The Hieroglyphics

by Michael Stewart

Horapollo Niliacus, who most likely never existed, wrote the original "Hieroglyphica." It was a collection of some 189 interpretations of the Egyptian hieroglyphics, which were entirely, and unintentionally, fallacious. Using Horapollo's original chapter titles and order, as well as incorporating many of his sentences, Michael Stewart's "The Hieroglyphics" attempts to engage in a kind of conversation with this text, while also bringing in lines from the Book of Jubilees, the Book of Enoch, and the Old Testament, among others.

82 pages, Kindle Edition

First published April 15, 2011

About the author

Librarian Note: There is more than one author by this name in the Goodreads database.

Reviews

[Nate D · Rating 4 out of 5]

In the fifth century A.D., Horapollo Niliacus wrote a book on the meanings of 70 hieroglyphs, apparently relying on a vague cultural understanding and a lot of creative license, but perhaps not on any actual information about Egypt. In the twentieth century A.D., Michael Stewart appropriated this book's entire organizing structure (hieroglyph sequence and their supposed names) along with bits of the text and ideas themselves, in order to convey an unsettling semi-anthropological account of an essentially unreal culture. Each glyph here generates a few lines to a page of rumination on time, divination, sacred baboons, approaching enemies, and a syncopated life of Hephaestus (whose appearance alongside the Nile is an idiosyncrasy probably sourceable to Niliacus' mythological muddling). Each section seems to function alone, but gradually the echo and haunt and transform one another, painting cryptic outlines in a slight prose poetry. If it fails to completely coalesce, just read it again, it's quick enough for that. Read it out loud and out-of-order. Accost strangers on the subway with its grim pronouncements. Heed the voice on the wind and wander alone to die among the jackals of the southlands. Whisper what you've learned to an old baboon for four years.

Mud Luscious is a great press, judging from this and similarly concise, fragmented, and punchy Grim Tales. It in no way deserved to be found in a dollar bin, but I'm lucky that it came my way, whatever the route.

[Charles Dee Mitchell · Rating 5 out of 5]

Harapollo Niliacus wrote his interpretations of Egyptian hieroglyphics during the fifth century CE. Some commentators think Harapollo might have been a pagan holdout in a rapidly Christianizing world, but in any event he knew very little about hieroglyphics. He ascribed moralizing meanings to the images, a practice that would remain popular into the Renaissance. You can read his work on the internet.

Michael Stewart has taken Harapollo's organization and his fallacious interpretations and entered into a dialog with the ancient writer. Stewart covers the seventy glyphs described in Harapollo's Book I, borrowing freely from the original text, bringing in semi-historical elements from the Old Testament, and creating an elliptical vision of his own society with its rituals, philosophy, and mores. The result is mesmerizing, most often hovering on the verge of revelations that would bring sharper focus to the place where Stewart has deposited us. The language is as matter-of-fact as dictionary entries, with an occasional, effective jolt of obscenity.

I usually hate it when reviewers say they look forward to "going back to [insert title here] frequently," because I never see much sense to that. But I had to go back to Hieroglyphics just to write the short review and enjoyed the experience. Rereading the book piecemeal, or even front to back, is not going to reveal the mysterious key to its meaning, but Stewart's world, wherever and whenever it is, remains a good place to poke around.

[Trey Harris]

a bug died in this book while I was reading it.

my favorite was 34. or 56.

[Benjamin Niespodziany · Rating 5 out of 5]

CREATION MYTHS! A book of fabulist prose poems that feel as old as time. So glad to have grabbed this one. Read it twice in the same day.