Palace Walk: The Cairo Trilogy, Volume 1 (Paperback)

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This is book number 1 in the The Cairo Trilogy series.

Staff Reviews


Palace
Walk

by Nobel Laureate Naguib Mahfouz is one of my favorite books.  It is the first in his Cairo Trilogy.  Mahfouz lived his whole life in Cairo; it
shows in the detail of his writing.  Palace
Walk
takes place around WWI, when nationalistic fever was running high
and trigger fingers were itchy.  This
family drama is set against a backdrop of tension between the Brits and Egyptians.  Al-Sayyid Ahmad Abd al-Jawad rules his home
with an iron hand, demanding respect from his wife Amina, and his
children.  At night he leads a different
sort of life, going off with friends to drink and have a grand time.  His friends view him as charming and
witty.  His family sees him as respectable,
and fierce.  Al-Sayyid feels it is the correct
way to run a household.  Amina is a
wonderful character, Mahfouz captures her perfectly.  She stands by her screened balcony looking
out as the world passes by on the street below. 
She stays within the house unless escorted by her husband.  As the children grow, Al-Sayyid finds them
more difficult to manage.  One son is
following a bit too closely in his father’s footsteps.  Another son is caught in the turmoil of the
times. 

— Deon Stonehouse

Description


Palace Walk is the first novel in Nobel Prize-winner Naguib Mahfouz’s magnificent Cairo Trilogy, an epic family saga of colonial Egypt that is considered his masterwork.

The novels of the Cairo Trilogy trace three generations of the family of tyrannical patriarch al-Sayyid Ahmad Abd al-Jawad, who rules his household with a strict hand while living a secret life of self-indulgence. Palace Walk introduces us to his gentle, oppressed wife, Amina, his cloistered daughters, Aisha and Khadija, and his three sons—the tragic and idealistic Fahmy, the dissolute hedonist Yasin, and the soul-searching intellectual Kamal. The family’s trials mirror those of their turbulent country during the years spanning the two world wars, as change comes to a society that has resisted it for centuries.

Translated by William Maynard Hutchins and Olive E. Kenny

About the Author


Naguib Mahfouz was born in Cairo in 1911 and began writing when he was seventeen. His nearly forty novels and hundreds of short stories range from re-imaginings of ancient myths to subtle commentaries on contemporary Egyptian politics and culture. Of his many works, most famous is The Cairo Trilogy, consisting of Palace Walk (1956), Palace of Desire (1957), and Sugar Street (1957), which focuses on a Cairo family through three generations, from 1917 until 1952. In 1988, he was the first writer in Arabic to be awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature. He died in August 2006.

Praise For…


“The alleys, the houses, the palaces and mosques and the people who live among them are evoked as vividly in Mahfouz’s work as the streets of London were conjured up by Dickens.” —Newsweek

“Rich in psychological insight and cultural observation. . . . A majestic and capacious accomplishment.” —The Boston Globe
 
 “A tale told with great affection, humor, and sensitivity, in a style that in this translation is always accessible and elegant.” —The New York Times Book Review
 
Palace Walk is a feast indeed.” —Chicago Tribune
Product Details
ISBN: 9780307947109
ISBN-10: 0307947106
Publisher: Anchor
Publication Date: November 29th, 2011
Pages: 544
Language: English
Series: The Cairo Trilogy