Reviews tagging 'Domestic abuse'

The Annotated Arabian Nights: Tales from 1001 Nights by Anonymous

3 reviews

morebedsidebooks's review

4.0

The Annotated Arabian Nights represents a of selection of folktales from what is (without the orientalist moniker) properly titled the One Thousand and One Nights, giving a sample of a newer contemporary translation by Yasmine Seale alongside analysis. 

Although this book does not quite reflect Seale’s thinking on the Nights, her translation is engaging and clear in attention to cadence, rhyme, especially verse, and the voice of Shahrazad. While, like her visual poem “Sleepless” of Shahrazad’s waking eye, illuminating texts for modern audiences and up out of previous liberties taken by many. A labor sure to produce something glorious when that edition arrives in full. In the time being, the Annotated Arabian Nights is an immense book more suited to coffee tables and academic interest.

See an in-depth review on my blog. 

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Confinement, Kidnapping, Death, Violence, Sexual content, Infidelity, Alcohol, Racism, Sexual assault, Misogyny, Murder, and Torture

Minor: Suicidal thoughts, Pregnancy, Incest, Animal cruelty, Cannibalism, Domestic abuse, Fire/Fire injury, Blood, Miscarriage, Infertility, Animal death, and Antisemitism

Dalila the Crafty includes drugging men and stealing their clothes.

carefulfearanddeaddevotion's review against another edition

adventurous funny mysterious

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.5

 some of the stories were repetitive or dragged on for too long, but mostly captivating and oftentimes funny

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Violence, Death, Domestic abuse, Sexism, Confinement, Physical abuse, and Kidnapping

Moderate: Sexual harassment, Torture, Racism, Murder, Injury/Injury detail, Classism, Slavery, and Alcohol

Minor: Animal cruelty

kake's review against another edition

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Strong character development? No

3.75

I must admit this was a bit of a slog in the middle part. Many aspects of the stories are somewhat repetitive, and there’s only so much heterosexual longing a person can take (there’s one story where literally the only things that happen are: man and woman see each other and fall instantly in love, man and woman hang out together twice, man and woman die of love because they can’t be together). It picks up toward the end though.

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Racism, Ableism, and Domestic abuse

More specifics on the racism: there’s an awful lot of anti-blackness in the plots of these stories.