Kurdish Tales — Part 1 (Khalil-Beg, Son of Lesko · The Shepherd Siso · Mambapir · Mullah Bazid)
Disclosure: this performance is narrated by AI-generated voices.
Part one — the premiere of a new shelf. Four Kurdish (Kurmanji) tales from Alexandre Jaba's Recueil de notices et récits kourdes (St. Petersburg, 1860), in a fresh in-house translation from Jaba's French. In Khalil-Beg, Son of Lesko, an Armenian-born convert risen to governor shames a proud agha who scorned his low birth by gift after gift — a thoroughbred horse, a sable pelisse, a watch — until the agha bows three times in a single day. In The Shepherd Siso, a Kurdish shepherd hosts two disguised dervishes with bread and milk, never guessing one is Sultan Murad himself; visiting "Baba Mourad" at the palace, he drinks his coffee from a wooden bowl with bread in it — and is loaded with honours and villages. In Mambapir, a rich and ignorant nomad pays the imam thirty sheep to have his name read in the Friday sermon, not knowing the imam has in fact called him "a big dog" in Arabic. And in Mullah Bazid, the preacher who tells his flock to give their spare coat and half their bread to the poor is furious when his wife applies the sermon at home: "my recommendations were for the people, and not for me!" The episode opens and closes with its theme, Bandoneo Street Romance, heard also briefly between the stories.
Chapters
0:37 Khalil-Beg, Son of Lesko
5:49 The Shepherd Siso
13:28 Mambapir
18:06 Mullah Bazid
Of the remaining récits in Jaba's collection, five stand on the bench for later parts of this shelf. Held for the owner's ruling by name: The Avarice of the Mullahs · Mullah Muhammed · Tetedi Abdullah Pasha · Doctor Mir-Ali · The Measuring of Koroglu. Excluded by name: Mirzo Resho · Deli Ismail Agha · Mehmedi Qulpi · The Girl Barnik · Adile-Khanum · Siyahmed and Semsi · Ali Nasran · Pergo · Sekir-Aya Senk · Sumo · Mir Az-ed-din and his servant Kulo · The Captivity of Jaubert — in each, enacted killing or mutilation is the substance, pivot or climax. No claim of completeness for Jaba's book is made.
From Recueil de notices et récits kourdes, by Alexandre Jaba (St. Petersburg, 1860), public domain — a fresh in-house translation from Jaba's printed French, the tales in the order given in the programme above. Jaba's Kurdish teacher, Mela Mahmud Bayazidi, is credited as the source of much of the material he collected. Narrated by Lulu. Theme: Bandoneo Street Romance.
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