Department of Persian Language and Literature, Faculty of Humanities, Vali-e-Asr University, Rafsanjan, Iran.
Abstract
Sindbadnama of Zahiri Samarqandi is one of the Persian fiction texts composed of one main story and several internal stories. It is narrated in several Arabic and Persian texts, including folklore Arabic Sinbadnama, Alif Laila and Laila (the Arabian Nights), Tutinama (Tales of a Parrot) of Nakhshabi, and Jami al-Hikayat. The research questions seek to find the differences in these texts in the narration of the main story and internal stories, and whether the examination of these differences can shed light on some of the ambiguities of this story in Zahiri’s narration. To answer these questions, we used the American school of comparative literature studies. Zahiri’s narration was the main focus and the others were compared with that version. The comparison showed that in the main story, in some narrations, more attention was paid to the details and cause and effect relationships. Accordingly, according to Zahiri’s narration, some ambiguities of the main story can be resolved. This is one of the goals of comparing and writing this article. The inner stories in these texts were not exactly the same. Some of the internal stories were common to all the texts we discussed, with slight differences. Some other stories were mentioned in Zahiri’s narration and not in other narrations. On the contrary, some stories were mentioned in other narrations and were not in Zahiri’s. Many factors have caused these differences: the place of translation or compilation and the translator and the author's imagination, creativity, or intention.
Comparative Literature Research
