The Thousand and One Nights

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The Thousand and One Nights
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The Thousand and One Nights

• Author unknown
• Culture Arab, from a collection of pre-Islamic
  Middle Persian tales.
• Time 14th century
• Genre prose, contains lots of different genres
  from poetry to prose adventure tales, romances,
  etc.
• Names to know Shahrazad, Shahrayar

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1,001 Nights

• Oral and written versions existed side by side.
• The tales are rooted in daily life, but are made
  magical by their settings, fantastic adventures,
  and the intervention of sorcerers and demons
  (djinn).
• The Prologue sets forth the themes
• Lust, madness, violence, justice, retribution,
  heroism.

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The Narrator

• Shahrazad succeeds through the power of
  story-telling (narrative) to ward off tyranny and
  to suspend time.
• Overall narrative structure nesting tales that
  flow from and lead into each other.
• Framing Narrative is set out in the Prologue.

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Generic Importance

• This is one of the richest reservoirs of
  narrative genres in Medieval times. E.M. Forster
  in his Aspects of Fiction (1927) considers One
  Thousand and One Nights to be the origin of the
  modern novel.
• The Greeks invented the novel in the Hellenistic
  period (3rd-1st centuries BCE) but these were
  adventure/romance tales only.
• Novel form is developing in medieval Japan, as
  well.

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Two-part Narrative Structure

• Baghdad part the characters and action focus on
  Baghdad in the time of Haroun al-Rashid.
• Egyptian part characters and settings are
  Egyptian, jinn are manipulated through talismans
  rather than directly.
• Tales reflect the influence of all the Islamic
  world ( the Koran) as well as ancient Babylonian
  Mesopotamian narratives and historical events
  figures such as those surrounding Alexander the
  Great.

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Prologue

• Sets out the reason for the tale-telling, and the
  main characters.
• Explains why Shahzaman visits his brother
  Shahrayar, why he is depressed, and what makes
  him feel better.
• Describes male/female sexuality

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Male vs. Female P.O.V.

• Men are comfortable when in control
• Men react violently when they realize they do not
  have control
• Women dislike the bonds put upon and actively
  seek escape
• Women can be powerful as even Djinn cannot
  control them
• Some women and men do find balance

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What to do when you have no control?

• When Shahrayar returns home he says, There is
  not a single chaste woman anywhere on the entire
  face of the earth Thus he plans to gain control
  through violence.
• Violent control comes with a heavy cost much
  death
• There is a reminiscence of Gilgamesh , He
  continued to do this until all the girls
  perished, their mothers mourned, and there arose
  a clamor among the fathers and mothers, who
  called the plague upon his head, complained to
  the Creator of the heavens, and called for help
  on Him who hears and answers prayers.

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Aim of the Tales

• Shahrazads tales may be chosen to teach
  Shahrayar that not all women are like his first
  wife.
• In many of the tales a benign but powerful woman
  undoes the harm done by a bad woman.
• The wicked characters are punished according to
  their crimes, but are never put to death (unlike
  all of Shahrayars other innocent wives!).

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Conclusion

• After a thousand and one nights, Shahrayar
  finally embraces Shahrazad as a virtuous woman
  and gives over his unjust behavior.
• She reveals their three sons.
• Dinarzad marries Shahzaman.
• The vizier becomes king in Shahzamans place.