Description
“Completely beguiling.”—William Dalrymple, author of The Golden Road
Finding Aladdin is a tale full of strange and wonderful twists that celebrates one of the world’s greatest storytellers.
When The Thousand and One Nights were first translated into European languages in the 1700s, they caused a sensation—and none more so than “Aladdin,” the tale of a good-for-nothing layabout who happened on a magic lamp. Always the most popular of the Nights stories, “Aladdin” mystified scholars for 300 years; while they could trace other tales from Arab and Persian folklore, this one seemed to have been charmed out of thin air.
Then a tattered, anonymous manuscript was discovered in the Vatican. It revealed Aladdin’s creator to be Hanna Diab, a young Syrian who had travelled to Paris with a French treasure hunter. Even more amazing, it showed that Hanna had conjured the story from his own extraordinary adventures.
In a captivating narrative of literary deduction, Matthew Teller restores authorship to a master storyteller.
Praise for Finding Aladdin
“A beautifully written tale of tales, and a work of remembrance and recovery, of stories and lies, theft and justice. Superb stuff—completely beguiling.”
—William Dalrymple, author of The Golden Road
“Eloquent and informative, Finding Aladdin challenges self-aggrandising narratives of orientalist learning. It is a pleasure to read.”
—Abdulrazak Gurnah, author of Paradise
“I love this book. I was utterly dazzled by it. Matthew Teller takes us on a breathtaking journey that is full of surprises, one that unearths a lost piece of history, and a person once buried in the shadows of fiction and stereotype. This book is truly a jewel. I could not put it down.”
—Moudhy Al-Rashid, author of Between Two Rivers
“A fascinating and entertaining book—Hanna Diab would have loved it! Author Matthew Teller draws upon admirably comprehensive knowledge of the historical context and existing scholarship, combined with a flair for intuitive interpretation. He is a storyteller as gifted as his subject.”
—Ulrich Marzolph, professor of Arabic and Islamic Studies, University of Göttingen
“A history of the Aladdin story that will enthrall readers.”
—Ruth Bottigheimer, author of Fairy Tales: A New History
“A fascinating look at the original teller of one of our most enduring stories—Aladdin; a tale younger than most included in the collected 1001 Arabian Nights. A young man of Aleppo who struck off on a years long adventure ending in France weaves this engaging tale for an author looking for more stories to publish, who then passes it off as his own. His story, a tale as old as time, where stories are appropriated, change, and evolve, while the originators are lost to history.”
—Alana Haley, Schuler Books (Grand Rapids, MI)
“Matthew Teller offers us a new account of the captivating history of the 1001 Nights. He writes with the talent of a storyteller and the skill of a historian.”
—Bernard Heyberger, Director of Studies at the École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales
Praise for Nine Quarters of Jerusalem
“Engaging . . . Teller is an informed, enthusiastic guide to one of the most contested sites in the world.”
—Financial Times
“As labyrinthine as the city it describes . . . a curious, offbeat biography that comes alive through the many gathered voices.”
—Critic
“Highly perceptive and readable . . . Presents a subtle portrait of the current reality at the heart of the world’s most intractable and divisive conflict . . . Fascinating.”
—Ian Black, Observer
