The Tale of Sinuhe

Melvyn Bragg and his guests discuss The Tale of Sinuhe, one of the most celebrated works of ancient Egyptian literature. Written around four thousand years ago, the poem narrates the story of an Egyptian official who is exiled to Syria before returning to his homeland some years later. The number of versions of the poem, which is known from several surviving papyri and inscriptions, suggests that it was seen as an important literary work; although the story is set against a backdrop of real historical events, most scholars believe that the poem is a work of fiction.

→ Play on BBC Sounds website

Guests

• Richard Parkinson 4 episodes
  Professor of Egyptology and Fellow of Queen's College at the University of Oxford
• Roland Enmarch No other episodes
  Senior Lecturer in Egyptology at the University of Liverpool
• Aidan Dodson No other episodes
  Senior Research Fellow in the Department of Archaeology and Anthropology at the University of Bristol

Reading list

• Sinuhe, The Bible, and The Patriarchs
  Miroslav Barta (trans. R. Landgrafova) (Set Out, 2003)
• Pharaohs and Mortals: Egyptian Art in the Middle Kingdom
  Janine Bourriau (Cambridge University Press, 1988)
• The Longman Anthology of World Literature: Volume A: The Ancient World
  D. Damrosch et al. (Longman, 2008)
• The Middle Kingdom of Ancient Egypt: History, Archaeology and Society
  Wolfram Grajetzki (Bloomsbury, 2013) Google Books →
• Ancient Egyptian Literature: A Book of Readings I: The Old and Middle Kingdoms
  Miriam Lichtheim (University of California Press, 2006) Google Books →
• A Companion to Ancient Egypt
  Alan B. Lloyd (ed.) (Wiley-Blackwell, 2010) Google Books →
• The Tale of Sinuhe and Other Ancient Egyptian Poems 1940-1640 BC
  R. B. Parkinson (Oxford University Press, 1999) Google Books →
• Poetry and Culture in Middle Kingdom Egypt: A Dark Side to Perfection
  R. B. Parkinson (Equinox, 2010) Google Books →
• Reading Ancient Egyptian Poetry: Among Other Histories
  R. B. Parkinson (Wiley-Blackwell, 2009) Google Books →
• Voices from Ancient Egypt: An Anthology of Middle Kingdom Writings
  R. B. Parkinson (British Museum Press, 1991) Google Books →
• The Norton Anthology of World Literature Vol. A
  M. Puchner et al. (ed.) (W. W. Norton and Company, 2012) Google Books →
• Society and Death in Ancient Egypt: Mortuary Landscapes of the Middle Kingdom
  Janet Richards (Cambridge University Press, 2005) Google Books →
• The Literature of Ancient Egypt: An Anthology of Stories, Instructions, Stelae, Autobiographies, and Poetry
  W. K. Simpson (ed.) (Yale University Press, 2003) Google Books →

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Programme ID: b041ybj3

Episode page: bbc.co.uk/programmes/b041ybj3

Auto-category: 932 (Ancient Egypt and neighboring civilizations)