Literature
Somayeh alsadat Tabatabaei
Abstract
Abstract
Shahrzad in Arabic Nights is not the only one who tells stories to escape from death; "Bondwoman" also clings to the thread of the story to escape from it. In competition with seven ministers, she tells stories about men's tricks and "Fountain of Magic" is one of them. ...
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Abstract
Shahrzad in Arabic Nights is not the only one who tells stories to escape from death; "Bondwoman" also clings to the thread of the story to escape from it. In competition with seven ministers, she tells stories about men's tricks and "Fountain of Magic" is one of them. Although this story is told in the language of a bondwoman and in defense of women, but in that "being a woman" is the worst calamity that can befall a man. Therefore, Egyptian feminist critics in the book: "(female) narrator said; Women's stories inspired by popular Arabic folktales", have emphasized it and tried to recreate it from a woman-centered point of view. "The story of Fahd in women world" and "The Fountain of life" are the results of this effort. We have used two approaches to read these women's narratives: Tzvetan Todorov's structuralist approach and feminist analysis. This choice has two reasons: First, the feminist analysis shows why the mentioned story is anti-feminist and it needs a feminine rewrite. It also clarifies how the feminist critics in their newly created narratives have erased the anti-feminist strains from "Fountain of Magic". Second, in the structural analysis of the narrative, we are going to to find out can such a reading help in receiving the anti-feminist strains of a text or understanding the female perspective in another text? The application of Todorov's poetic in its syntactic layer shows that all three narratives; the narrative of Arabic Nights and the woman's retellings, have a similar structure that fits into Todorov's model. But this approach fails to reveal and evaluate those layers of the text that are important for feminist critics. The application of Todorov's poetic in its syntactic layer shows that all three narratives; the narrative of Arabic Nights and the woman's retellings, have a similar structure that fits into Todorov's model. But this approach fails to reveal and evaluate those layers of the text that are important for feminist critics.
