God Dies by the Nile and Other Novels by Nawal El Saadawi

and the dung, from your diet of dry bread and salted pickles. Instead you will spend your days resting in the shade, eating white bread and meat. You will become the spouse of Sheikh Hamzawi, the man who devotes himself to the worship of God, to serving his mosque, the man who leads the people of the village in prayer, and lives a life of piety,’ said Haj Ismail at the top of his voice, as though he wanted everyone within hearing distance to know what was going on.
    But Fatheya continued to hide on top of the oven and refused to answer.
    Haj Ismail looked round at her father and inquired in angry tones, ‘Now what do we do, Masoud?’
    â€˜You can see, Haj Ismail, the girl is refusing.’
    â€˜Do you mean that in your household it’s the girl who decides what should be done?’
    â€˜But what can I do?’ asked the father looking perplexed.
    â€˜What do you do?’ exclaimed Haj Ismail, now looking furious. ‘Is that a question for a man to ask? Beat her, my brother, beat her once and twice and thrice. Do you notknow that girls and women are only convinced if they receive a good hiding?’
    Masoud remained silent for a moment, then he called out, ‘Fatheya, come here at once.’
    But there was no answer, so he climbed up on to the top of the oven, pulled her out by her hair, and beat her several times until she came down. Then he handed her over to Haj Ismail and the same day she married the pious old Sheikh.
    Sheikh Hamzawi grasped his stick firmly in his hand, and opened the door of his house. Fatheya strained her ears to catch the tapping sound of his stick through the wall as he walked on its outer side. She knew the sound well. It had continued to echo in her ears ever since the night of her betrothal. It pierced through the thick shawl wrapped around her body and head as she rode the donkey to Sheikh Hamzawi’s house. She could hear its tap, tap, tap as he walked along the lane by her side. Her father wore a new galabeya and Om Saber, the daya , * was clad in a long, black dress. She could not see the old woman for the folds of the shawl were worn tightly round her head. She could not see anything.
    But she felt. She felt the burning pain left by the woman’s finger as it probed up between her thighs looking for blood. And she felt the warm gush and the sticky wet. She did not see the clean white towel stained red, nor the wound the woman’snail had made in her flesh. But she felt her virgin colours had bled, for in her ears resounded the beat of the drums, the shrieks of joy and the high-pitched trilling of the women.
    She moved her hand in under the shawl and wiped the sweat from her nose and eyes, but it continued to pour out from the roots of her hair down over her face and her neck to her chest and her back. Underneath her, on the back of the donkey its rough coat was becoming wetter and wetter. The spine of the donkey pressed up between her thighs. She could feel it hard against the wound which was still bleeding inside. With every step, with every beat of the tabla , * the back of the donkey rose and fell, and its thin spine moved up and down to rub on her wounds, causing her a sharp pain every time, and making her lips open in a noiseless cry. The warm blood trickled out mixing with the sweat which poured down from her body, and the rough coat of the donkey felt soaking wet between her thighs.
    When they arrived in front of the house which belonged to the pious and God-fearing man who had become her spouse, they took her down from the donkey, but she was unable to stand on her feet, and collapsed into the arms of those who stood around, to be carried into the house like a sack of cotton.
    She realized she had left the streets and was now in the house from the dank, putrid smell of the air inside. Since shewas sure that the odour of godliness and moral uprightness smelt good and was pleasant to respire, she realized her nose was to blame for making the