Khan Al-Khalili by Naguib Mahfouz Page A

havens of hope, he found himself instead cast into the sheer hell of despair. If this girl was willing to stay with him, she would have to wait for at least ten years until his younger brother had completed his education. It became obvious that her mother was not going to encourage such a sacrifice since it would involve a long wait. In fact, it was the girl herself who made the decision to ignore her feelings; she cut off the relationship, and all their dreams came to nought. From then on Ahmad lost all faith in love and women, just as he had already done with the world as a whole. The love that in the presence of the Jewish girl had filled his heartwas nothing but a false illusion, a teenage disease just like teething in babies. Harsh reality had imposed its own severe sentence on someone who had decided to rely on a woman’s word; it didn’t matter whether she was like his fiancée when it came to both intelligence and virtue, or whether she was like the Jewish girl who had flirted with him to her heart’s content and then left him, like a guest at a hotel on Station Square leaving his room.
    Now twenty years had gone by and his heart was still a void. He continued to endure a life of poverty filled with a variety of concerns that augured little hope for the future. If only he had managed to control his rage, he might have been able to be successful at something. In fact he still nourished a hope—after all, life cannot be without any hope at all, can it?—that one day he might find some happiness. Even though he had eventually despaired of ever gaining any prestige or authority, he could still aspire to be happy.
    He tried getting engaged to the daughter of a merchant who lived in Ghamra, but her father rejected his offer in the nicest possible way. The middle-aged Ahmad learned that the girl’s mother had noted that he was of a certain age and yet his salary was small. This blow to his pride left him reeling, and he went into a towering rage. It was more than he could tolerate to be rejected by some woman or other, when he was the genius against whom the entire world was conspiring. What’s more, she had rejected him because he was insignificant! How could anyone say he was insignificant? So who exactly was supposed to be significant? With sparks flashing from his eyes he clenched his fist and vowed dire vengeance on the world. Only yesterday hisbeloved had rejected him because he was still young and had few prospects, where today another girl was rejecting him because he was too old and still had no prospects! So when exactly was he supposed to have prospects? Had his life been wasted? All glory was past, happiness was lost, everything was finished; was that it?
    Thereafter he developed a habit of criticizing women and accusing them of every kind of shortcoming. They were cunning creatures, using ambition, lies, and sheer stupidity to work their wiles. Soulless bodies, sources of pain for man, and grief for humanity in general. Their superficial interest in science and art was merely a sham they could hide behind whenever victims fell into their clutches. But for the wicked lust implanted in our instincts they would win neither hope nor love. They … they.…
    “I’ve made myself a solemn vow, thank God,” he would often tell his friends, “that I’m never going to get married however many chances I may have to do so. I totally refuse to be taken over by some dirty creature with neither mind nor soul!”
    If his complete failure to achieve anything turned him into an enemy of the entire world, then his failure with women made him their enemy too. Even so, deep inside him there still lurked rapacious illicit desires and emotions.
    The way that a passing girl affected him, as had happened today, stirred up some of those latent feelings and immediately brought to mind his previous experiences with women. It annoyed him, and provoked that profound and familiar sensation that combined love, fear, and hate. In