The overarching structure of The Tidewater Tales takes its inspiration from the tradition of the sailing narrative, in Western literature most notably found in Homer's Odyssey and in American literature in Twain's The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn (1884), books referred to often in The Tidewater Tales. Barth's novel is an homage to these books as well as an addition to the venerable tradition of the sea adventure.

Probably the most striking aspect of The Tidewater Tales' structure, however, is its tale-within-a-tale motif, a device Barth borrows from his most constant muse, Scheherazade of The Thousand and One Nights, who had to tell her king story after interlocked story in order to save her life. Just as John Barth corresponds to the anonymous narrator of this Arab classic, Peter and Katherine Sagamore correspond to Scheherazade, warding off the death of Peter's art and of their marriage by telling...