[In the following essay, Molan comments on the ironic disparity between Sinbad's actions versus his professed moral stance, characterizing the tale as a parable that is meant to instruct King Shahriyar about ideas of self-deception and justice.]

Sinbad the Sailor has become, for his modern audience, a Romantic hero. Jabra Ibrahim Jabra, the Palestinian poet and critic, says of him:

So human in wishes, in reactions, in dreams, and yet, because of his endurance and invention no death or destruction can get at him. His vision is all men's dream: his ship is wrecked, his fellow-travelers drown, death and horror overtake the world, but Sindbad battles on and survives. The original land-dream was so powerful that the sea has to be conquered, and so have the lands beyond the sea, the islands, the valleys of serpents and jewels.¹

This view, however, is one based on a popular, children's abstraction of the medieval folkloric figure of Sinbad. Even Jabra confesses that his view of Sinbad was formed by the children's stories which he first heard in his own youth and which he, in turn, read to his own children, carefully expurgating the more potent tales of “death and horror.”² Our view of Sinbad is not based on the reading of the medieval tales of Dolopathos, Syntipas, or The Thousand and One Nights.³ Instead, our view is formed by the Sinbad the Sailor as portrayed by Douglas Fairbanks Jr., who battled Walter Slezak and Anthony Quinn for the island of gold and the favors of Maureen O'Hara in the RKO-Radio film. As Bosley Crowther has pointed out, the screenplay writers, no Shahrazads at telling an engaging tale, spurred [Fairbanks] to elegant bravado, set him to vaulting oriental walls, and generally playing the bold hero in this gaudy fable.⁴ But, it is a spurious fable which Fairbanks' Sinbad undertakes, not one of the so significant seven voyages of the traditional tale.⁵

So firmly fixed has this romantic view of Sinbad become that even his most recent and most sophisticated critic, who does examine the 1001 Nights tales, concludes that:

Sindbad is, before all else, a man of action and it is in his actions that his characteristic qualities are revealed. In all the terrible situations from which he must extract himself, he, time after time, makes use of [both] boldness and discretion.⁶

And that:

Regarded from this angle, the Voyages of Sindbad the Sailor become a veritable glorification of navigation and maritime commerce; and Sindbad, as a model set up for the admiration of a sympathetic public, is the proper symbol of the sailor's profession such as it could appear in that privileged moment in its long history.⁷

In the following pages, we shall present a different analysis of the Sinbad tales, as they occur in the 1001 Nights.⁸ It will reveal a very different appreciation of the character of Sinbad and of the significance of the voyages which, we hope to demonstrate convincingly, is more in keeping with the structure of the medieval tales not only in their Arabic, but also in their Greek and Latin versions.⁹

There are two versions of the Sinbad tales. The best known is that of the editions of Bulaq (1835), of Calcutta (1839-42 [MacNaghten ed.]), and of the later Arab versions in general. The second version is that of the first Calcutta edition (1818) and that of the manuscripts, now lost, upon which Galland based his translation of the entire 1001 Nights and upon which L. Langles based his Les voyages de Sind-Bād le Marin et La Ruse des Femmes (Paris, 1814). The two versions differ in two ways. The second is generally shorter and sparer in its narrative treatment of the various themes. Of considerably more importance, however, is the fact that the end of voyage VI and voyage VII is entirely different in the two versions. It has been the view of most of the translators of the 1001 Nights that, while the more fully articulated first version is “better” for the bulk of the stories, the conclusion of the second version is more satisfactory to a properly formed tale. Thus Lane follows the first version until the ending of voyage VI. He then shifts to the second version for the translation of the end of voyages VI and VII. Burton simply combines the two as does Mardrus in his French edition of the Nights (Paris, 1900-1904). E. Littmann, in his German version (Wiesbaden, 1953), follows the first version to its conclusion and then adds the ending of the second version as an “important variant.”¹⁰

Littmann's is the appropriate procedure, for the significance of the two versions is precisely that they form two equally valid versions of the tale. They offer a marvelous example of the way in which an oral tale may be altered in its presentation and yet remain unaltered as to its significance, its “message,” and its “structure.” For, though markedly different in narrative detail, the two versions are structurally identical and thus fulfill the same function in the development of the tale. The analysis that follows, then, will be based on MacNaghten's 1839 Calcutta edition of the Nights but will include reference to the second version of voyage VII for the sake of interest only. Either of the other versions could have been equally well used.

As is so common in the tales of the 1001 Nights, the fundamental structural element in the Sinbad stories is a “framing” technique. The stories of the seven voyages made by Sinbad, “the merchant of Baghdad,” are first framed within the story of the relationship between that Sinbad, al-Sindibād al-Baḥarī, and the poor porter, al-Sindibād al-Hammāl. This story, in turn, is framed within the continuing story of Shahrazad and the cruel King Shahriyar. This point is essential, for we must always keep in mind that Sinbad the Sailor is only the “putatative” narrator of the stories of the voyages. In fact, the “real” narrator, as we are constantly reminded, is Shahrazad. Despite the fact that the bulk of the story is made up of Sinbad's first person narrative, the figure of Shahrazad narrates the opening and closing of the tales and intrudes some thirty times, never more than three pages apart, reestablishing her role as the narrator by the familiar, formulaic device and once more putting the words in Sinbad's mouth:

And morning came upon Shahrazad and she fell silent from [this] lawful discourse. Then when it was fully the sixtieth night after the five hundredth, she said, “It has come to my attention, oh happy king, that Sinbad the Sailor, when he had prepared his shipment, stowed it in the ship at the city of Basra, and embarked, said: ‘We went on traveling from place to place and from city to city, selling and buying and taking a look at the countries of [various] people.’”¹¹

Thus there is inherently an ironic disparity between the point of view of the protagonist, Sinbad, and that of the “narrator,” Shahrazad (along with her audience). The knowledge and values of the protagonist are almost inevitably different from those of the narrator; for she, and we, know the characters as they could not possibly know themselves.¹²

Shahrazad then, hoping once more to beguile the King with yet another story (and so stay by yet another day her execution),¹³ assures him that the story she has just completed is “not nearly so wonderful as the story of ‘Sinbad’.” The King replies, “How's that?” and the familiar tale begins.¹⁴ Shahrazad tells that on a burning hot Baghdad afternoon, a poor and lowly porter comes upon the magnificent palace of a rich merchant. Though nominally recognizing God's justice, his true distress at his situation relative to that of the merchant is clear as he recites a short song:

How many wretched persons are destitute of ease! and how many are in luxury, reposing in the shade!

I find myself afflicted by trouble beyond measure; and strange is my condition, and heavy is my load!

Others are in prosperity, and from wretchedness are free, and never for a single day have borne a load like mine;

Incessantly and amply blest, throughout the course of life, with happiness and grandeur, as well as drink and meat.

All men whom God hath made are in origin alike; and I resemble this man and he resembleth me;

But otherwise, between us is a difference as great as the difference that we find between wine and vinegar.

Yet in saying this, I utter no falsehood against Thee, [Oh my Lord;] for Thou art wise, and with justice Thou hast judged.¹⁵

His feelings are clear to the owner of the palace too, for he calls the porter in, tells him the story of each of seven adventurous voyages and concludes that the porter has been wrong:

These pleasures are a compensation for the toil and humiliation that I have experienced.¹⁶

The porter is convinced and agrees; but are we, the audience to whom Shahrazad tells the tale, convinced? Let us have a closer look at the tales themselves.

Though at first view simply adventure stories, the tales of the seven voyages of Sinbad are in fact subtly structured in a very sophisticated way to bring home a moral through irony. I do not mean to imply by this that the Sinbad tales are a didactic morality play in disguise. The 1001 Nights are not the conveyance for a moral message. In that sense, they are “amoral,” as the term that has so frequently been applied to them would have it. That does not imply, however, the lack of an ethical framework or point of view; and, even more to the point, it in no way precludes an acute and often cynical perception of the relationship to ethical principles of such human foibles and weaknesses as self-righteousness, self-delusion, greed and hypocrisy. Indeed, these are the fundamental perceptions of the Nights.

It may do here, too, to mention that the Sinbad tales find their origin in a universal, oral folk tradition which has analogues everywhere from China to the British Isles.¹⁷ The attempts to trace the “origins” of the 1001 Nights, as opposed to its “analogues,” (through a chain of translations) to Persian and Indian texts is thus dubious at best. The 1001 Nights Sinbad, however, has been completely Islamicized and Arabized. A Muslim teller of traditional tales reciting before a Muslim audience will inevitably, even if unconsciously, infuse his tale with a Muslim ethical structure—however the characters, events, and story line may have entered his tradition. Thus, Sinbad's constant evocation of Allah and his performance of Islamic ritual is not mere window dressing, but reflects the thorough-going infusion of Islamic ideals in the story. The impact of the story is the fact that, in spite of his apparent and self-avowed Muslim piety and righteousness, Sinbad finally contravenes Islamic ideals in the most astounding way during his adventures.

It is the relative number and nature of the adventures and catastrophes which befall Sinbad on his voyages which make up the major structural elements of the tales. These may be schematized here as follows:¹⁸

As may be seen at a glance, in each of his voyages, Sinbad suffers a catastrophe, usually a shipwreck or desertion upon the high seas. He then experiences a series of adventures which ebb and flow as the tales proceed. Not only does the number of adventures rise and then symmetrically fall off again, however; so, too, do the violence and horror which characterize the adventures.

In the first story, Sinbad is lost at sea when, having landed on an island, the island sinks! The “island” is, in fact, a huge fish which has been dozing on the surface so long that trees and bushes have sprouted on its back. Upon feeling the cooking fires of the landing party, it dives into the ocean. Sinbad's ship has pulled off to save itself, and Sinbad must save himself by paddling to land in a large wooden bowl. He is taken in by the King of the Sea Horses, becomes the latter's minister, and finally returns home rich.

In the second story, Sinbad is abandoned on a desert island. He manages to escape by tying himself to the leg of the Rukh, which flies him off of the island but deposits him in the valley of snakes and diamonds. He again escapes, this time loaded with diamonds, and finally returns home rich.

In the third story, catastrophe overtakes Sinbad when apes attack his ship. He and his companions are cast ashore, where they encounter a huge but man-like monster who eats many of the castaways. They collaborate to put out the monster's eyes; and, though he kills several more of the company by hurling stones at them as they escape in a boat they have made, some finally make good their escape.¹⁹ They fall foul of a man-eating snake, however, and only Sinbad escapes by building a cage in which to hide from the snake. He is soon rescued by a passing ship, fortuitously the very ship from which he had been lost in the preceding voyage, retrieves his goods, and again returns home wealthy.

The fourth story is the keystone of the entire piece. Driven ashore by a storm, the crew and passengers of Sinbad's ship fall into the hands of ghouls who fatten them up and eat them. Sinbad escapes, and happily settles among a nearby people. He becomes rich, initially by introducing the people (especially their King) to saddlery. He marries, but then falls foul of a bizarre custom of the people in which the spouse of a deceased person is buried alive with the corpse in a huge communal tomb. So buried, Sinbad stays alive by killing the newly interred and taking the meager supplies that are initially sent down with each new victim. Sinbad finds a way out of the tomb but returns, amasses the golden jewelry of the corpses, and continues to live by killing those who are sent down until he has enough.²⁰ He then hails a passing ship and returns home, rich.

In the fifth tale, Rukhs attack Sinbad's ship. He is captured by the Old Man o' the Sea, whom he manages to trick into getting drunk, but then kills him. With the aid of residents of a nearby city, he overcomes imprisonment by apes and makes a fortune out of coconuts which he induces the apes to throw at him by throwing stones at them. Again he returns home rich.

The sixth voyage finds Sinbad battling only the elements and circumstances. Cast ashore on a desert island, his companions die of disease and starvation. Sinbad must raft through an underground river to reach safety, but he does so; and the King of the people whom he finds commissions him as ambassador to the Khalifah Haroun. He makes his way home to wealth and honor.

In the seventh voyage of the fuller version, Sinbad's ship is blown off course and into a distant sea where it is attacked by huge fish and destroyed. Sinbad once again manages to save himself by rafting away from the desert shore upon which he is thrown, through an underground river and to salvation. Salvation comes in the form of an encounter with a wealthy merchant who takes Sinbad in and eventually makes Sinbad his son-in-law and heir. Sinbad relates his encounters with marvels more in the manner of his description of adventures than has been the case in the previous voyages. Usually the marvels are simply enumerated. Here, the descriptions of flying men and heavenly beings are more fully articulated. Nonetheless, the scenes appear in the proper relative position and bear no more upon the development of the structure of the tales than do the listed marvels of the previous voyages. Sinbad returns again to Baghdad, wealthy.

The format of the shorter version of the seventh voyage differs materially in its narrative detail, but only marginally in its structure as may be seen from the tabulation of topoi. It carries out the theme of Sinbad's entrance into politics. The impetus for this version of the seventh voyage is the Caliph Haroun al-Rashid's desire to have Sinbad head a return embassy to the king with whom Sinbad had stayed in the previous voyage. Nonetheless, Sinbad suffers the usual catastrophe, this time at the hands of “devil-like” pirates. He then has the one expected fearsome adventure with elephants which leads him to the elephants' graveyard, and makes his fortune yet once more.

Having briefly summarized the catastrophes and adventures which befall Sinbad, let us again tabulate these structural elements of the narrative—but this time, from another point of view: according to the nature of the beings involved in the encounters.

It can thus be seen that there is, in addition to the rise, climax, and fall of the number of adventures, a concurrent rise, climax and fall in the “sensibility,” or say even “humanity,” of the beings whom Sinbad encounters in his adventures. Though not quite as rigidly symmetrical in these terms as in terms of the abstractions, “catastrophe” and “adventure,” the same curve of rise and fall operates here. As the tales progress, the nature of those whom Sinbad encounters rises and falls along an almost evolutionary scale: I. sea-animals; II. non-mammalian land animals; III. animals (snakes, apes, cyclops); IV. man; V. animals (Rukhs, sea-man, apes); VI. anomalous; VII. sea-animals.

Let us tabulate Sinbad's adventures from yet one more point of view: the violence involved in his encounters.

An interesting echo of the basic rise and fall structure of the stories is to be found, too, in Sinbad the Porter's reactions to each of the stories:

But why, while the audience reacts with shock and horror, should the porter respond to the most chilling of the tales with “contentment and pleasure?” Perhaps because Sinbad only begins his stories after he has lavishly plied his guests, the nameless and faceless “companions” and the porter, with the finest of food and drink:

When morning dawned, lit [things] up with its light and appeared, Sinbad the porter arose, prayed the morning prayer and came to the house of Sinbad the sailor as [the latter] had ordered him. He entered and said good morning to him. [The sailor] welcomed him and sat with him until the rest of his companions, his group, had arrived and they had eaten, drunk, enjoyed themselves, been pleasured and relaxed. Then Sinbad the sailor began to speak and said: …²¹

Perhaps also because the sailor closes each tale with a lavish gift to the porter. He gives a fabulous dinner and then loads the porter with one hundred mithqāls of gold. In the final tale, Sinbad the porter takes up permanent residence with the sailor and they live out a happy and contented life:

They remained in friendship and love with increasing joy and relaxation until [that] destroyer of pleasures, that divider of companions, that destroyer of indolence, that filler of graves—the cup of death—came to them. So praise be to the Living One who does not die.²²

Sinbad the Sailor, then, tells his tales as an apology. He has been challenged by the porter's song and feels the need to justify his life and actions. But whom is he trying to convince, and how does he proceed to do so? Perhaps he needs to justify his actions to everyone who passes his door. Sinbad the porter receives an impression of the sailor's “companions” at the outset:

He saw, in that abode, a number of noble gentlemen and great lords.²³

But, this is all we know of them. Thereafter, they are merely Sinbad's companions who arrive each day to hear the tales of the sailor's adventures. Perhaps they are fellow merchants whose perceptions and rationalizations are akin to those of Sinbad the sailor himself. Or, perhaps they too are men who have doubted the justness of Sinbad's wealth and have been rewarded for their acquiescence to his self-justification just as the porter has been rewarded. In any case, the significance of the identity of names between Sinbad the sailor and Sinbad the porter is clear. It can hardly be fortuitous. Sinbad the porter is the sailor's alter-ego, the Sinbad who questions the distribution of wealth and the ways in which it has been gained. Finally, the questioning Sinbad is satisfied; but how? If Sinbad's self-justification stands on its own merits, why the need for the lavish presents of gold at the end of each story? Why the need to keep the porter's bought acceptance close at hand for the rest of their lives?

The answers are clear: Sinbad's actions are not finally justifiable. The crescendo and decrescendo of terror and violence that characterize the stories lead the audience from an attitude of readiness to believe, to questioning, doubt and downright rejection at the climax of the fourth tale. We then trail off into a knowing and cynical skepticism as the stories wind to a close.

Sinbad is plunged into horrible situations to be sure; but they are in large measure of his own making. The fundamental reason for his voyages is greed and his actions are often more violent than those of his antagonists. He himself notes at one point:

I said to myself: ‘I deserve all that has happened to me. All this is fated for me by God Most High so that I might turn from the greed by which I am [consumed]. All that I suffer is from my greed.’²⁴

Sinbad's wealth and position are, then, a material reward for a vicious determination to “get on” in the world of commercial wheeling and dealing at the expense of anyone who happens to be in the way. They are clearly no heavenly reward for patience, forbearance and charity.

The cyclopsian monster's actions are horrible to be sure; but not apparently malicious. His act is not a moral one, but simply feeding behavior. Sinbad's plot to kill the monster and his blinding of it are, however, gratuitous; for the monster's castle is always open and Sinbad is free to build and provision a boat for his escape. Only after doing so does he return and blind the monster.²⁵

So, we carried the wood out of the castle and we built a raft. We tied it at the sea shore and brought a bit of food down to it. Then we returned to the castle.

Such is the situation with the Old Man o' the Sea. The Old Man has used Sinbad harshly to be sure by forcing Sinbad to carry him around under threat of severe punishment.²⁶

If I crossed him, he would beat me with his feet more harshly than with a whip.

Having gotten him drunk and having escaped, however, Sinbad's murder of the Old Man, regardless of how subhuman and sinister he might have been, is again a gratuitous act of violence.

It is not suggested that either the modern or the medieval audience could not justify Sinbad's actions in the third and fifth stories. Indeed, the shock value of the Old Man of the Sea story arises from the brusque shift from the comical scene of Sinbad making wine in a gourd, arousing the Old Man's curiosity, and getting him drunk, to crushing his skull with a rock. Rather, these two stories serve to raise and then slow the tempo of violence and horror. They shock the audience into an awareness of Sinbad's potential for murder which culminates horribly in the killing of innocent people in the tomb of the fourth story.

This latter situation is perhaps ambiguous in Muslim law for the action clearly takes place outside the Dār al-Islām. Thus, the case could never be brought before a shari‘ah court. Furthermore, the victims are not even dhimmi.²⁷ Murder of the innocent, however, is abhorrent to Islamic morality under any circumstances: “Hast thou slain an innocent person not guilty of slaying another? Thou hast indeed done a horrible thing!”²⁸ Whatever justification might have been felt to be attached to Sinbad's being trapped in the tomb is obviated by the fact that he continues to murder after having found his way out of the tomb and to rob the corpses to make his fortune.²⁹

Whomever they buried, I would take his food and water and kill him whether man or woman. Then I would go out of the hole and sit on the sea shore.

Thus, while the first two stories find the audience in sympathy with Sinbad and ready to accept the view which he puts forward, our sensibilities begin to be seriously disturbed in the third and we are utterly repulsed by Sinbad's behavior in the fourth tale despite the fact that he has been presented to us as a grave and dignified figure of benign authority:

In the midst of that company was a great, respectable man. Gray had touched his temples and he was fine of stature and handsome of face. He had dignity, sobriety, power and pride.³⁰

Three more topoi which occur and reoccur concurrently with the major structural elements of the tale suggest that even Sinbad himself is aware of the indefensibility of the actions for which he is apologizing.³¹ In the beginning and ending stories, Sinbad tells the tale of his adventures to all and sundry. But in the middle tales, he does so less and less until, in the fourth—the keystone tale—he not only does not tell his tale but consciously conceals the story of what has befallen him and what he had done. The captain and crew of the ship which picks him up do ask for his story, but he tells them only of a shipwreck and adds:

I did not inform them of what had happened to me in the city or in the tomb fearing that there might be someone from the city with them aboard the ship.³²

In his own mind, Sinbad represses the memory of his actions. At the end of each story, he tells us that he would forget the hardships of his voyages. But in the middle stories, he increasingly treats the events as if they “had been a dream.” In psychological terms, his repression of guilt is clear.

Finally, Sinbad's conscience obviously bothers him, for in the middle stories he returns home not only to enjoy his wealth as he has in the first stories, but to give alms and to clothe the widows and orphans. A tabulation of these topoi will make their significance immediately apparent, inversely corresponding as they do to the rise and fall pattern of the story as a whole.

Thus, the structure of the relevant topoi of the story reveals a discrepancy between Sinbad's apology and the ethical principles of his, and the audience's, world. By it, we are led back to the outer frame story of Shahrazad and the king, for the stories are parallel. As Sinbad justifies his unjustifiable murders, so does the king justify the unjustifiable murder of his wives by their potential infidelity. But, as Shahrazad hopes to delay her own murder until the king may see the injustice of his own actions, she spins him a tale of self-justification which can only be had by buying off the conscience. The moral is not stated and the story is not didactic in any overt sense. It is merely one more example of the cunning cleverness of women which is such a common theme of the 1001 Nights. That cunning is not necessarily condemned, merely noted and here once again it works for Shahrazad who does finally have her way. As with the king, so for the audience. Not overcome by greed for more material wealth, the audience sees the ironic disparity of an external view of Sinbad's actions and his own unconvincing apology which provides the ethical impact of the story. To be sure, many in any given audience might accept Sinbad's apology. Those who are caught up in the same greed for surplus wealth might need to justify similar actions and so find justification in Sinbad himself. It is that greed that speeds Sinbad on his voyages for, as he points out in introducing each of his tales, he undertakes his voyages not out of need but for the desire for adventure which is subsumed under and intimately related to the desire to buy and sell: the desire for profitable commercial ventures-greed.

Seen in this light, the Sinbad story becomes more coherent in its internal structure and fits nicely into its external frame, the Shahrazad/Shahriyar story. It also comes to tally more closely with its Greek and Latin analogues for in those stories the protagonist is of questionable moral character at the outset: he is a thief.³³

The irony is most subtle; it is never stated. Only the audience's own reaction to Sinbad's stories affords an entrance to the teller's ironic intent. Indeed, the second version points out one more irony of the business world. Commercial acuity, however rapacious, piratical, even murderous, can also lead to political preference and power. In the sixth story, the King of Ceylon, impressed by Sinbad's stories of his adventures and by his commercial successes, commissions Sinbad as his Ambassador to Haroun al-Rashid. In the second version of the seventh voyage, Haroun takes Sinbad into the court and, in turn, entrusts him with the return mission to Ceylon. Thus, Sinbad has attained political power and success as well as commercial success and material wealth. But the story has become, not “a veritable glorification of navigation and maritime commerce,” but a critique of the disparity between ethics and action. For, the audience, including Shahrazad's king, is aware of the cost of Sinbad's successes: the suppression of the merchant's ethical sensibility in his pursuit of material gain.

AN INDEX OF THE TOPOI OF THE SINBAD STORIES

(Numbers refer to pagination of MacNaghten edition)

Notes

1. J. I. Jabra, Art Dream and Action, Unpub. paper presented at UC Berkeley, 26 May, 1976, p. 7.

2. Private communication, 26 May, 1976.

3. Cf. Bibliography in note 32.

4. NY Times, 23 January, 1947, 31:2.

5. So also the more recent Seventh Voyage of Sinbad, which bears little or no resemblance to the 1001 Nights tale. Cf. A. H. Weiler's review, New York Times, 24 December, 1958.

6. Gerhardt, Mia I., Les Voyages de Sindbad le Marin, Utrecht, 1957, p. 33.

7. Ibid., p. 39.

8. My thanks to all the students of Intermediate Literary Arabic at UC Berkeley, 1975-76, with whom I read the Sinbad stories and whose perceptive comments and questions have done much to make my own views more clear and concise.

9. Gerhardt ignores one fundamental, and several minor, structural elements in the 1001 Nights tales which, with a predisposition to see Sinbad as a Romantic hero, leads to problems.

10. For a fuller analysis of the variations in the Arabic textual tradition, cf. Gerhardt, pp. 17-27.

11. Alf Layla wa-Layla, Calcutta, 1839, MacNaghten ed., Vol. III, p. 64. (Hereafter MacN.).

    It is interesting to note that not only does the Sinbad tale contain this first person narrative in biographical form, but that the frame story and episodes form a continuous and integrated whole, no part of which is expendable. Most Western literary historians consider the anonymous, Sixteenth Century Lazarillo de Tormes and Don Quixote as the “progenitors” of the novel precisely because of these features, which distinguish them from the “romance.” That they occur here, in an obviously older tale deriving (at least) from an oral tradition, is of rather great significance for our understanding of the narrative art.

12. Cf. Scholes and Kellog, The Nature of Narrative, Oxford, 1975, pp. 52-53, for a discussion of this ironic disparity as a constant in fiction. We would suggest a caveat on the Scholes-Kellog point of view, however. They make a sharp distinction between “traditional,” i.e., oral, narrative and “written” narrative and confine the sort of irony described above to the written. We would argue that the irony exists in the 1001 Nights. The Nights, however, even in their written form, must represent a transitional stage between oral and written narrative in which elements of the two modes cross fertilize each other. The terms “narrator” and “protagonist” are, therefore, used to distinguish between the two levels of perception represented by Shahrazad and Sinbad. The potential third level, that of the “narrator” of Shahrazad's story, seems not to be structurally or literally relevant.

13. We will return to this point at some length in our conclusions, but it should be noted here that Gerhardt ignores entirely the relationship of the Shahrazad element in her analysis and thus skews her entire perception of the tale.

14. MacNaghten, Vol. III, p. 4.

15. Ibid., p. 6. The translation is from Lane, v. VI, p. 327.

16. From Lane, p. 429. MacN.'s text is less precise: “So, look Oh Sinbad, Oh landsman, at what has befallen me, at what has happened to me, and at what my circumstance has been. Then Sinbad the landsman said to Sinbad the sailor, ‘By God, you must forgive me for what I felt about your just rewards.” p. 82. Sinbad's view of his riches is prefigured when he first meets the porter, too: “For verily I have not attained this happiness and this position save after harsh fatigue, great toil and many terrors. How I suffered, at first, from fatigue and hardship’.” MacN., pp. 7-8. Here, though, the notion of heavenly reward is lacking.

17. I use the term, “analogue” as in Wm. F. Bryan ed., Sources and Analogues of Chaucer's Canterbury Tales, Humanities Press, New York, 1958. Analogues are tales having close similarities in plot, characterization and structure which are not demonstrably derived the one from the other or do not demonstrably form parts of a chain of direct transmission. While a common ancestor may exist for “analogue” tales, said ancestor exists too far removed in time and space to be established by any other means than the comparative method established for the reconstruction of proto-typical linguistic forms. Should said reconstruction be made, it must be treated as are such linguistic reconstructions—with a certain circumspection. Furthermore, until a full family tree is made of all of the analogues, great care must be taken about applying the term, “source” to any given tale in its relationship to another. While not wanting to exclude the possibility of a direct Greek influence on the Sinbad tales, and particularly the third story which is an obvious analogue to the Ulysses and Polyphemus story, I find that G. E. von Grunebaum's conclusion as to the Greek origins of much of the Arabian Nights is overly positive in its statement [Cf. Medieval Islam, Chapter Nine, Creative Borrowing: Greece in the Arabian Nights, esp. III, pp. 298-305 on Sinbad]. As von Grunebaum himself points out, there are discrepancies between the Homeric and Arabian Nights versions. These, however, should not be put down merely to corruption by the Arab tellers, for there are discrepancies too between the Greek and the proto-typical story as it occurs in so many different versions of the story. To cite but one instance, neither Sinbad nor Ulysses makes reference to the magic ring that figures so prominently in the analogous stories, British and Turkish, to mention but two.

    The relationship between the Ulysses and Polyphemus stories and all of their analogues, such as Sinbad's third voyage, is dealt with at length in appendix xiii to Apollodorus: The Library, Loeb Classical Library, New York, 1921, translated by Jas. G. Frazer.

18. This point is apparently missed by all the translators and commentators until Gerhardt. Burton, for instance, feels, “In one point, this world famous tale is badly ordered. The most exciting adventures are the earliest, and the falling off of interest has a somewhat depressing effect. The Rukh, the Ogre and the Old Man o' the Sea should come last.” v. VI, p. 77, n. Gerhardt, however, has developed a very good analysis of these major structural elements; and we can do no better than to use her categorization. The chart is based on Gerhardt's, p. 30.

19. Cf. Note 17 above.

20. It is interesting to note that the theme of premature burial, salvation from the tomb and pirating of funerary treasures is a common one in Greek romances. Cf. Moses Hadas, A History of Greek Literature, Columbia U. Press, 1950, pp. 293-4.

21. This particular version of the scene introduces the third voyage. Cf. MacN. op. cit. p. 27. The topos does not precede the seventh tale.

22. MacN. op. cit. p. 83. The suggestion that they actually lived together comes from Lane, p. 429.

23. MacN. op. cit. p. 6.

24. MacN. op. cit. p. 75.

25. Ibid., pp. 28-32.

26. Ibid., pp. 56-58.

27. Ambiguous is perhaps the wrong term, for the situation is one in contention in Muslim law. Cf., for instance, Muhammad Ibn al-Hasan al-Shaybānī, Kitāb al-Siyar (The Islamic Law of Nations), translator Majid Khadduri, Baltimore, 1966. Esp. “The Application of Hudūd Penalties,” pp. 171-74. Shaybānī holds that any ḥadd crime committed by a Muslim in the Dār al-Harb would be null and void, as “they were committed [in a territory] where Muslim rulings are not applicable to them.” pp. 171-2. Awzā‘ī and Shāfi‘ī, however, hold the opposing view. Cf. n. 49, p. 172. In any case, Shaybānī would apparently agree that the Muslim would be subject to the local law on such matters. Cf. pp. 173-4.

28. Al-Qur'an al-Karīm, “Sūrat al-Kahf”, verse 74.

29. MacN. op. cit. pp. 49-50.

30. Ibid., p. 6.

31. It is interesting to note the topoi used in the development of Sinbad the sailor which are not structurally relevant to the whole of the tale. They occur and reoccur, not regularly as do the themes with which we have been dealing here, but sporadically even where not called for. They suggest another level or element of structure in the technique of oral composition. Oral composition has been well defined for poetry, but not so well defined for the prose tale. Nonetheless, many of the same techniques are found in oral prose tales as in poetry. The “formula” as defined by Parry and Lord is readily apparent in the prose tale, as are the “themes.” What we have labeled “topos” seem to be intermediate features. Larger than the formula, though akin to it in form, they are not yet definable as themes. They appear to serve as building blocks for the tale teller. Each may be formed by a bundle of formulas and be recognizable as a mini-theme. They are, in turn, bundled together to form the major themes of the tale. Whereas, given themes become structurally significant in the tale individual topoi, unlike Propp's functions, may be, without affecting the tale, left out, added or interspersed between themes simply to flesh out the story in a familiar way.

    We will attempt to pursue this observation in subsequent work.

32. MacN. op. cit. p. 52.

33. We will make no attempt to make a detailed analysis of the Medieval Greek and Latin analogues, but merely make one or two points which may have been obscured in our article and give some bibliography to the materials besides n. 17 above. It should be noted that Syntipas and Dolopathos are not analogues to Sinbad the Sailor in their entirety, but rather analogues to the Arabian Nights tale of the seven wise viziers. In this story, also known as the Seven Sages of Rome in other European versions, a young prince is falsely accused by one of his father's (the king's) wives of attempted rape. The details already provide an analogue to the Biblical and Quranic stories of Joseph. Being under a one week vow of silence, the prince cannot answer the charges; and the king determines to execute him. The boy's tutor calls in a series of wise men, each of whom spins a tale showing that hasty judgments are dangerous and that women are perfidious. Each time the king relents in his judgment, only to have the favorite again incite him against the prince. Much to the distress of the favorite, however, they do manage to get through the week, the prince is able to defend himself, she is discomfited and king and prince live happily ever after. One of the stories told by one of the wise men is of a famous thief who, when called to recite the stories of his most famous exploits, tells of being captured by a cyclops and of how he managed to escape. This particular tale provides the analogue to the third voyage, in particular, of Sinbad the sailor. For these tales, Cf. the following:

    Essai sur les fables indiennes, L. Deslongchamps, Paris, 1838. Which deals with the origin and transmission of many of the analogues and a prose version of the Seven Sages of Rome (in Old French) as well as an analysis of the Old French version (13th century) of Dolopathos.

    Dolopathos sive de rege et septem sapientibus, H. Oesterley, ed. London, 1873. Edition of the Latin version of Dolopathos.

    Li romans de Dolopathos, after Herbers, 13th century poet, ed. C. Brunet and A. Montaiglon, Paris, 1846.

    Researches Respecting The Book of Sindibād, D. Comparetti, London, 1882, Publications of the Folk Lore Society, X.

    “Syntipas” in Fabulae Romanenses Graecae Conscriptae ex recensione et cum adnotationibus Alfred Eberhardi, Lipsiae (Teubner), 1872.