Isak Dinesen: To Be a Scheherazade

Paper Summary:

This paper analyzes the work of Isak Dinesen, a modern short story writer equated with Scheherazade. The paper discusses Dinesen's writing-style, which the author says is best enjoyed by those who want to read something that is neither real nor ever could be real. The paper then reviews one of Dinesen's stories, entitled "The Immortal Story", about Mr. Clay, an old, immensely rich tea trader who lives in Canton and does not have the best of a reputation. The paper shows how this story demonstrates Dinesen's powerful story-telling abilities.

From the Paper:

"Isak Dinesen's desire to be a storyteller and her ability to write as one, render her a modern day Scheherazade. In the book, "1001 Arabian Nights," there is a young woman named Scheherazade who had to tell stories every day in order to live. The frame tale goes that Shahryar, the King, would marry a virgin every day and he would send the wife from the day before to be beheaded. He did this because he was very angry since his first wife, of many years, had been betraying him. By the time Scheherazade came along, Shahryar had killed three thousand virgins. Scheherazade volunteered to spend one night with the King. When she was in the King's chambers, Scheherazade asked if she could say goodbye one last time to her sister Dunyazad. Dunyazad came into the King's chambers and had been secretly prepared to ask Scheherazade to tell a story during the night. The King lay awake and listened with awe to Scheherazade's first story and asked for another, but Scheherazade said there wasn't time as dawn was breaking, and regretfully so, as the next story was even more exciting. And so the King kept Scheherazade alive as he eagerly anticipated each new story, until, one thousand and one adventurous nights, and three sons later, the King had not only been entertained but wisely educated in morality and kindness by Scheherazade who became his Queen."

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