1001 Nights, or, Sophia is fannish over something with no fandom and it is tragic

[sophia_sol]

THESIS HANDED IN ZOMG THIS FEELS KIND OF UNREAL. ALSO NOW I WANT TO COLLAPSE INTO BED.

If The Thousand and One Nights was a fandom, I would be all over that fandom. For serious, yo. Just opening my thesis to get back to work at it, I stared at the list of story names in my table of contents and began to grin. Because I love these stories, you guys! So much love! But instead of reading reams of fic about them, I had to write a thesis instead.

(you know what would have been awesome? If there WERE a fandom for The Thousand and One Nights, and I did my thesis on an analysis of the way that religion was treated in the fics compared to in the canonical stories. Wouldn't that have been fascinating? In, you know, that hypothetical world where this fandom existed. Because I would be willing to bet you that religion would be one of the elements of the stories that would generally be pushed aside for the sake of the fics -- because religion is GENERALLY ignored in fanfic, minus a few (awesome!) aberrations. But the language of religion is so pervasive in the stories that in order to get the right feel, authors of fics would have to do something with it. I'd be curious to see how far they would actually go, and what they would and wouldn't pick up on as important religious themes throughout the Nights.)

(relatedly, I have not stopped desperately wanting Budoor/Hayyat/Kamar fic. 1001 Nights OT3 of my heart, okay?)

(Also, as well as wanting a Nights fandom, I want ALL THE FIC about the translators of the Nights. Well really I just want all the Richard Burton fic. But all the other translator-soap-opera mixed in there would be an AWESOME BONUS. (seriously you guys. 19th century academia was like this collection of really wanky BNFs and their wank was epic.) There could be so many awesome aus about these dudes! A space au! Or a high school au! Or a modern-university-professor au! Or a fandom au! Or really I am not at all married to the au idea and would be equally THRILLED by hilarious stories about their actualfax selves, especially if they're about Burton being all...Burton. That dude. SERIOUSLY. THAT DUDE. I mean, back when I last talked about this stuff I totally already spent a long comment thread flailing about Burton with tei, but I could HAPPILY KEEP GOING. (If you have never read his wikipedia article? Do yourself a favour and go and read it, and marvel at the stuff he got up to (and the attitude with which he got up to it!). And wikipedia doesn't even cover everything hilarious and amazing and headdesky about him!))

(While I'm talking about Burton, may I just say, these days I find it totally hilarious that in The Sentinel it is Richard Burton who is the ultimate academic source and authority on Sentinels. UNEXPECTEDLY GOOD CALL, show! Burton is totally the sort of dude who would have written a paper like that, and also totally the sort of dude who nobody would have believed.)

(You know, a fic about Burton in the Sentinel universe would be awesome. Stuff about him as he was doing his research for his monograph on Sentinels! IT WOULD BE EPIC AND YOU KNOW IT!)

(according to Sentientcitizen, you can totally tell when I get to the parts of my thesis that I actually care about, because the quality of my prose takes a sudden and noticeable turn upwards. It is not coincidence that this happens in the bit where I begin to discuss the translation options. But it's not only that I find the translators hilarious and awesome! It is also because I care deeply about the quality of the translation, okay! And I care really deeply about the fact that there ISN'T A GOOD ENGLISH TRANSLATION. AT ALL. NONE. This is when I start to mutter to myself that I really need to get on that whole learning German thing because apparently the Germans have quite a good (if uninspired) translation, at least of the Calcutta II manuscript. Clearly what I need to do is acquire a copy of this, and begin to work through it with a german-english dictionary, as German practice. Because the vocab it would teach me would clearly be all of the useful....)

It is really too bad I cannot just bring this fandom into existence by sheer wishing. And the rather horrific problems of it existing as an english fandom (to whit: the utter lack of any actually decent English translation) means any efforts I might make would be hopeless in the end. Especially since I do not have the necessary dedication to a single fandom that that would take. I'm too easily distracted by other shiny things!

DAMN YOUUUUU 1001 NIGHTS! I JUST WANT TO LOVE YOU ANY WAY I CAN!

(speaking of which, it really is too bad that when I acquired my personal copy of the 1001 Nights lo these many years ago, I was unfamiliar with the particular quirks of the various translations and ended up with the WORST POSSIBLE of the common English translations. It is a translation to English of the French translation of Mardrus, and Mardrus was a] bad at Middle Arabic and b] in the habit of making lots of changes to the original to the point where his translation is really an ADAPTATION not a translation and c] a total liar about these things. At least when Galland was making all his changes he admitted he was doing it...)

(Except that when I try to think of what translation I WOULD like to own, I get all indecisive. Can't I own all of them? THEY ALL HAVE THEIR VICES AND VIRTUES! I want Lane AND Payne AND Burton AND Haddawy, plskthx! As well as that German translation I mentioned earlier! (except where would I PUT THEM? That is a lot of volumes. And I am already quite laughably thoroughly out of bookshelf space.)

(You have no idea how hard it was for me to give back the library's copy of Lane, now that I'm done with the thesis. I'm quite sure nobody else has touched these volumes in years, and I've spent so much time up close and personal with them, and I love them, okay? And I got them all sticky-tabbed up with all sorts of relevant and/or interesting passages, and I had to TAKE THOSE OUT before giving them back. I put so much effort into those!)

(Actually what I really want to do is learn Middle Arabic myself and do my own annotated translations of all the major manuscripts of the Nights - Bibliothèque Nationale, and Calcutta I, and Bulaq, and Breslau (well, probably not Breslau, fabricated manuscript that it is), and Calcutta II. (Oh wait, I WOULD have to translate Breslau as well, because Calcutta II incorporates some of Breslau within it, so it would be relevant after all in figuring out which are the more reliable bits of Calcutta II.))

(Except I don't really want to do all of that because that would be a FUCKING HUGE amount of work. And I don't think I want to dedicate, like, my entire life to the project....)

OKAY I CAN STOP TALKING ABOUT THE NIGHTS NOW, I SWEAR. Really. Really. Don't you believe this face? It is a trustworthy face.

Comments

[sentientcitizen]

WHY DO YOU NOT WANT TO DEDICATE YOUR WHOLE LIKE TO THIS PROJECT? That sounds like your perfect life's work!

[sophia_sol]

BECAUSE THAT WOULD INVOLVE LEARNING MIDDLE ARABIC. NOT ACTUALLY HIGH ON MY LIST OF LANGUAGES I WANT TO LEARN!

Also, you have noticed my distractability from things, yes? I don't think I could manage to dedicate my whole life to one thing! :D

[michelel72]

Hooray handed-in thesis! And it is quite nice to see fervent enthusiasm on my flist/rlist (not to mention an appreciation for a parenthetical comment or five, hee).

[sophia_sol]

I knowwww! It's so exciting!

And, ahahaha, I think fervent enthusiasm is like my default position or something, if you look at the sheer number of times I use my "squee" tag....

(my parentheses are a sign, I think, that I was BREAKING FREEEEE of the strictures of academic writing. Also that I had no sleep. *grin*)

[calvinahobbes]

I am coming back to this post later! In the mean time I just want to say: have you noticed that nearly this entire post is in brackets??? <3

[sophia_sol]

Ahahaaa, I love how almost everyone has commented on my ridiculous parentheses.

My problem was that I just couldn't make all my thoughts be COHERENT! They all seemed like they were parenthetical asides from my really quite short main flow of thought! So clearly that meant that everything else needed to be enclosed in parentheses! (This is how my brain works when it is overdosed on academic writing and has no sleep.....)

(If you look closely, there are a few paragraphs that don't have parentheses, and if you read them without all the stuff in brackets, they do actually form a coherent and short post. Heh.)

[calvinahobbes]

Most adorablest squee post ever? It was ENTIRELY coherent, I have no idea what you are referring to!

I love that you have invented an entire imaginary fandom for your thesis project! That is so funny (but I totally get that urge; fandom's such a significant part of my life that sometimes the idea is automatic -- it's a cool way to process a thing, thinking about what Fandom would focus on.). I could imagine that the religion thing would also be problematic because of how Fandom is dominated by Western culture. And sure, that whole translation thing sounds like an obstacle...

So yes, you should totally get on that translation! ;o) It's such an awesome and terrifying experience to become so familiar with a text or a language that any attempt at translation seems inferior or plain WRONG. I like that feeling. But then, I'm a Classicist, so I better! Your tale of ending up with the worst translation is a cautionary one! It sounds like a lot of extra work -- but, you know, also a chance to feel really superior! Which, again, is sort of it's own discipline within the Classics :oP

Being out of shelf space is SUCH a tragedy! I feel your pain.

You should do a recs list! Of your favorite tales! As a Yuletide promo, perhaps? I foresee a Yuletide request ;o) (And then maybe eventually I will get around to reading some of them /o\ So, y'know, don't feel obligated to do that!)

Hey, YOU WROTE A THESIS! OMGWTF how awesome is that? Why are you not totally sick of your topic and never want to see it again??? That is impressive all on its own!

[sophia_sol]

Mostly wrt coherency I was just afraid that I was referring to things and then NOT EXPLAINING ANYTHING ABOUT THEM and thus would make no sense to people not intimately familiar with the history of the 1001 Nights. Like for example the way I just randomly inserted a reference to Galland's translation in a way that makes it sound like I'm assuming the reader knows all about Galland, when in fact that was my first and only mention of him.... I'm glad it all made sense anyways!

Basically I just want a fandom for EVERYTHING I LOVE. Because yes, it HAS become somewhat automatic by this point, I spend so much time in fandom.

AHAHAHA no I am not going to get on that translation. Learning Middle Arabic would be a COMPLETE BASTARD because it's nowhere near as well documented as either classical Arabic or modern Arabic. There isn't even a decent dictionary of Middle Arabic. And I highly doubt, then, that there's any handy and well-organized textbooks created for the purpose of teaching one Middle Arabic the way there are for modern languages, or for Greek and Latin etc. Also I am TOO EASILY DISTRACTED and getting going on a longterm project like that is bound to end in disaster.

Being out of shelf space is a HUGE tragedy. I have approximately four more shelves of books than really fit on my bookcase. IT IS A PROBLEM.

I totally SHOULD do a recs list of my favourite tales! The problem is that I read through them all kind of fast when I was frantically marking it up with all the passages relevant to religion so I don't actually remember anything about most of them anymore. Soooo that might take a fair amount of work. But it would be fun, so I should do it anyways! Or at the very least write up a rec post about why the story about Budur and Hayat and Kamar is SO AWESOME.

I CAN'T BELIEVE I WROTE A THESIS. I have no idea how I managed to avoid getting sick of my topic, but I am NOT COMPLAINING! Possibly it is because my topic is just that awesome? *grin*

[neveralarch]

I've never read through a full translation of 1001 Nights, but I just wanted to chime in on the Richard Burton flailing. HE IS SO RIDICULOUS. The Book of the Sword basically made my... fifteen-years-oldness with its snark and cattiness about other scholars. I don't think lots of people read it, because it's unfinished and a bit dry, but it has the best Burton line ever. As I recall, he's talking about the target areas of different weapons, and how pikes are generally aimed at the body, rather than the head. There's a footnote. It says "but not always, as I discovered to my peril." And that's it. Thanks for that, Burton.

Also, there's the time when he ruined a really good cover as a devout Muslim doctor because he wanted to learn some drinking songs from his new best friend and they ended up going on a binge through town. And also all of the other times. Because Richard Burton, man. Man.

Um. Right. 1001 Nights? I guess I should read the German translation, since maybe I actually can?

[sophia-sol.livejournal.com]

*dies* Oh, Burton!

Would you recommend The Book of the Sword as a fun book of his to read, then?

I would be interested to hear what you think about the German translation, if you do read it! I don't know very much about it, because I just read an offhand reference to it in a book that was in English and thus mostly talking about English translations. But I get the impression it doesn't cut OR add anything to the text, which is a massive improvement on any extant English translation, so you should totally go for it!

I do so love the 1001 Nights and they're definitely worth reading.

[neveralarch]

Iiiii don't know. I definitely enjoyed it, but we can't overestimate how much I'm into swords. It's very much a scholarly work, so if you want to read about the origin of swords and their development up to the Roman period, it's probably one of the best sources. Not so much on the anecdote front, though it does have some really interesting stuff about where words come from and about the first language - Burton basically disagreed with everyone and made a few random personal attacks, though I can't actually remember what his thesis was. Victorian linguistics!

Have you read other books of his? There's stuff I would recommend before The Book of the Sword, but if you've been reading a lot of his writing and want something new, definitely check it out.

Re: German translation, do you know the name of the translator or anything? Either way, I will give a shot at tracking it down.

[sophia-sol.livejournal.com]

Huh -- sounds interesting! I mean, I do find swords fascinating and everything. But I have in fact never really read anything by Burton before, so if you have recommendations as to a good place to start, I'd be all over that!

Alas, I do not remember the name of the German translator, and I didn't write it down out of the book that referred to it, and the book has now gone back to the library (in a different city than the one I'm in right now) so I can't get it back. SILLY OF ME. If it helps, it was referred to in Robert Irwin's "The Arabian Nights: A Companion", near the end of the chapter that talks about translators. So if you have access to Irwin you could look it up? Sorry I can't be more useful! (Irwin's book is in general an excellent resource on the Nights, if you're interested. I disagree with a few of his points, but otherwise it's great.)

[neveralarch]

Well, I will track it down! I actually saw an old German copy of 1001 Nights at a book fair yesterday, and was tempted, but it was one of those book stalls where everything is gorgeous and costs about 200 euros, so I backed away slowly.

I definitely recommend Burton's Personal Narrative of a Pilgrimage to Al Madinah and Meccah which is fascinating (though long). There's the given amount or Victorian racism and exoticism, but I find Burton generally better about that stuff than most European writers from the same period. It's a low bar, and there are still a lot of awful off-hand comments, but still. Anyway,Pilgrimage - it's basically the story of Burton doing the most ridiculous stuff, supposedly in the name of scholarship. It's on Gutenberg somewhere.

Burton also wrote a ton of articles and things that are generally interesting. They range from straight up travel reports to his Notes on Scalping. There are around 200 of them up as pdfs on burtoniana.org as an essential public service. Hope this helps?

[sophia-sol.livejournal.com]

AWESOME. If you do find a copy and read it, I will be very curious to hear what you think! And oh, I hear you on the beautiful and overly-expensive books...SO TEMPTING.

Thanks for the recs! I will totally go look some of that stuff up. I am surprised, though, that Burton is better about the racism thing than a lot of people. Because of the translators of the 1001 Nights from that period in history, he was the only one who added Extra Bonus Racism to his translation. I mean, the others did some exoticising, but Burton's racism was on a different level....

[neveralarch]

I mean, it's totally possible that I sort of erased his racism from my mind at some point. If so, really sorry - I try not to forget about the bad parts of things that I like, but I don't always succeed at that. Also, the books of his I've read are generally from when he was most immersed in other cultures and most annoyed with Europeans, so that might be a factor. From what I recall, his pattern was generally "here is this behavior that Europeans think is barbaric and backwards. But we do it too! The differences between us are largely superficial! We should be learning from each other!" and I would be like, 'yeah, Burton!' and then he'd go "except from those damn lying Cretans, I hate them" and I'd be like 'wait, what?' (Either way, when I say better than a lot of people, what I mean is better than HM Stanley and other journalist/adventurers, who were often abusive and dismissive toward the people living in the places they were traveling through. I guess that's probably a different low bar than one for 'European writers,' sorry about that.)

Tl;dr - I'm not sure anymore, you should probably check out some of his other works and let me know what you think (if you don't mind).

[sophia-sol.livejournal.com]

Interesting! Okay, now I'm really curious to read Burton for myself and see how racist he is. Definitely gonna happen.

(And I totally hear you on the difficulties in not forgetting the bad bits of things I love. It can be hard!)

[china_shop]

Congratulations!!!!!! *ballooooons*

Also, I love how this entire post is in parentheses. <3

Alsoalso, your adoration of the text(s) is made of win!

[sophia-sol.livejournal.com]

Yay, thank youuuuuuu!

Ahaha, I think that the excessive parentheses is what happens when you get me + no sleep + procrastination. I wrote most of this post in the midst of working on the thesis, as opposed to after I was done....

*grin* Ridiculous squee is a specialty of mine, I think!

[carmarthen.livejournal.com]

Man, religion being ignored in fic is both one of my peeves and...something I do myself, because it's hard, and I'd rather...avoid it than get it egregiously wrong, you know? Especially since I am a very atheist atheist. Like, there should be a lot more religion in Eagle fic, but Roman religion is confusing and we barely know anything about Celtic religion or Mithraism, and I cringe every time I see egregiously wrong religion.

WTF I WANT ALL THE BURTON FIC NOW. AND A GOOD ENGLISH TRANSLATION OF 1001 NIGHTS.

[sophia-sol.livejournal.com]

Yeah, no, I totally get it -- there's ALL SORTS of things that I am afraid to touch in fic because what if I do it wrong?

Also I think that not all the fault for religionless fic is on fic authors -- it's also endemic in the source material. I mean, characters in tv shows and movies are almost never overtly religious.

THAT'S BECAUSE THERE SHOULD BE ALL THE BURTON FIC. AND A GOOD TRANSLATION OF THE NIGHTS.

[carmarthen.livejournal.com]

Also I think that not all the fault for religionless fic is on fic authors -- it's also endemic in the source material. I mean, characters in tv shows and movies are almost never overtly religious.

Hmmm, yeah. I like how Sutcliff handles religion, for the most part (especially since we know so little about Mithraism or Celtic religion(s) )--it's pervasive, yet handily vague. I should probably try to copy that more.

But one of my favorite shows is Little Mosque on the Prairie, where most of the characters are pretty religious, ranging from fairly secularly so (Sarah) to professional (Amaar), and I desperately want more fic for it, and especially fic about Rayyan in university and how she discovered feminism and why she started to wear hijab, but there is no way I can imagine being able to write it. So I keep crossing my fingers that someone who actually is a Muslim feminist will write it.

I just, IDK. I try to research everything, but I feel like in some areas the probability of genuinely hurting people are higher if you fail, and I'm less comfortable with religion, I think, because I have a sort of frustration/fascination thing going on with it in general. And a lot of canons that ARE overtly religious leave me totally cold and/or irritated.

[sophia-sol.livejournal.com]

Sutcliffe does do pretty well at it, yeah, from what I've read of her.

Little Mosque on the Prairie! I LOVE that show -- from a distance, at least. I have a terrible embarrassment squick and can never watch sitcoms, but from everything I know about that show, and from what bits of it I've managed to make myself watch, it is otherwise RIGHT UP MY ALLEY. It is so fantastic. There totally needs to be all the fic about it.

Yeah, religion is a touchy subject for a lot of people, unfortunately. In this as in so many ways I want the world to learn how to disagree amicably -- but humanity has kiiiind of a bad track record at succeeding at that.

And I hear you on the overtly religious canons. I think the problem there is that the creator/author of those is so often coming at it from a religious perspective of their own, and consciously or unconsciously promoting their own religious agenda...

[carmarthen.livejournal.com]

I have a terrible embarrassment squick, too! But most of the humor in the show is not embarrassing, at least I don't think so.

Yeah, I like fiction about people and their faith, but not so much fiction that's intended to proselytize. And I guess for some religions it's hard to do the former without doing the latter, so I tend not to want to read about those religions. I dunno, it's a fine line.