Medieval Night
The first thing to be said is that The Thousand and One Nights is a rather exceptional work in the context of medieval Arabic literature. It happens sometimes that a person takes up the study of a language because of his love for a single work, but if someone were tempted to begin the task of learning Arabic because of his love of The Thousand and One Nights, he should be forewarned that the book is sui generis. He will really find nothing else like it in the literature, one reason being that the Nights seems to have absorbed a number of once independent medieval Arabic fictions; the story of “Sindbad” is probably the most famous example. The borders of this text were not, it seems, ever very well defined. Hence the size of the Nights. Unfortunately, in the case of the Nights its marginality in this respect has also worked to veil its history in a good deal of obscurity. Indeed, in recounting its history in the medieval period, there is no need to summarize; a fairly complete account will read like a summary, since most of its medieval history is unknown and is likely to remain unknown. To retell the story, let us think of it for the moment as a piece of architecture—a palace, as Borges calls it. “To erect the palace of The Thousand and One Nights, it took generations of men, and those men are our benefactors, as we have inherited this inexhaustible book, this book capable of so much metamorphosis,” Borges said of one of his favorite book
www.arabiannights.org/medieval.htm
The first thing to be said is that The Thousand and One Nights is a rather exceptional work in the context of medieval Arabic literature. It happens sometimes that a person takes up the study of a language because of his love for a single work, but if someone were tempted to begin the task of learning Arabic because of his love of The Thousand and One Nights, he should be forewarned that the book is sui generis. He will really find nothing else like it in the literature, one reason being that the Nights seems to have absorbed a number of once independent medieval Arabic fictions; the story of “Sindbad” is probably the most famous example. The borders of this text were not, it seems, ever very well defined. Hence the size of the Nights. Unfortunately, in the case of the Nights its marginality in this respect has also worked to veil its history in a good deal of obscurity. Indeed, in recounting its history in the medieval period, there is no need to summarize; a fairly complete account will read like a summary, since most of its medieval history is unknown and is likely to remain unknown. To retell the story, let us think of it for the moment as a piece of architecture—a palace, as Borges calls it. “To erect the palace of The Thousand and One Nights, it took generations of men, and those men are our benefactors, as we have inherited this inexhaustible book, this book capable of so much metamorphosis,” Borges said of one of his favorite book
www.arabiannights.org/medieval.htm
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