One Thousand and One Nights is a collection of Middle Eastern folk tales compiled in Arabic during the Islamic Golden Age.
The main story concerns a king, Shahryar. He discovers that his wife had been unfaithful and has her killed. In his bitterness and grief, he decides that all women are the same. Shahryar begins to marry a succession of young women only to execute each one the next morning, before she has a chance to be unfaithful to him.
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Eventually it is the turn of the beautiful Scheherazade to marry him. On the night of their marriage, she begins to tell the king a tale, but does not end it. The king, curious about how the story ends, is thus forced to delay her execution in order to hear the conclusion. The next night, as soon as she finishes the tale, she begins another one, and the king, eager to hear the conclusion of that tale as well, delays her execution once again. This goes on for one thousand and one nights, hence the name.
Reading
Listen to your teacher read the poem The Iraqi Nights by Dunya Mikhail. In this poem, the author speaks up on behalf of a country – she explains how the people of Iraq want the simple things in life to come back following years of war.
