Week 5 Story: Interview with a Legend

Sindbad the Sailor: Image

He finishes off another drumstick, sauce dripping onto his plate, and discards the bone gently. As he wipes his mouth with an embroidered napkin, he looks me in the eyes with a steely gaze.

"So," he asks. "Where would you like to begin?"

Wait, let me back up a bit.

Today is quite possibly the most important day of my career. I've been a reporter at the Baghdad Herald for 3 years now, and I've been searching constantly for a breakthrough that could get me out of this place. Local newspaper reporting is so incredibly dull, and I've got bigger dreams than writing articles about someone's cat being rescued from a tree. But today is the day that all of that changes, because I got an interview with Sindbad the Sailor.

I'm honestly still in disbelief about it. I mean this guy is a living legend and has turned down interviews and biography offers from international news giants, but here he is agreeing to an interview with some local nobody. Outside of the Dreamworks movie, no one knows anything about this guy, other than the fact that he was a hero who got rich off of adventures to unknown lands. Everything that comes out about him is a second-hand account from someone who knew him, and he rarely goes out in public.This is a golden opportunity, and I'm not about to screw it up.

As I sit across from him in his massive dining hall, a decadent feast spread all along the table, I start the most important interview of my life.

"How about your Third Voyage?" I reply. "There aren't many details known about your adventure on the island of Aritusia."

Sindbad smiles slightly. "That's probably a good thing, that island was a land of nightmares."

"So I've heard," I say. "But there's not many people who can make it out of a place like that alive. How did you manage to slay the giant clan that lived there?"

"Who said anything about slaying?" Sindbad chuckles. "How could a man even hope to kill a single one of those beasts, let alone an entire clan? We were able to escape the clutches of one of them, but the others still killed half of my companions with boulders as we ran."

I blink slightly, thoroughly confused. "Wait, so you didn't slay any giants?"

"Of course not," Sindbad replies.

"Well what about the dwarf clan that captured you? Or the giant serpent?" I ask. "How did you best them?"

Sindbad laughs heartily now. "Best them? Yes, I'm sure that's what others have said. Well we surrendered to the dwarves and they took our ship and left us stranded, and the serpent ate the rest of my companions while I hid in a tree shelter for 3 days. When it finally became bored with me, I spotted a ship passing by and flagged it down with my turban. They sent a raft for me, and that was the end of my time on Aritusia."

I slump into my seat, mouth wide in disbelief. "So all of those stories about you being this strong warrior, are they all fake?" 

"My friend," Sindbad says. "The only thing that I killed during my life of adventuring was a few elephants while hunting." 

"Well, what about your movie, Sinbad: Legend of the Seven Seas?" I reply. "I mean I figured they took some creative liberty with your story, but they kind of portray you as this swashbuckling pirate."

Sindbad scoffs. "No, that movie is a complete fiction. They didn't even spell my name right so I couldn't even sue them for it."

I can't believe it. Everything that's been said about this guy has been lies. Who's going to want to hear this story? My golden opportunity is totally wasted.

"So you're not a hero at all then," I say. "You're just some old merchant who doesn't like to go outside?"

Sindbad laughs again. I'm starting to hate the sound of it. "My friend," he says. "The men I sailed with tried to be heroes, giant-slayers and all that, why not interview them?"

I grind my teeth. "None of them are exactly talkative, seeing as how they all died on your voyages."

"Exactly," he says, grinning once again. "And what about the heroes of other lands, like Achilles and Beowulf? Are they available to comment?"

"No," I reply, slowly realizing his point. "No, they're dead too."

"That's what I thought," he says. "You mean to insult me by saying that I'm not a hero, but to me that is a gracious compliment. Heroes die terrible and avoidable deaths. Heroes don't get to come home to the riches and power that they've amassed. I've lived a long, eventful life and now I get to live out my old age in the opulence that I've earned through my efforts. That's because you are correct, my friend. I'm not a hero, I'm a survivor."

I perk up at this. I can feel the inspiration starting to come to me. I'll make a story out of this guy yet. 

"Alright then," I say, erasing my questions from before. "Let's start this thing over, shall we? Tell me everything, from your perspective."

As Sindbad regales me with his tales, a headline already begins forming in my head: Sindbad the Survivor.

Author's Notes: This story is retelling of the events of the Third Voyage of Sindbad the Sailor, where he and his crew are assailed by monsters of all kinds after landing on a mysterious island. Sindbad was the only survivor of this voyage, and returned home with not only his life, but great riches as well. In the original Arabian Nights, the reader learns of the story of Sindbad through the conversations that he has with a poor stranger that he lets into his home for a meal. I simply changed the setting to a more modern time and changed the stranger into a local reporter. This storytelling style was chosen to highlight the fact that Sindbad doesn't really fit the "valiant hero" archetype that defines many other hero tales from different cultures, as he seems to survive many of the situations he finds himself in through a bit of ingenuity and pure luck.

Bibliography- The Arabian Nights' Entertainments by Andrew Lang and illustrated by H. J. Ford (1898).