Does being a bad person make you a hero? In the Mesopotamian epic Gilgamesh the Hero retold by Geraldine McCaughrean it certainly seems like it does. Gilgamesh the Hero is about a powerful king named Gilgamesh. He embarks on a quest for eternal glory which later in the story becomes a quest for immortality. Gilgamesh is not a hero because he is cruel, cowardly, and selfish. First of all he is cruel. He is cruel because he killed a pride of lions just because they looked so alive. “...They glowed with health and energy, absolute rulers of their sunny habitat.” (McCaughrean 51). He is also cruel because he killed the guardian of the Cedar Forest, Huwawa just to build some fancy new gate and a fancy new temple for the sun god. This proves that
