By Dr Oliver Tearle (Loughborough University)
‘Aladdin and the Magic Lamp’ is the most famous story from the Arabian Nights collection of stories, also known as the 1,001 Nights. However, the story’s origins are surprising, and in fact for many centuries it wasn’t part of the Arabian Nights at all. But before we come to the question of textual analysis or the story’s complex history, let’s summarise the plot of the story of Aladdin.