Discussion

THE ARABIAN NIGHTS

INTRODUCTION

The Arabian nights is a story straight out of a romance novel.

One thousand and one nights is a collection of Middle Eastern folk tales
compiled in Arabic during the Islamic golden Age (was a period of cultural,
economic and scientific flourishing in the history of Islam, traditionally dated from
the 8th century to the 14th century). It is often known in English as the Arabian
Nights, from the English-language edition which rendered the title as The
Arabian Nights’ Entertainment.

ISLAMIC GOLDEN AGE- was a period of cultural, economic, and scientific

flourishing in the history of ISLAM, dated from the 8th century to 14th century.

Authors

Geraldine Mccaughrean - is a British children’s novelist.

 She was born in London and grew up in North London. She studied
teaching but found her true vocation in writing. She claims that what makes
her love writing is the desire to escape from an unsatisfactory world. Her
motto is: Do not write what you know, write about what you want to know.
 Her works includes: The Odyssey, El Cid, The Canterbury Tales, The
Pilgrim’s Progress, Moby Dick, One Thousand and One Arabian Nights and
Gilgamesh.

Antoine Galland – was a French orientalist and archaeologist , most famous

as the First European translator of One Thousand and One nights which
called Les Mille et une nuits. His version of the tales appeared in twelve
volumes between 1704 and 1717 and exerted a significant influence on
subsequent European Literature and attitudes to the Islamic world. Jorge Luis
Borges has suggested that romanticism began when his translation was read.
Muhsin Mahdi- was an Iraqi American Islamologist and Arabist. He was a
leading authority on Arabian history, philology, and philosoph. His best known
work was the First critical edition of the One Thousand and One Nights.

Edward William Lane- was a british orientalist, translator and lexicographer.

He is known for his Arabic English lexicon and translation of One Thousand
and One Nights, which he censored with the usual 19th century view on
Victorian Morality.

Origin of The Arabian Nights

• Its collection took place over many centuries and countries, and many of
the tales can be traced back to folk stories in the Caliphate era and others
from the Persian "A Thousand Tales."(CALIPHATE ERA – is an Islamic state
under the leadership of an Islamic steward with the title of caliph.)The first
English edition in 1706 titled it The Arabian Nights' Entertainment, causing it to
also be frequently known as the Arabian Nights.

• Several of the stories, including the frame story, have Persian origins. Early
mentions of the Nights call it an Arabic translation of a Persian book, Hazār
Afsān, "The Thousand Stories," which involves a king killing all of his wives
after their wedding night until one starts telling stories to delay her execution.
However, there is no surviving evidence of this book, so any further
information has been lost.

 The original core of stories came from Persia and India in the eighth
century.

Main Characters

 Scheherazade- is the primary storyteller of the Arabian nights, according to

“the frame story”. The daughter of Shahrayar’s vizier, she marries thee king
and tells him story every night to keep him from killing her or any more of
his wives. She is renowned for both her talent and beauty.
 Shahrayar- he rules over the kingdom of India and begins the practice of
marrying wives and killing them the next morning until Scheherazade
begins to tell him stories every night.
  Dinarzade- Scheherazade younger sister who asks for the stories that then
keep Scheherazade alive.

THE TALES FROM THE ARABIAN NIGHTS

 Aladdin and the lamp- tells of a peasant boy who is tricked by an evil
magician into retrieving a magic genie lamp from a cave.
 Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves- hardworking Alibaba stumbles upon a
thieves hideout full of treasure, protected by a magic entry.
 The Three Apples – a fisherman finds a chest in the ocean containing a
woman’s body. Both her father and her husband try to take the blame, but
the caliph discerns that the husband had killed her, believing her unfaithful.
He had brought her three rare apples when she sick, then got mad when
he saw a slave with one apples, claiming he had received fruit from his
girlfriend.
 The Seven Voyages of Sinbad and Sailor- are told by a famous sailor to an
impoverished porter, to explain the trials and tribulations that the sailor
suffered at sea.
 The Fisherman and The Jinni- tells a story of a fisherman whose nets
retrieve a yellow jar from the sea. He opens it to release a dangerous
genie, who has been trapped for hundreds of years and had decided to kill
the man who rescues him
 The Vizier and The Sage Duban- a wise healer named Duban heals king
yunan’s leprosy, but yunan’s vizier convinces the king that Duban is out to
kill him. Yunan has Duban executed on that suspicion, and Duban gifts him
a magic book before he dies. After the wise man is beheaded the king flips
through the book, and then dies himself from a poison that Duban has left
on its pages.
 The Three Princes and The Princess Nouronnihar- details the journeys of
three brother Princes who each wants to marry their cousin Nouronnihar.