[7V0]∎ [PDF] The Cairo Trilogy Palace Walk Palace of Desire Sugar Street Everyman Library Naguib Mahfouz Sabry Hafez Books

The Cairo Trilogy Palace Walk Palace of Desire Sugar Street Everyman Library Naguib Mahfouz Sabry Hafez Books

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The Cairo Trilogy Palace Walk Palace of Desire Sugar Street Everyman Library Naguib Mahfouz Sabry Hafez Books

Whichever way a critic chooses to assess the three books that comprise The Cairo Trilogy (Palace Walk, Palace of Desire, and Sugar Street) one arrives at a similar conclusion: this is a magisterial work. At the level of sheer storytelling, the narrative is amazing in its depth and scope of chronicling various individuals over three generations in the al-Jawad family. For me, the most satisfying aspect of the three books is the cerebral insight in which Mahfouz investigates each major character throughout successive generations. The result is a family saga immensely rich in its range of personalities. Readers feel as though they are experiencing emotions through a kaleidoscope. Mahfouz astonishes with his ability to channel the intimate thoughts of each character in order to unveil their deepest secrets. He probes his characters' minds like a psychiatrist performing clinical evaluations to determine the source of their actions and behavior. Moreover, Mahfouz penetrates the tantalizing matters of the heart. He gives us characters in their most human form: in both their pain and joy, through their hopes and despairs, and during their perils of love and loss.

The central figure spanning all three volumes is the imposing patriarch, Ahmad Abd al-Jawad. He dominates over his household with the authority of a tyrannical king. He presents himself as a man living up to the highest standards of religion and morality. By day, among his family he acts like a man of stern principles and devout prayer. Yet his hypocrisy is dually noted early on in the narrative, as he is also a man of uninhibited indulgence. By night, he carouses, drinks, and engages in adultery. He represents Mahfouz's quintessential literary focus on allegory, which is prevalent throughout most of the trilogy. Al-Sayyid Ahmad embodies someone who thinks he is free to do anything he wants without consequence, while at the same time he forbids others from the same behavior. In other words, Ahmad portrays himself as everything he is not, just as the historical backdrop of the trilogy shows how the free reign of British colonialism to do whatever it wants is anything but free of guilt.

Palace Walk, volume 1 of the trilogy, shifts gears from a family saga to a historical drama when Mahfouz begins to highlight the forces and events surrounding the Egyptian revolution against the British occupation. With extraordinary realism and visceral affect, he brings to life the sights, sounds, and motives of the populace to confront the injustices of colonialism. He inserts the al-Jawad family in the hub of this maelstrom. Of the five children of al-Sayyid Ahmad, it is the middle son, the idealist and erudite Fahmy, who falls victim to martyrdom, even as his father defies him not to pledge the rebellion of 1919. The oldest son, Yasin, is from Ahmad's first marriage, and he portrays the second generation figure whose misguidance perpetuates the same sins of debauchery as his father. Ahmad's two daughters are diametrical opposites both in appearance and demeanor. The older daughter, Khadjia, has unflattering features, yet she is full of energy and seemingly cursed with a flair for sarcasm and cheekiness. Her younger sister, Aisha, is a radiant blonde with a voice like a songbird, yet she is prone to languishing and reverie. The most compelling child is the youngest, Kamal. Prone to playfulness and lies, he is mischievous with inquiry about the world and fascinated with religious studies. Like all the siblings, Kamal is terrified of his father. Then there is the matriarch, Amina, a paragon of nurturing and caring. She does for her family what any ideal mother would do, and yet she suffers the duality of pretending to turn a blind eye on her husband's transgressions. Palace Walk takes readers through the daily struggles and joys of the family up until the 1919 nationalist revolution in which Fahmy loses his life.

In volume 2, Palace of Desire, the saga of the al-Jawad family recommences in 1924 with the British reaching a rapprochement with the widely popular Wafd leader, Sa'dZaghlul. In this second volume, the fate of the next generation plays out. After several affairs and scandals, Yasin attempts to find monogamy with his second wife Zaynab, but again he fails to do so. Although she is the younger sister, Aisha is wed off to Khalil Shawkat, and shortly thereafter her older sister Khadija follows suit by having her marriage arranged to Khalil's much older brother, Ibrahim. The children of both these couples are in their infancy as this novel proceeds, but the most compelling figure in volume 2 is Kamal, the youngest sibling of al-Sayyid Ahmad and Amina. Now seventeen, Kamal has passed his exams to earn his baccalaureate. Against the wishes of his father, he insists on purposing philosophical truths and the search for meaning in an existential world. Kamal's disavowal of religion places him in conflict with his father, who pledges the fundamentalist tenets of Islam. As a free thinker catapulted into the field of modern science's quest for meaning and understanding, Kamal falls victim to despondency after he suffers from the agony of unrequited love. Palace of Desire focuses on Kamal's plight as the central figure of the second generation. His modernist vision of the world, as reliant on science and reason, reflects the Wafd Party's nationalist ideology of governing the nation free from the constraints of Islam as a political system. When the second book ends with the passing of the leader Sa'd, one sees the parallel between the painful end of an era and the pain Kamal feels with his own lofty hopes for love shattering around him.

By volume 3, Sugar Street, it is now 1935, and the third generation has become the focal point. This generation is most aptly depicted through the two polarizing figures of Abd al-Muni'm and Ahmad, the two headstrong sons of Khadija and Ibrahim. Abd al Muni'm grafts himself to the fanaticism preached by Shaykh Ali al-Munufi, a religious zealot devoted to the budding philosophy that the Quran's teachings should be implemented as a political system and code, even in the modern world. As leader of the Muslim Brethren, al-Munufi ensnares vulnerable young minds such as Abd al-Muni'm during a time in Egypt's history when the country's political turmoil continues to consume everyday society. On the opposing side of ideologies, Ahmad finds solace in following AdliKarim, the open-minded Editor-in-Chief of The New Man magazine. Karim views the Wafdists as the starting point of Egypt's national movement towards independence and democracy. He, however, believes the nation must go beyond developing social freedom. Ahmad latches onto Karim's ideas and supports the mission of The New Man to confront the fanatics while at the same time promoting scientific mentality. Both brothers heed the patriotic call for revolution and independence, yet both see entirely different ways of achieving liberation from British rule. With a host of other family characters, friends, and acquaintances to supplement this diversion of the brothers' philosophies, Mahfouz ultimately brings this grand trilogy to a summation with the government's mass crackdown on political activists on each side of the divide. The arrests of both Abd al Muni'm and Ahmad bring this monumental work to a close.

In its totality, Mahfouz uses the three novels of The Cairo Trilogy to chart Egypt's tumultuous history through the meditations of various family members with distinctively different perceptions on life. He achieves this by also exposing and confronting the ideologies of both repressive colonialism and radical Islam. What he creates in the process is a breathtaking work of vivacity and bustle. The trilogy is allegorical and literal in his depictions of the al-Jawad family as a microcosm for the subsequent historical eras that three generations of the family endure. What stands out to me in everything that Mahfouz accomplishes is that he offers us a vast array of characters that go beyond giving us insight to the emotional chambers of their hearts. He reveals to us the essence of their souls so that we might seek to turn a mirror on ourselves and examine what it is in each of us that yearns for a better understanding of humanity and what it means to be human.

Having read the trilogy as a singular work, I believe in order to gain full appreciation of the novels, it is important to read them together as one book. So much transpires and reading the books separately or out of sequence may prevent one from experiencing the significance Mahfouz assigns to certain characters in each generation. For example, the patriarch al-Sayyid Ahmad, is unyielding in his authority over his family from the beginning of volume 1, Palace Walk. However, with his aging and with the influence of modernity on his beliefs, he is shown as capable of changing. What is uniquely notable is that his grandson Ahmad (one of the prominent figures of volume 3, Sugar Street) clearly symbolizes tolerance and open-mindedness. To gain the full effect of this fascinating generational dichotomy requires an understanding of Ahmad the grandfather from Palace Walk. This type of symbolic contrast between characters occurs throughout the three novels, but without knowledge of what certain characters are like early in their lives, the effect of who they are in different volumes is not as impactful.


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The Cairo Trilogy Palace Walk Palace of Desire Sugar Street Everyman Library Naguib Mahfouz Sabry Hafez Books Reviews

This book was, frankly, a revelation to me. Naguib Mahfouz is the only Arab author to ever win a Nobel Prize for literature, and it's easy to see why he won, if you base your judgement on this volume. This book is a compilation of his best-known and best-regarded work, three books which together are referred to as the Cairo Trilogy. Originally, the author had planned the whole work as a single novel, but after he finished it the publisher told him that a 1300 page novel wasn't possible in the 1950's Arab world, so they split it into three separate novels, with the original title of the whole book serving as the title for the first of the three novels Palace Walk. Palace of Desire follows it, and Sugar Street concludes the trio.

Mahfouz is a remarkable writer. The book spans 30 years at the beginning of the 20th Century, in Cairo of course, and follows the lives of an extended family during this time. He spends an enormous amount of time at the beginning of the book establishing character and setting. The opening 100 or so pages follow the various members of the family through a single day in their lives, starting with the mother getting up to start the day, and following in turn her, her husband, and their children as they perform various tasks during the day. The narrative then takes off and follows these individuals through various calamities (one of the sons gets killed in a demonstration, the father is briefly pressed into service to help with fortification construction, and so forth). He reserves judgement as far as the characters are concerned, tells you how they rationalize their actions when they do something less than perfect, and lets the reader see the warts of each of the characters individually.

This is a long, involved, carefully written book. Frankly it invites comparison with almost any other epic novel that covers a generation or two like this, and it's actually better than more than a few of them. It also has, as a sidelight, insight into the character of the nation of Egypt, its people, and especially it spends a great deal of time discussing the character of the city, who lives their, and their attitude towards their neighbors. It's intensely interesting, frankly pretty well written (the translation is very easy to read) and I enjoyed it a great deal.
This is a beautiful description of the development of Egypt, from the time when it was occupied by the English in the 1920s, to what was hoped by the author to be a revolutionary era. Mahfouz's prose is so vivid that one cannot help but believe he accurately describes the way Egypt actually looked and felt back then, with its alleys and markets, tea houses and brothels, mosques and shops, family dinners and rituals, both modern and ancient. It is a far cry from the usual Eurocentric versions of life in that incredible nation. Evocative and poignant, The Cairo Trilogy follows a middle class Egyptian family (by Third World standards, not North American), and their trials and tribulations during those changing times. Mahfouz won the Noble Prize for literature.
I absolutely loved Palace Walk, the first book in the Cairo trilogy, and was looking to once more lose myself in the crowded streets of Cairo and in the lives of the characters. I was not disappointed. The humanity and complexity of the characters is what draws us to them.
But I was a little disappointed with Kamal's adolescent introspections and found the book dragging in those places. Just a little too much of it!
Otherwise, the writing is as warm, fluent and vigorous as his earlier book.
Whichever way a critic chooses to assess the three books that comprise The Cairo Trilogy (Palace Walk, Palace of Desire, and Sugar Street) one arrives at a similar conclusion this is a magisterial work. At the level of sheer storytelling, the narrative is amazing in its depth and scope of chronicling various individuals over three generations in the al-Jawad family. For me, the most satisfying aspect of the three books is the cerebral insight in which Mahfouz investigates each major character throughout successive generations. The result is a family saga immensely rich in its range of personalities. Readers feel as though they are experiencing emotions through a kaleidoscope. Mahfouz astonishes with his ability to channel the intimate thoughts of each character in order to unveil their deepest secrets. He probes his characters' minds like a psychiatrist performing clinical evaluations to determine the source of their actions and behavior. Moreover, Mahfouz penetrates the tantalizing matters of the heart. He gives us characters in their most human form in both their pain and joy, through their hopes and despairs, and during their perils of love and loss.

The central figure spanning all three volumes is the imposing patriarch, Ahmad Abd al-Jawad. He dominates over his household with the authority of a tyrannical king. He presents himself as a man living up to the highest standards of religion and morality. By day, among his family he acts like a man of stern principles and devout prayer. Yet his hypocrisy is dually noted early on in the narrative, as he is also a man of uninhibited indulgence. By night, he carouses, drinks, and engages in adultery. He represents Mahfouz's quintessential literary focus on allegory, which is prevalent throughout most of the trilogy. Al-Sayyid Ahmad embodies someone who thinks he is free to do anything he wants without consequence, while at the same time he forbids others from the same behavior. In other words, Ahmad portrays himself as everything he is not, just as the historical backdrop of the trilogy shows how the free reign of British colonialism to do whatever it wants is anything but free of guilt.

Palace Walk, volume 1 of the trilogy, shifts gears from a family saga to a historical drama when Mahfouz begins to highlight the forces and events surrounding the Egyptian revolution against the British occupation. With extraordinary realism and visceral affect, he brings to life the sights, sounds, and motives of the populace to confront the injustices of colonialism. He inserts the al-Jawad family in the hub of this maelstrom. Of the five children of al-Sayyid Ahmad, it is the middle son, the idealist and erudite Fahmy, who falls victim to martyrdom, even as his father defies him not to pledge the rebellion of 1919. The oldest son, Yasin, is from Ahmad's first marriage, and he portrays the second generation figure whose misguidance perpetuates the same sins of debauchery as his father. Ahmad's two daughters are diametrical opposites both in appearance and demeanor. The older daughter, Khadjia, has unflattering features, yet she is full of energy and seemingly cursed with a flair for sarcasm and cheekiness. Her younger sister, Aisha, is a radiant blonde with a voice like a songbird, yet she is prone to languishing and reverie. The most compelling child is the youngest, Kamal. Prone to playfulness and lies, he is mischievous with inquiry about the world and fascinated with religious studies. Like all the siblings, Kamal is terrified of his father. Then there is the matriarch, Amina, a paragon of nurturing and caring. She does for her family what any ideal mother would do, and yet she suffers the duality of pretending to turn a blind eye on her husband's transgressions. Palace Walk takes readers through the daily struggles and joys of the family up until the 1919 nationalist revolution in which Fahmy loses his life.

In volume 2, Palace of Desire, the saga of the al-Jawad family recommences in 1924 with the British reaching a rapprochement with the widely popular Wafd leader, Sa'dZaghlul. In this second volume, the fate of the next generation plays out. After several affairs and scandals, Yasin attempts to find monogamy with his second wife Zaynab, but again he fails to do so. Although she is the younger sister, Aisha is wed off to Khalil Shawkat, and shortly thereafter her older sister Khadija follows suit by having her marriage arranged to Khalil's much older brother, Ibrahim. The children of both these couples are in their infancy as this novel proceeds, but the most compelling figure in volume 2 is Kamal, the youngest sibling of al-Sayyid Ahmad and Amina. Now seventeen, Kamal has passed his exams to earn his baccalaureate. Against the wishes of his father, he insists on purposing philosophical truths and the search for meaning in an existential world. Kamal's disavowal of religion places him in conflict with his father, who pledges the fundamentalist tenets of Islam. As a free thinker catapulted into the field of modern science's quest for meaning and understanding, Kamal falls victim to despondency after he suffers from the agony of unrequited love. Palace of Desire focuses on Kamal's plight as the central figure of the second generation. His modernist vision of the world, as reliant on science and reason, reflects the Wafd Party's nationalist ideology of governing the nation free from the constraints of Islam as a political system. When the second book ends with the passing of the leader Sa'd, one sees the parallel between the painful end of an era and the pain Kamal feels with his own lofty hopes for love shattering around him.

By volume 3, Sugar Street, it is now 1935, and the third generation has become the focal point. This generation is most aptly depicted through the two polarizing figures of Abd al-Muni'm and Ahmad, the two headstrong sons of Khadija and Ibrahim. Abd al Muni'm grafts himself to the fanaticism preached by Shaykh Ali al-Munufi, a religious zealot devoted to the budding philosophy that the Quran's teachings should be implemented as a political system and code, even in the modern world. As leader of the Muslim Brethren, al-Munufi ensnares vulnerable young minds such as Abd al-Muni'm during a time in Egypt's history when the country's political turmoil continues to consume everyday society. On the opposing side of ideologies, Ahmad finds solace in following AdliKarim, the open-minded Editor-in-Chief of The New Man magazine. Karim views the Wafdists as the starting point of Egypt's national movement towards independence and democracy. He, however, believes the nation must go beyond developing social freedom. Ahmad latches onto Karim's ideas and supports the mission of The New Man to confront the fanatics while at the same time promoting scientific mentality. Both brothers heed the patriotic call for revolution and independence, yet both see entirely different ways of achieving liberation from British rule. With a host of other family characters, friends, and acquaintances to supplement this diversion of the brothers' philosophies, Mahfouz ultimately brings this grand trilogy to a summation with the government's mass crackdown on political activists on each side of the divide. The arrests of both Abd al Muni'm and Ahmad bring this monumental work to a close.

In its totality, Mahfouz uses the three novels of The Cairo Trilogy to chart Egypt's tumultuous history through the meditations of various family members with distinctively different perceptions on life. He achieves this by also exposing and confronting the ideologies of both repressive colonialism and radical Islam. What he creates in the process is a breathtaking work of vivacity and bustle. The trilogy is allegorical and literal in his depictions of the al-Jawad family as a microcosm for the subsequent historical eras that three generations of the family endure. What stands out to me in everything that Mahfouz accomplishes is that he offers us a vast array of characters that go beyond giving us insight to the emotional chambers of their hearts. He reveals to us the essence of their souls so that we might seek to turn a mirror on ourselves and examine what it is in each of us that yearns for a better understanding of humanity and what it means to be human.

Having read the trilogy as a singular work, I believe in order to gain full appreciation of the novels, it is important to read them together as one book. So much transpires and reading the books separately or out of sequence may prevent one from experiencing the significance Mahfouz assigns to certain characters in each generation. For example, the patriarch al-Sayyid Ahmad, is unyielding in his authority over his family from the beginning of volume 1, Palace Walk. However, with his aging and with the influence of modernity on his beliefs, he is shown as capable of changing. What is uniquely notable is that his grandson Ahmad (one of the prominent figures of volume 3, Sugar Street) clearly symbolizes tolerance and open-mindedness. To gain the full effect of this fascinating generational dichotomy requires an understanding of Ahmad the grandfather from Palace Walk. This type of symbolic contrast between characters occurs throughout the three novels, but without knowledge of what certain characters are like early in their lives, the effect of who they are in different volumes is not as impactful.