The idea of a genie in a magical lamp can be found as a reference in countless television shows, movies, video games, art pieces, and so on and so forth. It is even normal to get to know someone by asking what their three wishes would be if they were ever to stumble upon such an ordeal. The genie, however, has not always been illustrated as a caring yet comical Robin Williams as Disney’s 1992 movie of Aladdin has instilled in the minds of many. The genie (or jinni/ifrit) has undergone many alterations, much like the story of “Aladdin and the Wonderful Lamp.” Though the origin of Aladdin’s story is not quite definite, its most famous rendering (“Ala Al-Din and the Wonderful Lamp”) can be found in The Thousand Nights and One Night or Alf laylah wa laylah, or more well known as The Arabian Nights, which has been directly translated into many different languages for consumption (Editors of the Encyclopedia Britannica, 2017). This specific version has been the basis of many adaptations, most plainly seen in Andrew Lang’s Blue Fairy Book published in 1889 as “Aladdin and the Wonderful Lamp” and, as mentioned previously, Disney’s 1992 animated film simply entitled Aladdin. All three of these renderings are based around the same tale, but the culture and time period in which they premiered makes them all very different and unique works.
The basic structure of the story itself has not changed in these three versions, creating multiple similarities that keep the stories closely connected. For instance, in all three tales there is a poor boy who resides in a foreign land. This boy is special as he is the only one who can access a hidden cave that will lead him to a magical lamp containing the genie. An older, magical gentleman seeks out the boy to trick him into thinking he will also receive riches from the cave if he can retrieve the lamp. The boy goes into the cave but doesn’t directly follow the magician’s wishes therefore the magician, in a fit of anger, traps the young man in the cave where he discovers a genie and manages to escape. The young man then uses the genie to change himself in order to be able to marry the princess of his land, and he is successful at first as he shows wealth and elegance, which impresses the princess’s father, the Sultan. The magician, however, interferes and causes a stir before he is eventually defeated by the princess tricking him through seduction and damning him in a way that he cannot bother the couple ever again. The young man and princess then live together happily for the rest of their lives with their riches and social status in tact.
The similarities, however, only go so far as the major plot points as minor details change with every version. For instance, the setting of the story within The Thousand Nights and One Night is China, which is meant to be an exotic land unknown to the Middle East. This collection of tales is also known as Arabian Nights because the characters typically live within Islamic communities and don Arabic names, which shows that the teller knew very little of China and seems to be using the country as something unknown and possibly exotic to those hearing the story within Arabic lands. Andrew Lang took this tale and placed it within Persia, allowing the tale to feel more at home and fitting with the terrain than the original tale taking place in China. However, the same stance stands as Persia to the English would feel like an exotic undiscovered land, allowing the tale to not lose its intrigue. Disney then took the story and set it within the fictional land of Agrabah that is explained to be an Arabic country within the first song of the movie “Arabian Nights.” The architecture throughout the movie echoes that of India, however, and the royal palace looks very similar to the Taj Mahal. This setting was a big move for the Disney company, however, as all of its animated films were largely Europeanized and starred mostly caucasian characters up until this point. Aladdin is also the first Arabic protagonist in a Disney film, showing an acceptance of Middle Eastern cultures in the 1990s.
The characters, however, are the biggest difference in each version, and as for the protagonist, he himself has undergone many changes within each of the retellings. In One Thousand Nights and One Night, for instance, his name is Ala al-Din, a more Arabic name that has emphasis on “Ala” and echoes that of Allah, who is referenced many times throughout this particular tale. Ala al-Din in this version is also, at the beginning of the tale, is described to be “a most disappointing little rascal,” who wants to do nothing all day (Mardrus & Mathers, 1987). This behavior of his causes his father grief, and his father then contracts an illness that kills him and leaves his mother to spin at her wheel every day to bring in money. In Lang’s version, Ala al-Din becomes Aladdin, a shortened version of the original that feels more colloquial and is more approachable than that of the older version. Lang’s version also states that Aladdin’s idleness “so grieved the father that he died,” making it sound as though Aladdin’s behavior was the direct cause of his father’s death. This detail adds a level of guilt and telling the society of this time that it is important for young men to find a line of work and provide for their families since Aladdin’s irresponsibility literally led to his father’s death. Aladdin keeps this spelling in the Disney film, however, his character is seen as a “street rat” and “scoundrel” to the people of Agrabah, though the audience gets to see another side of Aladdin: one that cares and only behaves the way he does because he is poor and in need of money. This side of his character allows for the audience to bypass his wily behavior and empathize with him as they believe there is more to him than just his status and behavior – that deep down, this boy strives to be better but his place in society holds him down. In essence, Disney’s Aladdin is far more relatable while the previous two versions of him are used to prove a moral point: providing for yourself and your family is a duty.
As previously mentioned, in the Lang retelling and the One Thousand Nights and One Night tale, there are father and mother figures to Aladdin/Al al-Din, and they are used in similar ways for both of the tales. The father is already dead by the time the story begins, showing not only how hard the mother is struggling, but also provides the plot point of the magician, who in these versions, tricks Aladdin/Ala al-Din and his mother into thinking he is their long-lost uncle. The mother in both of these stories also serves as a faithful mother to her son, working with him and going to the Sultan herself in order to beg him for his daughter’s hand in marriage to Aladdin/Ala al-Din. The mother goes out of her way to support her son no matter his character, providing a stereotypical caricature of the nurturing mother doing her duty to her son even though he has treated her poorly, keeping the family together at any cost. In the Disney film, however, Aladdin is orphaned with no mention of his parents besides for the fact that he lacks them. In 1992, the idea of the nuclear family was starting to become less important as divorce rates in America were far higher than that of the past. It is also clear that having a poor orphan who strives to one day have it all gives the protagonist some sympathy from the audience, explaining away Aladdin’s bad behavior and actually putting the audience on his side when he steals from vendors and runs from the royal guards.
One character who never gains sympathy, however, is the antagonist who holds strong through all three tales: the magician. In One Thousand Nights and One Night as well as Lang’s version, the magician is from Africa and tricks Aladdin/Ala al-Din into thinking that he is his long lost uncle here to help him become richer after his father’s death. Lang’s magician is quite a flat character, doing nothing more but causing trouble for the protagonist and echoing the role of traditional antagonists during the 1800s fairy tales such as those found in works from the Grimm Brothers. The magician in One Thousand Nights and One Night, however, seems to serve as more of an instrument of greed, gaining Ala al-Din and his mother’s trust by giving them dinars and lavish food to eat. He is also the one that brings Ala al-Din to the cave where he discovers the ifrits and becomes obsessed with wealth through wishes, giving the antagonist bad attributes not only by his dabbling in sorcery (which Ala al-Din’s mother condemns, saying ifrits “are the gifts of devils” and thus associating the magician with devils) but also by introducing the idea of greed to an innocent boy (Mardrus & Mathers, 1987). This role, once again, shows how this story serves as a Islamic morality tale. In the Disney film, the magician is given a name, Jafar, and he actually serves as the Sultan’s vizier – a position held by a separate secondary character in the other two versions – and Jafar uses his power to trick the Sultan into doing what he wants him to do. Jafar is still the one that leads Aladdin to the cave to fetch the lamp, however, he does it by posing as an old man instead of someone directly related to Aladdin. This removal of any familial connection keeps the idea of a nuclear family out of viewers’ minds and keeps Aladdin as the image of the poor orphan boy with nothing to his name.
The princess herself has very different roles in each retelling, making her character, perhaps, the most reflective of each time period in which each version was produced. For instance, in The Thousand Nights and One Night tale, Badr al-budur is her name, and though still seen as a beautiful and tantalizing woman to Ala al-Din, is viewed more as a prize. This role of hers is obvious when she first married the son of the vizier and her parents both primp her on her wedding night for the couple to consummate the marriage, talking of her finally becoming a woman (this consummation does not occur, however, as Ala al-Din wishes for her and her husband to have their marriage bed brought into his room). This situation keeps the two from touching one another, keeping Badr al-budur pure for Ala al-Din to later marry by providing quite a hefty dowry of eighty slaves and more gems than the Sultan himself owned. In Lang’s version, she is not given a name and is simply referred to as the Princess, which is befitting as her character, much like the magician’s, is rather flat and only exists within the plot to give Aladdin motivation to use the lamp and gain wealth. Lang’s version, of course, existed before the feminist movement, therefore, the Princess was just the wife Aladdin desired, and she served as nothing but loyal to him throughout the tale. Princess Jasmine in Disney’s version of the tale, however, has a mind of her own. From the beginning of the film, she is angry that her father is forcing her to marry a prince as she feels she should marry for love. She has a fiery attitude, states her opinions, and is insubordinate to the point of escaping the palace in an attempt to run away from her life there. In the 1990s – approximately 30 years after women’s liberation and the feminist movement – it became a social priority to show that women were strong willed and more than just a wife or mother, and Jasmine successfully displays this new accepted idea of what a woman can be.
Lastly, the genies/jinnis/ifrits are very different in each version, especially when comparing Lang’s version to the others. Andrew Lang, once again, provides flat characters as the genies in his tale (both the genie from the ring and the genie from the lamp) simply serve as servants to Aladdin and do not have a voice of their own besides for announcing themselves. The genies themselves are limited to only being described within the narrative or mentioned if Aladdin or the magician demand anything from them. They are mere servants to those who find their objects, and the idea of servitude was a commonality in 1800s England. Though slavery was abolished in the United Kingdom in the early 1800s, many houses had maidstaffs and butlers that served the higher class in order to be housed and fed. It was commonplace for the lower class to serve someone of the higher class, making the idea of a genie not so much a foreign concept. In The Thousand Nights and One Night version, there are also two genies, though they are reffered to as jinnis or ifrits within the ring and the lamp. These characters have voices of their own, and they also announce themselves as masters of different elements such as earth, air, and wave. Though they still serve Ala al-Din at his every whim, it is clear that they are seen as all-powerful beings due to their control over the elements, echoing Ala al-Din’s mother who described them as devils. This designation keeps the jinnis/ifrits as characters to be feared since sorcery in this tale is dangerous, warning readers not to dabble with such a thing. In an opposite respect, Disney’s film illustrates the genie as a comical being that can only give someone three wishes – unlike his predecessors who give Aladdin/Ala al-Din whatever he wants whenever he wants it -and his greatest wish of all is to be freed from the lamp once and for all. The genie hates being a slave to the lamp, and Aladdin’s character sees the wrongfulness in the genie’s position and eventually uses his final wish to free the genie forever, besmirching, in a way, the idea of a servant and highlighting the importance of free will, acting parallel to Princess Jasmine in her fight to marry who she wants.
Overall, these tales involve many of the same aspects but are not the same at all. The Thousand Nights and One Night version and Andrew Lang’s versions are very similar in essence, but when read closely, it is clear that the tale of Ala al-Din is an Islamic morality tale warning against greed and sorcery while Andrew Lang’s is written as a more modern, Europeanized version that’s primary reason for existing seems to be to entertain.
Editors of the Encyclopedia Britannica. (2017). The Thousand and One Nights – Asian Literature. Re
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