REVIEWS

ARABIC NOVELS IN TRANSLATION

YAHYA HAQQI, The saint's Lamp and other Stories, tr. by M. M. Badawi, Arabic Translation Series of The Journal of Arabic Literature, Vol. 2, Leiden, E. J. Brill, 1973. Pp. xiii, 90. NAGUIB MAHFOUZ, Midaq Alley, tr. by Trevor Le Cassick, Beirut, Khayats, 1966. Pp xi, 319. The Arabic novel in the modern sense has a relatively short history. As a literary genre, it was entirely copied from Western literature early in this century. With the novelists' adherence to 'realism', we have now a large body of novels depicting the lives of contemporary Arabs with varying degrees of success. Great works of fiction are not produced overnight and it was only in the mid-forties that the Arabic novel came of age with the work of Yahya Haqqi, Naguib Mahfouz and others who were their contemporaries or later followed in their steps. They were not the pioneers of the Arabic novel, for they had the advantage of the experience of one generation, immedi- ately preceding them, who had opened the way for them, but their work was the most perfect of its kind. Though each is characteristic of quite a different technique, Haqqi's Oind7l Umm Häshim, i.e. The ,Saint'.r Lamp (1944), and Mahfouz's Zuqjq al-Midaqq, i.e. Midaq Alley (1948), have one thing in common: both were immediate successes and have captured the imagination of Arab readers to an unprecedented degree. Both have caught the society they portray at a moment of balancing on the brink of change. The first catches the pulse of Cairo in the vicinity of one of the most visited shrines of the Muslim world, the Mosque of Sayyida Zaynab, the granddaughter of the Prophet Muhammed, at the time when the medieval square is first invaded by modern electric trams. The monstrous vehicles claim a victim or two every day from the crowds of slow unsuspecting peasants, who flock to the Great City on business or just to visit this mosque and other shrines of 'Ahl al-Bayt', the descendants of the House of the Prophet or specifically, the children and grand-children of His daughter Fatima. The novel is one of a number that illustrate the effects on an Oriental sensibility of the 'passage to Europe'. The hero who grew up in the vicinity of the mosque of Umm Hashim, his vigils over his school books com- forted by the familiar twinkling of her qindil or lantern, has to spend seven years in Britain, studying medicine. His predicament after his return supplies the conflict in the novel between the values clinging to the Mosque and the Saint's Lamp and the slick trappings of modern science, which the young doctor has to discard before he can come to terms with himself and his people. In the second novel change invades the little blind alley in the vicinity of the Mosque of Husayn, the martyred grandson of the Prophet, in the form of the modern wireless displacing the old 'bard' or story-teller, in the form of good money to be made by working on the British military base in the Canal Zone, or in the Ordnance depot on the outskirts of Cairo (those were the years of World War II). Girls of the poor district discard their 'melayas' (a woman's black Wrap), don modern dresses and go to work in 152 the numerous workshops set up by the Allied Forces. Change also comes in the form of Farag the master-pimp, who caters for the pleasures of the foreign soldiers stranded in an alien country. He recruits needy attractive girls for his special 'school', where they are tutored in the arts of pleasing their foreign clients and making a heap of money for their 'headmaster'. The translation of such works into English has long interested bilingual scholars, with a good command of both languages, but British publishers have repeatedly shied at the prospect, claiming that such translations would not command a wide readership as people here know little or nothing of Arabic life and culture. Caught in the vicious circle of poor marketing prospects because of the dearth of information on the subject and vice versa, we are faced with a situation in which the Arabs make daily news, but very little is known about modern Arabic literature outside the Arab World. (Western universities generally stick to the old Arabic classics). The Arabic novel that might have given Western readers an insight into the complexities of life in different Arab countries is still regarded by foreign publishers as a 'hazard'. On the other hand, organisations set up at home for the diffusion of Arabic literature through official channels never seem to choose works that would appeal to foreign readers! As English plays the role of a lingua franca in the greater part of Africa and the Arab world, it is through English that we read Russian, Spanish or even Turkish and Persian literature, it is through English that we expect our literature to get through to other nations in the world. The two translations under review here provide very good examples of the limitations of the situation as it now stands. The Saint'.r Lamp, translated by M. Badawi is sound, exact and pleasing, because the translator is fully trained in the disciplines of both languages. He fully understands the religious and social background of the novel and aptly chooses the appropriate English idiom, supplying a brief note here and there, when necessary. He manages to preserve the tone and atmosphere of the original. The translation, however, is published by Brill of Leiden for a limited readership of students of Arabic. It is neither priced nor marketed for the general reader. The second novel, Mahfouz's Midaq Ally, published by Heinemann, aims at a much wider readership. It is the same translation published by Khayat of Beirut in 1966. It is lively, almost racy, avoiding the slow ponderous rhythm of most translations from Arabic. It has every chance of attracting the wide readership the publishers cater for. It raises, however, a few basic questions concerning translations from Arabic in general. The Western bias of the translator's background is obvious. Why should Egyptian characters of the Azhar district in 1944 be called Mr. and Mrs? Mr. Kirsha and Mrs. Afifi sound ludicrous! No one uses Mr. for the German Herr or Mrs for the Italian Signora! Keeping 'Sayyid' and 'Sitt' helps to bring out the Arabic flavour of the charac- ters. Words for which there are no equivalents in English should be transcribed and explained briefly in the text or in a footnote. We have all come to accept the kulaks and muzhiks together with the use of patronymics and diminutive endearments in Russian literature, just as we are now familiar with kopjes and kraals in the literature from South Africa. Arabic titles and placenames have to be introduced some time; they will fasten themselves on the memories of readers and will later need no explanation. Mr. Trevor Le Gassic's understanding of the Arabic text is fairly adequate, but he should have submitted his translation to a native speaker for revision. Occasionally he is misled by the Arabic syntax into transcribing a word as a proper name, when he fails to understand its meaning. On p. 15 he takes the 'tabuna' (a bakery) for a proper name.