How is the Theme of Quest Portrayed in Sinbads Voyages - Essay Example

Running head: The Legend of Sinbad the Sailor Name: College: Lecturer: Course: Date: How is the theme of quest portrayed in Sinbad’s Voyages? Introduction Studies have identified quest as a central theme in the Legend of Sinbad the Sailor. Mythologists conveyed this theme in a multidimensional aspect that includes, inter alia, recurrence, emphasis, flow of events, coincidences as well as monotony. Thus, they developed the fairy tale in which they expressed quest as the fundamental theme. This essay examines the relevant literature in an attempt to establish the ways in which Sinbad’s expeditions portray the recurrent theme of quest. The essay discusses as well the fable of the seven voyages in a chronological order determining how each provokes the theme of quest. The Legend of Sinbad the Sailor Middle Eastern mythology has it that in the medieval age, there lived a wealthy Baghdad sailor named Sinbad. As the myth goes, Sinbad traded out his massive inherited wealth for an expedition course aboard a merchant ship (Croall and Hilinski, 2007). Literature on his voyages is broad amid numerous varying myths that surface to explain the legend. The seven voyages One of the customary traits of Sinbad the sailor as depicted by the legend was his unrelenting desire for expedition. According to James Riordan, Sinbad narrated the entire story about his seven voyages to a peasant porter named Hindbad. The theme of quest emerges from the instance that the sailor decided to trade out his affluence to follow a group of Middle Eastern merchants on a cruise aboard a ship. This cruise marked an important milestone in development of the legend since it constitutes the first voyage of Sinbad (Riordan, 2007). The sleeping whale In the course of their cruise, Sinbad and the merchants docked on what appeared to them as an island but later turned to be a sleeping whale. The legend goes that the whale dived and that people perished except for those in the ship and Sinbad who found rescue in a floating piece of wood. It is not clear how he got to the shore but when he did, he met with a groom of King Mihrage of Cassel Island. In the first voyage, the myth articulates desire for quest as an intrinsic personal trait of Sinbad that resulted into his insistent pursuit for adventure. At this early stage, mythologists depicted quest as exciting and overly fascinating. They used the theme of quest to develop the legend. Writers of medieval as well as contemporary literature have portrayed the character Sinbad, as one with a perpetual striving for expedition (Sir Burton, vol.12 2008) The valley of diamonds A year after he returned from the first voyage, Sinbad woke up in a mysterious valley off Cassel Island. This marked the beginning of his second voyage. This valley had numerous diamonds but it was snake infested – they were big enough to swallow an elephant. The snakes hid from yet another legendary monster, a giant bird called ‘roc.’ Roc flew Sinbad to its nest where a group of natives rescued him. He had managed to carry with him many diamonds that he took home with him (Lang, 1898). As portrayed in Sinbad’s second voyage, quest takes an entirely new turn. It goes from fascinating to petrifying but a little thrilling. The idea of flying high in the crawls of a gigantic bird is scary but when you add the rescue bit, it becomes less scary. Through Sinbad, legend portrays bravery as an indispensable value for human beings in their adventurous endeavours. Captured by Cyclops Sinbad’s unrelenting spirit for travel and expedition once again saw them captured by a gigantic creature on his third voyage. The mythical name for this monster and the description differs but the two recurrent names are Cyclops and Polyphemus. The Cyclops was hungry for human flesh and hence it began to devour Sinbad’s team. Being a hero as depicted by the myths, Sinbad devised a plan to slay Cyclops using the very hot iron rods that it used to roast human flesh. He blinded the monster by piercing its eyes with hot iron and he the rest of the crew managed to escape its ordeal. Still in the course of the third voyage, Sinbad experienced a series of adventures including one where a giant python attacked but he managed to outwit it. Again, literature diverges at this point with some writers claiming he immediately returned to Baghdad (Homer’s Odyssey) and others led by Sir Burton saying he cruised to the next voyage (Sir Burton, 1886). Similar to the prior cases, a literature review of Sinbad’s third voyage conveyed the theme of quest. Here, the theme is shrouded in mystery. It is not quite possible to unravel the driving force that compels Sinbad’s urge to travel and explore one mysterious phenomenon to another. One may attribute this quest to bravery or sheer curiosity – the kind that earned the proverbial monkey a bullet in its forehead (Achebe, 1988). The cannibals After having amassed a lot of wealth from previous expeditions, legend has it that Sinbad left Baghdad for Persia – the fifth voyage of Sinbad the sailor. He was aboard a ship that again capsized near a strange island following a heavy storm. Together with his crew, they wandered inland to the land of the black cannibals. The natives fed the crew with an unnamed plant the consumption of which made them loose consciousness immediately. Hayes (1984) identified this plant as cannabis sativa or modern day weed. Before the black cannibals could devour him, Sinbad made a run for his life and for the next seven days, he kept running. Given a mythical context, in order to articulate the theme of quest and taking into consideration its recurrent nature too, the hero always gets a happy-ending. It is prudent to note at this point that Sinbad’s escape as illustrated in the numerous myths is quite convenient. This becomes monotonous especially the part where he always manages to narrowly escape the jaws of death. The persistent quest for adventure in the series of voyages is triggered by the success in the immediately preceding one. Buried alive Still in his fourth voyage and after he escaped the cannibals he came across a white kingdom – this time he was on foot. As usual, he blended in with these people and befriended the king. The king, who remains unnamed in the various discourses, found Sinbad to be a very admirable character. The story goes that the king offered Sinbad his daughter’s hand in marriage. It was very unfortunate as Sinbad later learned that there were bizarre traditions amongst these people. When a spouse died, they had to be buried together with the other spouse and that was not negotiable. Once Sinbad’s wife died, the people performed their usual customs and buried him together with her in a dark tomb. The story goes that Sinbad survived on bread and water until for seven days. Before sunset on the seventh day, a strange wild animal showed him out of the tomb to the outside world. Passersby rescued and took him back to Baghdad aboard a cruise ship (Weiss & Fremont, 2003). At first, the theme of quest in the context of the fourth voyage takes a romantic turn with the hero marrying the daughter of a king. Then, the live burial part makes it dull and depressing – the overall mood here becomes sombre. The theme also portrays a series of events that is too much coincidental and convenient for Sinbad. The greater likelihood is that mythologists adopted this pattern to ensure that the element of continuity does not hit a dead end (McCaughrean, 1999). In his discursive analysis of the aspect of quest in the legend of Sinbad, Professor Godfrey Muriuki of The University of Nairobi noted that myths and legends have recurrent themes. He noted as well that the continuity of the theme such as that of quest in this analysis might compel mythologists to adopt an unrealistic turn of events. The professor noted that the seven voyages of Sinbad were full of fine tuned coincidences that always kept the sailor a perpetual quest (Zipes & Sir Burton, 2004). The fury of the roc Sinbad with his crew of merchants was set to go on his fifth voyage. As the legend goes, they stopped upon noticing a giant egg offshore. Sinbad recognised the egg as belonging to the roc that had previously carried him off the valley of diamonds (MacKaye, 2009). Despite warnings, the merchants crashed the egg and roasted baby roc who was about to hatch. The parent roc returned only to find baby roc devoured and the Sinbad’s crew taking off. Legend has it that the roc lifted a huge rock and dropped it right on top of the vessels consequently drowning the crew. Sinbad survived by a stroke of luck and swam to the shore. In light of the fifth voyage, the theme of quest as expressed in mythology is terrifying to say the least. The adventures during the cruise as well as the subsequent encounters with mythical creatures like the gigantic yet flying bird only happens in the movies. Quest is also traumatising and catastrophic as illustrated in the scenario where the roc crushes Sinbad’s vessel as they attempted to escape. Sinbad’s voyage to Serendib Sinbad’s cruise to Serendib (modern day Sri Lanka) was the sixth in the numerical order of voyages. Tim Severin, an explorer/ writer established that there was a magnetic rock in the Indian Ocean along the latitude 0o (equator). In his 1992 book ‘The Sinbad Voyage’, he wrote that Sinbad’s ship capsized near the magnetic rock after a dreadful monsoon wind swept across the equator. He noted that since they had fastened the ship using iron nuts, the magnetic fields from the rock attracted the ship towards it. Meanwhile the monsoon wind flowed in the opposite direction causing an impact that crashed the ship into peaces. Sinbad and his team of survivors sought refuge upon the rock (Severin, 1992). Upon his return to Baghdad, Sinbad vowed never to go on another epic voyage. The quest in the sixth voyage is depicted as tragic. The tragedy in this scenario does not significantly differ in magnitude from the situation in the previous expeditions. Nevertheless, it is real and scientifically quantifiable as opposed to the prior ones that were shrouded in mystery. The final voyage Just as Sinbad settled in his homeland with the will to keep a low profile, his king, Caliph of Baghdad requested him to return to Serendib and honour the king with presents. Out of his utmost respect for Caliph, he cruised back to Serendib and honoured the king with gifts from Caliph. The gifts included a lavish table that dated back to King Solomon’s era. On his return trip from Serendib, destiny was not done with him yet. Pirates who enslaved everyone on board hijacked his ship. Legend has it that once again, Sinbad managed to conveniently return to Baghdad and for good this time. The series of voyages ended with the seventh and final one (Hunt et al, 1995). This final voyage, ranked seventh in numerical order was the least dramatic of them all. Both medieval and contemporary literature express quest in this last voyage of Sinbad the sailor as recurrent and hence monotonous. This literature further depicts the theme as adventurous, mysterious and mythical (Averill & Sir Burton, 2000). Conclusion Though there are other recurrent themes in the Legend of Sinbad the Sailor and the Seven Voyages such as mysticism, they are not part of the primary concern of this research. In light of this discourse, the central theme in our historical study of the legend is quest. This theme is most prevalent in the western movie industry, for instance, in the movie ‘Sinbad and the Seven Seas’ directed by Mel Gibson. Others are TV series and animations of the Arabian Nights. It is also a recurrent theme in numerous literary works from all over the world. An example of such literature is Louise Hunt’s ‘Sinbad the Sailor and other Stories’ as well as other numerous books. References Achebe, Chinua (1988) A man of the people Nigeria: Heinemann Averill, R. & Sir Burton, Richard Francis (2000) The Seven Voyages Of Sinbad The Sailor: A Journey Through Life Illinois: Dramatic Publishing Croall, Marie & Hilinski, Clint (2007) Sinbad: Sailing Into Peril London: Rowke Enterprises Hayes, Barbara (1984) Sinbad London: Graphic Universe Hunt, Janie Louise, McCarthy, M. & Langempler, Andrew (1995) Sinbad the Sailor: And Other Stories California: University of California Lang, Andrew (1898) Arabian Nights Entertainment: Sinbad Longmans, Green and Co. MacKaye, Percy (2009) Sinbad, the Sailor London: General Books LLC, McCaughrean, Geraldine (1999) One Thousand and One Arabian Nights Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999 Riordan, James (2007). The Seven Voyages Of Sinbad the Sailor Singapore: Sheryl Fowles Severin, Timothy (1992) The Sindbad voyage California: University of California Sir Burton, Richard F. (2008) Arabian Nights: The Tale of a Thousand and One Nights Volume 12, London: Cosmos Inc. Weiss, Ellen & Fremont, Eleanor (2003) Sinbad: The Legend of the Seven Seas USA: Penguin Group Zipes, Jack David & Sir Burton, Richard Francis (2004) Arabian nights: the marvels and wonders of the Thousand and one nights Illinois: Dramatic Publishing Read More