Naguib Mahfouz

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Naguib Mahfouz (Arabic: نجيب محفوظ‎, Naǧīb Maḥfūẓ) (December 11, 1911 – August 30, 2006) was an Egyptian novelist who won the 1988 Nobel Prize for Literature.

Contents 1 Life and work 2 Works 3 References 4 See also 5 External links

[edit] Life and work

Mahfouz was born in the Gamaliya quarter of Cairo, named after Professor Naguib Pasha Mahfouz (1882-1974), the physician who delivered him. A longtime civil servant, Mahfouz served in the Ministry of Mortmain Endowments, then as Director of Censorship in the Bureau of Art, Director of the Foundation for the Support of the Cinema, and finally as a consultant to the Ministry of Culture. He published 34 novels, over 350 short stories, dozens of movie scripts and five plays over a 70-year career. Many of his works have been made into Arabic-language films.

Chitchat on the nile (1971) is one of his most popular novels. It was later made into a film featuring a cast of top actors during the time of president Anwar al-Sadat. The film/story criticizes the decadence of Egyptian society during the Gamal Abdel Nasser era. It was banned by Anwar al-Sadat to prevent provocation of Egyptians who still loved former president Nasser. Copies were hard to find prior to the late 1990s. Naguib Mahfouz's prose is characterised by the blunt expression of his ideas. He has written works covering a broad range of topics, including socialism, homosexuality, and God. Writing about some of the subjects was prohibited in Egypt.

Many of his novels were first published in serialized form, including Children of Gebelawi and Midaq Alley which was adapted into a Mexican film starring Salma Hayek (El callejón de los milagros).

Children of Gebelawi (1959), one of Mahfouz's best known works, has been banned in Egypt for alleged blasphemy over its allegorical portrayal of God and the monotheistic Abrahamic faiths of Judaism, Christianity and Islam. In 1989, after the fatwa for apostasy against Salman Rushdie, Egyptian theologian Omar Abdul-Rahman told a journalist that if Mahfouz had been punished for writing his novel, Rushdie would not have dared publish the Satanic Verses. Sheikh Omar has always maintained that this was not a fatwa, but in 1994 Islamic extremists, believing that it was, attempted to assassinate the 82-year-old novelist by stabbing him in the neck outside his Cairo home. He survived, permanently affected by damage to nerves in his right hand. Subsequently, he lived under constant bodyguard protection. Finally, in the beginning of 2006, the novel was published in Egypt with a preface written by Ahmad Kamal Abu Almajd.

Due to his outspoken support for President Anwar Sadat's Camp David peace treaty with Israel, his books were banned in many Arab countries until after he won the Nobel prize.

Prior to his death, Mahfouz was the oldest living Nobel Literature laureate and the third oldest of all time, trailing only Bertrand Russell and Halldor Laxness. At the time of his death, he was the only Arabic-language writer to have won the Nobel Prize for Literature.

In 1994, Mahfouz was stabbed in the neck by a Islamist electrician who had been inspired by the blind sheik Omar Abdel Rahman. This attack left Mahfouz's writing hand paralyzed, and he lived the remainder of his life under police protection.

In July 2006, Mahfouz sustained an injury to his head as a result of a fall. He remained ill until his death on August 30, 2006 in a Cairo hospital. Prior to his death, he suffered from a bleeding ulcer, kidney problems, and cardiac failure.

Mahfouz was accorded a state funeral with full military honors on August 31, 2006 in Cairo. His funeral took place in the Al Rashdan Mosque in Nasr City on the outskirts of Cairo.

Mahfouz once dreamed that all the social classes of Egypt, including the very poor, joined his funeral procession. In actuality, attendance was tightly restricted.

[edit] Works

• Old Egypt (1932) مصر القديمة
• Whisper of Madness (1938)همس الجنون
• Mockery of the Fates (1939) عبث الأقدار
• Rhadopis of Nubia (1943) رادوبيس
• The Struggle of Tyba (1944) كفاح طيبة
• Modern Cairo (1945) القاهرة الجديدة
• Khan al-Khalili (1945) خان الخليلى
• Midaq Alley (1947) زقاق المدق
• The Mirage (1948) السراب
• The Beginning and The End (1950) بداية ونهاية
• The Cairo Trilogy الثلاثية
  • Palace Walk (1956) بين القصرين
  • Palace of Desire (1957) قصر الشوق
  • Sugar Street (1957) السكرية
• Children of Gebelawi (1959) أولاد حارتنا
• The Thief and the Dogs (1961) اللص والكلاب
• Quail and Autumn (1962) السمان والخريف
• God's World (1962) دنيا الله
• Zaabalawi (1963)
• The Search (1964) الطريق
• The Beggar (1965) الشحاذ
• Adrift on the Nile (1966) ثرثرة فوق النيل
• Miramar (1967) ميرامار
• The Pub of the Black Cat (1969) خمارة القط الأسود
• Chitchat on the nile (1971) ثرثره فوق النيل
• A story without a beginning or an ending (1971)حكاية بلا بداية ولا نهاية
• The Honeymoon (1971) شهر العسل
• Mirrors (1972) المرايا
• Love under the rain (1973) الحب تحت المطر
• The Crime (1973) الجريمة
• al-Karnak (1974) الكرنك
• Respected Sir (1975) حضرة المحترم
• The Harafish (1977) ملحمة الحرافيش
• Love above the Pyramid Plateau (1979) الحب فوق هضبة الهرم
• The Devil Preaches (1979) الشيطان يعظ
• Love and the Veil (1980) عصر الحب
• Arabian Nights and Days (1981) ليالى ألف ليلة
• Wedding Song (1981) أفراح القبة
• One hour remains (1982) الباقي من الزمن ساعة
• The Journey of Ibn Fattouma (1983) رحلة إبن فطومة
• Akhenaten, Dweller in Truth (1985) العائش فى الحقيقة
• The Day the Leader was Killed (1985) يوم مقتل الزعيم
• Fountain and Tomb (1988)
• Dreams of the Rehabilitation Period (2004) أحلام فترة النقاهة

[edit] References

• Alamgir Hashmi, The Worlds of Muslim Imagination (1986), ISBN 0-00-500407-1
• Rasheed El-Enany, Naguib Mahfouz: The Pursuit of Meaning (1993), ISBN 0-415-07395-2

[edit] See also

• List of African writers

[edit] External links

• Naguib Mahfouz article from Nobel Prize website
• Nobel Prize press release
• Naguib Mahfouz from Pegasos Author's Calendar
• Cornell biography
• BBC report of death 30 August 2006
• Article dated 31 August 2006 from The Independent: Nobel Prize winner Naguib Mahfouz dies aged 94
• Associated Press report dated 31 August 2006 on Naguib Mahfouz's funeral
• Biography and bibliography in French
• Naguib Mahfouz Website