The Djinn in the Nightingale's Eye

The Djinn in the Nightingale's Eye is a 1994 collection of five mythical short stories by British novelist A. S. Byatt.^[1] The collection includes two short stories, "The Glass Coffin" and "Gode's Story," originally published in the novel Possession,^[1] as well as the titular story, "The Djinn in the Nightingale's Eye", which was published in The Paris Review.^[2]

The Djinn in the Nightingale's Eye

First edition
Author	A. S. Byatt
Published	1994
Publisher	Chatto & Windus (UK) Random House (US)
ISBN	0-679-42008-8

The stories included in The Djinn in the Nightingale's Eye adopt many of the conventions of folk or fairy tales to examine contemporary society with many of the common themes in Byatt's work.^[3] The novella-length title story is highly intertextual, including a "rich collage of fairy tale motifs", referencing folk tales from One Thousand and One Nights, the works of Geoffrey Chaucer and William Shakespeare, the Epic of Gilgamesh, and the myth of Cybele.^[4]

The Djinn in the Nightingale's Eye was published with woodcut illustrations.^[3] Reviews of the book were generally positive.^[5]

Writer-director George Miller's 2022 film Three Thousand Years of Longing is based on the title story of this collection.^[6]

References

1. Berman, Ruth (February 1998). "Review: The Djinn in the Nightingale's Eye". The Mythopoeic Society. Archived from the original on 3 April 2019. Retrieved 3 April 2019.
2. Byatt, A. S. (Winter 1994). "The Djinn in the Nightingale's Eye". The Paris Review. Interviews. Vol. Winter 1994, no. 133. ISSN 0031-2037. Archived from the original on 3 April 2019. Retrieved 3 April 2019.
3. "Fiction Book Review: The Djinn in the Nightingale's Eye: Five Fairy Stories by A. S. Byatt, Author Random House (NY) $20 (288p) ISBN 978-0-679-42008-8". PublishersWeekly.com. Archived from the original on 3 April 2019. Retrieved 3 April 2019.
4. Unzicker, Florian (February 2009). "You Must Be The Prince" - Traditional Fairy Tale Motifs in A.S. Byatt's "The Djinn in the Nightingale's Eye". GRIN Verlag. ISBN 978-3-640-27573-1. Archived from the original on 26 September 2022. Retrieved 2 June 2022.
5. Orthofer, M.A. "The Djinn in the Nightingale's Eye - A.S.Byatt". the complete review. Archived from the original on 18 April 2019. Retrieved 3 April 2019.
6. Mathai, Jeremy (18 May 2022). "Three Thousand Years Of Longing Footage Reveals First Look At George Miller's New Movie". /Film. Archived from the original on 18 May 2022. Retrieved 22 February 2022.