Essays on The Arabian Nights or The One Thousand and One Nights revisits this classic text in translations as well as reassesses its impact on world literature. Scholars from India and abroad have discussed the Tamil, Russian, Sanskrit, Urdu, Japanese, Malayalam, English, Turkish and Malaysian versions of these stories which have enchanted generations of storytellers and listeners.
Dealing with human foibles, fallacies, infidelities and desires, the stories truly capture the varied layers of human existence. Refusing to see it merely in stereotypical terms of East v West the contributors of the essays in this volume locate the classic in its socio-cultural context. This book takes into account the discourse on Sufism found in these stories as well as explores its impact on literary studies and Asian Dialogue.