Women in One Thousand and One Nights and Asian Novels of Gobineau: A Comparative Study

Attending to women in literature is a way to figure out the status in women in their society. A review of literature demonstrates the fact that the mirror of literature has not portrayed an appealing image of women. This principle makes more sense in the stories with a Hindu origin since Hinduism has always been associated with patriarchy and repressing the woman. One thousand and One Nights is also a work with the Iranian-Hindu origin and has reflected the writing of orientalists. One of the orientalists interested in One thousand and One Nights is Gobineau who has authored many stories with oriental content. In this article, the women's profile is comparatively investigated in One thousand and One Nights and the Asian Novels of Gobineau. This comparative study shows the similarity of attitudes towards women in the two work and reveals the effects on One thousand and One Nights on this orientalist.