Hypocritical Hypocrites

Nobody wants her. She's a woman of the street. She doesn't respect herself so why would anyone else respect her? Nobody knows the real Shen Te, but they are quick to judge. She goes through struggles but nobody cares. She's just a prostitute. Then the gods show up. They change her life. They help her out and she wants to change the direction her life is taking.
When Shen Te becomes economically stable, all of a sudden people that looked down on her are asking her for shelter. When Shen Te needed shelter, they turned her down, and they fear that she will do the same, but she didn't.

SHEN TE: They put me up when I first came in from the country.(To the audience) Of course, when my small purse was empty, they put me on the street, and they may be afraid I'll do the same to them. (To newcomers, kindly) Come in, and welcome, though I've only one little room for you – it's behind the shop. (13)

Shen Te has a warm heart, and she actually worries about the well being of others. But even while she takes care of them, they don't think of repaying her, not even by respecting her shop. The moochers that she let into her house not only took from Shen Te, but also tried to steal from the bakery near Shen Te's shop. This would make Shen Te look bad because she would be known for harboring thieves. But no one took her seriously still after all she did for everyone, so she had to transform into Shui Ta, her “cousin”. When Shui Ta arrived on the scene, the games were over. The hypocrisy levels sky rocketed. All of a sudden, the moochers, along with the non-moochers respected Shen Te, in front of Shui Ta, which is also Shen Te, but hated Shui Ta because of the mean things he did. The only thing wrong with that is that the people getting mad for Shui Ta's actions did the same or something similar to Shen Te. As Shui Ta, Shen Te's confidence went up, and she was able to order people around.
Days after Shui Ta got the thieves arrested for stealing bread, and kicked every person living in the shop out, Shen Te allowed the thieves to keep some of their tobacco in the back room of her shop. Once Shui Ta arrived on the scene, he pretended not to know anything about it and claimed it as his own. He threaten to call the policeman over to make sure that it belonged to him, but the thieves refused and gave him their tobacco. They weren't very happy about this, but when they stole a cigar, or two, or three from Shen Te, they didn't care. They were hypocrites.
The charade continued for quite a while. Shen Te's dual personality, showed her the others' dual personalities. Sure they didn't change their names and appearances like Shen Te did, but they acted differently around Shen Te and Shui Ta. Yang Sun for example, acted like he cared for Shen Te around her, but around Shui Ta, he showed his other side. He showed his selfish side. This benefited Shen Te because she now knew how he really felt about her, but she loved him, and she now had his baby in her stomach. So she couldn't really do much against him. But Shui Ta took care of Yang Sun.
But the play's biggest hypocrisy went further than anything that the mortal character did. In this play, the gods were the biggest hypocrites. It upset them that people didn't believe in them, but they didn't believe there was any good soul. The entire play is filled with hypocrites. People, or spirits, that get mad when others do as they do. The only person who wasn't a hypocrite was the good woman of Setzuan herself. She led by example to all from the mortal humans to the omnipotent gods.
In the last scene, Shen Te reveals herself to the gods who were acting as judges. They find what she did astonishing, but admire her for it. Wong, the water seller sees Shen Te and get excited to know that she is alive. They all missed her, but she knows that without her “cousin” everyone will walk all over her. Even though the play has no clearbv ending to it, which makes it hard to understand the moral, a wise conclusion would be that Bertolt Brecht wanted to persuade his audience to let go of that hypocrisy, and to be more understanding people that are less judgmental. The way he tried to persuade his audience was by showing us the opposite in all of the characters except one. Perhaps we should all take after the good woman of Setzuan, and make the Earth more tolerable.


Works Cited

Brecht, Bertolt. The Good Woman Of Setzuan. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1948.

What are they aiming at?

In the American society, we go through a hierarchy. The people at the top are doctors, lawyers, or scientists, while the people at the bottom are the homeless, the drug addicts, and women of the streets, or prostitutes. In his play, The Good Woman of Setzuan, Bertolt Brecht appears to switch this around, and makes the prostitute the person at the top of the list. Even though the play doesn't take place in America and it isn't related to American culture, this is still very strange.
Shen Te is a prostitute in Setzuan. The play revolves around her and the three gods. These three gods came to Setzuan to see who still believed in them. The gods say:

SECOND GOD: What did I tell you?
THIRD GOD: It could be pure coincidence.
SECOND GOD: The same coincidence in Shun, Kwan, and Setzuan? People just aren't religious anymore, lets face the fact. Our mission has failed. (7)

The gods feel like no one cares anymore and they are looking for a good person. When Wong, the water seller, is going from house to house asking people if they had room for the gods in their homes, everyone said no because they didn't want to, except Shen Te. Being a prostitute, she works by attending to men, and even though a man would be at her house that day, she said that she would let the gods come in. When the gods do enter her house, they declare her a good woman, and she denies their declaration. She tells them her story and why she does the things she does, and the gods feel sorry for her and try to help her pay the rent on her house.
What is strange in this play is that the gods claim that people aren't religious anymore. That they don't believe the gods exist, but they are right in front of them. If seeing is believing, what's the problem? Why aren't the people religious? It is clear that there is a problem with a dam, but even now if there's an earthquake or a hurricane, we don't stop believing in God. I will admit that there are times in my life when I ask why so many bad things happen, and even if I say well these are the consequences that we pay for our action, there are times where the people that suffered the consequences did no bad deeds. For example, the earthquake in Haiti. Those people go through hurricanes and all sorts of things every year, they are the poorest country in the west, but they still have tragedies. How could they deserve punishment year after year after year? This also happens in my personal life when I ask why did that happen? And as much as I try to figure out what I did to receive a punishment of the caliber, I can't figure it out. This is what might be happening in Setzuan, but just because I can't figure it out, I don't stop believing in God, so why have the people of Shun, Kwan, and Setzuan stopped believing in their gods?
One person, at least, still believes in the gods, and she is also a good person even though her profession indicates otherwise. When the gods reappear in Wong's dreams he tells them of all of Shen Te's good deeds, and the gods are happy. That is another strange thing in this play. As humans we tend to rely on God, those of us who believe, but the play makes it seem like the gods rely on humans.
I don't really know where this play is going. Hopefully we'll know once the second half of the play is read.

Works Cited

Brecht, Bertolt, and Eric Bentley. The Good Woman of Setzuan. Minneapolis, Minn.: University of Minnesota, 1999. Print.

Ahmad's Achilles Heel

Omnipotent. This is how Naguib Mahfouz presents al-Sayyid Ahmad in the beginning of his novel Palace Walk. Ahmad is the father of five, Yasin, Khadija, Aisha, Fhamy, and Kamal, and the husband of Amina. In his household, like in most Islamic households, he was king and whatever he said went. What was different in his house was that he didn’t follow any rules, not even the rules in the Koran. He would stay out partying and drinking until really late, and possibly having extramarital relationships with other women, which are both unacceptable in the Muslim world. His family wasn’t really comfortable with his behavior but they couldn’t say anything because if they did, Ahmad could have gone berserk, and nobody wanted that, so they just put up with it. At one point his oldest, Yasin, begins to follow in Ahmad’s footsteps. He becomes a man crazy about women and Ahmad doesn’t think much of it. And as the rest of his children grew, Ahmad began to lose his omnipotence.
When a child becomes a teenager, takes school more seriously, and makes more friends, he develops his own ideas and becomes interdependent. He still needs his parents for economic and emotional support, but he no longer needs them for decision-making, at least that’s what he thinks. We’ve all gone through it. Ahmad had five, and they would all go through it. When asked what the worst part of being a parent is, McKennasmom03 answered, “…When [your kids] are hurt or sick and there isn't a thing you can do. Watching them go off to Kindergarten... Watching them take the keys to the car and drive off. Watching them leave home when they [have] ‘grown’. (McKennasmom03)” Ahmad would have to see his five children leave one day, and he did. Once his two daughters were married, Ahmad was left with only boys and his little girls didn’t need him any longer. But before they left him, Ahmad showed some weakness. When the possibility of his youngest daughter, Aisha, getting married before her older sister, Khadija, came up, Ahmad became concerned with the possibility of Khadija getting depressed because her younger sister married before her. Mahfouz says,

When he could at last sit down again, he was breathing heavily. He was distressed and dejected. He had a sensitive heart, more sensitive than most people would have suspected. In fact, it was too sensitive. How could anyone believe that who had only seen him grinning, bellowing, or laughing sarcastically?... Sorrow was going to scorch his flesh and blood in a way that could spoil his whole life, making it seem ugly to him... Each of [his daughters] was a vital part of him (Mahfouz, 229).

Ahmad's kindness is exposed and a small window into his sensitivity is opened.
Daniela mentions this in her blog, Hiding Behind the Wall. The way to get to his weak side is through his children, and this isn't the only example of this in the novel.
The next time that we see Ahmad's sensitivity, it is in a much more extreme manner. It isn't about hurting one of his children, it is about one of his hurting, or no longer hurting, children.“The young man said with obvious sorrow, 'We are sad to inform you of the death of our brother freedom fighter Fahmy Ahmad'… (495)” Ahmad goes crazy. If seeing your children leave once they're grown up hurts, imagine how much knowing that you will never get to see your child again hurts. But he doesn't only show his sensitivity by going crazy and crying because his son died, but he also worries about Amina's feelings. As Tianna puts it in her blog Death in the End, “He does not know how to break the news to his wife.” How would she react to finding out that her son had died. He had never really seemed to care about what Amina felt or thought, but this time it was different, very different. Her feelings were one of his main preoccupations. He couldn't believe that his son had died. He always thought that Fahmy was a nice kid that never went to any rallies or things of that matter. In actuality, Fahmy was constantly attending rallies. But this was unknown to Ahmad, and even if he did know, the loss of his son would still hurt.
By the end of the novel, Mahfouz has taken us through Ahmad's transformation from an “omnipotent” tyrant, to a sensitive person similar to everyone else. By the end of the novel we discover that Ahmad's Achilles heel is his children.






Works Cited

Mahfouz, Naguib. Palace Walk. New York: Anchor, 1990. Print.

McKennasmom03. "What Do You Think the Worst Part of Being a Parent Is? - CafeMom." CafeMom - Moms Connecting About Pregnancy, Babies, Home, Health, and More. 24 Mar. 2009. Web. 06 Apr. 2010. .

Bruno, Tianna M. "Death in the End." Web log post. Digging Even Deeper. 26 May 2010. Web. 9 Apr. 2010. .

Barajas, Guadalupe D. “Hiding Behind The Wall.” Web log post. Digging Even Deeper. 23 Feb. 2010. Web. 9 Apr. 2010. .

Not A God, But A Human

Throughout the first part of Palace Walk, Naguib Mahfouz portrays Ahmad as a powerful, and feared man that thinks highly of himself and whose family views him as a god. Ahmad controls every move his family makes. But through his death and rebellion, Fahmy helps his father to realize that he is nothing but a human. Towards the end of the book, Ahmad loses control of his son Fahmy, who dares to disobey him. Fahmy’s behavior strip Ahmad of his power, driving him closer to admitting his humanity. Later faced with Fahmy’s death, Ahmad feels extreme sadness, which leads him to realize and accept that he is not to a god, allowing himself to break down. With this break down, Ahmad appears to be a new man that accepts his powerlessness and that gives into his human emotions.

Throughout the first part of the book, Ahmad has power, and control over everything that happens to his family because his ego has been aggrandized by the way everyone in the family fears, loves, and respects him as if he were a god. As TheJavi says in his blog, Ahmad Never Changes, that “ [Ahmad] thinks really highly of himself” so he never questions his behavior. He always wants things to be his way. He always has the power over everything and always uses that power to manipulate things, so that he can be at the center of them. For example when the officer wanted to marry Aisha, he said that “no daughter of mine would marry a man until I am satisfied that his primary motive for marrying her is a sincere desire to be related to me…me…me…me” (157). Here one can see how egotistical Ahmad is. Another time when we see that Ahmad thinks so highly of himself is when he tells Fahmy, “The only word that counts here is mine. Mine, mine, mine…” (425). Once again, Ahmad shows that he wants things to be centered around him as if he were god. Through these examples, one can see his power to control the family.

But it is the way the family behaves with Ahmad and the way they feel about him that allow Ahmad to have the power to control everything. The family adores Ahmad in a very extreme way. I feel like everyone in the family blindly follows his lead, even when he is wrong. One really gets a sense of this affection, loyalty and fear for Ahmad when the author describes the feelings Aisha had when her father decided that she wouldn’t get married before Khadija, thus denying Aisha from the opportunity of marrying the officer she had fallen for. The author writes:

Although she was hurt, angry, and resentful, these emotions could not touch her father. They fell back impotently like a wild animal stopped by its trainer, whom it loves and fears. Aisha was not able to attack her father, not even in the depths of her heart. She continued in her love and devotion for him. She felt sincerely dutiful to him, as though he were a god whose decree could only be received with submission, love and loyalty. (160-161)

Here we see that the love and fear she felt towards her father was much too strong to allow Aisha to let any of the negative emotions be against her father. The fear and the love she had wouldn’t even let her think of feeling the hurt, anger, and resentment against her father even in the secrecy of her heart. Not even the other strong emotions she felt could erase the deep love and great fear her father incited in her.

No one dares to speak against Ahmad because the fear incited by his power is intimidating. Even more than the intimidation, the affection they feel for Ahmad makes the family look at him as something close to a god. Here one can instantly see a cycle. The family’s veneration causes Ahmad to be powerful and Ahmad’s power causes the family to venerate him. Seeing not only Aisha, but everyone else comply to his wishes, simply makes Ahmad feel more powerful, even as powerful as a god. Aisha obeys him because she feels “dutiful to him, as though he were a god whose decree could only be received with submission, love and loyalty” (161). This last sentence proves that Aisha, and even the rest of the family see Ahmad as a god. They obey him because to them he is like a god; in their eyes, he has power to control everything.

Since Ahmad’s is empowered by his family’s submissiveness, when one of them, Fahmy, goes against his will, Ahmad starts doubting his power and seeing that he’s weak. Fahmy always venerated his father like the rest of the family; thus, he never dared to disobey his commands. But things change with the war because Fahmy has really strong feelings about the war, even stronger feelings than the fear for his father. When Fahmy has to confess to his father that he has been distributing handbills to promote Egypt’s independence, Ahmad is alarmed and angry, and tells Fahmy to stop. Fahmy, ultimately, refuses to swear on the Qur'an that he will stop, and instead, he continues his behavior, going against his father’s will. He does this even though in the Qur'an it says, "Three persons shall not enter the Garden: the one who is disobedient to his parents,” meaning that his offense is a great one. But despite the divine law, Fahmy disobeys his father. His son’s rebellion causes Ahmad to be stripped of his power. Ahmad says, “He said no to me for the first time in his life…should I reveal my lack of power to [Amina]? Should I seek help from her weakness after my power has failed” (449). By opposing him, Fahmy takes away the power that Ahmad was so sure he possessed, and makes him feel weak, showing that Ahmad’s power was in the hands of those that feared it. Here we see clearly that the submissiveness of the family built Ahmad’s power; thus, without everyone’s submissiveness, he lost the power to control. Here Fahmy has taken Ahmad closer to seeing his humanity.

But it isn’t until Ahmad’s death that Ahmad realizes and accepts that he is not god, and allows himself be human and break down. When Ahmad finds out his son had died, one can see how human, how sensitive Ahmad truly is because he finally lets us see it. He thinks when he gets the bad news, “How can I have a home without him? How can I be a father if he’s gone?” (495). Here Ahmad is saying that he can’t have life without his son; he can’t be a father without him. Before getting to this part, one would have never thought that Ahmad would think this way because one always perceived Ahmad as egotistical man and as one who never needed anyone. But with Fahmy’s death, he’s humbled. As Mauricio discusses in his blog, Sensitive Soul-dier, Fahmy makes Ahmad change his ways. Ahmad finally touches the ground and sees that he can feel pain too. Mahfouz says, “ a time would come when [Ahmad] would be all alone and could devote himself to his sorrow with all his soul…giving free rein to tears so he could totally exhaust them” (497). Ahmad sees that he can suffer too because he’s just human.

A cycle can always be broken; it just takes a small change in one of the elements involved. Fahmy broke the cycle going on with the family and Ahmad. He changed his behavior when he went against his father’s will, stopping the source of his father’s power. By dying, Fahmy places his father in a situation that Ahmad has never been in, making him feel new strong emotions such as sorrow. By making Ahmad feel powerless after disobeying him and sad and hopeless after dying, Fahmy lets Ahmad see that he can be human, and that he doesn’t always have to act like he can control everything because he can’t. Death comes when it wants to come, and Ahmad has no control over that.

Works Cited

1. Mahfouz, Naguib. Palace Walk. New York: Anchor Books, 1991.
2. Mvazquez. "Sensitive Soul-dier." Weblog post. Digging Even Deeper. Web. 06 April 2010. <http://diggingevendeeper.blogspot.com/2010/04/sensitive-soul-dier.html>
3. TheJavi. “Ahmad Never Changes.” Web log post. Digging Even Deeper. Web. 24 March 2010. < http://diggingevendeeper.blogspot.com/2010/03/ahmad-never-changes.html.>
4. The Holy Quran. Maulana Muhammad Ali, 2002. Web. 6 Apr. 2010. <http://aaiil.org/text/hq/trans/ma_list.shtml>

Ahmad: Strong to Weak

In Palace Walk by Naguib Mahfouz, one of the main characters is Al-Sayyid Ahmad Abd al-Jawad. He is the father of good children, a husband to a very obedient wife, and the proprietor of a successful store. When the novel opens up, we, the readers, are given the impression that Ahmad is a cold-hearted womanizer who has a missing toe due to a corn and mistreats his family. The level of disrespect that he gives his family, his wife especially, is immense. He disregards the effects that his actions will have on his family, which are the influences that he is having on his son Yasin and the fear that he is instilling in his other children. But Ahmad becomes a different person when he is with his friends. He becomes a light- hearted, drinker who is considered the life of the part. But even with them, he is powerful and influential. He has the power to attract the finest singers and become lovers with them. He exemplifies the “macho man” appearance. But because of certain happenings throughout the novel, we see the great Ahmad turn into a weak, helpless ordinary person. By the end of the novel, he realizes that he has lost his influential status. He is no longer in control of everything around him, which broke him down.
But it was not always like this. In the first part of the novel, Ahmad knows that he controls all that happens in his house. On page 4, Ahmad tells Amina, “I'm a man. I'm the one who commands and forbids. I will not accept any criticism of my behavior...” Ruqaiyyah W. Maqsood, a Muslim imam, would disagree with this statement made by Ahmad. He said that, “Her [a Muslim woman's] husband is not her master; a Muslim woman has only one Master, and that is God. If her husband does not represent God's will in the home, the marriage contract is broken.

What should one make of the verse in the Koran that allows a man to punish his wife physically? There are important provisos: he may do so only if her ill-will is wrecking the marriage - but then only after he has exhausted all attempts at verbal communication and tried sleeping in a separate bed.” Ahmad, obviously, goes against Maqsood because he hit her and is the most loyal, and docile woman in the novel. But Ahmad wants to scare her so he knows that she won't defy him because of fear. No one in his house would dare challenge his authority at this point. Their fear of him overpowers their love for him. Mahfouz explains Kamal's love for Ahmad as “a hidden jewel, locked up inside him by fear and terror”(50). The fear goes a lot further than Kamal. His own wife is afraid to talk to him about things or express herself because she might be beaten. Amina refrains from telling Ahmad about the things that Kamal has done at school and at home because she fears what he will do to him and sympathizes with Kamal. Ahmad knows what his family feels toward him and he feels satisfied with that. He is content as long as he gets respect and his family does not embarrass him. He does not seem to be effected by the fact that, besides respect, he does not get very many signs of love from his own family.
At his store, he has many loyal customers and employees that keep his business running successfully, which keeps his status up.
All is going according to Ahmad's plans and likings. He is blessed with a successful family and friends that all respect him and his authority. But it was not his family or friends that broke his reign of power. The Australian soldiers were the first to challenge him. A challenge from any of the soldiers was the most threatening and detrimental to Ahmad because he could not do anything to challenge them because he feared them. Ahmad say that “Their tyranny separated him from the Ezbekiya Garden entertainment district, which he abandoned in defeat,...”(11). It was the same situation when he was led by the English soldier in the middle of the night to fill that trench. It appeared that they were at a higher level that he. They were referred to in the novel as a “god” when Yasin encounters them. He cannot even decipher their language to communicate with them. Ahmad is very belittled in this scene. A man that is so well respected and honored in his community is forced to dig dirt to fill a trench that he didn't even burrow at gun point.
Ahmad senses the change in his authority. But he can't sit back and accept the truth of what is happening. He has to show and prove to himself that he still has power. This is also why he chooses to sleep with these unmarried women and party all night also. He has to prove to himself that he still has the same stuff in him that he did when he was a younger man when his pedestal held him so high above others. Maybe, this has something to do with why he gets so upset when he sees Yasin's actions resemble his. He wants to stop Yasin's rant before his son turns out to be the way Ahmad is by the end of the novel.
It is apparent that Ahmad struggles with not having power when he requests that Aisha and Khadija move back in with them until they have their babies. Ahmad, being the man that has controlled and been responsible for keeping his daughters safe, feels uncomfortable with the idea of not being able to protect them. He knows that these men cannot do as adequate job as he can and has done for majority of their lives. Ahmad's impatience when he was waiting to receive information about Aisha while she was in labor is great evidence of this. He thinks because he is her father he should be the first to find out anything that is going on in that room. He could not comprehend how he was not their first to receive the information about his daughter, especially if she is in danger of dying. Dying. Death is the major thing in the novel that throws Ahmad way off track. Death is the one thing that Ahmad knows that he has no power over. He can't bring anyone back once they have died. This is the point where he can't deny his downfall. As Daniela says in her blog He's Human After All, “to a certain extent Ahmad is portrayed as a god.” But when death arises, we, the readers, are exposed to an Ahmad that we had not seen throughout the entire novel. We see a weak, powerless human being. When he is first hit with the news, he can't even fathom the idea of Fahmy being dead. This is the only time in the novel where we see Ahmad hopeless. He does not have a solution to this. He can't get mad because that won't do anything. He sees that there is nothing in his power that will bring his son back. He knows that his power that he has adored has faded to nothing. This is the situation that finalizes it for Ahmad. He knows that he is not really that powerful. As Mvazquez discusses in his blog Sensitive Soul-dier, Fahmy is the one who brings about the true change in Ahmad. No one could say anything to Ahmad to change him. Things had to happen to him. First, soldiers belittle him, then he can't help his own daughter, and finally there is nothing that he can do for his son. There is nothing he can say to console his wife after the lost of her favorite son.
For majority of the novel, Ahmad would never have thought of being this powerless. If anything happened that upset him, Ahmad would probably drink that problem away. But he has been brought to the point where he sees that there is nothing that he can do except grieve. He wanted to always have control of everything so that nothing unexpected happens that he might not be ready for, for example Amina breaking her arm and Fahmy getting shot. But with Amina, he could felt he could solve the problem by instilling more fear in her. But with Fahmy, it is not possible to solve this problem. He can't instill fear in him and obviously fear would no have stopped Fahmy from going because it didn't before. The novel begins with a display of Ahmad's power and ends with that power being yanked away from him.



Work Cited

Mahfouz, Naguib. Palace Walk. New York: Anchor Books, 1991.

Maqsood, Ruqaiyyah W. "Islam, Culture and Women - Ruqaiyyah Waris Maqsood." Islam For Today. Web. 06 Apr. 2010. .

Mvazquez. "Sensitive Soul-dier." Web log post. Digging Even Deeper. Web. 05 Apr. 2010. .

Daniela. "He's Human After All." Web log post. Digging Even Deeper. Web. 05 Apr. 2010. .

Sensitive Soul-dier

The ending of Naguib Mahfouz’s novel, Palace Walk, shows one of the main characters opening himself up to the reader. Like an oyster, he opened his strong shell to expose his soft inside. Throughout the entire novel, al-Sayyid Ahmad plays the tough dictatorial father who allows no questioning of his authority, and does whatever he pleases whenever he pleases. But in a dramatic change of events, Ahmad reveals that he isn’t only the strict tyrant that he is perceived to be, he is a delicate, innocent person who, like most other on this world, is torn apart after finding out terrible news about one of his children.

“The young man said with obvious sorrow, 'We are sad to inform you of the death of our brother freedom fighter Fahmy Ahmad… (495)'” Ahmad learns that his son Fahmy just died during a peace rally. He asks the soldiers many questions and among them is a comment which shows Ahmad's ignorance. Ahmad thinks that this was Fahmy's first rally against the war, well it wasn't. Fahmy had gone behind his father's back and attended other rallies before. He must have thought of the saying, “What daddy don't know, wont hurt him.” Well that didn't, but Fahmy's death did. And with Fahmy also died the tyrannical Ahmad that Mahfouz portrayed throughout the novel. Like Daniela mentioned in her blog, Hiding Behind the Wall, “...[H]e was too sensitive, he acted so rough with them to protect himself from being hurt by them.” She is talking about how he acts with his daughters, and this also applies to his sons. But after Fahmy died, he can't be tough on him anymore, and there is no more act.
Like previously mentioned, Ahmad wasn't the nicest guy in the world. He wasn't faithful either to his wife or his religion, he was mean spirited, and he obviously wasn't a good role model, but an even like the death of your child, that can really turn a person around. I'll sidetrack to my personal life briefly. Whenever my mother hears a story about how someone's son died, she says, “Ay no! Yo no podria vivir sabiendo que se me murio un hijo.” With that, she summarizes some of the feelings that Ahmad is having. He could not live knowing that one of his children died. No one can truly feel what Ahmad feels unless they are a parent themselves.
And Ahmad learned a lesson that any other parent in this situation would learn. As I believe Johnathan tries to get at in his blog Father's and Children's Relationships, he learns what the role of being a father is. The death of Fahmy is going to bring him closer to his remaining children.
Fahmy is now dead, but he left an inheritance of lessons for his family, and the first one to get his share, Ahmad, learned quickly, and changed his ways.



Works Cited

Mahfouz, Naguib. Palace Walk (Cairo Trilogy). New York: Anchor, 1990.

Did He Really Rape Her?

In this week's reading of Palace Walk by Naguib Mahfouz, there an interesting revelation. It had previously been obvious that Yasin had problems controlling his sexual urges. Before, he crossed the line when thinking of how to approach Zubayda. This time, he went way beyond the limit by forcing
Nur, his wife's maid, to have sexual relations with him. He definitely has problems controlling his urges, but did he actually rape her?
The following passage seems to be half Yasin's view, and the other half seems pretty neutral. Just as an alcoholic will never admit that he is drunk, and a smoker won't give up the cigarette, Yasin finds excuses to justify his actions.

His greedy appetite overcame his hesitation. He put his hand on her waist. Then he pulled her gently toward his breast. She put up some resistance and kept him from achieving his goal. Putting his cheek next to hers, he whispered in her ear, "Come to the room."
She muttered uneasily, "Shame on you, master."
Her voice rang out in the silence in a way that disturbed him. She had not raised her voice intentionally, but it did not appear easy for her to whisper or her whisper had a resonance to it, even if less pronounced than that of her normal voice. His panic quickly deserted him, both because his lust was fully ignited and because her tone lacked the protest that her words suggested. He took her by the hand as he murmured, "Come along, sweetheart."
She did not attempt to free her hand, either because she was pleased or because she was obedient. He was lavishing kisses on her cheek and neck, swaying from the intense emotional impact, in a delirium of happiness. He began to say, "What's kept you from me all these months?"
She answered him in her normal tone of voice, lacking any ring of protest, "Shame on you, master."
Smiling, he commented, "Your objections are very attractive. Make some more."
She did resist a little when they reached the entrance to the room and said, "Shame on you, master. . . ." Then, as though to caution him, she added, "The room's full of bedbugs."
He pushed her inside, whispering with his mouth at the nape of her neck, "I'd lie among scorpions for your sake, Nur." (382)

Scarleteen says “Rape is when one person wants and pursues a sexual act on, to or inside another person who does not want to participate, and who does not fully and freely consent to take part in that act. (1) In this passage, Nur seems to fit the description pretty well. It is Yasin's twisted mind that confuses the reader. He makes the reader think that Nur is being kinky. That when she says no it means yes. If there was a history of Yasin and Nur flirting in the book it would be more believable, but there was nothing before. Mahfouz also describes Yasin as being someone so lustful that the only characteristic he looks for in a woman is that she is a woman. He will engage in intercourse with any woman no matter how ugly or old. The odds are against him. In a previous essay I had mentioned that in Islam, the woman has to satisfy her husband's sexual desires no matter what they are as long as it doesn't affect someone's health. Their religion justifies that, so there can't be any “rape” in an Islamic marriage. In a marriage! Yasin and Nur had nothing going on at all, and definitely nothing remotely close to marriage. Yasin has no excuse. He raped Nur. She didn't want to cohabitate with him and he forced her to.
Yasin still has problems with his sexual urges that he has to control at this point of the novel. Hopefully, these urges won't get him in any trouble the remainder of the novel.


Mahfouz, Naguib. Palace Walk (Cairo Trilogy). New York: Anchor, 1990. Print.

"What Is Rape & What Is It Like to Be Raped? Scarleteen." Scarleteen Sex Education For The Real World. Web. 03 Mar. 2010. .

Confusing Compliments

In the Muslim culture, a man has to provide for his wife, and the woman in return has to satisfy her husband's desires, all of them which do not harm her, or others. Their customs are to hide a woman's body with clothing most of the time only exposing her eyes for her to be able to see where she is going. This is done to prevent lustful thoughts in men, and it also eliminates the probability of choosing a mate based on physical attraction. To the Muslims, this lowers the chance of a divorce because marriages are nos based on the outside, but the inside (Islam the Eternal Path to Peace). But there is something in the XY chromosomes that makes men go crazy when a foxy lady walks by them. Yasin has too much of this, and has no idea of how to handle it.
About half way through the novel, Mahfouz shows us a little of Yasin's overexcited hormones. This is what was going through his head,
'Isn't it time yet, bitch? I've melted away, Muslims. I've dissolved like a bar of soap. Nothing's left but the suds. She knows this and doesn't care to open the window. Go ahead, play the coquette, you bitch. Didn't we agree on a date? But you're right to hold back ... one of your breasts could destroy Malta. The second would drive Hindenburg out of his mind. You've got a treasure. May our Lord be gracious to me. May our Lord be gracious to me and to every poor rogue like me who can't sleep for thinking about swelling breasts, plump buttocks, and eyes enhanced by kohl. Eyes come last, because many a blind woman with a fleshy rump and full breasts is a thousand times better than a skinny, flat-chested woman with eyes decorated with kohl. You're the performer's daughter and a neighbor of al-Tarbi'a Alley. The performer has taught you to flirt, and the alley has supplied you with its secret beauty potions. If your breasts have grown full and round, it's because so many lovers have fondled them. We agreed on this date. I'm not dreaming, open the window. Open up, bitch. Open up. You're the most beautiful creature ever to arouse my passion. Holding your lip between mine ... sucking on your nipple.... I'll wait until dawn. You'll find me very docile. If you want me to be the rear end of a donkey cart that you rock back and forth on, I'll do it. If you want me to be the ass pulling the cart, I'll do that. What a mishap, Yasin! Your life is destroyed, you son of Ahmad Abd al-Jawad. How the Australians gloat at your fate. Woe to me, expelled from the Ezbekiya entertainment district, a prisoner in al-Gamaliya. It's all the fault of the war. Kaiser Wilhelm launched it in Europe and I have become its victim here in al-Nahhasin. Open the window, delight of your mother. Open up, my delight...' (Mahfouz, 242)
Not much of a pick-up line, but it sure gives him a lot to talk about. When the reader takes a look at this passage the first thought that comes to mind is, “Is a woman supposed to reply positively to this?” If this isn't their first thought, it must be something along the lines of, “This is kinky.” Yasin gives Zubayda back to back backhanded compliments. He compliments the size of her breasts, but attributes it to the many men who have fondled with them. He also calls her a bitch right before calling her the most beautiful creature he has seen. Clearly, lust is a part of Yasin's life, and his religion doesn't seem to be very important to him. In the reader's eyes, Yasin might appear to be a good example of a bad Muslim.
Yasin's lustful comments to Zubayda wouldn't only confuse her during the attempt to decipher their vulgarity if she had heard them, but they also confuse the reader about his faith and his effectiveness. Yasin's XY chromosomes are way out of tune, and in order to get to any woman's heart, he is going to have to tone it down, and be aware of what he is saying.




"Marriage in Islam." Jannah.Org :: Islam the Eternal Path to Peace. Web. 25 Feb. 2010. .

Mahfouz, Naguib. Palace Walk. New York: Anchor, 1990

Poetic Writing

In chapter twenty six of Naguib Mahfouz's Palace Walk, Mahfouz's almost poetic language begins to pull the reader in. He starts mixing in long sentences with shorter sentences, and even uses dialogue. This is the first chapter in which the reader can actually feel present in the scene.
In this passage, Mahfouz writes about how simple it is to disrespect the man of the house, and the magnitude of being disrespectful to the man of the house.

Aisha had anticipated what would happen even before the matter was presented to her father. All the same, she had nourished a glimmer of hope in her dreams, like one of us tempted by the hope of winning first prize in a major lottery. At first, influenced by the generosity that comes with victory or happiness and by affection for her unlucky sister, she had been willing to object to getting married. Now her generosity had faded away and her affection had dwindled. Nothing remained but resentment, anger, and despair. There was not a thing she could do about it. This was her father's will and she could not criticize it. All she could do was submit and obey. In fact, she had to be happy and content. To be despondent would be an unforgivable offense. To protest would be a sin her conscience and sense of etiquette could not allow. From the intoxication of bounteous happiness that had elated her night and day she awoke to despair. How gloomy the darkness seemed coming immediately after dazzling light. Thus the pain was not limited to the current darkness but was doubled many times over by regret for the light that had vanished. She asked herself why, since light had been able to shine for a while, it could not keep on shining. Why should it die out? Why had it died out? It was a new regret to add to the others – drawn from memories, the present, and dreams of the future – that sorrow was weaving around her heart. Although she was sunk in thought about this and it dominated her feelings, she wondered again, as though for the first time, whether the light had really gone out. The bitter truth seemed to be bombarding her emotions for the very first time. (159)

What really catches the reader's eye is the detail and the similes and metaphors. The reader could understand that it was a severe action to disrespect the man in the house, but in this passage Mahfouz puts the reader there and the way he delivers this message is like a boxing match. He throws some jabs, short sentences, and the he throws right and left hooks along with uppercuts, long sentences, to know the reader out of his chair. The combinations he is throwing could not be put together any better, and the questions he asks are the knock out blows to the reader's kidneys. When he takes the gloves off, he picks up a T-square and a pencil, and like an architect begins drawing up masterpieces to be created in the reader's imagination. With words like dazzling, intoxication, bombarding, and bounteous, Mahfouz builds skyscrapers with the sharpest edges, and cathedrals with the most detailed cupola.
Mahfouz describes the situation exceptionally well, and if the rest of the novel is like the passage above, the reader will really enjoy reading it.

A Million Possibilities

In his novel, Palace Walk, Naguib Mahfouz writes in a descriptive but un-revealing manner, which leaves things up for numerous, strange, interpretations. Of course, if the reader is following the book, it isn't very hard to interpret. If the reader sets the novel down and later continues reading from where he left off, he might be a little disoriented by what he is reading. Even though this appears to take away from the novel's meaning, the reader can enjoy this experience and actually grasp the author's point.

One such passage where the reader can step into a world not related to the book's meaning is in chapter ten when Mahfouz writes,

Fahmy watched her appear and disappear until no clothes were left to separate them. She faced him, her small hands rising and falling, her fingers slowly and deliberately grasping and releasing what she held, as though she was dragging out her work on purpose. His heart guessed it was on purpose, although he was torn between doubt and hope. He did not fight his feeling of being liberated to the farthest horizons by his happiness. He was conscious of nothing but dancing melodies. Although she did not glance up at him, her demeanor, the blush on her cheeks, and her avoidance of looking at him all betrayed how intensely conscious she was of his presence, or the impact he had made on her feelings. (59)

What he is describing is Maryam doing laundry. But for the reader that set down the novel, went grocery shopping, and then once again engaged in reading, this could mean a ton of things.
The first thought that comes to mind is that Maryam is doing magic. With her disappearance and reappearance, she reminds the reader of a Harry Houdini, and with the grasping and releasing of objects, she reminds the reader of Carrot Top. And even though it is far fetched because of his age, Fahmy could really be enjoying this magic show. Another thought that can go through the reader's mind is that Maryam was in the fitting room trying on dresses. This is less of the possibility especially once the time period and location are taken into account. But when the reader is discombobulated, anything can happen. And even though the list goes on and on, the most obvious one is sexual intercourse (I won't go into details).

This possibility makes the most sense and it is so plausible, that it can be the hidden message. The statement previous to this passage says, “No fear is able to spoil love's development or keep it from dreaming of its appointed hour.” (59) This says that love has no barriers and no matter what is in the way, love, especially young love, will always prevail. How can you jump from love, or making love, to doing the laundry? Mahfouz, intentionally included this sexual allusion to keep the reader on his toes and ready for what lies ahead.

This goes to show that not just this passage but every other in this novel, and in every other novel, can have a double meaning, you just have to be distracted enough to catch it.