Immediate charm of place and beautifully sketched characters. It's easy to get engrossed in this world. It was sometimes hard to read the women, like in any older book, but overall I loved his discerning eye cast on this little slice of a city. ( )

The more I read of Mahfouz, the more confused I grow. I have read excellent works and I have read works that I considered a waste of time. I chose this work specifically as one I had somehow overlooked and which has a very good reputation. The plot revolves around a large cast of individuals who live or work in this tiny alley in Cairo during World War II. The book is no more or less than the story of these and a number of other lives. Mahfouz’s themes are numerous: religion, marriage, gender roles, and even Egyptian nationalism. But overriding them all, perhaps is the economics of wealth and poverty. Indeed, Mahfouz is said to have acknowledged that Hamida, whose desperation to leave the alley ends in tragedy, is a metaphor for Egypt itself. The characters are very well-drawn and complex but I found not one of them particularly sympathetic. Sadly, they often seemed more pitiful than unfortunate. Mahfouz doesn’t judge—a strength of his writing and his depictions—but ultimately I found this more depressing and disappointing than anything else. [Trivia: this was made into a Mexican film, El Callejón de los Milagros, starring Salma Hayek. It won a substantial number of awards in many Spanish-speaking countries.] ( )

I've not read any fiction from Egypt in quite some time so was excited to find this book and read about the culture of poverty as it exists in an alley. I had to keep reminding myself that the time for this novel was during and at the end of World War 2 because the characterization seemed timeless. ( )

1.1

Hamida es una joven que ambiciona casarse con un rico comerciante que la rescate de su mísera existencia. El modesto barbero Abbas estaría dispuesto a todo por ella, pero por mucho que la corteja no consigue conquistar su codicia. A Kirsha, el dueño del café del barrio, su inclinación por los muchachos le lleva a tal punto que ya no le importan los escándalos que provoca su lujuria, y la viuda Afifi, madura y sola, se reúne con la casamentera en busca de un joven que caliente su cama por las noches. Todo ocurre en el callejón Midaq, en pleno centro de El Cairo, donde una moderna radio ha sustituido al viejo poeta que recitaba el Corán. Allí, todos comparten su tiempo, mientras la miseria convive en silencio con el amor y la desdicha.