Tales from the Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night Audiobook By Richard Francis Burton cover art

Tales from the Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night

A Plain and Literal Translation of the Arabian Nights Entertainments

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Tales from the Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night

By: Richard Francis Burton
Narrated by: Kevin Foley
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About this listen

Bawdy and exotic, Tales from the Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night features the wily, seductive Scheherazade, who saves her own life by telling tales of magical transformation, genies and wishes, flying carpets and fantastical journeys, terror and passion to entertain and appease the brutal King Shahryar. First introduced in the West in 1704, the stories of "The Thousand and One Nights" are most familiar to American readers in sanitized children's versions. This modern edition, culled from the first three volumes of Richard F. Burton's famous ten-volume translation, restores the sensuality and lushness of the original Arabic. Intricate and imaginative, these stories continue to captivate audiences as they have for centuries.

The following stories can be found in this audiobook: "Tale of the Bull and the Ass", "Tale of the Trader and the Jinni", "The First Shaykh's Story", "The Second Shaykh's Story", "The Third Shaykh's Story", "The Fisherman and the Jinni", "The Tale of the Wazir and the Sage Duban", "King Sindibad and his Falcon", "The Tale of the Husband and the Parrot", "The Tale of the Prince and the Ogress", "The Tale of the Ensorcelled Prince", "The Tale of the Three Apples", "The Hunchback's Tale", "The Nazarene Broker's Story", "The Reeve's Tale", "The Tale of the Jewish Doctor", "The Tale of the Tailor", "The Barber's Tale of Himself", "The Barber's Tale of His First Brother", "The Barber's Tale of His Second Brother", "The Barber's Tale of His Third Brother", "The Barber's Tale of His Fourth Brother", "The Barber's Tale of His Fifth Brother", "The Barber's Tale of His Sixth Brother", "The End of the Tailor's Tale", "Nur Al-Din Ali and the Damsel Anis Al-Jalis", "The Birds and Beasts and the Carpenter", "The Hermits", and "Tale of the Water Fowl and the Tortoise".

Public Domain (P)2011 Tantor
Classics Fairy Tales Fantasy Fiction Short Stories Royalty
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What listeners say about Tales from the Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night

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    3 out of 5 stars
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    3 out of 5 stars

The stories were but,,,

What really irritated me and got on my nerves is the amount of racist comments and remarks in this book. Every time a woman committed a sultry it was a blacked skinned whatever. I began to wonder if it was from the original story or if it was translated or written that way by the white man who published it in English. It made the stories unsettling and almost unlistenable!

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1 person found this helpful

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    2 out of 5 stars
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    4 out of 5 stars

Radio DJ Narrated

Such a hard listen. I couldn’t finish. I hope to find a better version of these stories.

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  • Overall
    3 out of 5 stars
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    3 out of 5 stars

Worth the exposure of ancient story telling

I was curious of Arabian folk lore. It was hard to finish the various story lines. I was curious of reported sexual topics or practices mentioned by historians. This book had very little sexualization of any scenes that would offend most modern readers. The knowledge I gained was the sexist or enslavement of females to satisfy the needs of men. The reader did an excellent. I don't plan to try any future readings on this book. Like learning Geometry to learn mathematical proofs, once was enough to fill that square of exposure.

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  • Overall
    2 out of 5 stars
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    3 out of 5 stars
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    2 out of 5 stars

Cut off her Head!!

There was some good in here, such as, The tale of Sheherazade, The Bull and The Ass, some of the Trader with the Jinni, some of the Fisherman and the Jinni, etc. Instead of buying eleven hours of this all together, I suggest you buy them one tale at a time. The sing song narration, repetition of similar stories and wide variety of strange names and thy's and old English can wear on your nerves after a while. I enjoyed the first stories, but toward the end it became white noise. This is suppose to be vol one thru three of a ten volume set. Not included are Aladdin, Sinbad, the Forty Thieves, and so on. These you know because they are the better stories and they are sold separately, buy them that way.

Here are some Arabian truths you will learn buy reading this:

"Rely, not on women: Trust not to their hearts, Whose joys and whose sorrows, Are hung to their parts!"

Here are some common themes, Man loves his wife, but she does not love him and she cheats on him with a black slave. Black slaves are big and ugly. Kindness leads to calamity, so do not be kind. Ifrit's can easily be fooled. She is as pretty as a full moon. Women will always cheat with black men, but that will always lead to them getting cut into little pieces or having their head cut off or both. If a crime is committed someone will hang. If you can not find the guilty then someone else will do, as long as someone hangs.

Narrator is probably reading this the sing song way he is suppose to, but that does not mean I got to like it.

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23 people found this helpful

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    3 out of 5 stars
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Awful reader

It takes a special talent to take one of the world’s best stories and make it repugnant. What a pity.

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  • Overall
    1 out of 5 stars

Terrible narration

For me, listening to an audio book all boils down to the narration. If the narrator is flat and toneless, I can't enjoy the story no matter how interesting it may be in and of itself. That being said, this narrator is the worst I have heard! His diction is flat and his meter is so obvious I felt like I was riding a roller coaster. Instead of enjoying the story I found myself distract by his up, down, up, down droning. I was thoroughly dissappointed, especially because I was looking very forward to these stories.

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21 people found this helpful

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    5 out of 5 stars
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    4 out of 5 stars

Really cool

These stories fascinate me because they’re ancient and the authors translation was done over a hundred years ago so it’s really cool to enjoy a sort of elegance in the language it’s even challenging and complex to cipher the ancient cadence of storytelling because although English the vernacular is waay different I also enjoy this almost unabridged version
If you want watered down easy listening versions of the stories this book is not for you if want the full effect then sit back and relax

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  • Overall
    1 out of 5 stars
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    1 out of 5 stars

very difficult to listen

I couldn't finish the firs chapter, its like listening to a robot, very difficult to keep up.

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    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

Beauty and enlightening.

Wonderful engaging stories revealing attitudes of cultures and learning stories of the wise. I did not want it to end

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3 people found this helpful

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    1 out of 5 stars
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    2 out of 5 stars

Needs a new recording

I couldn’t get through the first few chapters because the voice just didn’t catch me. I’m not sure if the recording is old or what but I couldn’t keep going because of the recording.

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