The Arabian nights in English literary theory (1704-1910): Scheherazade in England : an expanded and updated version of the 1981 edition (Expanded and updated edition)

In its first edition, this book was a new opening in the study of the Arabian Nights as an index of literary taste, a case study for the engagements of poets and writers, along with the common reading public, with an art that took Europe by surprise, and forced new patterns of response and writing.

Borges thought of its advent as a dynamic that helped generate the romantic mode and sensibility.

It certainly disturbed old habits of thought and made significant cultural inroads throughout European cultures.

Almost no one in 18th-19th century literatures remained oblivious to that sweeping phenomenal appearance.

The book analyses and studies modes and patterns of reading, response, engagement, commentary, translations, claims to authentication, abridgements, and illustrations.