13 in-print translations and 6 audiobooks, compared by who made them, when, and what each one is actually trying to do — Anonymous (Akkadian).
The short answer. There is no single best translation of The Epic of Gilgamesh, because the editions are optimised for different things: for a first read, the editions described as the most readable are Andrew George, Stephen Mitchell; on audio the choice is mostly which translation is being read and whether it is one narrator or a full cast.
Every claim below is the publisher’s or translator’s own description, shown next to it, so you can judge rather than take our word. And you can read the whole thing free on this site first.
Scriptorium Press publishes a complete new plain-English translation of The Epic of Gilgamesh, free, with a complete free audiobook. No account, no paywall — 12 works in this volume.
Start reading free → Free audiobook → Whole book on one page →Older translations, out of copyright, hosted free by Internet Archive, Project Gutenberg. Not our work and not affiliate links — they are here because they are genuinely useful.
| Translator | Year | What it is | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Morris Jastrow Jr. and Albert T. Clay | 1920 | Old Babylonian fragments (Pennsylvania and Yale tablets) with introduction/commentary, not the full 12-tablet Standard Babylonian epic | Project Gutenberg → |
| Morris Jastrow Jr. and Albert T. Clay | 1920 | Old Babylonian fragments (Pennsylvania and Yale tablets) with introduction/commentary, not the full 12-tablet Standard Babylonian epic | Internet Archive → |
| R. Campbell Thompson | 1928 | Complete (all 12 tablets, Standard Babylonian recension, literal verse translation from British Museum cuneiform) | Internet Archive → |
Sorted as the research file records them. The note on each row is that edition’s own published description.
| Translator | Year | Publisher | What it is | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Andrew George | 1999 | Penguin Classics | prose; the standard scholarly-yet-readable edition, most-recommended | Find it |
| Stephen Mitchell | 2004 | Free Press | verse; most popular readable/poetic version, bestseller | Find it |
| Sophus Helle | 2021 | Yale University Press | prose/verse hybrid; newest major scholarly translation, acclaimed | Find it |
| Benjamin R. Foster | 2001 | W. W. Norton (Norton Critical Edition) | prose; scholarly critical edition favored for classroom use | Find it |
| David Ferry | 1992 | Farrar, Straus and Giroux | verse; literary/poetic rendering, widely praised | Find it |
| N. K. Sandars | 1960 | Penguin Classics | prose; the long-standard classic introduction, still in print | Find it |
| Maureen Gallery Kovacs | 1989 | Stanford University Press | prose; academic line-by-line translation, used in university courses | Find it |
| Stanley Lombardo | 2019 | Hackett | introduction by Assyriologist Gary Beckman; includes the 'monkey tablet' material | Find it |
| John Gardner and John Maier | 1984 | Vintage | from the Sin-leqi-unninni standard version, with scholarly notes | Find it |
| Stephanie Dalley | 1989 | Oxford World's Classics | scholarly translation alongside the other Mesopotamian myths | Find it |
| Herbert Mason | 1970 | Mariner Books | free verse narrative retelling rather than a scholarly translation | Find it |
| Danny P. Jackson | 1992 | Bolchazy-Carducci | verse translation with woodcut illustrations | Find it |
| Robert Temple | 1991 | Rider | literary verse translation, 'He Who Saw Everything' | Find it |
Those are affiliate links. They cost you nothing extra and pay a small commission to the people who publish these editions, and to us.
The thing that most changes an audiobook of The Epic of Gilgamesh is which translation is being read — a scholarly text and a colloquial one are different listening experiences before the narrator says a word.
| Narrator | Translation read | Publisher | Year | Notes | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| George Guidall | Stephen Mitchell | Recorded Books | 2006 | best-known modern verse translation, veteran audiobook narrator | Listen |
| Richard Pasco | N. K. Sandars (Penguin Classics prose version) | Penguin Audio | 1997 | AudioFile Earphones Award winner, classic Penguin Classics prose rendering, unabridged cassette | Listen |
| Sebastian Lockwood | Sebastian Lockwood (storyteller adaptation) | LumenArts | 2012 | bardic/oral-storyteller adaptation rather than a straight literary translation | Listen |
| John Hanks | Gerald J. Davis | Audible Studios | 2015 | independent modern prose translation, Audible-only release | Listen |
| Victor Craig | Stephen Langdon (early 20th-century scholarly version) | Woodkeep Audio | 2020 | public-domain-era scholarly translation given a new commercial narration | Listen |
| Graham Dunlop | Valentin Rey (anonymous/composite rendering) | Audible Studios (Originals-adjacent indie release) | 2023 | lesser-known modern indie audiobook edition | Listen |
Affiliate links, including the Audible ones. They cost you nothing extra. Our own audiobook of The Epic of Gilgamesh stays free either way.
The editions described as the most readable are Andrew George (1999), Stephen Mitchell (2004). Their published descriptions emphasise pace and plain modern idiom rather than strict line-by-line fidelity, which is what makes them easier on a first pass.
The most frequently recommended are Andrew George (1999), Sophus Helle (2021), David Ferry (1992). "Most recommended" is not the same as "best for you": a scholarly standard and an easy first read are different books, and the table on this page shows which is which.
There are 6 commercial recordings. They differ mainly in which translation is being read and whether it is a single narrator or a full cast: George Guidall reads Stephen Mitchell; Richard Pasco reads N. K. Sandars (Penguin Classics prose version); Sebastian Lockwood reads Sebastian Lockwood (storyteller adaptation). A complete free audiobook of our own translation is also on this site.
Yes. Scriptorium Press publishes a complete new plain-English translation of The Epic of Gilgamesh free to read, with a complete free audiobook, no account and no paywall - 12 works in this volume.
Historical context, on our companion site: When was the Epic of Gilgamesh written?