Tiffany Bertone
Professor Kelley
LIT-203-099WB
19 October 2015
The Thousand and One Nights: The Tale of the Ox and the Donkey The Thousand and One Nights is a collection of folk tales arising from the Islamic Golden Age. The book was compiled by many different authors over many hundreds of years. Today I have chosen to analyze The Tale of the Ox and the Donkey, which is the first tale told in The Thousand and One Nights. Shahrazad, who is the daughter of the king's vizier, is the narrator of almost all of the stories in the “Thousand and One Nights” except for The Tale of the Ox and the Donkey and the story that follows it, The Tale of the Merchant and his Wife. With King Shahrayar on a brutal killing spree after discovering his wife's infidelity, …show more content…
Your ground is swept and watered, and they serve you, feed you shifted barley, and offer you clear, cool water to drink” (The Tale of the Ox and the Donkey 1183). While the donkey lives a rather luxurious life for a farm animal, the ox endures countless hours of strenuous labor and horrific living conditions. The ox continues by saying, “I, on the contrary, am taken out to plow in the middle of the night. They clamp on my neck with something they call yoke and plow, push me all day under the whip to plow the field, and drive me beyond endurance until my sides are lacerated, and my neck is flayed” (The Tale of the Ox and the Donkey 1183). After a grueling day of labor, the ox is only provided with spoiled beans as his meal and is forced to lay in his own feces to …show more content…
The plowman was stricken with grief for how he treated the ox and went to the merchant with his concerns for the ox’s health. The merchant, aware of everything that was going on, suggested that the plowman take the donkey out to finish the ox’s work. That very same day the plowman did just that. The plowman retrieved the donkey, suited him with the yoke, and drove him with vicious blows until he finished the ox’s work. By the end of the day the donkey was inflicted with multiple lacerations and his neck was flayed. The donkey had endured and suffered just as much pain as the ox had while working. By nightfall the donkey was barely able to walk his exhausted body back
Professor Kelley
LIT-203-099WB
19 October 2015
The Thousand and One Nights: The Tale of the Ox and the Donkey The Thousand and One Nights is a collection of folk tales arising from the Islamic Golden Age. The book was compiled by many different authors over many hundreds of years. Today I have chosen to analyze The Tale of the Ox and the Donkey, which is the first tale told in The Thousand and One Nights. Shahrazad, who is the daughter of the king's vizier, is the narrator of almost all of the stories in the “Thousand and One Nights” except for The Tale of the Ox and the Donkey and the story that follows it, The Tale of the Merchant and his Wife. With King Shahrayar on a brutal killing spree after discovering his wife's infidelity, …show more content…
Your ground is swept and watered, and they serve you, feed you shifted barley, and offer you clear, cool water to drink” (The Tale of the Ox and the Donkey 1183). While the donkey lives a rather luxurious life for a farm animal, the ox endures countless hours of strenuous labor and horrific living conditions. The ox continues by saying, “I, on the contrary, am taken out to plow in the middle of the night. They clamp on my neck with something they call yoke and plow, push me all day under the whip to plow the field, and drive me beyond endurance until my sides are lacerated, and my neck is flayed” (The Tale of the Ox and the Donkey 1183). After a grueling day of labor, the ox is only provided with spoiled beans as his meal and is forced to lay in his own feces to …show more content…
The plowman was stricken with grief for how he treated the ox and went to the merchant with his concerns for the ox’s health. The merchant, aware of everything that was going on, suggested that the plowman take the donkey out to finish the ox’s work. That very same day the plowman did just that. The plowman retrieved the donkey, suited him with the yoke, and drove him with vicious blows until he finished the ox’s work. By the end of the day the donkey was inflicted with multiple lacerations and his neck was flayed. The donkey had endured and suffered just as much pain as the ox had while working. By nightfall the donkey was barely able to walk his exhausted body back