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Comparing Storytelling In Dante's Inferno And The Arabian Nights

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Introduction “We tell ourselves stories in order to live” by Joan Dideon in the book The White Album. How many times have you told a story from your own personal experience to get an idea across to someone, or tell another’s experience? How many times have you heard a story and suddenly felt your eyes open to a new way of thinking? We have all experienced these moments many times throughout our lives. In both Dante’s Inferno and The Arabian Nights, we see that storytelling saves lives. Telling tales is a way of living, from the moment we are born to our last breath telling-tales is imbedded in us.
What is storytelling?
Stories is an essential part of our societies and cultures. Movies, shows, dramas books, music, painting, news, religion, …show more content…

Spiritually lost and wandering away from the path of righteousness and of God. Dante has become weak and is in need of guidance. Storytelling is a way to teach moral values and to guide those who are lost. Throughout the Inferno, Dante the poet uses storytelling as a way to save his life in a sense, to confess one’s sins, and as a way for immortality. Dante’s sinners tell stories to him and he reflects it on to himself. Meaning, that certain stories that are being told to him makes him feel remorse; as though he is guilty of the same …show more content…

In the main story of the Arabian Nights, Shahrazad believes that the power of her tales will be able to keep King Shahryar from killing her or any more innocent women. Storytelling for Shahrazad is life, it isn’t only life for her but for the King, the young women in the kingdom, and society. Shahrazad is the storyteller, she carries out message, information, and knowledge, in an enjoyable way for the King. Shahrazad tells stories that relates to her and the Kings situation. Shahrazad takes the position of not only the storyteller, but also of the educator in a sense. Throughout the Arabian Nights she recounts ideas about betrayal, violence, jealousy, and the prejudice against women in the hopes of revealing these wrongs to King Shahrayar. Shahrazad never appears to be taking an authoritative position. She maintains the role of an entertainer in the

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