Whenever Arabic literature is mentioned, one name inevitably comes up: Naguib Mahfouz. He was the first Arabic writer to receive the Nobel Prize for Literature — in 1988- and he is considered in the West as a point of reference by which all other modern Arabic writers are measured.
Mahfouz lived a long and productive life. He died at the age of 94 and wrote some 40 novels and short story collections plus thirty screenplays. So it comes as no surprise to find another novel translated into English. “Cairo Modern” was first published in 1945 as “Al-Qahira Al-Jadida.” This novel has been beautifully translated by William Hutchins, the principal translator of Mahfouz’s trilogy.
Mahfouz’s novels are peopled by a rich variety of characters which have prompted comparisons with Balzac, Dickens and Tolstoy. At first, he planned to write about the whole history of Egypt. After he had finished the third volume, he decided to focus on the social changes among ordinary people. His masterpiece is The Cairo Trilogy, a colossal work, completed before the July Revolution. He ceased to write after finishing the trilogy in 1952. He became profoundly disappointed with the Nasser regime, which had overthrown the monarchy in 1952. He began publishing again in 1959.
“Cairo Modern” reminds us that much of Mahfouz is timeless. This gripping story of four students tackles some of life’s most difficult questions in an effort to understand the role of fate and evil in our lives, the reflection on free will, the relationship between east and west and the role of Islam in Arab society.
Fatma Moussa who has translated “Miramar,” one of a few of Mahfouz’s novels not based in Cairo — it takes place in Alexandria — explains that his work: “Has to do with the plight of humanity as a whole. He has presented it from the local angle but it’s not really local at all. It’s kind of a microcosm of the whole world, a little image of the fate of man.”
Mahfouz deals with universal topics but his novels are all set in Egypt. He inherited a love for his country’s rich past from his mother, the illiterate daughter of an Al Azhar sheikh. She showed a keen interest in Egypt’s rich Pharaonic, Greco-Roman and Islamic history and she often took her son to museums. Mahfouz’s works convey his profound love of Egypt. His masterpieces delight us with larger-than-life descriptions of middle and lower class life in Cairo. His writing, which is at the same time popular, intellectual, spiritual and humorous, chronicles Egyptian life during most of the twentieth century. Edward Said rightly said: “As a geographical place and as history, Egypt for Mahfouz has no counterpart in any other part of the world. Old beyond history, geographically distinct because of the Nile and its fertile valley, Mahfouz’s Egypt is an immense accumulation of history, stretching back in time for thousands of years and despite the astounding variety of its rulers, regimes, religions, and races, nevertheless retaining its own coherent identity.”
Until his death, Naguib Mahfouz wrote a weekly column in Al-Ahram newspaper and he tried to maintain a busy schedule well into his 90s. In his final years, he still enjoyed meeting his friends in Cairo’s famous literary cafes.
He explained his tight adherence to routine, saying: “I’m a Sagittarius, I was born under a cold sign, so of course I have discipline.”
For most of his life, Mahfouz wrote in his spare time since he spent most of his adult life working for the government. He once described how he prepared a parliamentary speech for the minister of religious endowments. He gave the minister an envelope containing the speech, then sat down outside the parliament to review a short story he had just finished. He then realized to his horror that he had the speech, and the minister had the story. The writer ran into the parliament and managed to exchange the two envelopes when the minister wasn’t looking.
Naguib Mahfouz works are known for their astonishing realism and his extraordinary depictions of men and women from all walks of life, struggling between tradition and modernism. “Cairo Modern” gives us the opportunity to rediscover the writer’s extraordinary literary genius and enjoy timeless writing at its best.
