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The Iraqi culture of “Thousand and one Nights”
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Faleh Saleh
Most of the people
who deal with the Orient know that “1001-nights” is a collection
of nice fairytales from the golden time of Baghdad. That is
right. But what many people may don’t know is that these fairytales
are still part of the Iraqi culture.
“1001-nights” is the culture
of giving advice or words of wisdom by using stories. The
trigger for them was initially to give king Shehreaar words
of wisdom to make him rule his people prudently. Shehrezad
was the daughter of his wise minister.
She was a wise girl and had the talent to
embed her advices and words of wisdom in the stories she told
king Shehreaar.
Some people in those fairytales saved their
life from a bad ghost through telling him a good story. A
good story or good tale must always have a good advise or
a wisdom that deal with the situation that happed to the juncture
of the conversation.
People in Iraq still use this culture in
their conversations to give examples of specific situations
as an aid. They explain a meaning or compare a situation from
a specific fairytale with the situation they talk about in
their conversation. It is a continuation of the old Iraqi
culture.
“Thousand and one Night” as a culture is
actually an endless and continued collection of fairytales.
Everytime something interesting happens to somebody and could
be used for a wise saying it will be added as a story to this
collection and becomes part of it. Not all the collections
is necessarily known for everyone. Different people make different
experiences and consequently produce different stories.
Somebody may tells you for
example that you behave like this or that person. A person
from a particular fairytale or story. So if you know this
fairytale, then you know what the speaker means, otherwise
you may ask him, what he means.
He will tell you about the
person and the situation he means using a story or a fairytale.
You can then continue your arguing or conversation.
You will try to remember
the fairytale and add it to your own collection and use it
in your conversation with other people.
People who know many of
such fairytales and stories are a respected persons in Iraq
and welcome guests in meetings and events.
The Stories can have different lengths but they still based
on the same idea.
Part2
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