National literatures of Arab States. It is often known in English as the Arabian Nights , from the first English-language edition c. The work was collected over many centuries by various authors, translators, and scholars across West Asia , Central Asia , South Asia , and North Africa. Some tales trace their roots back to ancient and medieval Arabic , Persian , and Mesopotamian literature. Common to all the editions of the Nights is the framing device of the story of the ruler Shahryar being narrated the tales by his wife Scheherazade , with one tale told over each night of storytelling.
The stories proceed from this original tale; some are framed within other tales, while some are self-contained. Some editions contain only a few hundred nights of storytelling, while others include or more.
The bulk of the text is in prose , although verse is occasionally used for songs and riddles and to express heightened emotion. Most of the poems are single couplets or quatrains , although some are longer.
Some of the stories commonly associated with the Arabian Nights —particularly " Aladdin and the Wonderful Lamp " and " Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves "—were not part of the collection in the original Arabic versions, but were instead added to the collection by French translator Antoine Galland after he heard them from Syrian writer Hanna Diyab during the latter's visit to Paris.
Discovering that his own wife's infidelity has been even more flagrant, he has her killed. In his bitterness and grief, he decides that all women are the same. Eventually the Vizier Wazir , whose duty it is to provide them, cannot find any more virgins.
