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 Alley of the World September 22, 2008
Made In Hero: The War for Soap
MIDAQ ALLEY is a masterpiece of existentialist satire. It has enough greed, lust, envy and delusion to match Jean Paul Sartre's NO EXIT (famous for the line "Hell is other people"). And this is what makes it such fun.
MIDAQ ALLEY works on so many levels that it's easy to be drawn in, yet indecisive about where to settle. The characters share the confusion (maybe even inspire it). After all, that's their role.
For starters, they inhabit a crowded strip of a crowded Egyptian city in the midst of the second World War. With an unlikely mix of fondness and derision, this home-sweet-home is dubbed The Alley. It is less than a street, yet no less than a microcosm of the planet.
Many humans dwell there. One is a young, humble barber without a trace of ambition. He falls sick with love for a vain young woman who is sick with ambition. Next is the sweetshop owner, the baker's wife, and the wealthy widow--all corpulent. Add the matchmaker, the professional beggar, and the graverobber--all greedy. Not least, there is the businessman, the cripple, and the cafe proprieter--all consumed with lust. There is no shortage of weak men and the shrewish wives who love to pommel them. Tensions are occasionally relieved by the affections of ordinary people for one another, but they are quickly subsumed by layers of resentment and malice--the natural result of people suffocating in close quarters and longing to see the world beyond.
On a local level, The Alley is a meager universe yet enriched by its distinctive character and texture. In fact, the place is itself a character--complete with an odor and a pulsing heartbeat. Like many of the cast, The Alley is even portly--threatening to burst at the seams. Moreover, it is a carnival of the bizarre, an invitation to surrender one's sense of reality.
The effect is not delight, exactly, although it's hard to say what. In spite of that, I thoroughly enjoyed this book. However, I was more than halfway through it before I realized that I was supposed to be laughing (with us, at us). It's a sad kind of laughter based on recognition--that this is the human lot. But by the time I caught on, it was too late. There was no turning back. Actually, I couldn't wait to turn the pages.
 cool July 1, 2008
for something written in the early 1900s, its a charming novel. it gives a great insight on how women can be manipulative, confused, desperate, and yet charming.
Midaq Alley June 9, 2008
Naguib Mahfouz's Midaq Alley is a fictional novel which focuses on the lives of the inhabitants of a neighborhood alley in the heart of Cairo during World War II. Told in a soap opera fashion, Mahfouz introduces the readers to nearly 12 main characters with 7 side characters. With so many characters present, it is easily noticeable that the main literary element Mahfouz employs in Midaq Alley is characterization; and thus all of the characters are crucial to the story's plot.
The main conflict within the story lies in between a struggle between those who dream of leaving the alley for a "more prosperous life" and those who are more than content with staying in the alley forever. This is highlighted between Hamida's desire to become rich and powerful and Abbas' desire to marry Hamida. Abbas, who is a poor barber in the alley, wishes to court Hamida; however, she is not interested until he decides to go work for the British Army just to please her, which was very lucrative during World War II. However, Hamida would not remain content for long as her desire for power was too great, this desire and greed would take Hamida down a path that would not only bare consequences for her, but also for those who loved and cared for her. A side struggle which followed along this same motif was between that of Kirsha, the pedophiliac cafe owner, and his son, Hussein Kirsha. Hussein Kirsha decides to leave his house because of his immense disgust towards the alley in which his father denounces him. Hussein Kirsha believes that the British Army will forever lucratively support him; however, World War II will soon come to an end and the alley beckons.
However, Midaq Alley does not just focus on this motif with many side stories constantly emerging throughout the novel. From Salim Alwan, the rich business man who believes that his health will forever last him, to Zaita, the scum who controls the beggars of the Hussein district in Cairo and helps people become crippled, to Dr. Booshy, the dentist who has no real license and suspiciously attains gold dentures at low prices. In the end, Mahfouz ingeniously ties all the stories together for a heart-racing climax. A great work, one that should be in the library of all Mahfouz fans, and those who aren't.
Quiet desperation, Egyptian style December 17, 2007
Thoreau said that "most men lead lives of quiet desperation." This wonderful novel, set in Cairo, Egypt, during WWII, beautifully illustrates that point. Midaq Alley is just what it sounds like, an out of the way alley in a big city where most of the inhabitants are just getting by, or worse. Some accept their fate, accepting it as God's will. Others are very unhappy with their lot in life and are determined to better themselves. Only one of them succeeds, but it is debatable whether the fate of that character, Hamida, whose way out is prostitution, a life style she is at first seduced into but chooses freely, is better than what she left.
Midaq Alley has a vibrancy and a sense of community that has all but disappeared in modern urban settings, at least in the US, but probably less so in Egypt. All of its residents know each other and are generally there for each other. All of then live by their wits. One man sells sweets. One is a coffee shop owner and openly homosexual, something I found very surprising in an Islamic society of six and a half decades ago. One woman is a matchmaker. One woman is a landlady. One young man is a barber who goes to work for the British in order to be able to marry the girl he loves, a girl who ultimately proves to be unworthy of him, and is his undoing.
One of the reasons fiction is valuable is that it gives us an insight into how societies that we may never otherwise come into contact with function. Midaq Alley is such a book. And, although it is tragic, its ultimate message is that life goes on. I highly recommend this book.
Social Entrapment May 29, 2007
2 out of 2 found this review helpful
Readers will sense the "darkness" that is "enclosed like a trap" as they turn the pages of Midaq Alley. Mahfouz exploits his characters through vivid descriptions. For instance, Uncle Kamil's "legs" that are "like tree trunks" and "his behind" is "rounded like the dome of a mosque" not only puts a physical image to the man, but posits him into the Muslim culture. Mahfouz is clever in his depiction of Midaq Alley, a small part of Old Cairo. He juxtaposes the reality of the British occupation in the bigger picture while focusing on the narrative of simple, middle-class Egyptians who struggle for their identity and hope for survival. Hamida desperately tries to escape her cage, claiming that "everyone in this alley is half dead;" however, she is met with a similar fate when she emerges into the outside world, entrapped into a prison of prostitution. Her "yearning for power centered on her love for money" and she pays the ultimate price with her dignity in "the streets of illicit love." The real genius of Naguib Mahfouz is evident in this novel; it invites the reader into a culture that depicts a social reality of mid 20th century Cairo.
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