Through the Eras

LiteratureRichard Parkenson and Stephen Quirke, Papyrus (Austin,Tex.: University of Texas Press, 1995).THE AUTHORDETERMINING THE AUTHOR. Nearly all Egyptianworks of literature are anonymous. Even in works of wisdomor teaching attributed to famous sages of the past,it is never clear to modern readers whether or not the“I” of a first person text is the actual author or whetherthe attribution to a famous sage is a literary device thatadds value to the advice given in the text. Though authorsare difficult to name, it is still possible to detectthe voice of a real author behind many kinds of storiesand texts. The best method for finding the voice of anauthor, suggested by the French Egyptologist PhillipeDerchain, is to compare two or more texts that relatesimilar information. Yet even when there is only one versionof a text, it is possible to appreciate the author’svoice.NARRATOR AND AUTHOR. Literary critics distinguishbetween the “I” of a first-person narrative, calledthe narrator, and the author of the text. In Egyptian literature,modern scholars have often supposed that theauthor was either the person named as the “I” in the textor that the author was the scribe who wrote down anoral tradition. For example, Egyptologists once identifiedthe author of the text called The Teachings of Ptahhotepwith a vizier who lived during the reign of KingDjedkare Isesy (2415–2371 B.C.E.) during the Old Kingdom,approximately 400 years before the text was composedin the Twelfth Dynasty. This attribution, inEgyptian thought, made the text more important. Modernculture attaches such importance to knowing the authorthat it seems unimaginable that the person whocomposed the text would attribute it to the long-deadvizier. Sometimes Egyptologists have thought that theauthor of the text was the scribe who wrote it down orwho owned it. Such is the case with the poem composedabout the Nineteenth-dynasty Battle of Qadesh. OlderEgyptologists thought that Pentawer, the scribe whowrote it down and possibly owned the papyrus, was theauthor. Derchain suggested that even the Egyptians becameconfused about this practice in the New Kingdom.In the Ramesside text known as Papyrus Chester Beatty,eight famous authors of the past are praised. Amongthem is Ptahhotep, who almost certainly did not writethe text that Ramesside readers had available. In the end,the anonymity of the majority of Egyptian authors issimilar to the anonymity of almost all Egyptian artists.AUTHOR’S ROLE. One way to assess the author’srole, suggested by Derchain, is to compare the way thatdifferent writers described similar experiences. Derchainanalyzed three Middle Kingdom stelae (upright slabs ofstone with inscriptions), that each commemorate a differentwriter’s pilgrimage to Abydos, the city sacred tothe god Osiris. The three authors are Sehetepibre, Iyhernefert,and Mentuhotep. All three came from familieswealthy enough to ensure that they were literate. Theyalso had access to libraries and archives and were familiarwith Egyptian literature. As authors, they each chosedifferent aspects of the pilgrimage to emphasize in theiraccounts. Sehetepibre emphasized his loyalty to the kingand the way that the pilgrimage demonstrated that loyalty.Iyhernefert wrote about the ritual of Osiris that heobserved and attended when he went to Abydos. Mentuhotep’saccount supplements Iyhernefert’s account ofthe ritual, but he also included information on his ownearlier career and more epithets about himself. His accountis the most literary of the three. Its style is themost sophisticated, and he makes more references toother Egyptian literature in his account. This higher styleconfirms his contention that he worked in the library ofa temple and might be considered more of an intellectualthan the other two authors. Sehetepibre and Iyhernefertwrite more like the bureaucrats they were. Butbeyond style, each author chose to include different detailsof the pilgrimage. When combined with stylistic decisions,these choices are what distinguish them asauthors.FICTION AUTHOR. Another example of a storywhose author had a distinctive voice was the anonymouswriter of The Contendings of Horus and Seth. AlanGardiner, the English Egyptologist, suggested in theearly twentieth century that this story was a tale, writtendown from an oral storyteller’s recitation. Derchainand others have realized that the story is too sophisticated,especially in its literary allusions, to be merely apopular story. In fact, it probably contains veiled referencesto the struggle for power which followed thedeath of Ramesses III (1156 B.C.E.) and continued inthe reign of Ramesses IV (c. 1156–1150 B.C.E.). Somescholars have suggested that the story celebrates the accessionof Ramesses IV in the same way European kingsused to commission operas for their coronations. Thestory has a definite point of view and that in itself suggeststhat there was a real author, though his name isnot known.WARS OF THUTMOSE III. Another case study foran examination of authors’ voices concerns two worksof literature on the wars of Thutmose III (1479–1425Arts and Humanities Through the Eras: Ancient Egypt (2675 B.C.E.–332 B.C.E.) 121