Kara Ben Nemsi (in Arabic: كارة بن نمسي Karl The Austrian, meant was Karl the son of Germans) is a fictional character in the works of Karl May, best-selling 19th century German writer. Alter ego of the author, everything written from first person perspective, he travels throughout the Ottoman empire, alongside his friend and servant Hadschi Halef Omar.
His character being identical to that of Old Shatterhand, he owns two famous rifles, the Bärentöter (Bear Killer) and the Henrystutzen (Henry Carbine). Without ever leaving the saddle of his fabulous black horse Rih (it means “fast as the wind” in Arabic), Kara Ben Nemsi single-handedly fights off droves of thieves and crooks left and right. On night-long rides through bleak and barren lands, he never wavered in sharing his long-winded religious musings with unenlightened natives and readers alike.
Read more about Kara Ben Nemsi: Original German Stories, English Translations of Karl May's Works
Famous quotes containing the word ben:
“Ye knowe eek, that in forme of speche is chaunge
Withinne a thousand yeer, and wordes tho
That hadden prys, now wonder nyce and straunge
Us thinketh hem; and yet they spake hem so,
And spedde as wel in love as men now do;
Eek for to winne love in sondry ages,
In sondry londes, sondry ben usages.”
—Geoffrey Chaucer (1340–1400)