DOHA: ‘One Thousand and One Nights,’ a ballet in two acts, will be staged at Katara Opera House from June 16 to June 23.
Based on an anthology of folktales in Arabic collected during the Islamic Golden Age, the ballet tells the story of a young sultan, Shahrayar, who ruled a country in the Far East and loved his wife Noreda very much.
But after returning from a hunting trip, he finds his wife in the arms of one of his servants and in rage kills her.
Her death, however, does not ease his bitterness. Fuelled by embarrassment and resentment, Shahrayar decides to kill all girls in the country, marrying a new girl every night only to have her decapitated the next morning. The pleas and prayers of the victims go in vain as the rage of Shahrayar keeps growing until he meets Scheherazade.
A very beautiful and wise woman, Scheherazade, knowing what awaits her at dawn, devises a plan to avoid her death.
She starts narrating a story every night to the sultan, only stopping at a captivating point at dawn. Her stories enchant Shahrayar and he keeps postponing her execution.
In the second act, Shahrayar’s bitter heart begins to feel love for his wife, though he refrains from expressing it. He gets lost in a battle between love and hatred, good and revenge, but finds comfort every night in the stories of Scheherazade that are full of wisdom.
The play ends showing the sultan spending 1,001 nights in a beautiful, magical place full of tales that he knew nothing about.
He begins to believe in love again and on the last night he opens his heart to Scheherazade and pardons her death.
Show starts at 8pm. Tickets are available in Virgin Megastores at Villaggio and Landmark Mall. The Peninsula
