A MILLENNIUM OF ONE THOUSAND AND ONE NIGHTS

Abstract

No other work of Oriental literature has had such an influence on Europe as the collection of Arabic tales entitled One Thousand and One Nights. It was first translated from the Syrian original into French (Les Mille et Une Nuits, 1704–17) by the orientalist Antoine Galland and into English by Richard Burton (The Thousand Nights and a Night, 1885–88). The first Slovenian translation is an adaptation: the translator was Filip Lipe Haderlap, and the title was Tisoč in ena noč: pravljice iz jutrovih dežel (One Thousand and One Nights: Fairy Tales from the Lands of the East, 1880–91).  It is a Christianized translation from German based on the Viennese edition (Max Habicht, Friedrich Heinrich von der Hagen, Carl Schall: Die Erzählungen der 1001 Nacht aus Tunesien. Arabische Erzahlungen [1825]). In the Slovenian adaptation, Scheherazade is called Lunica, Dinarezada Srebrnica, Sultan Shahryar is Riar, his brother Shahzeman is Senan, and the vizier is a minister. Makalonca (1944) by F. S. Finžgar was also taken from the Arabic collection entitled Zgodba o Kamar-al-Zamanu in kitajski princesi Badur (The Tale of Kamar al-Zaman and the Chinese Princess Badur), in Haderlap’s translation under the title Historija od princa Krasnobora in od Kitajske princezinje Milene (The History of Prince Krasnobor and of the Chinese Princess Milena). Slovenian readers are most familiar with individual fairy tales (Aladdin and the Magic Lamp, Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves, TheThief of Bagdad, The Magic Horse, Harun al-Rashid, The Fisherman and the Genie, Open Sesame, Sinbad the Sailor, TheThree Apples, etc.).