For centuries, humans, creatures and other worldly beings have been trying to decipher texts from Sumerian societies. Once texts have been analyzed, readers must try to understand what is going on in these stories. Life before the common era was substantially different from the life that everyone lives today. Many people would attribute this difference with the culture change that has happened over time.
In “The Rivals”, two young boys are fighting for the same girl. Now this is no normal love triangle. Nor is this a story with a predictable happy ending. One day while walking home, the three of them encounter a leopard. Now one would assume this would be the perfect time to show this girl who is the stronger out of the two by fighting the leopard. So as one of the boys throws a spear at the Leopard, the other boy joins in to try and be the hero. Unsurprisingly, these two nitwits run out of spears because somehow they completely missed the Leopard. Now these two then decide it would be a smart idea to go and get more spears. Long story short, one of the boys eventually ends up killing the leopard, while the girl ends up being “killed”. Finally, after a long battle with the leopard, they were able to kill it. However, who ends up with the girl? As we look back ,was the battle even worth it?
This tale of two boys fighting for one girl seemed very predictable at first. However, it ended up leaving me surprised. Somehow, the author basically let each boy kill the same leopard. Now how is this possible you ask? I do not know. However, one thing that I would like to know is which one of these boys is this girl going to end up with? In todays world, the author of this tale would have definitely made it so that everyone had a happy ending. Luckily for us, were talking about a tale written thousands of years ago. One that left a reader such as I, craving for more.
Through this story, I cannot say that I understand how they viewed god at the time. However, I believe that in the world they lived in, they never planned ahead. In today’s society people make plans that wont happen for decades from now. Instead of worrying about that, they should be worrying about tomorrow, because no one is guaranteed tomorrow, and that is exactly how these people who wrote this story felt. Also, I believe that they lived life very unrestricted. In today’s world putting death in a children’s book is ridiculed and deemed absurd. However, back then no one cared about any of those things. Now that is a society in which I would love to be apart of.
Now I have a lot of questions that I know will remain unanswered. I don’t have a time machine, so no, traveling back in time would not be possible. However, I do have two questions for the class and they correlate with one another. The first being, which boy is the manliest and gutsiest of the two, and who do you think the girl ended up with, and why do you think this? “Rivals” is a fantastic love story. One that shows does not involve love and revolves around action. Clearly, stories such as “the rival” need to be talked about in todays society.
Hi, I also liked this story a lot. After reading it, I thought it was obvious that the boy who actually killed the leopard would be chosen. After thinking about it some more, the second boy also demonstrated bravery by attacking the leopard, since he believed it was still alive. When I looked at it through the lens of a creation story, I saw the female and male as “Adam and Eve” type characters. Which boy she chooses would determine the character of the human species. The first boy got the opportunity to kill the leopard by deceiving the second boy into leaving the scene. He took pleasure in playing a cruel joke on the second boy also. I still think she chose the first boy, but now I see that this is the culture’s interpretation of how the darker aspects of human nature came to be.