Nobel Prize Winners (1988)
Palace of Desire continues the Cairo Trilogy of Nobel Laureate
Naguib Mahfouz. Like it's excellent predecessor, Palace Walk, it
follows the family saga of the patriarchal merchant al-Sayyid Ahmad Abd
al-Jawad and his children in 1920s Egypt. The changes occurring in
the family parallel the upheaval in the outside world as a new generation
comes to power, challenging al-Sayyid on the one hand and English rule
on the other. The particular focus of this installment is Kamal,
a nascent writer who is apparently modeled on Mahfouz himself.
The book brilliantly evokes the lost world of 20's Cairo and there are
some funny set pieces, typically involving sex. But the story is
badly under plotted and presents fairly few ideas, two factors which combine
to make for a pretty lackluster read. As the story meanders along,
we get a richly detailed picture of these peoples lives, but seem to be
living them in real time; one longs for something, other than the sort
of casual serial adultery which is the staple of the book, to happen.
I didn't like it nearly as much as Palace Walk, but it was still
worthwhile as a sharply observed portrait of a time and place about which
we in the West know fairly little.
(Reviewed:15-Dec-99)
Grade: (C+)
Websites:
Book-related and General Links:
-Naguib
Mahfouz (Peter Murray Website)
-Naguib
Mahfouz (1911-)(kirjasto)
-Naguib
Mahfouz Winner of the 1988 Nobel Prize in Literature (Nobel Prize Internet
Archive)
-BIBLIO:
-Naguib
Mahfouz: Biased To Grassroots (People & Facts)(Egyptian Government
Site)
-ESSAY
: The Cruelty of Memory (EDWARD W. SAID, NY Review of Books)
-ARTICLE:
Laureate in the Land of the Pharoahs (Brad Kessler, NY
Times)
-ARTICLE:
RECOVERING EGYPT WRITER ASKS EXTREMISM'S DEFEAT ( Associated Press,
Sunday, October 16, 1994)
-REVIEW:
of PALACE OF DESIRE The Cairo Trilogy II. By Naguib Mahfouz (Peter
Theroux, NY Times Book Review)
-REVIEW
ESSAY: J. M. Coetzee: Fabulous Fabulist, NY Review of Books
The Harafish by Naguib Mahfouz
and translated by Catherine Cobham
OTHER NOVELS IN ENGLISH
BY NAGUIB MAHFOUZ DISCUSSED IN THIS ARTICLE
Midaq Alley translated by
Trevor Le Gassick
The Cairo Trilogy: Palace
Walk translated by William M. Hutchins and Olive E. Kenny
Palace of Desire translated
by William M. Hutchins, Lorne M. Kenny, and Olive E. Kenny
Sugar Street translated
by William M. Hutchins and Angele B. Samaan
The Beginning and the End
translated by Ramses Awad
Children of Gebelawi translated
by Philip Stewart
The Thief and the Dogs translated
by Trevor Le Gassick and M.M. Badawi
Adrift on the Nile translated
by Frances Liardet
The Journey of Ibn Fattouma
translated by Denys Johnson-Davies
-REVIEW:
of Palace of Desire 'PALACE' SKETCHES PORTRAIT OF THE ARTIST (Richard
Dyer, Boston Globe)
-REVIEW:
of PALACE WALK By Naguib Mahfouz. Translated by William M. Hutchins
and Olive E. Kenny (Edward Hower, NY Times Book Review)
-REVIEW:
of Palace Walk TIMELESS RHYTHMS OF AN EGYPTIAN FAMILY (Richard Dyer,
Boston Globe)
-REVIEW
: of The Cairo Trilogy: Palace Walk, Palace of Desire, Sugar Street
by Naguib Mahfouz (Caroline Moore, Daily Telegraph)
-REVIEW:
of SUGAR STREET The Cairo Trilogy III. By Naguib Mahfouz. Translated
by William Maynard Hutchins and Angele Botros Samaan (Ammiel Alcalay, NY
Times Book Review)
-REVIEW:
of Sugar Street MAHFOUZ'S RICH 'CAIRO TRILOGY' CONCLUDES (Richard
Dyer, Boston Globe)
-REVIEW:
of Akhenaten by Naguib Mahfouz (Gelareh Asayesh, Washington Post Book
World)
-REVIEW:
Najib Mahfuz by Menahem Milson (Daniel Pipes, Commentary)
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