Arabian Nights

[Donatien]

The oriental story collection known under the name Arabian Nights contains many erotic stories and anecdotes. Heavy BDSM may be a scarce commodity, but some kinky action can be found. Here are a couple of samples...
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Interested in more delights from the 1001 Nights?
www.manybooks.net provides the entire text for free as part of the Gutenberg Project.
In a library or bookstore, just look for any unabridged edition.
Not a children's edition purged of sexual content. Enjoy.

My complete edition is translated into english from the literal and complete french translation of Dr J.C.Mardrus by Powers Mathers published in paper back in 1986 by Routledge, and reprinted in1993 [isbn 0-415-04543-6]

Here is a brief episode which gives a flavour of the books and the translation.

THE THOUSAND NIGHTS,AND ONE NIGHTS
Inscription on a Chemise
Then Shahrazad said:
IT is related that al-Amin, brother of the Khalifah al-Mamun, I on going one day to visit his uncle al-Mahdi, saw a very beautiful young slave playing the lute, and fell in love with her. Al-Mahdi noticed the impression which the child had made upon his nephew and, wishing to give him an agreeable present, waited until he had gone and then sent the slave after him, loaded with jewels and very richly dressed. But al-Amin, knowing that his uncle had a great reputation as a lover of still unripe fruit, imagined that he had had first use of the slave; therefore he did not wish to accept her and sent her back with a letter, saying that apples which the gardener had bitten before they were ripe were not popular in the market.
Al-Mahdi at once undressed the girl, placed a lute in her hand, and sent her back again to al-Amin, dressed only in a silk chemise over which ran this inscription in letters of gold:

No hand has been allowed to touch The rose I hide,
Though eyes have looked upon it and desired it.
Surely the thought of all this foiled desire Should feed your fire.

on seeing the girl's charms displayed by this delightful garment on reading the inscription, al-Amin accepted the gift as one of most pleasant he had ever had.


As I said in the thread on music, I have for as long as I can remember found the world of the arabian nights , intnsely sensual, erotic voluptuous, and barbaric, an extremely BDSM ambience pervades it even though there is little that is explicitly so. At school, of all places we read in class the play "Hassan", now probably remembered for the incidental music written for it by Delius the most popular number being the serenade with its violin solo. It was written by James Elroy Fletcher who died in 1915 aged only 31, leaving the play complete but uncorrected.
In the play a middle aged confectioner Hassan who saves the life of the calif through overhearing and reporting a plot against him, is honoured at court. But then a rebel Rafi who was involved in the plot that Hassan, had over heard and aborted is captured; and It turns out that his betrothed Pervaneh was abducted and sold as slave to the caliphs harem. When the caliph hears their story he offers them a choice, either Pervaneh returns to the harem and Rafi leaves Bagdad for ever, or they may spend one day of love together and then be tortured slowly to death in front of each other and the court.After some anguish, they choose the one day of love.when the the confectioner protests to the caliph that he is too cruel he is forced to watch their execution. ythis is the scene as written:--

"Come now, a sweet lie first, Yasmin: sing a little how you love me. Show me your beauty limb by limb - then bring, ah, bring your new lover - mock my moon-touched verses and call me the fool, the old fool, the weary fool I am!
Y A S M I N : I will not yet call Hassan a fool. Hassan has fallen from power, but he need not fall from riches. The Palace Confectioner, Hassan, may still become the richest merchant in Bagdad.
HA S S A N : Thou harlot, thou harlot, thou harlot!
Y A S M I N : Why art thou angry? In what have I insulted thee? HASSAN : Oh, if it were thou about to suffer! If it were thou ! YASMIN (staring across the garden and forgetting xnssnN):
At last, at last! - the Procession of Protracted Death! I shall see it all!
A deep red afterglow illumines the back of the garden. Across the garden towards the door of the pavilion moves in black silhouettes the Procession of Protracted Death, of which the order is this:
MASRUR, naked, with his scimitar.
Four assistant torturers in black holding steel implements. Two men in armour bearing a lighted brazier slung between them on a pole.
Two men bearing a monstrous wheel. Four men carrying the rack.
A man with a hammer and a whip.
PERVANEx arid RAFI, half naked, pulling a cart that bears their coffins: their legs drag great chains.
Behind each of them walks a soldier with uplifted sword.
MASRUR knocks at the door of the Pavilion: the Slaves open and flee in terror at the sight. The light of the brazier glows through the windows. The Soldiers who guard PERVANEx and RAFt unhook the chai ns that chain them to the cart, and placing their hands on the necks of the prisoners push them in. The four Slaves of the house then appear under the guidance of the man with the whip and lift in the coffins. Lastly, xnssAN is taken by his two Guards and forced to enter. The stage grows dark, save for the shining of the light from the windows. In the silence rises the splashing of the fountain and the whirring and whirling of a wheel. The sounds blend and grow unendurably insistent, and with them music begins to play softly. A cry of pain is half smothered by the violins. At last the silver light of the moon floods the garden. HASSAN, thrust forth by his Guards, appears at the door of the pavilion. His face is white and haggard: he totters a,few steps and finally falls in a faint in the shadow of the fountain. The coffins are brought out, nailed down, and placed in the cart. The Soldiers pull the cart in place of the prisoners, and what remains of the procession departs in reverse order. MASRUR only has lingered by the door. YASMIN is clutching at his arm.
Y A S M I N : Masrur - thou dark Masrur ! MASRUR: Allah - the woman! YASMIN: How you smell of blood! MASRUR: And you of roses.
YASMIN: I laughed to see them writhe - I laughed, I laughed, as I watched behind the curtain. Why did you drink his veins?
MASRUR: A VOW.
Y A S M I N : Will you not drink mine also?
M A S R U R : Shall I put my arms around you?
Y A S M I N : Your arms are walls of black and shining stone. Your breast is the castle of the night.
MAS.RUR: Little white moth, I will crush you to my heart.
YASMIN (with a sudden cry of terror, struggling from his embrace a moment after) : Ah, let me go. Do you hear them? Do you hear them? ...
M A S R U R : What is there to hear but the noises of the night?
YASMIN (springing away): The flowers are talking . . . the garden is alive.... (She falls.)
M A S R U R (stooping to carry her) : She loves blood and is fright*ened of the moon. She is smooth and white. I will take her home.
Enter Isxnx searching for xnssAN.
ISHAK: Hassan - where doth he he? Haman, oh Hassan. Thou hast broken that gentle heart, Haroun, and I have broken my lute: I play no more for thee. Ah, why did they not tell me sooner - I fear his reason may have fled before I find him. Hassan.
It is he: he lies just as I first saw him: beneath a 'fountain, face toward the moon. His life is rhyming like a song: it harks back to the old refrain. Is life a mirror wherein events show double?
HASSAN (half waking from his swoon): Swans that drift into the mist....
Isxnx (bending over him to raise him): Friend, I am glad to hear thy voice. Rise, rise, thou art in a pitiable case. HASSAN (faintly): Let me lie.... This place is quiet, and the earth smells cool.
ISHAK; You are alive - you have your reason. Why do you despair? Be brave: I know you have suffered.
HA S S A N : She was brave. Ah, her hands, her hands!.........."

Below is a reproduction of Delacroix's death of Sardanapolis which although depicting the assyrian period, captures the ambience I have talked about , perfectly.