Home :: Books :: Audiocassettes  

Arts & Photography
Audio CDs
Audiocassettes

Biographies & Memoirs
Business & Investing
Children's Books
Christianity
Comics & Graphic Novels
Computers & Internet
Cooking, Food & Wine
Entertainment
Gay & Lesbian
Health, Mind & Body
History
Home & Garden
Horror
Literature & Fiction
Mystery & Thrillers
Nonfiction
Outdoors & Nature
Parenting & Families
Professional & Technical
Reference
Religion & Spirituality
Romance
Science
Science Fiction & Fantasy
Sports
Teens
Travel
Women's Fiction
The Arabian Nights: The Book of a Thousand Nights and a Night

The Arabian Nights: The Book of a Thousand Nights and a Night

List Price: $17.98
Your Price: $12.23
Product Info Reviews

<< 1 2 3 >>

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Hauntingly beautiful
Review: A hauntingly beautiful book; I fell in love with the wild, strange, exotic prose style. To the reader who was bored at having to look up so many words, I recommend _See Spot Run_.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: The most insteresting and provocative classic I have read.
Review: Arabian Nights is a great book. With around 50 stories in 600 pages, it is not only a good read, but has more adventure, mystery, and fantasy than sny European book. Arabian Nights is funny at times, yet sad (and even perverted) at others. It gives the reader a good sense of the corruption in old Arabia, and the grandness of the empire. This book is a definite read for anyone who longs for adventure.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Shocking and fun
Review: Considered by most to be the definitive translation of this cobble of stories, some of which were truly old, others of which the ink was barely dry when the translation was started. By now incorporated into almost every facet of Western society, nevertheless these tales are still a good read, with some interesting things to say and a very interesting point of view on life.

Rating: 2 stars
Summary: Better to read about Burton than something by Burton.
Review: I gave this edition one star for entertainment, one star for Burton's scholarship.

This is undoubtly a faithful edition of the "Nights" and A.S. Byatt's introduction is almost worth the cost of the paperback, but did any single reader at Random House try this as a member of the general public? I bet not. The reading experience is crushed under the weight and volume of Burton's notes. While quite a few of the notes provide good anthropological and lingistic background, many are of the "I,m right, he's wrong" academic in-fighting variety. The sheer volume alone, 121 multi-line notes in the 76 page "The Porter and the Three Ladies of Bagdad" tale cause the reader to easily lose the thread and narritive power of any story. The fact that all the notes are grouped and numbered individually by tale means you spend a considerable amount of your reading time flipping through pages at the end of the book looking for the particular tale you are in and then the specific note. I ended up having a bookmark for my progress through the "Nights" and another one to find my way through Burton's notes. But it was still not enough. Sometimes there were six lengthy notes to a single page of text. Editor: If you are going to do that, remember the footnote? It sits at the foot of the page as a convenience for the reader.

Burton, himself, is quite fasinating. I highly recomend "Captain Sir Richard Francis Burton" by Edward Rice and "The White Nile" by Alan Moorehead, but for now I'll give this "Nights" a pass.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Classic for all ages
Review: I have been searching for an Arabian Nights book for months. The only books I found were rewrites for children. Then I came across this masterpiece. While it was alittle hard to read at first (because of the old english used), I was soon drawn into the enchanting stories held within. This has all the classic "Nights" tales that we grew up with (Alladin, Ali Babba, Sinbad) plus many, many more! They will undoubtably grab you and draw you in. I highly recommend this to anyone! You won't be dissapointed!

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Fascinating, bawdy and adventurous!!!!
Review: I have read this book several times, I love it, it takes one into the fascinating world of magic. Lots of admonitions. A bit bawdy. Recommend to everybody.

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: most of these reviews are not for this book
Review: I just wanted to point out that most of these reviews refer to the previous version of this book that is no longer available from .... I gave this book its average grade, because as of yet I've not read this SEQUEL. Please note that this book does not contain Sinbad, Aladin, or many of the other classic stories (though it does seem to expand on the shortened earlier edition). Check the chapters to make sure you're getting the right book. Given the original however (which I have read) I'm sure this is an excellent edition of the tales.

Encourage ... to not only carry this book, but its predecessor too.

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: most of these reviews are not for this book
Review: I just wanted to point out that most of these reviews refer to the previous version of this book that is no longer available from .... I gave this book its average grade, because as of yet I've not read this SEQUEL. Please note that this book does not contain Sinbad, Aladin, or many of the other classic stories (though it does seem to expand on the shortened earlier edition). Check the chapters to make sure you're getting the right book. Given the original however (which I have read) I'm sure this is an excellent edition of the tales.

Encourage ... to not only carry this book, but its predecessor too.

Rating: 1 stars
Summary: The Reader distroys the experience
Review: I love arabian nights it has always been a favorite of mine, but the reader of this audio book is so boring, it makes it seem like he is reading the entire book in verse. He has a set melody he reads to; like a rollercoster he has to make his voice go up and down even if it is so completely contrary to the story , so that he is emphasizing words based on this sing song not on what is actually happening in the story. It is like he is reading rhyming poetry badly, or singing some kind of spoken song, but what becomes lost is the actual content of the story. he is more concerned with making the words patterned in some rigid way, that the story is unimportant. Which is the very thing that is wonderful about the arabian nights, the stories.

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: Childhood Memories
Review: I read an abridged version as a youngster many, many years ago, before I discovered and became passionate about Sir Richard F. Burton and his exploits, and have continued to reread the book throughout my life. Because I move around so much, and always give the book to good friends as a present, I find myself having to buy it again and again. Of course I don't mind at all! The tales always take me back to that first time I read them, and bring me forward as I read them into my own life. It's like a story within the story. I am looking forward to giving this book to my children as a present. It will be fantastic! I'll introduce them to Burton and let the book's magic capture their imaginations, just like it did me.


<< 1 2 3 >>

© 2004, ReviewFocus or its affiliates