“Sugar Street” by Nagub Mahfouz (translated by William Maynard Hutchins, Olive E. Kenny, Lorne M. Kenny, & Angele Botros Samaan)

This final novel of Mahfouz’s trilogy finds the Jawad household having aged and grown through marriages and births. Al-Sayyid Ahmad’s grandchildren are by now already attending college and, through ill health, he has had to reform his debauched ways. “Every time he had exceeded the limits, he had paid the price. He had finally been forced to give in, eating or drinking only what he was supposed to and coming home by nine. His heart had not given up hope that, by whatever means, he would regain his health and enjoy a pleasant, quiet existence, even though his past life had disappeared forever.” His youngest son, Kamal, has settled into a lowly existence, as a humble grade school teacher, who moonlights writing philosophic scribblings in an unread magazine. “The happiest part of his day was the period he devoted to philosophy. Lasting until midnight, it was the time—as he put it—when he felt like a human being. The rest of his day spent as a teacher in al-Silahdar School or in satisfying various needs of daily life was the stamping ground of the animal concealed in him. The creature’s goals were limited to self-preservation and the gratification of desires.”

Meanwhile, Al-Sayyid Ahmad’s son-in-law, the layabout of independent means, Ibrahim Shawkat, bemoans how best to raise his two rebellious sons, Abd al-Muni’m, a member of the Muslim Brethren, and Ahmad, a budding Communist, “We rear our children, guide them, and advise them, but each child finds his way to a library, which is a world totally independent of us. There total strangers compete with us. So what can we do?” Soon enough, Ahmad, himself, is forced to reflect on the subversive paths he and his brother have taken in life. “Ahmad asked himself why the three older men had been arrested. Had the charges been theft, fighting, drunkenness, or rowdy behavior? Clad in his overcoat, he had often written about “the people” in his beautiful study. Here they were—cursing or snoring in their sleep. For a few seconds by the light of the torch he had seen their wretched sullen faces, including that of the man who was scratching his head and his armpits. At this very moment his lice might be advancing resolutely toward Ahmad and his brother…. “You are devoting your life to people like this,” he told himself…. Ahmad advised himself, “Without regard to the differences of taste between us, our common human condition has united us in this dark and humid place: the Muslim Brother, the Communist, the drunkard, and the thief. Despite dissimilarities in our luck and success at looking after ourselves, we are all human beings.””

“Palace of Desire” by Nagub Mahfouz (translated by William Maynard Hutchins, Olive E. Kenny, Lorne M. Kenny, & Angele Botros Samaan)

In this second novel of the Cairo Trilogy, Mahfouz focuses on Kamal, Al-Sayyid Ahmad’s youngest son, now seventeen. He is a student, entering the teacher’s college in Cairo, and hanging around a wealthier, aristocratic set. In fact, his best friend, Husayn’s, family has just returned from political exile in Paris, while his two other pals, Hasan and Isma’il, come from families of distinguished civil servants. Although they are all nominally Muslims, in fact, Kamal is the only one who doesn’t drink alcohol or eat ham sandwiches. The other three treat him, more or less, as an equal. Nonetheless, there is an unspoken gulf. Husayn admits, “I hate fawning over the nobility, but that doesn’t mean I respect the masses. I love beauty and despise ugliness. Sadly enough, beauty is rarely found among the common people.”

Husayn’s sister, Aida, quickly emerges as the love of Kamal’s dreams. This consuming infatuation predictably ends in heartbreak. Later, while pretending to pray with his family at the mosque of al-Husayn, Kamal reflects back, “He remembered how revelation of this tomb’s secret had been the first tragedy in his life and then how the succession of tragedies following it had carried off love, belief, and friendship. Despite all that, he was still standing on his own two feet as he gazed worshipfully at truth, so heedless of the jabs of pain that even his bitterness caused him to smile. He had no regrets over his rejection of the blind happiness illuminating the faces of the men circumambulating the tomb. How could he buy happiness at the price of light when he vowed to live with his eyes open?”

“Palace Walk” by Nagub Mahfouz (translated by William Maynard Hutchins, Olive E. Kenny, Lorne M. Kenny, & Angele Botros Samaan)

This is the first novel in Mahfouz’s epic trilogy, set in Cairo in the aftermath of the First World War. The story centers around an old merchant family, the Jawad, fully embracing of the conservative customs, but being encroached by the trappings of modernity all around them. The paterfamilias is Al-Sayyid Ahmad Abd al-Jawad, a harsh disciplinarian to his wife and children, but a hard-drinking, carousing jokester to his nightlife friends. “He was forty-five and still enjoyed an ardent and exuberant vigor like that of an adolescent youth. His life was composed of a diversity of mutually contradictory elements, wavering between piety and depravity. Contradictory though they were, they all met with his satisfaction…. Having a clear conscience, he was good-hearted and sincere in everything he did. His breast was not shaken by storms of doubt, and he passed his nights peacefully. His faith was deep…. With the same ardent, overflowing vitality, he opened his breast to the joys and pleasures of life. He delighted in fancy food. He was enchanted by vintage wine. He was crazy about a pretty face. He pursued each of these pleasures with gaiety, joy, and passion.”

Al-Sayyid Ahmad keeps a tight leash on his wife, Amina. Since the day of her marriage, she was rarely ever able to leave the confines of her own home. Somewhat rankled by all the excessive restrictions placed upon her life, she was, nonetheless, obedient, pious, and loving to her husband and family. “Looking at the unknown had overwhelmed her: both what is unknown to most people, the invisible spirit world, and the unknown with respect to her in particular, Cairo, even the adjacent neighborhood, from which voices reached her. What could this world of which she saw nothing but the minarets and roofs be like? A quarter of a century had passed while she was confined to this house, leaving it only on infrequent occasions to visit her mother in al-Khurunfush. Her husband escorted her on each visit in a carriage, because he could not bear for anyone to see his wife, either alone or accompanied by him.”

The serenity of the Jawad home is first put to the test when Al-Sayyid Ahmad goes off on a business trip only to return to Amina recuperating in her bed, after getting run over by a car while sneaking off to the mosque of al-Husayn. “It was unfortunate, unfortunate for his wife, that he reviewed the matter when he was calm and all alone. He convinced himself that if he forgave her and yielded to the appeal of affection, which he longed to do, then his prestige, honor, personal standards, and set of values would all be compromised. He would lose control of his family, and the bonds holding it together would dissolve. He could not lead them unless he did so with firmness and rigor. In short, if he forgave her, he would no longer be Ahmad Abd al-Jawad but some other person he could never agree to become.”

Juxtaposed dichotomies abound in this novel. The elder sons Yasin and Fahmy scrapingly bow to their father to his face, but, alone, both rebel in their own quiet ways. For Yasin, this means sneaking off every night to the coffeeshops, speakeasies, brothels, and dens of female musicians in the entertainment district. One night, he stumbles into the private quarters of a singer whose boss, at that same moment, happens to be performing for his own father. For the first time Yasin sees his domineering taskmaster in a new light, “My father goes to Zubayda’s house to drink, sing, and play the tambourine …. My father allows Jalila to tease him and be affectionate with him …. My father gets drunk and commits adultery. How could all this be true? Then he wouldn’t be the father he knew at home, a man of exemplary piety and resolve. Which was correct? I can almost hear him now reciting, ‘God is most great …. God is most great.’ So how is he at reciting songs? A life of deception and hypocrisy? … But he’s sincere. Sincere when he raises his head in prayer. Sincere when he’s angry. Is my father depraved or is licentiousness a virtue?”

Fahmy, Al-Sayyid Ahmad’s second son, is studious and religious by nature. He is studying law, but also, unbeknownst to his family, becomes involved with the Wafdist movement to expel the British from Egypt. “Everything was proceeding as usual, as though nothing had happened, as though Egypt had not been turned upside down, as though bullets were not searching for chests and heads, as though innocent blood was not enriching the earth and walls. The young man closed his eyes with a sigh…. During the last four days he had lived a life of far greater scope than he had ever known before. His only comparable experience had been in shadowy daydreams. It was a pure, lofty life, ready to sacrifice itself in good conscience for the sake of something glorious, a goal worthier and more exalted than life itself…. When the struggle began, it found him ready. He threw himself into the midst of it. When and how had that happened? He was riding a streetcar to Gaza on his way to the Law School when he found himself in a band of students who were waving their fists and protesting: “Sa’d, who expressed what was in our hearts, has been banished. If Sa’d does not return to continue his efforts, we should be sent into exile with him.””

As the street protests drag on and become more violent, with the British creating new martyrs to the struggle every day, events in the Jawad household come to a head. As always, Al-Sayyid Ahmad tries to wrest control of a situation that has, perhaps, spiraled beyond even his firm grasp. “He had nothing against the freedom fighters, quite the contrary. He always followed news about them with enthusiasm and prayed for their success at the conclusion of normal prayers. News about the strike, acts of sabotage, and the battles had filled him with hope and admiration, but it was a totally different matter for any of these deeds to be performed by a son of his. His children were meant to be a breed apart, outside the framework of history. He alone would set their course for them, not the revolution, the times, or the rest of humanity. The revolution and everything it accomplished were no doubt beneficial, so long as they remained far removed from his household.”