Midaq Alley (novel)

Updated on Nov 14, 2023

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Original title زقاق المدق Language Arabic Publication date 1947 Originally published 1947 Genre Novel		Country Egypt Publisher Khayats, Beirut (1966) Published in English 1966 Author Naguib Mahfouz Translator Trevor LeGassick

Adaptations The Alley of Miracles (1995) Characters Umm Hamida, Salim Alwan, Radwan Hussainy, Zaita Similar Naguib Mahfouz books, Novels

This article is about the Naguib Mahfouz novel. For the film of the novel, see Midaq Alley (film). For the alley, see Khan El-Khalili.

Midaq Alley is the English Translation of Zuqāq al-Midaq by Naguib Mahfouz, released in English in 1966. The story is about Midaq Alley, a teeming back street in Cairo which is a microcosm of the world.

Plot introduction

Mahfouz plays on the cultural setting. The novel is introduced with description of the Arabic culture. It centers around the list of characters described below. The novel takes place in the 1940s and represents standing on the threshold of a modern era in Cairo and the rest of the nation as a whole.

Characters

Each character is expressed like a caricature in which one quality or trait is over-emphasized. Mahfouz is not satirizing the individual character – he is satirizing the character type.

Kirsha, a café owner who illegally sells and uses hashish and has a predilection for young boys

Mrs. Kirsha, infamous for her temper

Uncle Kamil, good-hearted, bachelor sweets-seller, famously bloated and sleepy

Abbas, a young, kindly barber who wants to get married, joins the British army to make money to be able to marry Hamida

Salim Alwan, the wealthy businessman who is embittered after surviving a heart attack

Dr. Booshy, the self-proclaimed dentist who sells false teeth at dirt-cheap prices by stealing them off dead bodies

Sanker, the waiter at Kirsha's café

Sheikh Darwish, the old poet and former English teacher, who left his former life to roam the streets.

Radwan Hussainy, a landlord who beats his wife and failed his al-Azhar exams, yet is revered for his high degree of education and devotion to God. He has lost all of his children.

Hussain Kirsha, son of the café owner who works for the British. He marries a woman of lower class and returns home with her and her brother.

Saniya Afify, widowed landlady who desires to remarry

Umm Hamida, the neighborhood matchmaker and bath attendant; Hamida's foster mother

Hamida, a beautiful young woman who dreams of a better life and has a distinctly self-centered personality, but is easily persuaded by wealth or power.

Husniya, the bakeress who beats her husband with her slipper

Jaada, Husniya's husband

Zaita, the cripple maker who lives outside the bakery and aids Dr. Booshy in his theft of false teeth.

Ibrahim Farhat, a politician

Ibrahim Faraj, a pimp

The Poet, who is replaced by a radio and is barred by Kirsha (only appears in the first chapter)

References

Midaq Alley (novel) Wikipedia

(Text) CC BY-SA

Contents

Plot introduction

Characters

References