Customer Reviews

ReMembering Osiris: Number, Gender, and the Word in Ancient Egyptian Representational Systems

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I recommend this highly to anyone out there who is looking for a really stimulating conjunction of Kemetic thought and postmodern philosophy.

Now, a word of warning, inasmuch as this is no book for the beginner, in two senses. It would help if the Egyptological reader had some familiarity with thinkers like Jacques Derrida and Judith Butler. And by the same token, the reader of critical theory would want some Egyptology under their belt. But the book is well worth the effort for both, and could open the eyes of either significantly.

This book represents a truly unusual convergence, inasmuch as it is in my opinion a valuable contribution both to Egyptology as well as to critical theory. While the author is not himself an Egyptologist, he has steeped himself in the best of contemporary work in the field (especially Erik Hornung and Jan Assman). And there is some virtue in his distance from the field, inasmuch as Hare is able to turn a critical eye on some of the prejudices and presuppositions which are so endemic in interpretations of Kemetic thought.

An extremely rich book, which demonstrates as well that the intellectual tools provided by post-structuralist theory can make a positive and rigorous contribution to research in particular fields.

The Editorial Reviews and the one by another reader tell well what is in the book and the readership it may reach. I would add another reason some may find valuable. I have marked 15 passages that the author has provided in hieroglyphic text as well as in translation. I find these passages useful exercises for a student of Middle Egyptian, as they are moderate in length (mostly 6 to 10 lines in English translation). They are portions of hymns, coffin texts and the like.