Ella Torres
FWS: The Arabian Nights
Paper 3: Research Paper
November 28, 2018
Proposal
for
The Arabian Nights: A Wealth of Knowledge But Not Culture
There is much that can be learned from a text as illustrious as The Arabian Nights. But where does the boundary lie between arguable conclusions and unfounded ones? Exploring varying ideas of justice is a rational expedition. However, viewing the Nights as a primary source of Middle Eastern culture can cause misleading notions. In class we have discussed, how culture is a concept that cannot, or at least or should not, be obtained from any single narrative text or work of art. In this paper, I hope to explore this idea along with the relationship between art and culture from the perspectives of the creator and the consumer. In summation, what can be arguably obtained from any given work of art and if not culture, what?
I believe that although knowledge can be obtained from the Nights, culture cannot. Through my own perspective, along with those of Horta, Makdisi and Nussbaum, Nochlin, Shamma, and Styles (see annotated bibliography at the end of the paper for more information), I hope to analyze this argument within The Arabian Nights. From these viewpoints, I will go in depth about how the Nights stretches beyond entrainment and can be utilized as a wealth of knowledge. Additionally, I will explore the essence of culture as it relates to art. Then, I will elaborate on a few select topics which can be validly explored within in a scholarly setting.
Ella Torres
FWS: The Arabian Nights
Paper 3: Research Paper – First Draft
November 28, 2018
The Arabian Nights: A Wealth of Knowledge But Not Culture
For over a millennia, The Arabian Nights has been circulating through varying mediums. Through a myriad of iterations––via oral tradition, written texts and translations, and the visual and performing arts––the stories of the Nights have reach an audience across continents and generations. With this broad audience comes many different possible veins of inquiry. For example, is the Nights purely entertainment or can something greater be ascertained from it? How do the tales portray female sexuality and allude to its place in society? What perspectives of justice are explored in the collection of stories? The possibilities for exploration are seemingly endless. But where is the boundary between arguable conclusions and unfounded ones? An excellent subject for this investigation is the topic is culture. I believe that although knowledge about many topics can be obtained from The Arabian Nights, culture is not one of them.
First of all, I cannot press enough the validity of the Nights as a wealth of knowledge. I think it is a great tool for learning within a classroom setting and beyond. Other scholars agree with this. In fact, some experts even go so far as to recommend The Arabian Nights for early childhood education. In her article, Morag Styles looks at how the tales greatly influenced future English authors of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries during their childhood years. With this historical background in mind, she suggests current day teacher encourage their student to read whole books (not excerpts) “indiscriminately” (of their own choosing) while taking pleasure in reading (Styles 166). Although I agree with Styles’ sentiment that young students should read
entire books with enjoyment in mind, unabridged versions of the Nights are not appropriate for children on multiple levels. To begin, the stories are much too risqué for young minds to consume. Additionally, I am of the mindset that the tales are prime objects of scholarly analysis.
Although The Arabian Nights can be read purely as entertainment, that collection of stories invites its readers to examine it in search of greater meaning. Despite at first glance appearing to simply be frivolous tales about love at first sight and the supernatural, the Nights has a lot to offer in a way that can be uncovered by thoughtful reading. The power of narrative is best illuminated by the frame tale. In the frame story, Shahrazad tells stories in order to “…cause the king to stop his practice, save [her]self, and deliver the people”––for her storytelling not only prevents her own death but protects other women from the same horrible plight (The Arabian Nights 21). In the tales, storytelling is so salient that it is quite literally life-saving. So why do not more readers take advantage of being able to read critically? This is not to say that the Nights cannot be read for pleasure. Indeed, enjoyment should be a primary component of reading. However since the collection of stories provides a chance to explore great ideas, passing it up is a grave missed opportunity. In short, despite not necessarily appearing to have much substance beyond entertainment, at first sight, the Nights exhibits considerable intellectual value if the reader chooses to uncover it.
Though there is much to learn from The Arabian Nights, one topic that cannot be gathered by reading the text is Middle Eastern culture. To elaborate on this most effectively, I will first explain what I mean by culture since this word has many different connotations. For our purposes, culture is the substantive material that connects a particular nation, people, or other groupings. The matter than denotes this can include but is not limited to collective languages, customs, food, art, social establishments, and accomplishments. To illustrate, I will elaborate on a culture of a place I know well: Eastman School of Music. Students at Eastman are connected by numerous characteristics––the most obvious of which is that we all study music. But our commonalities do not end there. Additionally, we are united by the fact that we all have greater ambitions. Whether we are striving to learn how to cultivate communities of musicianship or to be able to share something greater with our audiences, in my experience, students come to this school seeking more from their training than expert technique and future job connections. At Eastman, ingrained in our culture is an attitude of meliora.
Advancing with this definition of culture, one question comes to mind: can culture be learned from The Arabian Nights? I do not think so, in fact, viewing the Nights as a cultural embodiment of the Middle East is problematic because it does not take the limitation of human understanding into account. I believe culture is not something that can be distilled or ever fully comprehended. As demonstrated by my analysis of Eastman, culture is complex and vast. It is a living, breathing entity. Even while being immersed at the school, I do not understand the culture of Eastman in its entirety. Part of the reason for this is the implicit biases that each person adopts over the course of their lifetime. As Saree Makdisi and Felicity Nussbaum phrase it,
“we always approach other places, peoples, and texts from our own worldly location” (9-10). Additionally, I believe that culture is a social construct so vast that, although some have tried, no one single person can totally understand it comprehensively and inclusively.
Even if the social construct of culture was a comprehensible paradigm, the transnational nature of the Nights would make it impossible to distill information about any one culture. To understand this concept more thoroughly the best place to look is the history of Alf layla wa layla itself. As Makdisi and Nussbaum aptly refer to the Nights as “the complicated circulation of the texts that came to be known as The Arabian Nights” (11-12). This remark paints a wonderful connotation as to the Nights’ unique nature. The tales that make up the collection were originally stories past down by the oral tradition of storytelling. Most scholars agree that the Nights was first written down around the twelfth century. The first known manuscript is in Syrian. The Arabian Nights first appearance in Europe was through Antoine Galland’s eighteenth-century French translation Les mille et une nuits, contes arabes traduits en français or “The Thousand and One Nights, Arab stories translated into French” (“The Thousand and One Nights”). Unfortunately, Galland’s title subtitle is not accurate. The stories that compose the Nights do not only originate from the Arab World but also have roots in and take their locations from places such as Persia, Asia, and the Ottoman Empire. Ever since Les mille et une nuits, The Arabian Nights has been translated back and forth and adapted on so many occasions by many different cultures. This creates another issue. The collection of stories have been altered beyond the identifiability of one culture. Makdisi and Nussbaum express this quite eloquently:
Establishing a border between Arabic and European language sources, between East and West, sets up too sharp a division because it suggests stable and readily identifiable entities rather than blendings that expose the impossibility of knowing where one thing leaves off and the other begins (18).
I agree with this analysis wholeheartedly. Perceiving the Nights to be a cultural embodiment of any single culture is flawed because it is a transcultural collection of stories.
Furthermore, although art is an extraordinary form of expression, no single piece of artwork can embody a culture. Art has limitations––different mediums of art each with their own unique disadvantages. For example, one quality of music is its ephemerality. Music is organized sound. It only truly exists at the moment it is being played. Although there are ways in which music is notated, musical notation is not music. Another illustration of these limitations can be seen in Linda Nochlin’s analysis of paintings. In her essay “The Imaginary Orient,” Nochlin identifies that history, the white man, and art are absent from many nineteenth-century Western depictions of the Oriental world (35-37). By this she means, even though, the images were painted as to appear if they were scientific representations, they are not––for a confine of art is that it is not a photographically accurate depiction of real life. Moreover, one limiting characteristic of literature is language. As a form of communication, language is far from perfect. Tone, or the general attitude or character, is often lost in text. Since all art forms have constraints, I am of the opinion that a complete and accurate view of any giving culture cannot be obtained from any one source. Even if, hypothetically, The Arabian Nights was only influenced only by a single culture, this sentiment would still ring true. For although art is wonderful, it is not omnipotent.
As previously stated The Arabian Nights is a wealth of knowledge, but if culture cannot be obtained by reading it, what can be learned? To answer this question, I will briefly share the findings of Tarek Shamma and Paulo Lemos as well as thoughts from my own mind as examples of rational conclusions about the text. Shamma posited that the Nights is an account of the danger that the original patriarchal storytellers considered inherently embedded within female sexuality. Horta asserted that the stories set in cities provide insight into Middle Eastern societies of the past that are often unaccounted for in conventional Western records. I believe that by depicting different types of justice, The Arabian Nights forces readers to confront their own thoughts about justice and determine what they believe to be just. All three of these conclusions are arguable. Each shows a perspective unique to the individual scholar; each approach the texts from their own “worldly location” (Makdisi 10). Still, observe how none of these interpretations claim that culture can be learned from the Nights––for that is one concept which cannot be drawn from the text.
In short, The Arabian Nights is a text with a long and storied antiquity. It can easily be read for something beyond pure entertainment. However, it is important to distinguish that culture, Arabian or otherwise, cannot be extracted from the text. In fact, I believe that culture is a living, breathing entity beyond full human understanding. Additionally, if any comprehension about culture can be obtained at all, it is most certainly not from a single piece of art. This is not to say that art is not influenced by culture and culture by art. All art forms have limitations. Be that as it may, these restrictions undoubtedly do not diminish art’s inherent value; nonetheless, a savvy consumer must be aware to them. When we become cognizant of the bias and limitations of art, we are able to more analysis more critically––furthering our abilities to make conclusions for ourselves.