fourth story is fashioned in part from a classic Egyptian text,
The Tale of Sinuhe
. In âThe Return of Sinuhe,â Mahfouz includes many of the ancient storyâs elementsâ but adds a crucial one only vaguely implied in the Middle Kingdom original: the romance. Parkinson, one of
The
Tale of Sinuheâs most famous translators 2 and a renowned expert on ancient Egyptian literature overall, calls the nearly four-thousand-year-old poem âa fictional work of the highest artistry.â He is equally enamored of Mahfouzâs versionâwhich Parkinson has hailed as âwonderful.â
The fifth and final story offers an appropriately spiritual exit from Mahfouzâs ancient Egyptian universe. âA Voice from the Other Worldâ astoundingly anticipates, by at least three decades, the popular wave of âout-of-body experienceâ literature that swept the publishing world in the 1970s and 1980s. Yet it is almost certainly set in the time of Rameses II (r. 1198â1166 BC), as the storyâs protagonist appears loosely modeled on Pentaweret (Pentu-wer)âonce thought to have composed the epic poem that he inscribed on this kingâs monuments trumpeting the (much-disputed) triumph over the Hittite forces at Qadesh. Likewise, the other period details are for the most part plausible. These include Mahfouzâs description of the tomb and its contents, his reference to the feast of Isis, plus his repeated use of the ancient (and still extant) Egyptian identification of the Westâthe land of the sunsetâas the abode of Death. And, with one or two minor exceptions, Mahfouz renders the methods of mummification employed in the New Kingdom with gruesome precision. Even more importantly, however, he creates a truly vivid glimpse into that other existence after this oneâand his vision is sanguine.
And so this quintet of vintage tales has been saved from the near oblivion that for many years had claimed them. The same fate had befallen his three early pharaonic novels, as well:
âAbath al-aqdar
(
Khufuâs Wisdom
, 1939);
Radubis
(
Rhadopis
, 1943), and
Kifah Tiba
(
Thebes at
War
, 1944). They had been overshadowed by his splendid Cairo Trilogy (
Palace Walk, Palace of Desire
, and
Sugar Street
) and other works set in modern Cairo and Alexandria. But no more. Thanks to the American University in Cairo Press, which brought out his brilliant 1985 novella
al-âAâish fi-l-haqiqa
, set in ancient Egypt, under the title
Akhenaten: Dweller in Truth
(translated by Tagried Abu-Hassabo), in 1998, these hidden historical gems will soon make their debut in English. (They began to appear in Europe, principally in French, Italian, and Spanish, in the 1990s.)
Together with this book, they launch a much-deserved introduction of some of the masterâs finest (but most unusual, and least familiar) works to readers of English. Like their ninety-year-old author, their spirits, for all their wisdom, remain forever youngâthough they speak with voices from a world much different from the one for which he is best known.
The translator thanks Roger Allen, Kathleen Anderson, Hazem Azmy, Brooke Comer, Gaballa Ali Gaballa, Zahi Hawass, Prince Abbas Hilmi, Shirley Johnston, Klaus Peter Kuhlmann, Mark Linz, Bojana Mojsov, Richard B. Parkinson, Donald Malcolm Reid, Veronica Rodriguez, Rainer Stadelmann, Paul Theroux, Peter Theroux, and David Wilmsen for their helpful comments on the present work, as well as Kelly Zaug and R. Neil Hewison for their excellent editing. And, above all, he thanks Naguib Mahfouzâfor patiently, as always, answering endless questions about these stories.
Evil Adored
Before the first king ruled on the throne of Egypt, the great valley of the Nile was divided into independent districts, each with its own god, religion, and sovereign. One of these nomes, called Khnum, was famed for its fertile soil, favorable climate, and plentiful population. Yet its
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