Tales of the Marvellous and News of the Strange: Robert Irwin in conversation with Marina Warner

Islamic scholar Robert Irwin joined us at the Bookshop in discussion with mythographer Marina Warner about a groundbreaking new translation of Tales of the Marvellous and News of the Strange, and its implications for our understanding of the classical Arabic storytelling tradition.

The 18 medieval tales collected here (by Penguin Classics), probably originating in the 9th and 10th centuries, are the earliest examples of Arabic stories known to have survived. A few of the stories were collected and adapted, centuries after their composition, in The Arabian Nights. The remainder have never before appeared in English.