burton--1001-nights--sample

About this Edition
This edition is based upon a “Burton Club” edition, a reprint of the
1900/01 American “Burton Society” edition, which again is faithful to
the original “Kamashastra Society” edition.
Two major changes were made, concerning paragraphs and notes:
In the original, apart from the foreword, the text is set continuously,
except for verses and headings — there are no paragraphs. Burton, it
may be assumed, wanted to emphasize the steady flow of the narration,
which, at its heart, is an oral one. Since this lack of any visual structure
is inconvenient for the reader, for this edition paragraphs were introduced,
with care taken to keep their disruptive effect at a minimum.
As to Burton’s notes, only those were included that add to the
reader’s understanding of the translated text, and of those some were
abridged. Not included were notes that, for instance, deal with intricate
issues of the translation and distinctions from previous translations,
those that give explanations where no explanation seems to be needed,
those that provide background information that meanwhile is outdated,
or those in which Burton expresses his own personal views of customs,
moral standards, sexual behavior, penis lengths etc. of various nationalities
or ethnic groups.
Other than that, few changes were made. Spelling was not changed,
only æ and œ ligatures (in the foreword and in notes) were resolved to
ae and oe. Standard (double) quotation marks for nested quotes were
changed to single quotation marks. In some cases Burton’s use of
colons and dashes for nested quotes was abandoned in favor of single
7