The Road-Map

Mahfouz’s classic novel captures the existential choices at the juncture of transition from tradition to modernity.

Cairo Modern, Naguib Mahfouz, translated by William M. Hutchins, The American University in Cairo Press, p.242, $19.95.

Though Egypt has an age-old tradition of oral literary forms, the novel came of age in the modern era with the rise of literacy and the establishment of the printing press. The 19th century saw the rise of the intellectual classes and a period of fre edom from colonial rule. These developments resulted in a literary self confidence along with a nationalist spirit that gave impetus to the renaissance of creative arts with an inherent boldness of not shying from the avant garde and yet giving full importance to tradition. The amalgamation of antiquity and contemporaneity lent a singular dynamism to the literary arts of Egypt.

The people of Egypt stand at the juncture of transition when tradition is being replaced by modernity. Their various existential choices are skilfully woven into the plot of Mahfouz’s 1935 novel Cairo Modern which has been only recently translated from Classical Arabic. Through university students who are about to embark on their future careers, Mahfouz emphasises the varied interests of either following fundamentalist tenets laid by Islam which could present the grand solution to all social and political problems or the principles of August Comte and socialism which have the inherent potential for redeeming mankind. Mahgub Abd al-Da’im, the protagonist, follows the ideology of Nihilism, and is one of four friends who lay out their distinct and contrasting ways of defining their stance on life.

Corruption everywhere

Mahgub is inclined seriously to finally attain his degree, so essential for the upkeep of his family. But on completing his studies, he finds it impossible to get a job in a country where networking is all that matters. A well wisher gives him some practical advice: “Forget your qualifications. Don’t waste money on applying for a job. The question boils down to one thing: Do you have someone who will intercede for you? Are you related to someone in a position of power? Can you become engaged to the daughter of someone in the government? If you say yes, then accept my congratulations in advance. If you say no, then direct your energies elsewhere.”

Faced by abject poverty, Mahgub makes the difficult decision of marrying the mistress of a high official in exchange of a job. Fraudulent existence in a make-believe relationship smacks of the corruption of life in Cairo. Mahfouz, undoubtedly, is morally disturbed by such social conditions, but nothing can be done to save people like Mahgub who daily face the temptation of a wealthy life. Living in the opulent luxury of an apartment with a wife who in fact belongs to another man, he finally realises that “His marriage was a fraud. His life was a fraud. The whole world was a fraud.” The intense relationship that develops between the two overshadows Mahgub’s concern for his family.

His good days in such circumstance are short-lived as his fortune depends on the position of his wife’s lover. Though it is easy to feel sorry for anyone in Mahgub’s situation, one is surprised by his lack of concern for his family. The novel turns out to be a tragic picture of depravity and decadence leading to a deep reflection of a world where education and merit are inconsequential honours. One is left asking these questions in the end: What kind of people are these? Why is it that no meaningful relationships ever develop between these people? Life in modern Cairo becomes symbolic of world-weariness and uncertainty in an empty private world of frustrated energies too fragile to rise to any meaningful intellectual involvement. Nothing could be more mind-numbing.

The novel is a picture of insecure, unhappy people whose mental world rests tremulously on the edge of a neurosis. It is an apotheosis of material well being into an economic craving resulting in the collapse of human values and the gradual corruption of the spiritual hygiene once experienced in get-togethers while in the university.

Faithful portrayal

Though Mahfouz does not succeed in knitting the story of the protagonist with the lives of his three friends from his university days, the novel stands out as a convincing narrative of the archetypal Cairo with all its dreams of a prosperous and just society overwhelmed by contemporary decadence and loss of moral values. His Cairo Trilogy, along with the long delayed publishing of Cairo Modern, indicates his deep seated concern for modern Egypt and the social and political history of his land from “pharaonic Thebes to modern Cairo’s dark alleys” which lingers visibly in the background. Despite its many structural lapses, the novel depicts the conditions of corruption and protest that resulted in the 1952 revolution leading to a fervent spirit of nationalism in Egypt.