Magic and supernatural elements are important for many storytelling traditions.

Magic and supernatural elements are important for many storytelling traditions.

Magic and supernatural elements are important for many storytelling traditions. What examples of magic and supernatural elements did you see in this week’s stories? What kinds of characters used magic? What did they use magic for? Were there supernatural characters or events in this week’s stories? What role did these supernatural characters or events play in the plot of the stories? What did these magical and supernatural effects contribute to the impression that the stories made on you this week?

use characters from the stories

Circling the Mediterranean: Europe and the Islamic World

The Qur’an

The Thousand and One Nights

discussion post

250 words +

use examples from the stories

Solution Preview

Magic and the Supernatural
This week’s readings have presented various incidences in which magic and the supernatural played a critical role in developing the storyline. One of the most common narratives surrounding the supernatural involved their power to present gifts to those that did good or punishment to people they considered to have done some form of wrong in society. In particular, one of the supernatural characters encountered in the stories was the Jinni in the story of the Fisherman and the Jinni. In this case, the supernatural being used his magic to reward the fisherman who had freed him from centuries of imprisonment in the jar.

(293 words)