One Thousand and One Nights

Written by Amiel Clarke | 25 August 2011

Bound by the efforts of director Tim Supple, the Lebanese novelist Hanan al-Shaykh, nineteen actors and five musicians, One Thousand and One Nights is an enterprise within itself that makes for a glorious three hours of storytelling one cannot help but delight in hearing.

With its cast plucked from every corner of the Middle East, Hanan al-Shaykh’s adaptation of Nights reflects this multiplicity, moving freely between the three great languages of Arabic, English and French. In this, the second part of the saga, the key theme of the conflict between punitive men and resourceful women continues to hold sway. First, we hear the stories of five sisters viciously wronged by men: one bears the scars of a lecherous shopkeeper’s bite on her cheek, while two others reveal how, turned into dogs, they were whipped each night until they bled and were on the edge of death. We also hear the tale of the cunning woman who humiliated a  Wāli, a qadi, a vizier, a carpenter and a king by trapping them in a cage when her pleas for justice were met with their lubricious sexual advances.

Listening to these lucid tales unravel before you, and in the most beautiful of tongues, is a pleasure. The cast devotedly bring to life the great spirit of adventure, passion, injustice and playfulness of Nights; Rachid El Adouani, Nanda Mohammad and Houda Echouafni particularly give it their all.

It was therefore a huge frustration that the subtitles, shown on screens flanking the stage, were so often out of sync with the unfolding narrative. Be it due to technical or human error, this defect really did undermine the show. 

One Thousand and One Nights: Part 2, Royal Lyceum Theatre, 21, 24, 26 - 28 & 31 Aug, 1 - 3 Sept, 7.00 pm