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NAGUIB MAHFOUZ.
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Analysis of the Egyptian writer.... More...
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Paper Abstract:
Analysis of the Egyptian writer. Pioneer of the novel in the Arabic language. Winner of Nobel Prize for Literature. His body of work, literary devices, and themes related to family, religion, politics, poverty, drugs, prostitution. Examines several novels including "Cairo Trilogy," "The Thief and the Dogs," "Respected Sir." Mahfouz's place in the world of contemporary literature.
Paper Introduction:
Analysis of the Work of Naguib Mahfouz
Naguib Mahfouz is probably one of the best-known writers and novelists in the Arabic language. As Michelle Hartman (1997) pointed out in her analysis of one of Mahfouz’s novels, al-Liss wa’l kilub (The Thief and the Dog), this Egyptian writer’s fame and reputation has grown on the international level since he won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1988. In fact, Hartman (1997) considers Mahfouz to be the pioneer of the novel in the Arabic language; his career has spanned the entire range of novelistic development in the Arab world. This essay will examine several of Mahfouz’s novels, drawing upon the novels and critical commentary to describe his themes, his use of literary devices, and his place in the world of contemporary literature.
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In describing his views about religion and science inan interview, Mahfouz stated that he believed that science had thepotential to work for mankind's benefit and that religion could be used toensure that the potentially dehumanizing effects of science were controlled(Interview with Nagib Mahfouz, 1989). The Economist, 342 (8 8), S15 - S16.Ghosh, A. Though not quite the "Father of the Arabicnovel - a distinction that is accorded to another Egyptian, MuhammadHussein Haykal, who published Zaynab in 1913 - Mahfouz has certainly beenits greatest popularizer and most successful author (Echoes of anautobiography, 1997). In The Thief and the Dogs, Mahfouz (1989) broke from his earlierstyle of "realistic" novels (i.e., conventional, long narratives tracingthe lives of entire families with long, detailed descriptive passages). This situationhas changed dramatically in the past several decades. The novel also departs from convention by portraying women in a waynew to Arabic literature. The novel is an iconoclastic allegory of human life. Ghosh (199 ) believesthat in facing his critics and continuing to write, Mahfouz showed enormouscourage and conviction. This report has examined, in brief, some of the themes and work thathave been produced by Naguib Mahfouz, arguably the most prominent Arabicnovelist of the current era. Although they seem to be "modern," they are surrounded by theirpast. By 1997,when he was 85 years old, he had published some 3 or more novels anddozens of short stories which were translated into two dozen languages(Echoes of an autobiography, 1997). Interestingly, hisexamination of prostitution moves from the critical perspective of theIslamic clerics to a more understanding recognition that among the mostpoor, this particular "work" may be the only available means of survival.Drug addiction is also addressed in a forthright manner in these books,with Mahfouz arguing that use of drugs to escape the awfulness of povertymay not be a good thing, but it is sometimes understandable. It seems clear that in his work, Mahfouz haspaved the way for other, younger Arabic novelists to follow. The conflict betweentwo generations of men - one staunchly conservative, and the other desiringa more modern world - is typical of events taking place in Mahfouz's ownlife (Ghosh, 199 ). In Echoes of an Autobiography, Mahfouz (1997) undertook somethingentirely different. There is a sense of mystical musing in this book, which describesthe ways in which human beings search for and often fail to findcontentment. For Mahfouz, the search for meaning inlife and in the context of familial relations is a vital concern. 78) featured a male protagonistnamed Salim Alwan, for whom the day is marked by the requirement of prayerand ritual washing or purification: "HE woke early in the afternoon,performed the ritual washing and said his prayers." However, thisextremely pious man - who is also a devoted husband - is not free of lustand carnal desire for a beautiful, poor young woman named Hamida. Analysis of the Work of Naguib Mahfouz Naguib Mahfouz is probably one of the best-known writers andnovelists in the Arabic language. After his marriage,which has lasted for several decades, this character has not permitted hiswife to leave their home. As noted earlier in this report, he has not only received numerous deaththreats; he was actually attacked and almost killed. In that novel, the sternpatriarch described above is an allegorical rendering of Moses. Each of these novels is set in a quarter of Old Cairo thatMahfouz, who was born there, knew intimately. For example, when the young civil servant first enters the office ofthe director-general of his department, his boss appears as a god beforewhom he must bow down and to whom he must offer himself as a sacrifice.Thus, Mahfouz equates modern Egyptian bureaucracy with Egypt's ancientaristocracy and court system, with both the bureaucrat and the aristocracyof the past functioning as officials "appointed by the gods of heaven torule the Nile valley (Mahfouz, quoted in Papyri on a café table, 1988, p.95)." In Palace Walk, written between 1956 and 1957, Mahfouz created aprotagonist who is a patriarch of extreme convictions. Mahfouz is pre-eminently a Cairo writer, as distinct from either anArabia or Egyptian writer (Papyri on a café table, 1988). It is this kind of conflict that Mahfouz interjects intomuch of his work, largely because he recognizes that the tensions betweenan idealized faith and the reality of the human conditions cannot beeliminated by simply ignoring them. In this novel, the wife is persuaded by one of her sons to ventureout of the home; she is struck by an automobile. As Michelle Hartman (1997) pointed outin her analysis of one of Mahfouz's novels, al-Liss wa'l kilub (The Thiefand the Dog), this Egyptian writer's fame and reputation has grown on theinternational level since he won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1988.In fact, Hartman (1997) considers Mahfouz to be the pioneer of the novel inthe Arabic language; his career has spanned the entire range of novelisticdevelopment in the Arab world. Inthis novel, he used concise and spare language and formal innovations suchas shifting narrative voices, long passages that focus on interiormonologues, and flashbacks. Sadly,this particular philosophy has angered many Islamic theologians. In this manner, as Hartman (1997) noted, Mahfouz employsideal conventions drawn from Islam and from Arabic life and society buttwists them to more nearly replicate reality. The human comedy in Cairo: The secret, respectable work of Naguib Mahfouz. He resumed his work, however, and has continued toconfront the issues that he believes are critical to his society. (Interestingly, Mahfouz himself began hisprofessional life in such a positions.) As Bayyumi progresses, he works tosave money for a magnificent tomb for himself - a clear reference to theglorious tombs favored by the wealth and royalty of Ancient Egypt. That past, symbolized by the Pyramids at Giza and the Sphinx, andencapsulated in the annual inundations of the Nile, presses and weighs uponmodern-day Egyptians who have not forgotten that their was once a dominantcivilization. The patriarch isclearly the dominant force in the family, but one of his sons is an ardentnationalist who wants to see major changes in Egypt. The path they took was toemphasize Egypt's Pharaonic and Hellenistic roots, to the point ofdisavowing all connections with Islam and the Arabic world. (199 ). He calls for freeing religion - certainly one of ifnot the most important social influence in Islamic countries - fromsuperstition in order to improve human society through science. Itpresents Mahfouz's collected wisdom; he was some 85 years old when the bookwas published (Echoes of an autobiography, 1997). In Midaq Alley (first published in Arabic in 1947), Mahfouz (1989)presented a highly charged set of religious issues and created a world inwhich religion (specifically Islam) was dominant as s source of norms andmores. However, she has onedream: she wants to be allowed to visit the mausoleum of Sayidna Hussein,which is down the road from her home. Of particular concern to many Islamicfundamentalists was Children of Gebelawi. The novels are characterizedby a strong strain of gritty realism and a focus on the day-to-daydifficulties (for men and women alike) of living in a city and a place thatis often troubled. Family is important in this work as well. Naguib Mahfouz: Life in the alley of Arab history. Much of this work is at least quasi-autobiographical. Another of Mahfouz's books titled Respected Sir was described as"Nilotic (Papyri on a care table, 1988)." It makes the point thatEgyptians do not see themselves as Arabs; they are dwellers by the NileRiver. This essay will examine several ofMahfouz's novels, drawing upon the novels and critical commentary todescribe his themes, his use of literary devices, and his place in theworld of contemporary literature. Between 1945 and1957 he produced a trilogy of books titled Between the Palaces, The Palaceof Aspiration and The Sugar Pot. Mahfouz, in The Thief and the Dog, does not hesitate to contrastthese two stereotypical images of women, the characters of Nabawiyya andNur are not so simplistically drawn that they are fully representative ofthee contrasting portraits of women. Though Mahfouz does employ female stereotypes in the novel, hedoes so in a manner suggesting that he recognizes these characterizationsas stereotypes and not as accurate portrayals of "real world" women. He created The Children of Gebelawi in 1959. However, reading Mahfouzwithout an understanding of what it means, for example, to be a "salariedemployee" in Egypt or the ins and outs of the Egyptian civil service, canbe difficult. The Georgia Review, 49 (1), 224 - 231.Papyri on a café table. (1997). During the years he spent in college in the late 192 s and early193 s, the principal intellectual influence on Mahfouz was a group ofnationalists who were working to create a national culture for Egypt thatwould be distinctly Egyptian (Ghosh, 199 ). Mahfouz also injects a bit of political thoughtinto the book, which includes references to the 1919 riots that took placein Cairo. When her husband discoversthat she has disobeyed his wishes, he sends her home to her own mother indisgrace. In fact, it is Nabawiyya, the wife,who has abandoned her husband after he has been imprisoned for four yearsfor theft; she has taken a new lover, and it is Nur, the prostitute, whoemerges in the story as a sympathetic and caring women. In Respected Sir, the central character is a humble Egyptian collegegraduate named Othman Bayyumi who is seen as climbing the ladder ofpromotion in the civil service. ReadingMahfouz is like getting to known a place (Egypt and Cairo) and a peoplethat are exotic and fascinating, even when they are poorly understood byWesterners who lack any in-depth knowledge of this place and people. Thetwo man characters are the loving, devoted wife, mother or sister and thecontrasting "fallen woman" or prostitute, whom Hartman (1997) sees asrepresenting the dichotomous Islamic view of women and their characters. (1997). Ghosh (199 ) stated that the 'ulema, the muslin doctors of theologyand religious law, declared this particular book by Mahfouz to be offensiveto Islam. Ghosh (199 ) suggested further that winning the Nobel Prize has hadan unfortunate consequence for Mahfouz. Mahfouz created an extraordinary and large body of work. Itends with a vision of a man searching in a rubbish dump for his salvation(Papyri on a café table, 1988). UNESCO Courier, December, 4 -6.Mahfouz, N. The New Republic, 2 2 (19), 32 - 37.Hartman, M. Thislengthy novel begins with the events found in Genesis and continues throughto the 195 9s. (1989). (1995). Only after she has been sufficiently punished does he permit herto return to their home. Since that time, of course, Islam has emerged asone of the most compelling and potent political forces in the world. He is said to have chosen the novel ashis genre over poetry - which has long been the primary focus of literaturein Arabic - because he found in the genre a greater degree of flexibilityand opportunity for innovation. By focusing onsuch details, Mahfouz brings Cairo to life. Because this is thecase, Mahfouz's work has become suspect in the view of many Muslim clerics. In Midaq Alley, Mahfouz (1989, p. The end result is a confusion of timesequences and a blurring of past, present, and a possible future. Nur, and not theadulterous wife, is the "good woman" of the Islamic ideal, despite her workas a prostitute. Ghosh(199 ) suggested that in Mahfouz's youth, Islam had been largely sidelinedas a political ideology. New York: Quality Paperback Book Club.Moosa, M. The book was never published in Arabic in Egypt, and for a timeMahfouz stopped writing. Mahfouzwas actually stabbed by an impassioned critic of his work on a Cairostreet; he survived, and continued to explore his philosophy in many newworks. Theprotagonist's conflict is between his sense of duty and obligation to hiswife and his religion, and his equally intense desire for the sexual favorsof a young woman. This is a condition that does not seem todisturb this woman, who loves and reveres her husband and who findssubmission to this demand to be no undue burden. Mahfouz began his literary career by writing essays on philosophy andliterature and only then moved to fiction as a genre of choice (Moosa,1995). 35)noted that "It is in the observation of the small details on which theedifices of respectability are constructed that Mahfouz is really acuteabout his society." His work is filled with arcane and particularlyEgyptian details that are not well understood in the West. This book is a collection of allusions and aphorismsthat bears what seems to be a striking similarity to Kahlil Gibran's TheProphet. His ideal society, according to criticMatti Moosa (1995), is a form of moderate socialism in which the main basisof life is science. Shortly after the announcement wasmade, he began to receive death threats from Islamic fundamentalists whoconsider his work to be impious. Family life is one of the themes that tend to predominate inMahfouz's novels. (1988). ReferencesEchoes of an Autobiography. Othercharacters were seen as representatives of Jesus and Muhammad - both ofwhom with Moses are important prophets in Islam. Mahfouz said that his use of such atmosphere was deliberate; it isthe legitimate atmosphere of much of Cairo, particularly in poorer sectionsof the city and in the Old Quarter that the novel describes (Interview withNagib Mahfouz, 1989). Midaq Alley, The Thief and the Dogs, Miramar. His work invariably draws upon his understanding of Egyptian lifein the past, present, and future. (1989). The perhaps best-known of all Mahfouz's novels in the West are the"Cairo Trilogy," consisting of Midaq Alley, The Thief and the Dogs, andMiramar. The Economist, 3 9 (7574), 95 - 96. In discussing the entire body of Mahfouz's work, Ghosh (199 , p. The male protagonist of the story does say ofwomen that "I have no faith at all left in her gender (Mahfouz, 1989, p.32), but the story itself does not render women as simple, misogynisticportraits. Research in African Literature, 28 (3), 5 - 16.Interview with Najib Mahfouz. Themes in these books included issuesrelated to religion and politics, as well as prostitution, drug addiction,and the poverty of the urban population of Cairo. Re-reading women in/to Naguib Mahfouz's al-Liss wa'l kilab. Otherreferences to Egypt's past social relations can also be found in thisnovel.
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