This is a fictitious jester, drawing on the Thousand and One Nights, and commenting on the archetypal role of the jester as truth-teller, in this case to the exclusion of any one else. It is this perception of (and tendency among) jesters to speak the truth regardless of the consequences, which sets them apart from the general mass of musicians, actors, or other entertainers.
“That does it!” said Selim. “What makes you think you’re indispensable?” “No one else will tell you the truth,” she said. “I love my prince too much to let him deceive himself.”
Source: Güneli Gün, On the Road to Baghdad: A picaresque novel of magical adventures, begged, borrowed, and stolen from the Thousand and One Nights (London: Picador, 1994), p. 58.
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