On Friday March 11th 7pm at Kenilworth Library Eleanor Allitt will be launching her book ‘Daring To Discover’

“Daring to Discover” is a retelling of an Ancient Sumarian Myth and is a beautifully presented book with Eleanor’s atmospheric illustrations on every page. This will be a lovely evening, and you will find that the author is a great story-teller. You will be greeted with a glass of wine, then given time to chat,  and look at a display of the illustrations from the book. Eleanor will then give a short talk followed by questions and answers, after which she will sign copies of ‘Daring To Discover’ for those who wish to purchase it on the night.

The book tells the tale of Inanna who was the most important deity of ancient Sumeria, the land now called Iraq. She was revered as the goddess of fertility, of rhythm and the seasons. She represents many opposites, light and dark, life and death, body and spirit, passivity and action. Without the dark resting period of winter there can be no growth in the summer. Without the peacefulness of thought there can be no just and wise decisions. A bunch of reeds is her symbol, for reeds which grow at the edges of the dark watery depths represent the transition between one stage and another. She was a vital life-giving figure who gave a sense of balance and equilibrium. Her tale was written in cuneiform script on clay tablets around 2,500BC and is one of the very first recorded stories. It is only comparatively recently that it has been translated.