One Thousand and One Nights

by Richard Burton

  These bévues, which give us the fairest measure for the Reviewer’s competence to review, are followed () by a series of obsolete assertions. “The highest authority on this point (the date) is the late Mr. Lane, who states his unqualified conviction that the tales represent the social life of mediaerval Egypt, and he selects a period approaching the close of the fifteenth century as the probable date of collection, though some of the tales are, he believes, rather later” (). Mr. Lane’s studies upon the subject were painfully perfunctory. He distinctly states (Preface, p. xii.) that “the work was commenced and completed by one man,” or at least that “one man completed what another commenced.” With a marvellous want of critical acumen he could not distinguish the vast difference of style and diction, treatment and sentiments, which at once strikes every intelligent reader, and which proves incontestably that many hands took part in the Great Saga-book. He speaks of “Galland’s very imperfect MS.,” but he never took the trouble to inspect the three volumes in question which are still in the Bibliothèque Nationale. And when he opines that “it (the work) was most probably not commenced earlier than the fifteenth century of our era” (Pref. p. xiii.) M. Hermann Zotenberg, judging from the style of writing, would attribute the MS. to the beginning456 of the xivth century. The French Savant has printed a specimen page in his Histoire d’Alâ al-Dîn (; see my Suppl. vol. iii., Foreword p. ix.); and now, at the request of sundry experts, he is preparing for publication other proofs which confirm his opinion. We must correct Lane’s fifteenth century to thirteenth century — a difference of only 200 years.457

  After this unhappy excursus the Reviewer proceeds to offer a most unintelligent estimate of the Great Recueil. “Enchantment” may be “a constant motive,” but it is wholly secondary and subservient: “the true and universal theme is love;” “‘all are but the ministers of love’ absolutely subordinate to the great theme” (). This is the usual half-truth and whole unfact. Love and war, or rather war and love, form the bases of all romantic fiction even as they are the motor power of the myriad forms and fashions of dancing. This may not appear from Lane’s mangled and mutilated version which carefully omits all the tales of chivalry and conquest as the History of Gharíb and his brother ‘Ajíb (vol. vi. 257) and that of Omar ibn Al-Nu’umán, “which is, as a whole so very unreadable” () though by no means more so than our European romances. But the reverse is the case with the original composition. Again, “These romantic lovers who will go through fire to meet each other, are not in themselves interesting characters: it may be questioned whether they have any character at all” (). “The story and not the delineation of character is the essence of the ‘Arabian Nights’” (). I can only marvel at the utter want of comprehension and appreciation with which this critic read what he wrote about: one hemisphere of his brain must have been otherwise occupied and his mental cecity makes him a phenomenon even amongst reviewers. He thus ignores all the lofty morale of the work, its marvellous pathos and humour, its tender sentiment and fine touches of portraiture, the personal individuality and the nice discrimination between the manifold heroes and heroines which combine to make it a book for all time.

  The critic ends his article with doing what critics should carefully avoid to do. After shrewdly displaying his powers of invective and depreciation he has submitted to his readers a sample of his own workmanship. He persists in writing “Zobeyda,” “Khalifa,” “Aziza” () and “Kahramana” () without the terminal aspirate which, in Arabic if not in Turkish, is a sine quâ non (see my Suppl. vol. v. 302). He preserves the pretentious blunder “The Khalif” (), a word which does not exist in Arabic. He translates (), although I have taught him to do better, “Hádimu ‘I-Lizzáti wa Mufarriku ‘l-Jama’át,” by “Terminator of Delights and Separator of Companies” instead of Destroyer of delights and Severer of societies. And lastly he pads the end of his article (p-199) with five dreary extracts from Lane (i. 372-73) who can be dull even when translating the Immortal Barber.

  The first quotation is so far changed that the peppering of commas (three to the initial line of the original) disappears to the reader’s gain, Lane’s textual date (Ap) is also exchanged for that of the notes (A.H. 653); and the “æra of Alexander,” A.M. 7320, an absurdity which has its value in proving the worthlessness of such chronology, is clean omitted, because Lane used the worthless Bull Edit. The latinisms due to Lane show here in force— “Looked for a considerable time” (Maliyyan = for a long while); “there is an announcement that presenteth itself to me” (a matter which hath come to my knowledge) and “thou hast dissipated458 my mind” (Azhakta rúhí = thou scatterest my wits, in the Calc. Edit. Saghgharta rúhí = thou belittles” my mind). But even Lane never wrote “I only required thee to shave my head” — the adverb thus qualifying, as the ignoramus loves to do, the wrong verb — for “I required thee only to shave my head.” In the second échantillon we have “a piece of gold” as equivalent of a quarter-diner and “for God’s sake” which certainly does not preserve local colour. In No. 3 we find “‘May God,’ said I,” etc.; “There is no deity but God! Mohammed is God’s apostle!” Here Allah ought invariably to be used, e.g. “Mohammed is the Apostle of Allah,” unless the English name of the Deity be absolutely required as in “There is no god but the God.” The Moslem’s “Wa’lláhi” must not be rendered “By God,” a verbal translation and an absolute nonequivalent; the terms Jehovah, Allah and God and the use of them involving manifold fine distinctions. If it be true that God made man, man in his turn made and mismade God who thus becomes a Son of Man and a mere racial type. I need not trouble my reader with further notices of these extracts whose sole use is to show the phenomenal dullness of Lane’s latinised style: I prefer even Torrens ().

  “We have spoken severely with regard to the last” (my version), says the Reviewer (p.185), and verily I thank him therefor. Laudari ab illaudato has never been my ambition. A writer so learned and so disinterested could hurt my feelings and mortify my pride only by approving me and praising me. Nor have I any desire to be exalted in the pages of the Edinburgh, so famous for its incartades of old. As Dryden says, “He has done me all the honour that any man can receive from him, which is to be railed at by him.” I am content to share the vituperation of this veteran — incapable in company with the poetaster George Gordon who suffered for “this Lord’s station;” with that “burnish fly in the pride of May,” Macaulay, and with the great trio, Darwin, Huxley and Hooker, who also have been the butts of his bitter and malignant abuse (April ‘63 and April ‘73). And lastly I have no stomach for sweet words from the present Editor of the Edinburgh Mr. Henry Reeve, a cross and cross-grained old man whose surly temper is equalled only by his ignoble jealousy of another’s success. Let them bedevil the thin-skinned with their godless ribaldry; for myself peu m’importe — my shoulders are broad enough to bear all their envy, hatred and malice.

  During the three years which have elapsed since I first began printing my book

  I have not had often to complain of mere gratuitous impertinence, and a single

  exception deserves some notice. The following lines which I addressed to The

  Academy (August 11, ‘88) will suffice to lay my case before my readers: —

  The Bestial Element in Man.

  “One hesitates to dissent from so great an authority as Sir Richard Burton on all that relates to the bestial element in man.” So writes (p. xii., Introduction to the Fables of Pilpay), with uncalled-for impertinence, Mr. Joseph Jacobs, who goes out of his way to be offensive, and who confesses to having derived all his knowledge of my views not from “the notorious Terminal Essay of the Nights,” but from the excellent article by Mr. Thomas Davidson on “Beast-fables,” in Chambers’s Cyclopædia, Edinburgh, 1888. This lofty standpoint of morality was probably occupied for a reason by a writer who dedicates “To my dear wife” a volume rich in anecdotes grivoises, and not poor in language the contrary of conventional. However, I suffer from this Maccabee in good society togeth
er with Prof. Max Müller (pp. xxvi. and xxxiii.), Mr. Clouston (pp. xxxiii. and xxxv.), Byron (p. xlvi.), Theodor Benfey (p. xlvii.), Mr. W. G. Rutherford (p. xlviii.), and Bishop Lightfoot (p. xlix.). All this eminent half-dozen is glanced at, with distinct and several sneers, in a little volume which, rendered useless by lack of notes and index, must advertise itself by the réclame of abuse.

  As regards the reminiscence of Homo Darwinienesis by Homo Sapiens, doubtless it would ex hypothesi be common to mankind. Yet to me Africa is the old home of the Beast-fable, because Egypt was the inventor of the alphabet, the cradle of letters, the preacher of animism and metempsychosis, and, generally, the source of all human civilisation.

  Richard F. Burton

  And now I must proceed a trifle further a-field and meet

  The Critic in Anglo-America.

  The Boston Daily Advertiser (Jan. 26,’86) contains the following choice morceau which went the round of the Transatlantic Press: —

  G. W. S. writes from London to the New York Tribune in regard to Captain Burton’s notorious translation of the “Arabian Nights.” Of Captain Burton’s translation of “The Arabian Nights,” two volumes have now appeared. Before anything had been seen of them, I gave some account of this scheme, and of the material on which he had worked, with a statement of the reasons which made all existing versions unsatisfactory to the student, and incomplete. Captain Burton saw fit to reprint these desultory paragraphs as a kind of circular or advertisement on his forthcoming book. He did not think it necessary to ask leave to do this, nor did I know to what use my letter had been put till it was too late to object. In any ordinary case it would have been of no consequence, but Captain Burton’s version is of such a character that I wish to state the facts, and to say that when I wrote my letter I had never seen a line of his translation, and had no idea that what I said of his plans would be used for the purpose it has been, or for any purpose except to be printed in your columns. As it is, I am made to seem to give some sort of approval to a book which I think offensive, and not only offensive, but grossly and needlessly offensive. If anybody has been induced to subscribe for it by what I wrote I regret it, and both to him and to myself I think this explanation due.

  Mr. Smalley is the London correspondent of the New York Tribune, which represents Jupiter Tonans in the Western World. He may be unable to write with independent tone — few Anglo-Americans can afford to confront the crass and compound ignorance of a “free and independent majority” — but even he is not called upon solemnly to state an untruth. Before using Mr. Smalley’s article as a circular, my representative made a point of applying to him for permission, as he indeed was bound to do by the simplest rules of courtesy. Mr. Smalley replied at once, willingly granting the favour, as I can prove by the note still in my possession; and presently, frightened by the puny yelping of a few critical curs at home, he has the effrontery to deny the fact.

  In my last volumes I have been materially aided by two Anglo-American friends, MM Thayer and Cotheal, and I have often had cause to thank the Tribune and the Herald of New York for generously appreciating my labours. But no gratitude from me is due to the small fry of the Transatlantic Press which has welcomed me with spiteful little pars mostly borrowed from unfriends in England and mainly touching upon style and dollars. In the Mail Express of New York (September 7, ‘85) I read, “Captain Richard Burton, traveller and translator, intends to make all the money that there may be in his translation of the ‘Arabian Nights.’ * * * If he only fills his list, and collects his money, he will be in easy circumstances for the remainder of his days.” In a subsequent issue (October 24) readers are told that I have been requested not to publish the rest of the series under pain of legal prosecution. In the same paper (October 31, ‘85; see also November 7, ‘85) I find: —

  The authorities have discovered where Capt. Burton’s “Thousand and One Nights” is being printed, despite the author’s efforts to keep the place a secret, but are undecided whether to suppress it or to permit the publication of the coming volumes. Burton’s own footnotes are so voluminous that they exceed the letterpress of the text proper, and make up the bulk of the work.459 The foulness of the second volume of his translation places it at a much higher premium in the market than the first.

  The Tribune of Chicago (October 26,’85) honours me by declaring “It has been resolved to request Captain Burton not to publish the rest of his translation of the ‘Thousand and One Nights,’ which is really foul and slipshod as to style.” The New York Times (October 17 and November 9, ‘85) merely echoes the spite of its English confrere: —

  Capt. Burton’s translation of the “Arabian Nights” bears the imprint “Benares.” Of course the work never saw Benares. America, France, Belgium and Germany have all been suggested as the place of printing, and now the Pall Mall Gazette affirms that the work was done “north of the Tweed.” There is, without doubt, on British soil, it says, “a press which year after year produces scores of obscene publications.”

  And the same is the case with the St. Louis Post Dispatch (November 11, ‘85) the Mail Express of New York (November 23,’85); the Weekly Post of Boston (November 27 ‘85), which again revives a false report, and with the Boston Herald (December 16,’85). The Chicago Daily News (January 30, ‘86) contains a malicious sneer at the Kamashastra Society. The American Register (Paris, July 25, ‘86) informs its clientèle, “If, as is generally supposed, Captain Burton’s book is printed abroad, the probability is that every copy will on arrival be confiscated as ‘indecent’ by the Custom-house.” And to curtail a long list of similar fadaises I will quote the Bookmart (of Pittsburg, Pa., U.S.A., October, ‘86): “Sir Richard Burton’s ‘Nights’ are terribly in want of the fig-leaf, if anything less than a cabbage leaf will do, before they can be fit (fitted?) for family reading. It is not possible (Is it not possible?) that by the time a household selection has been sifted out of the great work, everything which makes the originality and the value — such as it is — of Richard’s series of volumes will have disappeared, and nothing will remain but his diverting lunacies of style.” The Bookmart, I am informed, is edited by one Halkett Lord, an unnaturalised Englishman who finds it pays best to abuse everything and everyone English. And lastly, the Springfield Republican (April 5, ‘88) assures me that I have published “fully as much as the (his?) world wants of the ‘Nights’.”

  In the case of “The Nights,” I am exposed to that peculiar Protestant form of hypocrisy, so different from the Tartuffean original of Catholicism, and still as mighty a motor force, throughout the length and breadth of the North-American continent, as within the narrow limits of England. There also as here it goes hand-in-hand with “Respectability” to blind judgment and good sense.

  A great surgeon of our day said (or is said to have said) in addressing his students:— “Never forget, gentlemen, that you have to deal with an ignorant public.” The dictum may fairly be extended from medical knowledge to general information amongst the many headed of England; and the Publisher, when rejecting a too recondite book, will repeat parrot-fashion, The English public is not a learned body. Equally valid is the statement in the case of the Anglo-American community which is still half-educated and very far from being erudite. The vast country has produced a few men of great and original genius, such as Emerson and Theodore Parker, Edgar Allan Poe and Walt Whitman; but the sum total is as yet too small to leaven the mighty mass which learns its rudiments at school and college and which finishes its education with the newspaper and the lecture. When Emerson died it was said that the intellectual glory of a continent had departed; but Edgar A. Poe, the peculiar poetic glory of the States, the first Transatlantic who dared be himself and who disdained to borrow from Schiller and Byron, the outlander poet who, as Edgar Allan Poe, is now the prime favourite in France, appears to be still under ban because he separated like Byron from his spouse, and he led a manner of so-called “Bohemian” life. Indeed the wide diffusion of letters in the States, that favourite theme
for boasting and bragging over the unenlightened and analphabetic Old World, has tended only to exaggerate the defective and disagreeable side of a national character lacking geniality and bristling with prickly individuality. This disposition of mind, whose favourable and laudable presentations are love of liberty and self-reliance, began with the beginnings of American history. The “Fathers,” Pilgrim and Puritan, who left their country for their country’s good and their own, fled from lay tyranny and clerkly oppression only to oppress and tyrannise over others in new and distant homes. Hardly had a century and a half elapsed before the sturdy colonists, who did not claim freedom but determined to keep it, formally revolted and fought their way to absolute independence — not, by the by, a feat whereof to be overproud when a whole country rose unanimously against a handful of troops. The movement, however, reacted powerfully upon the politics of Europe, which stood agape for change, and undoubtedly precipitated the great French Revolution. As soon as the States became an empire, their democratic and republican institutions at once attracted hosts of emigrants from the Old World, thus peopling the land with a selection of species: the active and the adventurous, the malcontent and the malefactor, readily expatriate themselves, while the pauvre diable remains at home. The potato-famine in Ireland (1848) gave an overwhelming impetus to the exode of a race which had never known a racial baptism; and, lastly, the Germans flying from the conscription, the blood tax of the Fatherland, carried with them over the ocean a transcendentalism which has engendered the wildest theories of socialism and communism. And the emigration process still continues. Whole regions, like the rugged Bocche di Cattaro in Dalmatia and pauper Iceland, are becoming depopulated to me the wonder is that a poor man ever consents to live out of America or a rich man to live.