The Triumph of Horus. An Ancient Egyptian Sacred Drama. With a chapter by D. Newton and D. Poole.

Batsford, London, 1974. X,150p. ills. Original blue hard bound. Lacking dust wrps. Small personal library marks on tail spine as well as free endpaper. Name on free endpaper. ?As Professor Fairman recalls in the Preface, The Triumph of Horus was first presented in an annotated English translation by him and A.M. Blackman in the Journal of Egyptian Archeology, vols 28-30 (?). In subsequent years Fairman restudied the text along with the other texts of the Edfu temple that constitute the ?Myth of Horus?, and the result is a new translation and new conclusions regarding the nature of this dramatic composition. In chapter 1 Fairman briefly reviews the problem which ancient Egyptian dramatic texts pose to the scholar and cited the extant compositions that can be defined as belonging to the genre of ritual, or liturgical, drama. (?) In chapter 2 Fairman presents the argument for his main thesis, viz that ?The Triumph of Horus is a play, a somewhat primitive religious drama acted annually at Edfu during the Festival of Victory. (?) There follow comments on the staging, the priestly actors, the language, and the verse form. Chapter 3, by D. Newton and D. Poole, is the account of the actual production and performance of the play by Padgate College of Education in 1971. Chapter 4 is Fairman?s verse translation of the text. (?) But whichever view one takes, one will be grateful for Fairman?s new rendering of the Triumph of Horus and for his contribution to the discussion of ancient Egyptian drama.? (MIRIAM LICHTHEIM in Wiener Zeitschrift für die Kunde des Morgenlandes, 1977, pp.121-122). From the library of the late Sir Kenneth James Dover.