I, in fact, think it
was. But this assumption is probably the majority one in the field.
Similarly he writes a lot about international relations (necessarily)
which we in fact know little about, but he doesn't say anything at odds
with what we do know. So in general his treatment of ancient India was
astonishingly good, given the general reign of ignorance about that
country's history hereabouts.
It's my impression that his treatment of Greece was basically OK too, but
I'm not as confident talking about that area, or any other than India.
Joe Bernstein
PS It occurs to me that I haven't provided any citations. However, my
reading of the 2nd RFD does not indicate to me that this post would be
rejected by the moderation proposal as proposed. Others may disagree.
PPS I liked the book a lot, myself.
PPPS Oh, good grief, flameproofing again. Yes, I mean India; he also
writes about Taxila, which is in Pakistan, but I don't feel at all
confident commenting on the accuracy of that.
--
Joe Bernstein, free-lance writer, bank clerk and bookstore worker
speaking for himself and nobody else j...@sfbooks.com
Joe Bernstein
Willems) wrote:
> This brings me to another question I have about the events depicted
> in _Creation_. Gore Vidal includes some very detailed descriptions of
> rituals throughout the book. For example, Cyrus Spitama and Xerxes
> participate in various sex cults in Babylon, Cyrus has a wedding in Magadha,
> he witnesses the horse sacrifice, again in Magadha, and he attends a
> funeral in Ch'in with a lot of human sacrifices. How much of this is based
> on record, and how much is the speculation that necessarily goes with
> fiction of this type?
Let's see... Speaking from relatively uninformed guesswork, I gather the
sacred prostitution etc. of Babylon is a more or less permanently
controversial and uncertain topic; human sacrifice at royal funerals in
China was pretty standard at one time, I think c. 1500 BC, but was extinct
in favour of little clay figures by about the time of Christ, so Vidal is
sort of pushing things to say it was still around in c. 500 BC. But these
are matters I'm not too familiar with.
The horse sacrifice is part of the ritual system outlined in the
Brahmanas; we have every reason to believe these texts were still as
current in 500 BC as they ever were (which we're not really in any
position to assess, though they seem somewhat plausible). The Satapatha
Brahmana, generally considered one of the latest Brahmanas overall (though
all of them formed over centuries of accretion), probably includes horse
sacrifice instructions and is translated in the Sacred Books of the East
series of the last century. I assume Vidal followed this closely, but
certainly didn't bother to check (the Brahmanas drive me crazy, and the
horse sacrifice, rajasuya, is in fact about the only section I ever read,
some years before I read CREATION).
As for a wedding, that would be in the grhya or grihya sutras, which are
generally dated somewhere in the second half of the last millennium BC.
500 BC is a reasonable guess. I haven't read hardly any of these, so
can't speak to Vidal's accuracy here, but there were certainly texts
available for him to be accurate *from*.
Assuming, of course, that the wedding was conducted by brahmins who would
(today) be considered orthodox; these were in rather short supply in
Magadha at that time...
Joe Bernstein
Jona Lendering
> -Phil
I am sorry, I should have written my remark differently.
One.
The biblical creation story was written by Jewish priests as a kind of reply
to the creation myths they heard when the Jews were in exile. The words
"borrowings" and "myth" are therefore incorrect: a "myth" is by definition
oral literature and not a conscious, written story. The Jewish priests who
wrote the biblical account of the creation were stimulated to do so by the
existence of Zoroastrian (and Babylonian) stories, and they wrote a story in
which only one God was responsible for the complete creation. They did not
borrow, they replied.
Two.
There are Zoroastrian elements in the Bible. I can mention two, but tehy are
not in Genesis 1.
- The so-called "second Jesaja" (i.e. the author of the chapters 40-60, a Jew
who probably lived in Babylon) quotes a Zoroastrian text. More precisely,
Gatha 14 must have been known to the author of Jesaja 44.
- In the story of Tobit, the Zoroastrian demon Aeshma returns under the name
Asmodi or Asmodeus (Tobit 3.8 and 3.17). The story of Tobit is part of the
"second canon", which is a list of Biblical books whose inspired character was
slightly disputed. Most Greek-speaking Jews and Catholics accept these books
as divinely inspired, the Jews from Palestine in the second century CE and
most Calvinist churches entertain some doubts.
I should also mention the text of the Edict of Cyrus on the Jews' return,
quoted in Ezra 1.2. Probably, the edict is authentic, and the first line was
"Ahura Mazda, the lord of the heavens, gave me all kingdoms" in stead of
"JHVH...".
Three.
The Babylonians were not Zoroastrians, but there were Zoroastrians living in
Babylonia.
I hope this reply does not contain new obscurities.