This volume grew out of a series of lectures delivered to audiences with no special background in Egyptology. While each of the chapters and dresses a separate topic, their shared aim is to convey a sense of the richness, the variety, and the fundamental character of the ancient Egyptian imagination. The book is an introduction to the Mind of Egypt.
As far back as the third millennium B.C. the Egyptians were investigating questions that concern us still - questions about being and non-being, about the meaning of death, about the nature of the cosmos and of man, about the basis of human society and the legitimization of power. The Egyptians knew that their answers could never be definitive, and this flexible and pluralistic approach is the essence of their philosophical position. The idea that there is no single answer, that everything is flow and every answer provisional, is worth exploring today in an age that has focused attention on fragmentation while continuing to cling to a history of absolutes.
Idea into Image also includes a number of black-and-white photographs by Bill Barrette, which illustrate in concrete visual terms the abstract concepts explored in Hornung's essays.