Naguib Mahfouz - Morning and Evening Talk

Hadiya was the youngest of Amana’s children. She had recently returned from the Gulf after teaching there for two years and had purchased an apartment in Manshiyat al-Bakri. He went with Samira to Abd al-Rahman Amin and Amana’s house on Azhar Street and saw Hadiya, a fine looking teacher in the prime of youth, whose beauty was very much like her grandmother Matariya’s, the most beautiful woman in the family. Samira proposed to her on his behalf, she was wedded to him, and he moved to her apartment in Manshiyat al-Bakri. He had a lovely wife and flourishing career. He knew love and compassion under Sadat and had no cause for worry other than the new religious currents that had emerged within the Brothers, cleaving new paths surrounded by radicalism and abstruseness. “There is a general Islamic awakening, no doubt about it. But it is also resurrecting old differences which are consuming its strengths to no avail,” he said to his brother Hakim. However, Hakim had other priorities and, despite his personal feelings, saw what befell the regime on June 5 as an absolute catastrophe; the nation was moving into uncharted territory. As the days went by, God granted Salim fatherhood, material abundance, and satisfaction on the day of victory. Yet none of this jostled from his heart his deeply rooted belief in, and eternal dream of, the divine perfect city. He swept Hadiya along in his forceful current until she said, “I was lost and you showed me the right way. Praise be to God.”

Salim became a propagandist writer for the Muslim Brotherhood’s magazine and, like the rest of the group, was filled with rage at Sadat’s reckless venture to make peace with Israel. He reverted once more to vehement anger and rebellion, and when the September 1981 rulings were issued he was thrown back in jail. When Sadat was assassinated he said, “It’s a divine punishment for an infidel government.”

He could breathe freely in the new climate but had lost confidence in everything except his dream. It was for this that he worked and lived.

Samira Amr Aziz

She was Amr’s fourth child and second only to Matariya in beauty. As she played on the roof and beneath the walnut trees in the square and studied at Qur’an school, her serious personality, calm nature, and brilliant mind crystallized. She seldom got involved in quarrels with her siblings and when violence flared up would withdraw into a corner, content to watch what she would later be summoned to bear witness to. Though more beautiful, she resembled her mother in general appearance — except for her height, at which Radia greatly marveled. In contrast to her sisters, she retained the principles of reading and writing that she learned at Qur’an school and nurtured them diligently, so she was the only one to regularly read newspapers and magazines as an adult. On visits to the Murakibi family at the mansion on Khayrat Square and the Dawud family in East Abbasiya, she made a mental note of the elegant setup, table manners, rhythm of conversation, and beautiful style and tried to adopt and emulate them as far as means and circumstances allowed. Mahmud Bey would joke in his crude manner, “You’re a peasant family, but there is a European girl in your midst!”

She entered adolescence but did not have to dream secretly of romance for long, for a friend of her brother Amer called Hussein Qabil, who owned an antique shop in Khan al-Khalili, came and asked for her hand. He had kept her brother company up to the baccalaureate then taken over from his father when he died. Despite his youth, his manly features catapulted him into manhood early. He had a huge body, a large head, and sharp eyes, and was generous and very well-off. Unlike Sadriya and Matariya, Samira was wedded to her husband in an outer suburb, in one of the apartments of a new building on Ibn Khaldun Street. This suited her very well for she met many Jewish families, learned how to play the piano, and raised a puppy called Lolli that she would take with her on walks around al-Zahir Baybars Garden. When Amr heard about this he said, both protesting and accepting the situation, “It’s God’s will. There is no power or strength but in God.”

Hussein Qabil was wealthy and generous, so fountains of luxury burst forth in his house and Samira could gratify her hidden longing for style and elegant living. Her happiness was compounded by her husband’s good company and manners, and the fact that he addressed her as “Samira Hanem” in front of others while she called him “Hussein Bey.” Sincere patriotism and deep piety filled the man’s heart and he spread them to everyone around him, and so the 1919 Revolution penetrated Samira’s heart in a way it did not the hearts of her sisters. Similarly, her piety was the most sound of the young women because she was the least influenced by Radia’s mysteries. She gave birth to Badriya, Safa, Hakim, Faruq, Hanuma, and Salim, all of whom enjoyed a generous share of beauty and intelligence. The parents worked together to bring them up well in an atmosphere of religion and principle. From the first day she said to Hussein Qabil, “We will educate the girls along with the boys.” He agreed enthusiastically.

Samira’s glow was enough to stir jealousy among the Murakibi and Dawud families. Yet her life was not devoid of great sorrow, for she lost Badriya and Hakim and his family, and anxiety about Salim broke her heart at various points in her life. Astonishingly, she met these calamities with a strong, patient, and faithful will and was able to confront and endure them. But the forbearance with which she endured her sorrow also made her vulnerable to accusations of coldness.

“You should believe in amulets, spells, incense, and tombs. There is no knowledge but that of the forefathers,” Radia said to her. Samira secretly asked herself whether it was these that had protected Sadriya and Matariya from calamities.

Death came and Hussein Qabil died a year after Salim was born, four years after her own father’s death. He left her nothing except a depository of antiques. She sold them as the need arose and lived on the proceeds. He died just as his children were moving from secondary school to university.

“What’s left for you now, Samira?” Radia asked.

“A depository of antiques,” she replied.

“No, you still have the Creator of heaven and earth,” said her mother.

Shazli Muhammad Ibrahim

THE SECOND SON OF MATARIYA and Muhammad Ibrahim, he was born and grew up in his parents’ house in Watawit. He was good looking, but less so than his deceased brother, Ahmad. He took his brother’s place as his uncle Qasim’s playmate but did not achieve the same legendary status. From childhood, he frequented the house of his grandfather Amr and the families of Surur, al-Murakibi, and Dawud and continued to do so throughout his life, borrowing his love of people and socializing from his mother. From childhood too, attributes that would accompany him through life manifested: amiability, a penchant for fun, hunger for knowledge, love of girls, and all-round success in all of these, though his academic achievements were only average. His love of knowledge probably came from his father and it prospered with the books and magazines he procured for himself. Besides his relatives, he made friends with the leading thinkers of the day, who woke him from slumber and inflamed him with questions that would dog him all his life. Despite his burgeoning humanism, he inclined to mathematics so entered the faculty of science, then became a teacher like his father, remaining in Cairo thanks to the intercession of the Murakibi and Dawud families. He proceeded through life concerned with his culture and oblivious to the future until his father said to him, “You’re a teacher. The teaching profession is traditional. You should start thinking about marriage.”