The Love Lost Among the Disrespect

In our in class discussion, we focused a lot on how women are disrespected in the book. We placed much emphasis on how the male figures such as Mr. Ahmad and Yasin are disrespectful with their words and behavior. But I think that in the middle of all the “disrespect,” as we judge it to be, Naguib Mahfouz has placed Kamal, a character that to a certain sense still holds innocence and much love in his heart, in the book to show that there’s another side to the story. There’s a love side. The life of women isn’t only waking up early and serving the men; their lives aren’t all about being disrespected by males because, as the author shows through Kamal, there’s much love for women. Here I’m not talking about a lustful love, but a tender and sincere love from a son.

We get this sense of love for the women from Kamal when the author writes:

The truth was that [Kamal] loved the women’s company with all his heart and did not want to be separated from them even when he was working. Seeing them gave him a pleasure nothing else could equal. He loved his mother more than anything in the world. He could not imagine existing without her even for a moment. Khadija played the role of a second mother in his life... Aisha…loved him deeply, and he reciprocated her love totally. (65)

Through this quote we can see that women are loved so much. Mahfouz makes sure to show that Kamal has such a strong love, not just for his mother, but also for his sisters. Kamal holds a strong affection for these women because they are important in his life.

In class, we touched on how women are submissive and sometimes are degraded by men, but we missed to see really how important women are. Through the quote I mentioned above, I feel like we see women in a different way. Women are very special and essential in the life of males. Kamal loves his mother more than anything else in the world, which makes us see that it’s a pretty strong love. The author says, “He could not imagine existing without her even for a moment” (65). Here we see clearly the importance of women. His mother is so essential to his life that Kamal doesn’t see himself without her. He needs her to live, and that is a very strong statement about the significance of the role women hold in this society. It changes to a certain extent the negative way I thought all males treated women in the book, and the way I viewed the role of women. Women are more than just submissive human beings who should follow commands. They are the heart of men because without women, men can’t live.

I ask you all to rethink the role of women in this book. Is their role just cooking, cleaning, and taking care of the house, or is there a more important role that, we as outsider, can’t understand yet? What is really the significance of women in a males’ life? I think women are essential to men, but what do you think?