Mushin Mahdi (1926–2007)
Author of The Arabian Nights
About the Author
Image credit: Uncredited image found at American University of Cairo website
Works by Mushin Mahdi
Ibn Khaldun's Philosophy of History: A Study in the Philosophic Foundation of the Science of Culture (Phoenix books) (1964) 71 copies, 1 review
Ibn Khaldun's philosophy of history A study in the philosophic foundation of the science of culture 2 copies
Associated Works
The Arabian Nights: Based on the Text of the Fourteenth-Century Syrian Manuscript — Editor, some editions — 61 copies
Tagged
Common Knowledge
- Canonical name
- Mahdi, Mushin
- Legal name
- Mahdi al-Mashhadani, Muḥsin Sayyid
- Other names
- Mahdi, Mushin S.
- Birthdate
- 1926-06-21
- Date of death
- 2007-07-09
- Gender
- male
- Nationality
- Iraq
USA - Birthplace
- Karbala, Iraq
- Place of death
- Brookline, Massachusetts, USA
- Education
- University of Chicago (MA|Ph.D|1954)
American University of Beirut (BBA|BA|1947) - Occupations
- islamologist
arabist
translator
professor - Organizations
- Harvard University
University of Chicago
University of Baghdad
Members
Reviews
Arabian Nights: Based On The Text Edited By Muhsin… by Husain Haddawy
An interesting read as historical artifact. Full of romance and violence and sexism and sentiments like: A woman needs a husband or a grave. Pretty entertaining overall.
This is as good as it gets. I don't know Arabic so there's no way I can judge the accuracy of the translation -- all I know is how it reads, and it reads superbly. I'd rather not get into any "oh, but there's only 271 nights here, what the --" patter. I have the newer, bigger Penguin translation on my shelves too & it presumably uses the (much!) longer Egyptian 'version' (version is the wrong word but I can't think of the right one at the moment) ... but I doubt it could be, well, better than this. What's here is simply the rapture of tales, tales, tales ... and it's a volume that makes it eminently clear why people get obsessed with this thing. I'm a bit obsessed with it, right now.… (more)
The famous tale ("Open Sesame") is magical. The rest are barely mediocre aside from historical interest.
This edition is translated into the English from Arabic by Husain Haddawy. The Arabic source is a 14th century Syrian manuscript edited by Muhsin Mahdi.
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Statistics
- Works
- 11
- Also by
- 3
- Members
- 1,955
- Popularity
- #13,146
- Rating
- 3.9
- Reviews
- 27
- ISBNs
- 44
- Languages
- 6
- Favorited
- 2