Reading Diary A: Arabian Nights

Arabian Nights, by pbario

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I have always wanted to explore the Arabian Nights tales, but I haven't had the chance up till now. I know the most famous of these stories, like most people, and I have also heard of the circumstances under which they are told: by the girl Scheherazade to her new husband, the Sultan. However, it's fairly enchanting to actually read the literature as it was originally structured, because the reader can readily understand the dire circumstances that cause Scheherazade to jump from story to story, each preceding one in the other.
   The story of the merchant and the genius is obviously one of the most potent tales, and it has to be (Scheherazade's life is at stake after all!). I find it interesting how the first day of Scheherazade telling the story ends with her talking about how the genius waits to execute the merchant, at least until he has finished talking about his wife and family. And then, when the story continues, the merchant is told that he has only a limited amount of time left. These twists in the story clearly show Scheherazade's state of mind desperately trying to find some kind of narrative foothold to make a story that never has to end.
   And then the next story, the First Old man of the Hind, continues because one of the three old men attending the merchant's execution by the genius wants to save the merchant's life a little longer. However, the intertextual irony does not stop here: the old man claims that his wife, the hind, was once a sorceress that turned is slave and his son into cows. However, whenever it comes time to slaughter either of them, they manage to arouse his utmost pity, even in their current forms. This could be thought of as a metaphor for how Scheherazade currently sees the Sultan: taking his cows (her) to slaughter, but not being able to do so. Granted, the Sultan is not executing Scheherazade for other reasons, but it's still a comparable situation.
   This narrative convention continues through all the stories the three old men tell to further delay the merchant's death.

Here's the link to the table of contents page for the unit