Books with title The Arabian Nights' Entertainments, Revised for Young Readers

The central core of the stories concerns a Persian king and his new bride. The king has a brother who is a vizier in faraway Samarcand, and he invites him to come to the palace for a visit. Just before his departure, the vizier is shocked to discover his wife's infidelity. Enraged, he kills her. Full of pain and grief, the vizier continues on to the court of his brother, the king. But, once arrived at his brother's palace, the vizier soon discovers the king's wife is also involved in an even more flagrant infidelity, which he reluctantly reports to him. The maddened king, Shahryar, then kills his wife, too. The distrustful king next decides to marry an endless succession of virgins only to execute each one the next morning before she has a chance to dishonor him. Weeks go by. Eventually, Scheherazade, the vizier's daughter, offers herself as the next bride. She is convinced she knows how to stop the slaughter. Her father reluctantly agrees to the marriage. On the night of their marriage, Scheherazade begins to tell the king a tale, but does not end it. The king, curious about how the story ends, is thus forced to postpone her execution in order to hear the conclusion. The next night, as soon as she finishes the tale, she begins (and only begins) a new one, and the king, eager to hear the conclusion, postpones her execution once again. And so it goes on for 1,001 nights.... Listen as the fabulous tales of Alladin, Sindbad the Sailor, Ali Baba, and many others sweep you away to the Golden Age of Islam.

The Tales from the Arabian Nights is probably the finest example of what a magical narrative should be. If I had to categorize this collection of tales, I would not call them fairy tales, but rather magical tales. Since almost everyone is familiar with the premise behind these stories, I shall not go into detail concerning the backdrop for this fine collection. Rather, I shall express my opinion about them. Aside from the impact these tales (once introduced in Europe) had on the western literary tradition, they continue to entertain generation after generation of readers the world over. Unlike many passing narratives, The Tales from the Arabian Nights remain timeless, for in their core they portray human nature perhaps better than any other similar collection. They can be enjoyed by readers both young and old, new and experienced, and even the returning reader is sure to find some new experience, some overlooked detail, or a new lesson.For, in reality, these tales are lessons about humanity. Within Scheherazade's narrative are woven magical lands, mysterious creatures, powerful rulers, and humble commoners. Above all, there are lessons. Lessons about us, lessons about the human nature with all its imperfections. Yes, as it is with most tales, there is justice, but the justice in this book is not always just, the rulers are often wrong, and the wrongdoers sometimes escape their punishment. And such is, and has been, our world. But there is an inherent hope that all will turn out well, that the evil will receive, in due time, its punishment, and that the victims will be recognized and treated as such. And that is the same hope we have to hold onto even in our times, because our world is not that different from the world of Scheherazade. We may have replaced sultans with presidents, dervishes with priests, and camels with wheeled vehicles. Nevertheless, we remain flawed.

The Arabian Nights was introduced to Europe in a French translation by Antoine Galland in 1704, and rapidly attained a unique popularity. There are even accounts of the translator being roused from sleep by bands of young men under his windows in Paris, importuning him to tell them another story.The learned world at first refused to believe that M. Galland had not invented the tales. But he had really discovered an Arabic manuscript from sixteenth-century Egypt, and had consulted Oriental story-tellers. In spite of inaccuracies and loss of color, his twelve volumes long remained classic in France, and formed the basis of our popular translations.A more accurate version, corrected from the Arabic, with a style admirably direct, easy, and simple, was published by Dr. Jonathan Scott in 1811. This is the text of the present edition.The Moslems delight in stories, but are generally ashamed to show a literary interest in fiction. Hence the world's most delightful story book has come to us with but scant indications of its origin. Critical scholarship, however, has been able to reach fairly definite conclusions.The reader will be interested to trace out for himself the similarities in the adventures of the two Persian queens, Schehera-zade, and Esther of Bible story, which M. de Goeje has pointed out as indicating their original identity (Encyclopædia Britannica, "Thousand and One Nights"). There are two or three references in tenth-century Arabic literature to a Persian collection of tales, called The Thousand Nights, by the fascination of which the lady Schehera-zade kept winning one more day's lease of life. A good many of the tales as we have them contain elements clearly indicating Persian or Hindu origin. But most of the stories, even those with scenes laid in Persia or India, are thoroughly Mohammedan in thought, feeling, situation, and action.The favorite scene is "the glorious city," ninth-century Bagdad, whose caliph, Haroun al Raschid, though a great king, and heir of still mightier men, is known to fame chiefly by the favor of these tales. But the contents (with due regard to the possibility of later insertions), references in other writings, and the dialect show that our Arabian Nights took form in Egypt very soon after the year 1450. The author, doubtless a professional teller of stories, was, like his Schehera-zade, a person of extensive reading and faultless memory, fluent of speech, and ready on occasion to drop into poetry. The coarseness of the Arabic narrative, which does not appear in our translation, is characteristic of Egyptian society under the Mameluke sultans. It would have been tolerated by the subjects of the caliph in old Bagdad no more than by modern Christians.More fascinating stories were never told. Though the oath of an Oriental was of all things the most sacred, and though Schah-riar had "bound himself by a solemn vow to marry a new wife every night, and command her to be strangled in the morning," we well believe that he forswore himself, and granted his bride a stay of execution until he could find out why the ten polite young gentlemen, all blind of the right eye, "having blackened themselves, wept and lamented, beating their heads and breasts, and crying continually, 'This is the fruit of our idleness and curiosity.'" To be sure, when the golden door has been opened, and the black horse has vanished with that vicious switch of his tail, we have a little feeling of having been "sold,"—a feeling which great art never gives. But we are in the best of humor; for were we not warned all along against just this foible of curiosity, and is not the story-teller smiling inscrutably and advising us to be thankful that we at least still have our two good eyes?

*This Book is annotated (it contains a detailed biography of the author). *An active Table of Contents has been added by the publisher for a better customer experience. *This book has been checked and corrected for spelling errors.The Arabian Nights is a collection of Perso-Arabic folk tales and other stories. The collection, or at least certain stories drawn from it (or purporting to be drawn from it), became widely known in the West from the 18th century, after it was translated from the Arabic — first into French and then into English and other European languages. The first English language edition, based on Galland's French rather than the original Arabic, rendered the title as The Arabian Nights' Entertainment - and this, or simply The Arabian Nights, has been the title by which it has been best known to English-speaking people ever since.ContentsThe story of the merchant and the genius -- The story of the first old man and of the hind -- The story of the second old man and of the two black dogs -- The story of the fisherman -- The story of the Greek king and the physician Douban -- The story of the husband and the parrot -- The story of the vizir who was punished -- The story of the young king of the black isles -- The story of the three Calenders, sons of kings, and of five ladies of Bagdad -- The story of the first Calender, son of a king -- The story of the second Calender, son of a king -- The story of the envious man, and of him who was envied -- The story of the third Calendar, son of a king -- The seven voyages of Sindbad the sailor -- The little hunchback -- The story of the barber's fifth brother -- The story of the barber's sixth brother -- The adventures of Prince Camaralzaman and the Princess Badoura -- Noureddin and the fair Persian -- Aladdin and the wonderful lamp -- The adventures of Haroun-al-Raschid, caliph of Bagdad -- Story of the blind Baba-Abdalla -- The story of Sidi-Noumann -- Story of Ali Cogia, merchant of Bagdad -- The enchanted horse -- The story of two sisters who were jealous of their younger sister.

The Arabian Nights Entertainments (1898) Selected and Edited by Andrew Lang; generously Illustrated By Rene Bull and H. J. Ford. Andrew Lang is best known as one of the most important collectors of folk and fairy tales. The twelve fairy tale books he edited contain stories from around the world, collected from various sources, and translated mainly by his wife and other enthusiasts. The stories in the Fairy Books have generally been such as old women in country places

'Do you see that mountain?' asked the king, pointing to a huge mass that towered into the sky about three leagues from Schiraz; 'go and bring me the leaf of a palm that grows at the foot.' The words were hardly out of the king's mouth when the Indian turned a screw placed in the horse's neck, close to the saddle, and the animal bounded like lightning up into the air, and was soon beyond sight even of the sharpest eyes. -from "The Enchanted Horse" A startlingly prolific collector of fairy tales from around the world, Andrew Lang, in this 1898 work, brought together in one volume the "fairy tales of the East," the delightful and resoundingly entertaining adventures of The Arabian Nights. Translated from a French version that omits all the "very dull and stupid" additions of early European retellings, this wonderful book regales us with the stories of Sindbad and his seven voyages, the "Vizir who was Punished," Aladdin and his magic lamp, and many, many more. Complete with beautiful pen-and-ink illustrations, this is a collection to treasure, whether you're studying comparative mythology or just seeking a rollicking good read. Scottish journalist and author ANDREW LANG (1844-1912), a friend of Robert Louis Stevenson, produced a stunning variety and number of volumes, including books of poetry, novels, children's books, histories, and biographies, as well as criticism, essays, scholarly works of anthropology, and translations of classical literature. * * *

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