STYLISTIC FEATURES IN SELECTED TALES FROM THE THOUSAND AND ONE NIGHTS.

Format:

Book

Thesis/Dissertation

Author/Creator:

Pinault, David.

Contributor:

University of Pennsylvania.

Subjects (All):

Middle Eastern literature.

0315.

Local Subjects:

0315.

Physical Description:

435 pages

Contained In:

Dissertation Abstracts International 47-04A.

System Details:

Mode of access: World Wide Web.

text file

Summary:

This dissertation comprises a literary analysis of selected tales from the Alf laylah wa-laylah (The Thousand and One Nights), in which I collate texts from the nineteenth-century editions of MacNaghten (Calcutta II) and Bulaq and compare these two editions with the recently published Galland MS (BN 3609-3611), which has been edited by Muhsin Mahdi. I address the hitherto largely neglected area of "microstructural" analysis of the Alf laylah by attempting a line-by-line examination of the Arabic text of several tales from the collection, with the end in mind of defining and cataloguing characteristic stylistic techniques used by various redactors. As I compare differing versions of given stories, I coin terms (such as "repetitive designation" and "dramatic visualization") to describe these techniques as they are variously employed in Bulaq, MacNaghten and Galland.

In collating the three Arabic editions I found that they frequently diverge very sharply from each other in the staging of scenes within a given tale; furthermore, no one edition is consistently superior to another in its display of literary craftsmanship. Thus, for example, the Galland MS's version of the Scheherazade story shows better plot structure than the version found in Bulaq or MacNaghten; while the latter two texts are much more carefully developed thematically than G in those passages which comprise the inner frame of "The Tale of the First Lady" and are more coherent in their use of descriptive detail in important scenes from "The Two Viziers." On the basis of such findings I take issuse with the view expressed by Mahdi in his edition of the Galland MS, where he dismisses Bulaq and MacNaghten as abridged and inferior versions of Galland; for in some stories Bulaq and MacNaghten offer readings which are fuller and better crafted than Galland's. One can appreciate stylistic differences among the three editions only when one abandons sweeping critical generalizations and engages with the text in a process of close reading; for comparison of Bulaq, MacNaghten, and Galland on an individualized story-by-story basis demonstrates that the literary quality of the Alf laylah collection varies widely from tale to tale even within a single given edition.

Notes:

Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 47-04, Section: A, page: 1345.

Thesis (Ph.D.)--University of Pennsylvania, 1986.

Local Notes:

School code: 0175.

Access Restriction:

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