Newland, Amy Reigle; with an essay by Oikawa, Shigeru:Time Present and Time Past: Images of a Forgotten Master: Toyohara Kunichika 1835-1900
- eerste uitgave 1999, ISBN: 9789074822114
gebonden uitgave
Blue cloth binding with gilt title and turban figures on the front board. All edges gilt.The History of the Arabian Nights One Thousand and One Nights The Origins of the Arabian Nights … Meer...
Blue cloth binding with gilt title and turban figures on the front board. All edges gilt.The History of the Arabian Nights One Thousand and One Nights The Origins of the Arabian Nights Arabian Nights, more properly known as One Thousand and One Nights is a collection of Middle Eastern and South Asian stories and folk tales, compiled in Arabic during the Islamic Golden Age. This period lasted from the eighth century to the thirteenth century, when much of the Arabic-speaking world experienced a scientific, economic, and cultural flourishing One Thousand and One Nights epitomising the rich and multifaceted literary output. The title Arabian Nights came from the first English language edition (1706), which rendered the title as The Arabian Nights' Entertainment. The work itself was collected over many centuries by various authors, translators, and scholars across West, Central, South Asia and North Africa. The tales are many and varied, but common throughout all the narratives is the initial frame story of the ruler Shahryr, and his wife Scheherazade. One day, King Shahryr discovers that his wife has been unfaithful. Consequently, he has her executed. But in his bitterness and grief, he decides that all women are the same. Shahryr begins to marry a succession of virgins only to execute each one the next morning before she has a chance to dishonour him. Eventually, the vizier, whose duty it is to provide them, cannot find any more virgins. Scheherazade, the vizier's daughter, offers herself as the next bride and her father reluctantly agrees. On the night of their marriage, Scheherazade begins to tell the King a tale but does not end it. The King, curious about how the story ends, is thus forced to postpone her execution in order to hear the conclusion. The next night, as soon as she finishes the tale, she begins (and only begins) a new one, and the King, eager to hear the conclusion, postpones her execution once again. So it goes on for 1,001 nights.The Variety of Themes The different versions have different, individually detailed endings. In some, Scheherazade asks for a pardon, in some, the King sees their children and decides not to execute his wife, in others, things happen that make the King distracted but they all end with the king giving his wife a pardon and sparing her life. The One Thousand and One Nights and various tales within it make use of many innovative literary techniques, which the storytellers of the tales rely on for increased drama and suspense. It is one of the earliest examples of 'embedded narratives' which can be traced back to earlier Persian and Indian storytelling traditions, most notably the Panchatantra (an ancient Indian collection of interrelated animal fables in verse and prose). Across the collection, the tales vary extremely widely. They include historical tales, love stories, tragedies, comedies, poems, burlesques, and various forms of erotica. Numerous stories depict ghouls, apes, sorcerers, magicians, and legendary places, which are often intermingled with real people and geography. The narrator's standards for what constitutes a cliff-hanger seem broader than in modern literature. While in many cases a story is cut off with the hero in danger of losing his life or another kind of deep trouble, in some parts, Scheherazade stops her narration in the middle of an exposition of abstract philosophical principles or complex points of Islamic philosophy, and in one case during a detailed description of human anatomy according to Galen. In all these cases, she is justified in her belief that the King's curiosity about the sequel would buy her another day of life. Some of the stories widely associated with The Nights, in particular 'Aladdin's Wonderful Lamp', 'Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves', and 'The Seven Voyages of Sinbad the Sailor', while almost certainly genuine Middle-Eastern folk tales, were not part of The Nights in its original Arabic versions, but were added to the collection by Antoine Galland (1646 1715) and other European translators.The History of the Arabian Nights Stories The history of the Nights is extremely complex, and modern scholars have made many attempts to untangle the story of how the collection came about. Most scholars agree that is was a composite work, coming from India and Persia. At some time (probably in the early eighth century), these tales were translated into Arabic under the title Alf Layla, or 'The Thousand Nights'. The original core of stories was probably quite small, with Arabic stories added to it in the 9th and 10th centuries. Previously independent sagas and story cycles may have been added later, as the tales moved through Syria and Egypt many showing a preoccupation with sex, magic or low life. The first European version (1704 1717) was translated into French by Antoine Galland, from an Arabic text of the Syrian recension. This twelve-volume work, Les Mille et une nuits, contes arabes traduits en français ('Thousand and one Nights, Arab stories translated into French'), included many stories that were not in the original Arabic manuscript. He wrote that he heard them from a Syrian Christian storyteller from Aleppo and a Maronite scholar whom he called 'Hanna Diab'. The text was an immediate best-seller throughout Europe, and numerous other translations soon appeared. As scholars were looking for the presumed 'complete' and 'original' form of the Nights, they naturally turned to the more voluminous texts of the Egyptian recension, which soon came to be viewed as the 'standard version'. The first translations of this kind, such as that of Edward Lane (1840, 1859), were bowdlerised. Unabridged and unexpurgated translations were made, first by John Payne, under the title The Book of the Thousand Nights and One Night (1882, nine volumes), and then by Sir Richard Francis Burton, entitled The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night (1885, ten volumes). In view of the sexual imagery in the source texts (which Burton even emphasised further, especially by adding extensive footnotes and appendices on Oriental sexual mores) and the strict Victorian laws on obscene material, both of these translations were printed as private editions for subscribers only, rather than published in the usual manner. Illustrated Editions With such scandalous and ingenious subject matter Arabian Nights has captured the imagination of many great artists. Famous illustrators of the British editions include John Tenniel and John Everett Millais for Dalziel's Illustrated Arabian Nights Entertainments, published in 1865; Walter Crane for Aladdin's Picture Book (1876); Albert Letchford for the 1897 edition of Burton's translation; Edmund Dulac for Stories from the Arabian Nights (1907), Princess Badoura (1913) and Sindbad the Sailor & Other Tales from the Arabian Nights (1914). Others artists include John D. Batten, (Fairy Tales From The Arabian Nights, 1893), Kay Nielsen, Maxfield Parrish, and W. Heath Robinson.Thomas Bolton Gilchrist Septimius Dalziel (18231906) was an engraver known chiefly for his illustrations of the work of Charles Dickens. Thomas Dalziel produced many illustrations for books published by the family firm, the Brothers Dalziel. Many of his designs are considered by Philip Allingham (Faculty of Education, Lakehead University, Thunder Bay, Ontario) to be workmanlike rather than anything more inspired, although he considers Thomas Dalziel's illustrations for Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress and The Arabian Nights to be above average., George Routledge & Sons., 1889, 3, London/ Leyden: Al-Furqan Islamic Heritage Foundation/ Brill, 1999. 1st edition. Hardcover. Fine/Very good. London/ Leyden etc., Al-Furqan Islamic Heritage Foundation/ Brill, 1999, XXVIII,(2),large 4to., 12 x 9", 638 pp. richly illustrated., diagrams, orig. cloth with dust wrapper. -- -- Two remarkable Iranian world-maps were discovered in 1989 and 1995. Both are made of brass and date from 17th-century Iran. Mecca is at the center and a highly sophisticated longitude and latitude grid enables the user to determine the direction and distance to Mecca for anywhere in the world between Andalusia and China. Prior to the discovery of these maps it was thought that such cartographic grids were conceived in Europe ca. 1910. This richly-illustrated book presents an overview of the ways in which Muslims over the centuries have determined the sacred direction towards Mecca (qibla) and then describes the two world-maps in detail. The author shows that the geographical data derives from a 15th-century Central Asian source and that the mathematics underlying the grid was developed in 9th-century Baghdad. (Brill) David A. King, Ph.D. (1972) in Near Eastern Languages and Literatures, Yale University, is Professor of the History of Science at the J.W. Goethe University in Frankfurt. He has published extensively on medieval Islamic astronomy and astronomical instruments., Al-Furqan Islamic Heritage Foundation/ Brill, 1999, 4, Hotei Publishing, Leiden, 1999 Book. Very Good. Hardcover. 1st Edition. English text; Hardcover (with dust jacket); 29.5 x 29.5 cm; 1.7 kg; 175 pages with colour illustrations.; Minor signs of wear on the exterior and interior. The dust jacket show signs of wear, namely some minor scratches and wear signs. Interior in very good condition. Very good condition overall.; The Japanese woodblock-print designer Toyohara Kunichika (1835-1900) was active during the second half of the 19th century when Japan experienced immense political, social and cultural changes following the restoration of imperial rule under the Meiji emperor. Many traditional arts were challenged by this new age and the art of the woodblock print (ukiyo-e), unable to continue as it once had, entered into its final period. In the past, scholars and collectors have frequently dismissed ukiyo-e print designers in this area as insignificant, representing the dernise of the ukiyo-e tradition. However, in recent years the prints of a number of these artists have been re- evaluated. Time present and time past: images of a forgotten master, Toyohara Kunichika (1835- 1900) is the first publication in English to treat in detail the life and work of Kunichika, who is considered today one of the last ukiyo-e masters. Kunichika's designs were drawn from established ukiyo-e genres. Ranging from actor prints (yakusha-e), prints of beautiful women (bijinga) to sumo and historical scenes. However, Kunichika was also a man of his time and this is reflected in his use of colour, composition and subjects. In Time present and time past, author Amy Reigle Newland draws on Japanese and Western- language sources to present an overview of Kunichika's life and his prints. She provides a biographical sketch of Kunichika's life, which is followed by sections on the artists prints of beautiful women and actors. In addition the Japanese scholar Shigeru Oikawa presents an essay on Kunichika's fruitful collaboration with the flamboyant painter Kawanabe Kyosai (1831-89). The illustration of over 135 prints by Kunichika, an extensive bibliography, appendices containing carvers seals and Kunichika's representative signature forms make Time present and time past an important contribution to our understanding of this little-known Meiji-period print artist.., Hotei Publishing, Leiden, 1999, 3<
