The Arabian Nights (Everyman's Library)

 

A new edited collection of stories from the Nights has been published by Everyman (2014). It is a selection of stories collected by Wen-chin Ouyang. The stories are culled from Burton, Lane, Scott and Payne. Although I haven't received my copy yet it seems like an interesting text that would possibly make for a good intro reader. There seem to be hundreds of versions of the Nights coming out every week.

Here's an overview of the book's genesis by The National (Abu Dhabi) - http://www.thenational.ae/arts-culture/books/new-anthology-of-the-arabian-nights-has-controversial-subtext

from the article:

"“There is a large group of people who now see The Arabian Nights as a western rather than Arabic classic,” says the anthology’s editor, Wen-chin Ouyang. “And it is very possible that Aladdin and the Magic Lamp and Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves were European inventions from writers wanting to pen ‘Oriental tales’. They were then translated into Arabic and became part of this ever-growing compendium of stories by the 19th century. The story of Sindbad is really interesting, for example. Is it originally a Turkish folk tale, or a Turkish translation of an Oriental tale? There’s still work to be done on that.”

You’d bet on Ouyang to do it. Her love of The Arabian Nights reads like a literary adventure all of its own: growing up in Libya, she first read it in Chinese – but her school friends had never heard of this world of genies, ebony horses or fairies. What’s more, in Libya, there wasn’t an Arabic version to be found in libraries, universities or bookshops. Finally, a friend smuggled her a copy of Alf Layla Wa Layla (The Thousand and One Nights) with the warning : “My mother says good girls are not allowed to read it.” This edition was such hard work to read, Ouyang gave up.""

Thomas Barger's 1001 Nights

This is a rare one of a kind version of the Nights that a family member has. It was a gift upon retirement to Thomas Barger, ex-CEO of Aramco and one of that company's founders (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Barger).

It is a sixteen volume version of Richard F. Burton's Alf Layla in a wooden treasure chest box. Each volume is bound in leather and each one is stamped with Barger's name in Arabic. The Saudi Arabian publisher is marked on one of the pages below. It is stamped 1964 KHAYATS Beirut. Just wanted to share the pictures -

James Joyce's copy of Burton's Nights

Here's something you don't see everyday, and something I was particularly excited to get to look at, the volumes of Richard F. Burton's Nights that were a part of the library of James Joyce.  I don't know much about the particularities of the volumes, where Joyce bought them, etc., but do know he got them and read them (via a couple of articles by Aida Yared) after writing, or shortly before finishing, Ulysses.

They are housed as a part of the Poetry Collection of the University of Buffalo (NY) Libraries, along with a ton of Joyce related writings and other incredible things, like the original of Yeats' order form for Ulysses, and etc. etc.

Many thanks to the staff at the Library, very cool people, always be nice to your librarians, they run the world.

I took these pictures, but they are owned by The Poetry Collection of the University Libraries, University at Buffalo, so don't use them elsewhere!  Thank you!

As an aside, it is known that there are no markings in the books, and that most of the pages are cut (they used to have every page sealed, and you had to cut them to read them), but what has never (as far as I've read) been remarked on is that Volume 10 ("Terminal Essay," etc.) has a particularly well creased spine, the pages laid flat, unlike all of the other volumes (yes, I asked to look through all of them...), and, most interestingly, the pages of Volume 10 smelled of smoke, other volumes didn't.  Immortality indeed.  Yes.

From JJ Nights

From JJ Nights

From JJ Nights

From JJ Nights

From JJ Nights

From JJ Nights

From JJ Nights

Burton & the Wortley-Montague & Oxford

I chanced upon several letters in the Appendix of Volume 4 of Burton's Supplemental Nights which throw light on the situation he faced when he was in the process of translating his Nights.

He wanted to have the copy of the Wortley-Montague manuscript sent to him at the India Office from the Bodleian Library at Oxford but the board members at the library were refusing, despite Burton's insistence that he was not going to translate the racier passages or stories.

This may explain why ultimately there are several stories in the Wortley-Montague (including "Ali and his Large Member" of my previous post here: http://journalofthenights.blogspot.com/2011/03/ali-and-his-large-member.html) that Burton did not translate.

He also mentions the incident in the preface to the edition.  It's in my Volume 4 but may be in different volumes depending on which edition you are looking at, the initial set of his translations from the Wortley-Montague.

He tried to have a student who didn't know Arabic at Oxford copy the manuscript for him (like drawing the same characters without knowing what they said), but the student quit after a few days!

He eventually had someone photocopy (or the equivalent?) the manuscript for him and send it to him.  Ali and his large member is MIA however.  I'll have to check the 1995 German edition of the manuscript to see if Ali is there.   I have been officially sidetracked, though not completely off my own tracks.  Studying the Nights is truly like digging in the sand.

Many thanks to Jamie at USC for the question.

There is another English edition by Jonathan Scott translated before Burton which also includes stories from the Wortley-Montague but which, and I'm not certain here and only relying on Burton's notes so far, seem to be edited for cleanliness and not to contain an extensively translated amount of stories either.

Burton's letters are interesting to read in this volume.  He's quite upset with the library and ends the Appendix A of this volume with a scathing indictment of Oxford in general!

Some snippets from his letters:

"I may note that the translated tales (as may be seen by Scott's version) contain nothing indelicate or immoral; in fact the whole MS. is exceptionally pure.  Moreover, the MS., as far as I can learn, is never used at Oxford" (281).

"I am acquainted with many of the public libraries of Europe, but I know of none that would throw such obstacles in the way of students" (282).

The reason for the story not being translated by Burton, however, may not be related to the incident with the Bodleian after all.  As I look at Volume 5 I see his rebuttal to the library's refusal of lending the manuscript to him.  He writes to them that, because of their refusal, he's now going to put in all of the racy material, even overdoing it!

He also dedicates the Volume to them:

"TO THE CURATORS OF THE BODLEIAN LIBRARY, OXFORD:  Especially REVD. B. PRICE and PROFESSOR MAX MULLER."

He writes to them:

"Gentlemen,
I take the liberty of placing your names at the head of this Volume which owes its rarest and raciest passages to your kindly refusing the temporary transfer of the Wortley Montague MS. from your pleasant library to the care of Dr. Rost., Chief Librarian, India Office.  As a sop to "bigotry and virtue," as a concession to the "Scribes and Pharisees," I had undertaken, in case the loan were granted, not to translate tales and passages which might expose you, the Curators, to unfriendly comment.  But, possibly anticipating what injury would thereby accrue to the Volume and what sorrow to my subscribers, you were good enough not to sanction the transfer - indeed you refused it to me twice - and for this step my Clientele will be (or ought to be) truly thankful to you.

I am, Gentlemen,
Yours obediently,
RICHARD F. BURTON

BODLEIAN LIBRARY, August 5th, 1888."

"Ali and his large member" is not in this volume under this title.  Perhaps the story is inside another story or titled differently by Burton?  Perhaps the story doesn't really exist??

PS RICHARD F BURTON IS NOW ON TWITTER!:  http://twitter.com/#!/mirzaburton

The Tomb of Sir Richard Francis Burton

Here is a video of someone walking up to the tomb of Nights translator Richard F. Burton in Mortlake, London, England.  As you can see (only briefly at the end of the video) the tomb is in the style of an Arabian tent.

Free Online Versions of the Nights

I'm going to add to this over time (and put a link to this page on the main blog menu on the right) as I come across them but this page is a list of links to freely accessible well known versions of the 1001 Nights.

English Versions:

- Wollamshram.ca - This website has complete versions of the following: 1. Richard Burton's complete 16 volume set (including hyperlinked footnotes), 2. Jonathan Scott's 1890 version, 3. JW Scott's Jack Hardin's Arabian Nights (1903), 4. John Payne's 9 volume Nights, his Tales from the Arabic and his Alaeddin, 5. WF Kirby's The New Arabian Nights (1883), 6. Andrew Lang's Arabian Nights (1898), 7. Edward Lane's Arabian Nights (1909 - edited by Stanley Lane-Poole), 8. E. Dixon's Fairy Tales from the Arabian Nights (1893) and More Tales (1895) and several other derivative versions and single stories. The best source for English versions online and collected in one place.

link: http://www.wollamshram.ca/1001/index.htm



- Little Hunchback. From the Arabian Nights Entertainments. In Three Cantos (1817). This is a three canto poem derived from the Hunchback story of the Nights, published first in London, England.

link: http://www.archive.org/stream/littlehunchbackf00londiala#page/n0/mode/2up



Spanish:

Las mil y una noches - Translated by Vicente Blasco Ibanez. According to the Arabian Nights Encyclopedia the author Gabriel Garcia Marquez is said to have been inspired by this particular version (p. 561 vol. 2).

Link: http://es.wikisource.org/wiki/Las_mil_y_una_noches




Arabic Versions:

Calcutta II online

Thanks to Moti (>http://moti-kagan.blogspot.com) for passing on the online version of Calcutta II of the Arabian Nights (1001 Nights) linked below, free and complete and in Arabic with a nice looking script too.

Unfortunately the book is scanned backwards! And it starts with the last page!

I'll try to contact Google books about it.

Here is the link to the Calcutta II online version:

http://books.google.ca/books?id=COgNAAAAYAAJ




Bulaq - 


Here is the 1863 Bulak Edition of Alf Laila wa Laila complete and online for free (in Arabic):

Volume one:

http://www.archive.org/details/alflailwalail01bulauoft

Volume two:

>http://www.archive.org/details/alflailwalail02bulauoft

Volume three:

>http://www.archive.org/details/alflailwalail03bulauoft

Voume four:

>http://www.archive.org/details/alflailwalail04bulauoft

mark white's critique of burton

This essay is kind of simplistic but still offers a decent overview of some of the more controversial points regarding Burton's use of Payne in Burton's translation.

It doesn't really have a title but it's called "criticism" on the 1001 Nights' "Answers.com" page.

The essay: http://www.answers.com/topic/the-arabian-nights-story-7

I don't agree with the author's assessment of Burton not "deserving" the attention that his version of the Nights received for many important reasons and I don't agree that Burton's version outshone Payne's because of "sex" - I think much more importantly Burton's version was more popular and has been more popular than Payne's because of Burton himself.

Like all modern authors shaping their own identities Burton's life history and controversy shaped the reception of his translation much more than his inclusion of sex, though Burton's notes are, to be sure, the most often talked about things when people talk about his translation.

Too much of this essay relies on Mia Gerhardt's book on the Nights as well. Gerhardt's book is important to be sure but basing your essay's thesis on her assertions and claims of plagiarism (which were pre-research suggesting otherwise - see Mary Lovell's biography of Burton for example) is not conclusive enough I think.

From the essay:

"Burton, however, was never deserving of that reputation. His version was essentially plagiarized, with some modifications, from an existing translation by John Payne. While some of his revisions improved Payne's work, many of them gave the text an archaic and formal feel that bears little relationship to the original. The real "value" that Burton gave to the work was to be found in his salesmanship, and for that he relied on his potential readership's age-old desire, despite the veneer of Victorian prudishness, for sex. Burton knew, long before the advent of Madison Avenue marketing campaigns, that sex, particularly exotic sex, sells, and he made certain that his version of The Arabian Nights had plenty of it."

how to tell a story - the porter and the three ladies

Safie, One of the Three Ladies of Bagdad - 1900 - William Clarke Wontner

The following is a selection of paragraphs from different versions of the English language Nights. All are from a favorite story of mine “The Porter and the Three Ladies of Bagdad,” which relies on a bit of fun with sexuality and at the same time gives a lot of agency to the female characters, making it a sort of sexually subversive scene.

In case you don’t know the story it involves a porter who is waiting for a job on the street, is picked up by a young woman who makes him carry a feast of foods that she buys, she takes him to a house/courtyard with a fountain and two other young attractive women, and the foursome end up drinking and frolicking and a joke is told involving everyone’s private parts that, if you haven’t read it, I won’t spoil the humor of.

Here are the various takes on it, some range from the nonexistent (Lane) to the over the top (Burton, though Burton’s is by far the most humorous in its tone), to the defensive and anti-poetic to the downright boring, how can you make this story so boring?!

I think Pasolini does it well in his film. And I also like Burton, Mathers and kind of Dawood but the others are too far gone to salvage. Bulak and the Egyptian Arabic versions are much more explicit and fun than the Mahdi/Galland manuscript too.

But I digress and let thou be thy own judge:

Lane/Poole

“The wine continued to circulate among them, and the porter, taking his part in the revels, dancing and singing with them, and enjoying the fragrant odours, began to hug and kiss them, while one slapped him, and another pulled him, and the third beat him with sweet-scented flowers, till, at length, the wine made sport with their reason; and they threw off all restraint, indulging their merriment with as much freedom as if no man had been present.”

Note 25 (at end of quote) – "I here pass over an extremely objectionable scene"

[this is the second time they drink in the story, as Lane has it - I can feel his fretting through his language, though why include the story at all if he’s so nervous about its contents?]

(60)

Dawood:

[I feel the need to include the entire section though I’ll just put the paragraph below, though Lane excises the whole “joke” of the story almost completely, leaving out the “what do you call this…” sections and ruining the need for the story at all. I’m a hesitant fan of Dawood’s even if his version has its own problems…]

“When they had drained their cups a second time, they rose and danced round the fountain, singing and clapping their hands in unison. They went on drinking until the wine took possession of their senses and overcame their reason, and, when its sovereignty was fully established, the first girl got up and cast off all her clothes, letting down her long hair to cover her nakedness. She jumped into the fountain, frolicking and washing her body, filling her mouth with water and squirting it at the porter. At length she came out of the pool and threw herself into the porter’s lap. Then she pointed down to that which was between her thighs and said: ‘Darling master, what do you call that?’”

(247)

Grub Street Edition/ Robert Mack editor:

(also a little on the tame side and no “what do you call it” joke):

“After they had eat a little, Amine, who sat next the sideboard, took up a bottle and cup, filled out wine and drank first herself, according to the custom of the Arabians, then she filled the cup to her sisters, who drank in course as they sat; and at last she filled it the fourth time to the porter, who, as he received it, kissed Amine’s hand; and before he drank, sung a song to this purpose: That as the wind brings along with it the sweet scents of the perfumed places through which it passes, so the wine he was going to drink, coming from her fair hands, received a more exquisite taste than what it had of its own nature. This song pleased the ladies so much, that each of them sung another in their turn. In short, they were extraordinary merry all the time of dinner, which lasted a long while, and nothing was wanting that could make it agreeable.”

(70)

And then of course Burton:

“Then the lady took the cup, and drank it off to her sisters’ health, and they ceased not drinking (the Porter being in the midst of them), and dancing and laughing and reciting verses and singing ballads and ritornellos. All this time the Porter was carrying on with them, kissing, toying, biting, handling, groping, fingering; whilst one thrust a dainty morsel in his mouth, and another slapped him; and this cuffed his cheeks, and that threw sweet flowers at him; and he was in the very paradise of pleasure, as though he were sitting in the seventh sphere among the Houris of Heaven. They ceased not doing after this fashion until the wine played tricks in their heads and worsted their wits; and, when the drink got the better of them, the portress stood up and doffed her clothes till she was mother-naked. However, she let down her hair about her body by way of shift, and throwing herself into the basin disported herself and dived like a duck and swam up and down, and took water in her mouth, and spurted it all over the Porter, and washed her limbs, and between her breasts, and inside her thighs and all around her navel. Then she came up out of the cistern and throwing herself on the Porter’s lap said, “O my lord, O my love, what callest thou this article?” pointing to her slit, her solution of continuity.”

(vol 1: 90)

Haddawy: (I hear the humor in Burton, there is none here, I feel, just my humble opinion):

Thus receiving the full and returning the empty, they went on drinking cup after cup until the porter began to feel tipsy, lost his inhibitions, and was aroused. He danced and sang lyrics and ballads and carried on with the girls, toying, kissing, biting, groping, rubbing, fingering, and playing jokes on them, while one girl thrust a morsel in his mouth, another flirted with him, another served him with some fresh herbs, and another fed him sweets until he was in utter bliss. They carried on until they got drunk and the wine turned their heads. When the wine got the better of them, the doorkeeper went to the pool, took off her clothes, and stood stark naked, save for what was covered of her body by her loosened hair. Then she said, “Whee,” went into the pool, and immersed herself in the water.

[here Haddawy has a night and morning section]

I heard that the doorkeeper went into the pool, threw water on herself, and, after immersing herself completely, began to sport, taking water in her mouth and squirting it all over her sisters and the porter. Then she washed herself under her breasts, between her thighs, and inside her navel. Then she rushed out of the pool, sat naked in the porter’s lap and, pointing to her slit, asked, “My lord and my love, what is this?”

(72-3)

The new Lyons edition:

She then took the cup, drank it and sat down with her sister. They continued to drink, with the porter seated between them, and as they drank, they danced, laughed and sang, reciting poems and lyrics. The porter began to play with them, kissing, biting, rubbing, feeling, touching and taking liberties. One of them would give him morsels to eat, another would cuff him and slap him, and the third would bring him scented flowers. With them he was enjoying the pleasantest of times, as though he was seated among the houris of Paradise.

They went on in this way until the wine had taken its effect on their heads and brains. When it had got the upper hand of them, the doorkeeper stood up, stripped off her clothes until she was naked, and letting down her hair as a veil, she jumped into the pool. She sported in the water, ducking her head and then spitting out the water, after which she took some in her mouth and spat it over the porter. She washed her limbs and between her thighs, after which she came out from the water and threw herself down on his lap. ‘My master, my darling, what is the name of this?’ she said, pointing to her vagina.

(55-6)

Mathers/Mardrus:

Again the young girl took the cup to the porter and, after holding it to his lips, sat down beside her sister. Soon they began to dance and sing and to play with the wonderful petals, the porter all the time taking them in his arms and kissing them, while one said saucy things to him, another drew him to her, and the third beat him with flowers. They went on drinking until the grape sat throned above their reason, and, when her reign was fully established, the portress rose and stripped off all her clothes until she was naked. Jumping into the water of the fountain, she began to play with it, taking it in her mouth and blowing it noisily at the porter, washing all her body, and letting it run between her childish thighs. At length she got out of the fountain, threw herself on the porter’s lap, stretched out on her back and, pointing to the thing which was between her thighs, said:

‘My darling, do you know the name of that?’

(54-5)

Jack Zipes, in his Arabian Nights vol II, an “adaptation” of Burton, keeps everything Burton has but takes out the sentence about the Houris for some reason. Zipes’ version is quite readable for contemporary readers actually and may be one of the better adaptations, though lacking in the poetics of say Burton or Mathers.

Albert Letchford and Adolphe Lalauze

These pictures were passed on to me by someone who is wondering of their origins and/or the names of the illustrations.

I believe the first is by Albert Letchford who did paintings for the second Burton edition and the second is by Adolphe Lalauze who did engravings for the same edition. I'm not sure of the titles of these but does anyone have a copy of them with titles for the illustrations?

The first publication of Burton's second edition of his Nights with these illustrations is: The 1894-1897 Burton Club edition by Nichols and Smithers - Albert Letchford and Adolphe Lalauze (who did engravings) illustrators. This puts the earliest date for the illustrations at 1894.

There were 70 illustrations by these guys (one collection of the illustrations is on ebay at the moment for $550!) and subsequent editions had less than 70 as far as I can tell.

If anyone could add anything more please do as a reply to this posting and thank you in advance.


This is what I suspect to be the Letchford painting (there is something about Letchford in several of Burton's biographies, he was a good friend of Burton's and painted most of his paintings for the Nights in Naples with local landscapes as backgrounds). It is from the frame story and illustrates the poor fate of the brothers Shahryar and Shahzaman...


Not sure what story this is from but the name on the bottom is clearly A. Lalauze, a semi-famous French engraver and artist.

- M

Pasolini's Inspiration

Pasolini's film version of the Nights is one of the few versions, filmic or otherwise, of the story collection dealing explicitly with the sexual nature of the stories and also includes some relatively unknown stories from the Nights (no Ali Baba, Aladdin or Sinbad!) which I suspect comes at the prompting of Burton.

In his "Terminal Essay" Burton writes:

"The pederasty of The Nights may briefly be distributed into three categories. The first is the funny form, as the unseemly practical joke of masterful Queen Budur (vol. iii. 300-306) and the not less hardi jest of the slave-princess Zumurrud (vol. iv. 226). The second is in the grimmest and most earnest phase of the perversion, for instance where Abu Nowas [70] debauches the three youths (vol. v. 64-69); whilst in the third form it is wisely and learnedly discussed, to be severely blamed, by the Shaykhah or Reverend Woman (vol. v. 154)."

Pasolini uses stories from both "Zumurrud" and "Abu Nowas" and incorporates and makes much use of the blurry lines between what constitutes homosexual and heterosexual sexuality.

I doubt that Pasolini read the entirety of Burton and picked those stories at random, it seems more likely that Burton's essay prompted Pasolini to take a closer look at those particular stories instead.

what time were the tales told

The question of when the stories of the Nights were "officially" told by "Shahrazad" and who she them to who seems contentious and different in most every version of the Nights and is an interesting aside that I notice as I'm studying them and perhaps will come back to if time warrants in the future.

In the last section of Burton's Supplemental Nights vol. 1 which mostly seems to contain stories from the Breslau edition of the Nights Burton writes in a footnote:

"1 The Bresl. Edit. (xi. 318-21) seems to assume that the tales were told in the early night before the royal pair slept. This is no improvement; we prefer to think that the time was before peep of day when Easterns usually awake and have nothing to do till the dawn-prayer" (250).

Murukami & the Nights

A friend gave me a copy of Haruki Murukami's book Kafka on the Shore which is a great read if you haven't read it or any Murukami. It was a gift because the friend enjoys Murukami (not because of the references below).

The main character (Kafka Tamura) is a teenaged boy in contemporary Japan who, among many other bizarre events, runs away from home and spends time reading all day in a small private library in the suburbs.

Sometimes when you study something you see it everywhere just because you are reading things into things or are trying to fit everything into your thesis (when you study psychology you swear you have all of the mental illnesses you read about or when you read Marx you see everything as a class conflict...! for example).

But what if it really is everywhere?

In Murukami, Kafka begins browsing the library's collection, reflecting in a sense the larger literary points that the narrative weaves:

"When I open them, most of books have the smell of an earlier time leaking out between the pages - a special odor of the knowledge and emotions that for ages have been calmly resting between the covers. Breathing it in, I glance through a few pages before returning each book to its shelf.

Finally I decide on a multivolume set, with beautiful covers, of the Burton translation of The Arabian Nights, pick out one volume, and take it back to the reading room. I've been meaning to read this book" (36).

- Kafka then engages with a character named Oshima and they talk about hermaphrodites (something Burton also brings up several times throughout his Nights) before Kafka returns to his book.

"Back in the reading room I return to 'The Tale of Abu-l-Hasan, the Wag,' but my mind wanders away from the book. Male/male, male/female, and female/female?" (37).

This means that Kafka is reading Burton's volume one of his Supplemental Nights, and no, I'm not that nerdy, I just happen to have read this story yesterday, and yes, it is all strange coincidence.

What is interesting (among many other things) here is that the narrator refers to the story title that is not the Burton title. Burton's title of this story is "The Sleeper and the Waker." In a footnote in his main Nights Burton does mention the story by this exact title but it is in reference to Lane:

"Lane (ii. 352) here introduces, between Nights cclxxi. and ccxc., a tale entitled in the Bresl. Edit. (iv. 134) “The Sleeper and the Waker,” i.e. the sleeper awakened; and he calls it: The Story of Abu-l-Hasan the Wag. It is interesting and founded upon historical-fact; but it can hardly be introduced here without breaking the sequence of The Nights. I regret this the more as Mr. Alexander J. Cotheal-of New York has most obligingly sent me an addition to the Breslau text (iv. 137) from his Ms. But I hope eventually to make use of it."

(this footnote comes in Burton's 271st Night)

I wonder what the case is here, is Murukami being clever by putting the Lane title in the Burton book? Or is it a mistake? If anyone has the original Japanese and can tell me if the title of this story is "The Story of Abu-l-Hasan the Wag" in Murukami's book please let me know, though I can't really see the English translator of Murukami choosing this title if Murukami wrote "The Sleeper and the Waker."

Later, after a few episodes in his own adventure, Kafka returns to the book:

"I head off to the reading room and back to Arabian Nights. Like always, once I settle down and start flipping pages, I can't stop. The Burton edition has all the stories I remember reading as a child, but they're longer, with more episodes and plot twists, and so much more absorbing that it's hard to believe they're the same. They're full of obscene, violent, sexual, basically outrageous scenes. Like the genie in the bottle they have this sort of vital, living sense of play, of freedom, that common sense can't keep bottled up. I love it and can't let go. Compared to those faceless hordes of people rushing through the train station, these crazy, preposterous stories of a thousand years ago are, at least to me, much more real. How that's possible, I don't know. It's pretty weird" (53).

This is a nice passage and one can't help but imagine the author's voice seeping in through his teenaged character giving voice to, on some level, what reading and stories are all about, let alone in the frame of Burton's Nights, especially reading as a teen and/or young adult, moving away from the childish and yet still dragging it with you (or it dragging you) into adulthood and more serious concerns.

There are a few more references (though the whole book is on many levels Murukami's rewrite of what he says Burton's Nights are above):

"I go back to the reading room, where I sink down in the sofa and into the world of The Arabian Nights. Slowly, like a movie fadeout, the real world evaporates. I'm alone, inside the world of the story. My favorite feeling in the world" (54).

Some Grub Street Reflections

Robert Mack's edition of Arabian Nights' Entertainments allows the reader to see the Nights how they looked to the first English readers as it is a (slightly) edited version of the first "Grub St" English edition which started appearing in England between 1706-1721.

(for a brief history of the Nights see the link - "What is the Arabian Nights" on this blog)

What strikes me as interesting so far is the frame story and how much emphasis it places on the reasons for Scheherazade wanting to marry "Schahriar" (as he is spelled here).

She seems particularly concerned with the future fates of her fellow townswomen, maybe more so than I recall any other version.

The background of Schahriar's unique marriage situation is explained as such:

"The rumor of this unparalleled barbarity occasioned a general consternation in the city, where there was nothing but crying and lamentation. Here a father in tears, and inconsolable for the loss of his daughter; and there tender mothers dreading lest theirs should have the same fate, making the air to resound beforehand with their groans. So that instead of the commendations and blessings which the sultan had hitherto received from his subjects, their mouths were now filled with imprecations against him" (10).

And Scheherazade comes to the rescue:

"I have a design to stop the course of that barbarity which the sultan exercises upon the families of this city. I would dispel those unjust fears which so many mothers have of losing their daughters in such a fatal manner" (10).

She later says "If I perish, my death will be glorious, and if I succeed, I shall do my country an important piece of service" (11).

Burton's edition has these reasons but they are backgrounded behind the necessity of Scheherazade as being next in line due to the lack of any other living marriageable young women:

"and mothers wept and parents fled with their daughters till there remained not in the city a young person fit for carnal copulation" (14)

and Scheherazade wants to "save both sides from destruction" (15), not just the townfolk, putting more of an emphasis on the innocence of Shahryar, that he was acting in some ways rationally given the betrayal of his wife (vs. the Grub Street edition which doesn't give him that much play)...

Another thing that is interesting to me is the set up of the storytelling, in Grub St. Dinarzade wakes her sister up before dawn in order to hear the rest of the story, when dawn comes Scheherazade stops (and promises to resume for her sister the next evening if she lives). Schahriar takes a backseat to the whole thing, kind of creepily listening in the dark and secretly being interested in the stories (vs. being the or a main person who listens and can't wait for the rest of the stories, as is more popularly portrayed).

Burton's has Scheherazade telling stories for the enjoyment of both her sister and her king: "'Tell on,' quoth the King who chanced to be sleepless and restless and therefore was pleased with the prospect of hearing her story" (24).

Lyons review/press release? from WSJ

This is a strange and vague article (or press release?) about the Nights from the Wall Street Journal of all places. I'm not sure of the point of it but it does mention the recent English edition from Malcolm Lyons.

As a side note, the author says that Edward Said spends little time on the Nights in Orientalism which is quite a false claim, Said spends most of the first part of his book focusing on Galland, Lane and Burton.

This author also calls Burton's edition "practically unreadable"! (this is what I've heard about it from just about everyone who mentions the Nights and knows about Burton, I suspect that it's one of those tall tales that make their way around and also suspect that many of the people saying this about Burton's edition haven't actually tried to read it)...

He also says: ""The Arabian Nights" has long had a bad reputation among Arab intellectuals for its vulgarity, perceived shallowness and general lack of moral uplift." This is fairly false as well, though it seemed like a true statement in the 10th century, but scholars all over the Middle East are re-interested in the Nights:

entire article: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970204886304574308744212027048.html

excerpts of the article:

By JAMIE JAMES

It surprises us to learn that Charles Dickens made more allusions to "The Arabian Nights" than any other work of literature—but it shouldn't. Shahrazad, the narrator of "The Arabian Nights' Entertainment," or "Tales of 1001 Nights," has ­inspired great storytellers for centuries. As a treasure-house of characters and stories, the "Nights" is an essential point of reference for popular entertainments ranging from British pantomime to Romantic ballet and opera to Hollywood spectacle.

The key to its lasting popularity and influence is that it's all about the story. The anonymous bards whose tales are collected in the book's thousands of pages espoused no ideology and preached no religious message. Princes play the villain as often as they are praised. The book's pedigree is cosmopolitan, with tales drawn from India and Persia as well as Arabic sources; scholars believe the Aladdin story is actually ­European in ­origin.

..............................................

Reading "The Arabian Nights" is like visiting a medieval lending library. Stories are embedded within stories like Russian dolls, encompassing ­every narrative genre from ­instructive fable to swashbuckling adventure to diaphanously veiled pornography. It wasn't translated into a modern European language until Antoine Galland's French version began to appear in 1704, and then took all Europe by storm. "Read Sinbad and you will be sick of Aeneas," wrote Horace Walpole, ­18th-century England's whimsical tale-spinner and author of the first Gothic novel. (Walpole coined the word "serendipity" from Serendib, the old name for Sri Lanka, to capture the aura of enchantment of the ­island—which he read about in the sixth voyage of Sinbad.)

Until recently, the standard English version was Sir Richard Burton's practically unreadable translation of 1885. Thus in the 20th century "The Arabian Nights" became best-known in simplified adventure stories for children. Adults imbibed Shahrazad's tales in a stream of popular adaptations in every conceivable medium and genre.

To restore this classic page-turner to the world's reading list, last year Penguin in London published a captivating new translation by Malcolm Lyons in a magnificent three-volume set. Penguin USA is planning to bring out a one-volume paperback abridgment of the Lyons ­translation.

For all its bizarre monsters and miraculous goings-on, the world of "The Arabian Nights" is instantly recognizable as our own. At the conclusion of each of his perilous voyages, Sinbad rejoices at his return to ­Baghdad, where he eats home cooking and drinks good wine with his boon companions. The perspective is populist and secular: The protagonists of most of the tales aren't great princes but wily merchants and clever young laborers. Religion plays a smaller role in "The Arabian Nights" than it does in medieval Christian epics; its characters rarely pray except when in a jam. Women ­frequently play the hero, rescuing their hapless aristocratic masters with cunning stratagems.

"The Arabian Nights" has long had a bad reputation among Arab intellectuals for its vulgarity, perceived shallowness and general lack of moral uplift. Yet the tales capture an essential quality of the Arab soul: passionate self-romancing. Edward Said's influential book "Orientalism" (1978) warns modern readers to be skeptical of falsely ­romantic views of the East propagated by Western writers and painters. He scarcely mentions "The Arabian Nights," possibly because it undermines his basic premise; but no Western view of the East, however fanciful, could possibly exceed it for perfumed glamour. The most seductive quality of the stories is Shahrazad's serene conviction that her audience will follow her anywhere. And we do.

—Mr. James is the author of "The Snake Charmer" ­(Hyperion 2008).

Somaliland coins feature Richard F. Burton

The breakaway sort of country of Somaliland (northern part of Somalia, which, as I was told by a taxi driver from the region, enjoys a more relative amount of peace and prosperity than Somalia) has pictures of Richard F. Burton on two of their coins currently in use as currency.

One is the 5 shilling coin and the same picture is also on the 2,000 shilling coin.

More on Somaliland coins:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coins_of_the_Somaliland_shilling

SHERRI ZAHAD AND HER ARABIAN KNIGHTS

"SHERRI ZAHAD AND HER ARABIAN KNIGHTS" was a short run comedy play by the Laboratory Theater in Brooklyn, NY in 2008.

from their website: "In Laboratory Theater’s SHERRI ZAHAD AND HER ARABIAN KNIGHTS, a fictional performance troupe – perhaps from the Middle East, perhaps from Las Vegas – attempts to rehearse a ballet based on tales from Sir Richard F. Burton’s translation of The Arabian Nights, but ends up falling prey to the forgotten ghosts from these ancient stories."

more here: http://www.laboratorytheater.org/shows/schzd.html


video of the play:

Sherri Zahad and Her Arabian Knights from Laboratory Theater on Vimeo.

Burton Translated

Xah Lee - a Nights fan and English teacher has an interesting website featuring Burton's expurgated version of the Nights with unusual Burtonesque words highlighted and defined on the side panel. Well worth a look:

http://xahlee.org/p/arabian_nights/index.html

The Collector of Worlds - Seattle Times Review

A new book based on the life of Richard Burton makes about 30 that I've found which deal primarily with the controversial Nights-translator/author Richard F. Burton. My list of Burton bios is on Amazon here: http://www.amazon.com/gp/richpub/listmania/fullview/R1YDOE16L1FEI. Do let me know if I've missed something.

The new book "The Collector of Worlds" by Iliya Troyanov is interesting because it's fiction and written in a novel format. I look forward to adding it to my massive pile of unread "books to read."

Here's the link to the review (I'm sure there will be many others forthcoming):

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/books/2009008636_br12collect.html

And the review itself:

"The Collector of Worlds": a 19th century global visionary

"The Collector of Worlds" is novelist Iliya Troyanov's fictional version of the fantastically complicated life of 19th-century explorer Sir Richard Francis Burton.

By Robert Allen Papinchak

Special to The Seattle Times

"The Collector of Worlds: A Novel of Sir Richard Francis Burton"

by Iliya Troyanov, translated by William Hobson

Ecco, 453 pp., $24.99

Nineteenth-century world traveler Sir Richard Francis Burton (1821-1890) has been called an explorer, linguist, writer, soldier, translator, diplomat and a possible spy. Bulgarian writer Iliya Troyanov distills Burton's adventuresome life in the hefty yet fast-paced biographical, historical novel "The Collector of Worlds." This highly atmospheric novel details 20 years of Burton's experiences in British West India, Arabia and Africa, where "only the ignorant or the arrogant would venture."

Much of the success of the three-part novel depends on Troyanov's inspired choice of structure. Instead of re-creating events only from Burton's point of view, Troyanov introduces the perspectives of a loyal servant, government officials and an intrepid guide.

The first part, "British India," begins with Burton's servant of seven years, Naukaram, hiring a lahiya (a street scribe) to tell his own story. This section sparkles with humor. What purports to be a two-page letter approaches 200 pages in Troyanov's novel, as the scribe keeps adding details of Naukaram's life. Meanwhile, the servant recounts the youthful Burton's conscientious immersion in Indian culture — from avidly learning the language of Sanskrit to accepting a diet of vegetables, nuts and fruits. The erotic nature of Burton, future translator of the "Kama Sutra," evolves through his relationship with Kundalini, a vestal courtesan.

While in India, Burton became a master of disguises. This serves him well in part two, "Arabia," when he takes on the identity of Mirza Abdullah, a doctor and a dervish, on the hajj pilgrimage to Mecca. This second section includes a series of investigative exchanges by government officials certain that Burton is a spy for the British government seeking information on "previously remote, unknown corners of the world [which] will become part of the empire." The journey to Mecca is not without serious consequences as the "master of secrets" becomes the victim of a violent attack.

One of Burton's greatest efforts, searching for the source of the Nile River, is disclosed in the final part of the novel, "East Africa." He is accompanied by his stalwart guide, Sidi Mubarak Bombay, who offers the third alternative narration for the novel. Details of the trek include information about Burton's exploring companion, John Hanning Speke. The trio travels from Zanzibar, where the sands are "like finely ground sea salt steeped in gold," through the villages of Bagamoyo and Kazeh before reaching Lake Tanganyika and then Lake Victoria. Along the way, they are almost killed by a mudslide, contract severe cases of malaria and get help from a mganga (witch doctor).

Although "The Collector of Worlds" is ostensibly about Burton and his daring accomplishments, the reader seems to learn more about Naukaram and Sid Bombay. This in no way diminishes the value of the tightly-woven novel, which succeeds in fleshing out the servant and the guide while Burton remains the well-regarded historical figure.

Lyons Review focusing on translation - Elspeth Barker

A review of the 2009 Lyons edition of the Nights focusing on its translations and past translations and their issues. I agree with much of what the reviewer says.

It's from the Independent (pasted below):

link: http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/books/reviews/the-arabian-nights-tales-of-1001-nights-trs-malcolm-c-lyons-1607007.html



Penguin £125

The Arabian Nights: Tales of 1001 nights, trs Malcolm C Lyons

A fairy-tale classic gets a modern makeover, but don't bin its fusty predecessors just yet

Reviewed by Elspeth Barker

Sunday, 15 February 2009

In his witty essay on the translators of the 1001 Nights, Borges celebrates a hostile dynasty, each scion striving to annihilate his predecessor. There are so many manuscripts to choose from, none definitive, representing a fantastical melange of tales preserved, embroidered, lost and reinvented by countless oral storytellers, Arabic, Persian, Indian – and French.


Antoine Galland, the first European translator, in the 18th century, is thought to have created two of the most famous stories, Aladdin and Ali Baba, himself. JC Mardrus's French version of 1899 (meticulously translated into English by Powys Mathers) has been hugely criticised for its delightful additional details – a dish of rice cream comes from him "powdered with sugar and cinnamon", while the Arabic "girl" may become "an enchanting child". Why not? This is the tradition of the storyteller. A contemporary translator, Husain Haddawy, recalls stories from his childhood in Baghdad: "As the embers glowed in the dim light ... she would spin the yarn leisurely, amplifying here and interpolating there, episodes I recognised from other stories." So it goes on. Everything is an aide-memoire for something else.

This new version of the Nights by Malcolm C Lyons is the first direct translation into English of the Calcutta II recension since Sir Richard Burton's famous 19th-century version. The three volumes bear introductions by Robert Irwin, who rises to Borges' prescription and casts scorn on earlier translations, though Lyons himself notes debts to Haddawy and to Enno Littmann, the German scholar derided by Borges for his literalism: "Like Washington, he cannot tell a lie."

If one were to find fault with Lyons' monumental achievement, it would be in the painstaking plainness of his diction. Like Haddawy, Lyons falls often into linguistic traps that are avoided by the exuberant Mardrus and Mathers. Instead of "cripple" or "lame" (traditional fairy-tale adjectives), Haddawy writes "paraplegic" while Lyons has "semi-paralysed". Lyons also consistently translates the common Arabic zib and kis as "penis" and "vagina". The cumulative effect is clinical, jarringly out of place in the perfumed chambers and ghostly gardens of the Nights.

In the tale of the second barber, a young man must gratify a drunken admirer. Mardrus/Mathers gets the right tone: "The old woman came up to him and said, 'Now you must run after the dear young lady and catch her. It is her custom, when heated by dance and wine, to undress naked and not to give herself to her lover until she has been able to examine his bare limbs, his rampant zabb, and the agility of his running. You must follow her from room to room, with your zabb in the ascendant, until you catch her. That is the only way she will be mounted."

Lyons has: "'Now,' said the old woman, 'you have achieved your goal. There will be no more blows and there is only one thing left. It is a habit of my mistress that, when she is drunk, she will not let anyone have her until she has stripped off her clothes, including her harem trousers, and is entirely naked. Then she will tell you to remove your own clothes and to start running, while she runs in front of you as though she was trying to escape from you. You must follow her from place to place, until you have an erection, and she will then let you take her.'"

I don't want to seem sex-obsessed, but in a medieval fairy tale, albeit for grown-ups, men do not have erections, they have rampant (or even rampaging) zabbs. And to continue the theme, inevitable in this saga, in the story of a Prince "Semi-Petrified" for Lyons, "Ensorcelled" for Burton, a lover lamenting the unpunctuality of his mistress, says, according to Lyons, "I will never again keep company with you or join my body to yours," but according to Burton, shouts "nor will I glue my body to your body, and strum and belly-bump". Which threat carries the more weight? Lyons mentions a ruined city "echoing to the screech of owls and the cawing of crows"; fine enough, but for Burton it is a place where "raven should croak and howlet hoot". Divine. Unfortunately Burton also says things such as "verily this is a matter whereanent silence cannot be kept". Verily, 'twas time for a new translation.

Yet the English reader may not be so badly served by the now-unfashionable Mardrus-Mathers version. Mathers is championed by the poet Tony Harrison, and Mardrus's admirers have included Gide, Proust, Borges and Joyce. As even their sternest critics admit, Mardrus and Mathers come closest to conveying the experience of a medieval Cairo storyteller, albeit at the cost of strict fidelity. Mardrus also dispenses with minor tales he finds dull, replacing them with others he likes better. A case in point is "The Tale of the Sea Rose of the Girl of China", remarkable for its transsexual subplot.

Scholars universally accept the claim made by Mardrus's enemy, Victor Chauvin, that Mardrus appropriated this tale from a Victorian source. But a little literary detective work on our part reveals that the source of this story is the Sanskrit Mahabharata, which dates from more than a millennium before the earliest manuscript of the Arabian Nights. Who wins on pedigree?

Scholars object to Mardrus's adornment in passages such as the iconic first description of Scheherazade, where he adds an extra line of praise. Lyons here deletes a line which is considered by Haddawy, Burton and Payne, to be correct.

Two final quibbles with Lyons: the "index" is an unalphabetised table of contents, provokingly placed at the back of the book, and page headers give the number rather than the name of the tale.

Despite these caveats, every aficionado will want to add Lyons to a rickety shelf which ideally will also contain Mardrus/Mathers, Haddawy, and the peerless Arabian Nights Encyclopedia by Ulrich Marzolph and Richard van Leeuwen, which is almost as much fun to dip into as the Nights themselves. Doughty Burton will serve to prop the whole thing up.

Mahdi, Haddawy & Burton Compared II

These quotes are from the Fisherman/Jinni/Ensorcelled Prince series of stories:

Note on the Arabic: Several words are misspelled because of the original manuscript but I’ve copied them as they are in Mahdi’s manuscript (ie tuma instead of thuma and no dots below the ya, etc.).

Note Burton’s description of the Prince’s lover and its crudeness, which is nowhere near the same in Mahdi or in Haddawy (although the latter two are different, Haddawy translates as “black man” the Arabic for “black slave”). I’ll have to take a look at some more Arabic texts in order to get a better idea for how far off base Burton took his translation.

Fisherman and the Jinni

Burton – “Now when the Sultan heard the mournful voice he sprang to his feet; and, following the sound, found a curtain let down over a chamber-door. He raised it and saw behind it a young man sitting upon a couch about a cubit above the ground; and he fair to the sight, a well shaped wight, with eloquence dight; his forehead was flower-white, his cheek rosy bright, and a mole on his cheek-breadth like an ambergris mite; even as the poet doth indite:” (68)

Haddawy – “When the king heard the lamentation and the verses, he rose and moved toward the source of the voice until he came to a doorway behind a curtain, and when he lifted the curtain, he saw at the upper end of the room a young man sitting on a chair that rose about twenty inches above the floor. He was a handsome young man, with a full figure, clear voice, radiant brow, bright face, downy beard, and ruddy cheeks, graced with a mole like a speck of amber, just as the poet describes it:” (54-5).

"فلما سمح الملك الشعر والبكا نهض قايماً وتتبع الصوت وجد ستراً مرخى على باب مجلس, فشاله ونظر وادا فى صدر المجلس صبياً جالس على كرسى مرتفعاً عن الارض مقدار دراع وهو شاباٌ مليح وقداً رجيح ولسان فصيح, بجبين ازهر ووجه اقمر وعدار اخضر وخدٍ احمر وشامه عليه كقرص عنبر, كما قال الشاعر فيها

(Mahdi 113-4)

This description of the ensorcelled prince in Arabic seems best encapsulated here by Burton’s rhyming English adjectives, although it sounds a bit flowery and put on – I think that was the point here. In Haddawy’s version it is much less poetic and more straight forward in its description, which for me loses something of the original’s playfulness.

Tale of the Ensorcelled Prince

The Prince’s servants gossip:

Mahdi – 116

"الا تعمل له فى القدح الشرب الدى يبات عليه مرقد وتسقيه له فيرقد ويصير هو والميت سوا, وتخرج تغيب الى الفجر, ولما تاتى تبخر ببخور عند انفه يشمه فيستيقض, فيا خصارت"

Burton - “Nay, more, doth she not drug every night the cup she giveth him to drink before sleep-time, and put Bhang into it? So he sleepeth and wotteth not whither she goeth, nor what she doeth; but we know that after giving him the drugged wine, she donneth her richest raiment and perfumeth herself and then she fareth out from him to be away till break of day; then she cometh to him, and burneth a pastille under his nose and he awaketh from his deathlike sleep.” (70-1).

Haddawy - “No. She places a sleeping potion in the last drink he takes, offers him the cup, and when he drinks it, he sleeps like a dead man. Then she leaves him and stays out till dawn. When she returns, she burns incense under his nose, and when he inhales it, he wakes up. What a pity!” (57)

Here it seems that Burton is way off in his own corner but again it might be that he was using a different source for his translation, although the deliberate archaic language seems strangely incorporated here. Here Haddawy and the Arabic are closer than before.

The Prince’s wife’s lover:

Mahdi – 117

وتسلقت انا سطح القبه واشرفت عليهم وادا ببنت عمى قد وقفت على عبد اسود مبتلى قاعد على قش قصب وهو لابس هدمه وشراميط فقبلت الارض بين يديه

Burton - “Lo! My fair cousin had gone in to a hideous negro slave with his upper lip like the cover of a pot, and his lower like an open pot; lips which might sweep up sand from the gravel-floor of the cot. He was to boot a leper and a paralytic, lying upon a strew of sugar-cane trash and wrapped in an old blanket and the foulest rags and tatters” (71).

Haddawy – “I saw my wife standing before a decrepit black man sitting on reed shavings and dressed in tatters” (57).

Not sure where Burton got this description from but I’d be very interested in finding it. Haddawy forgoes the Arabic “black slave” to settle on “black man” here. She kisses the earth in front of her lover in the Arabic but the English is not quoted here.

The Prince’s wife’s torture:

Mahdi - 121

تم انها لم يكفها دلك وما صارت حالتى اليه تم انها تعرينى فى كل يوم وتضربنى بالصوت مايه جلده حتى يسيل دمى وتتهرى اكتافى, تم تلبسنى توب شعر صفه البلاّس على نصفى الفوقانى وتلبسنى هده الاتواب الفاخره من فوق

Burton – “And every day she tortureth me and scougeth me with an hundred stripes, each of which draweth floods of blood and cutteth the skin of my shoulders to strips; and lastly she clotheth my upper half with a hair-cloth and then throweth over them these robes” (77).

Haddawy – “she strips me naked every day and gives me a hundred lashes with the whip until my back is lacerated and begins to bleed. Then she clothes my upper half with a hairshirt like a coarse rug and covers it with these luxurious garments.” (61)