From The Thousand and One Nights
Translated by N.J Dawood
The Fisherman and the Jinnee
 Ancient Persian and Muslim Folklore
 Has story-within-a-story structure
 Folktales – part of the oral tradition passed down by
word of mouth for centuries before being written
down.
 Usually contain magical details
 Usually contain a lesson about life
 Usually contain characters who possess on or two main
traits
 Usually contain a clear separation between good and
evil.
Reading Strategy: Summarizing
 A Summary is a brief statement expressing the key
details of a literary work.
 To summarize:
 Identify the details that are essential to your
understanding of the story
 Next, organize those details into a concise statement
 Summarize to aid your understanding of literature.
Vocabulary Builder
 Inverted
 Blasphemous
 Adjured
 indignantly
 Resolutely
 Adj. upside down
 Adj, showing disrespect
toward God or religious
teachings
 Ordered solemnly
 Adv. In a way showing
righteous anger or scorn
 Adv. In a determined
way
Vocabulary Continued
 Enraptured
 Adj. Completely
 Munificence
delighted; spellbound
 N. Great generosity
 ominous
 Adj. Hinting at bad
things to come
Word Analysis: Latin Root - vert
 The Latin root –vert- means “turn.”
 Inverted – means “turned upside down.”
 Using your understanding of the root word –vert-,
write a brief definition of the italicized word in each of
the following sentences:
 We can convert this old theater into a store.
 If the new system does not work, we will revert to the
old one.
 The plane was diverted to another airport.
Spelling Strategy – “f” Spelled as
“ph”
 The f sound is sometimes spelled ph, as in
blasphemous.
 More often, it is spelled f or ff: fish, staff.
 Rewrite the following sentence, correcting the
misspelled words in italics.
 The fysician was bafled by the ffisherman’s afliction.
Vocabulary Builder: Synonyms
 Select the word that is closest in meaning to the first








word:
Inverted:
a) reversed b) wicked c) shy
Blasphemous:
a) loud
b) unwise c) sinful
Adjured: a) disliked b) commanded c) healed
Indignantly:
a) angrily b) noisily
c) slyly
Resolutely: a) weakly b) helpfully c) stubbornly
Enraptured: a) puzzled b) repressed c) charmed
Munificence: a) poverty b) violence c) violence
Ominous:
a) shining b) threatening c) open
Grammar and Style Lesson
 Action Verbs such as saw, thought , and went, express
physical or mental action.
 Linking verbs, such as was, felt, and became, express a
state of being.
 Linking verbs are followed by a noun or pronoun that
renames the subject or by an adjective that describes it.
 Some linking verbs can also function as action verbs.

If you can replace the verb with a form of be – such as am, is,
are, was, were - and still express a similar meaning, the verb
is a linking verb.
Action and Linking Verbs
Action Verb
Linking Verb
 The Fisherman looked in the
 The jinnee looked monstrous
bottle
 We tasted the food.
(was)
 The food tasted good. (was)
 Notice how the subject takes
action to perform the verb.
 Notice how the subjects are in
a state of being; they cannot
perform an action.
 Notice how both highlighted
verbs can be replaced with
the being verb “was.”
Action and Linking Verbs
 Identify the verb in each sentence below as an action
verb or a linking verb.
 The bottle appeared heavy.
 The fisherman broke the seal.
 Once outside, the jinnee seemed like a powerful giant.
 The fisherman felt enormous fear.
 The fisherman tricked the jinnee in the end.