Fable

Author: Wang Ruiqin (Translation)
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2002-01-25
Features: The Arabian Nights is an outstanding large collection of folktales from the medieval Arab region. Its vast scale, colorful scenes, fantastical plots, and peculiar imagination represent the highest achievement of ancient Arab literature, attracting readers from both the East and the West across generations. It is rich and diverse, encompassing fairy tales, myths, fables, jokes, historical stories, adventure stories, love stories, and strange anecdotes. It spans the globe, from land to sea, reflecting the social systems, lifestyles, and thoughts of the people in the medieval Middle Eastern countries from various periods, regions, and perspectives. It paints vivid pictures of social life and serves as a valuable reference for studying the ancient Arab society. The Arabic original of The Arabian Nights is One Thousand and One Nights, but the Chinese translation is commonly rendered as The Arabian Nights. "Arabian" comes from the homophone of the Kaaba in Mecca, Saudi Arabia, and "Nights" refers to the Arab custom of storytelling at night. In ancient China, Arab countries were known as the "Daxi Kingdom," which was later changed to the "Tianfang Kingdom" after the Ming Dynasty. Therefore, One Thousand and One Nights was translated as The Arabian Nights.
In ancient Arabia, a certain king harbored resentment against women due to the misconduct of his wife. He demanded that his prime minister find him a young girl each day, marry her, and then kill her the next day. The people lived in fear, terrified that their daughters would be married to the king, and fled to other provinces with them. The prime minister's daughter, Scheherazade, was well-read and wise. Knowing the king loved to listen to stories, she began telling him tales the night she was married. The stories were one after another, with larger tales encompassing smaller ones, and new stories within the smaller ones. As dawn approached, she would pause at a crucial point. To hear more stories, the king repeatedly postponed her execution. It is said that Scheherazade told stories for one thousand and one nights, and finally, the king was moved by her tales and abandoned his cruel habit of killing young brides. The stories Scheherazade narrated are included in this book.