The Narrator, “Half a Day”
One is tempted to label the narrator of this story as something like “young boy” or “student” but that misses the entire point of the narrative. The title refers to the allegorical structure of the story in which an entire life can be lived in half a day. The narrator does start his first day of school as a nervous young boy, but by the time school ends and he prepare to head back home, is an old man referred to as “Grandpa.”
“The Happy Man”
The titular character of this ironically amusing little slice of philosophical satire wakes up one day suddenly happier than he has ever been. As is the case with many people, the arrival of previously unknown emotional contentment becomes, paradoxically, a thing of such worry and concern that he cannot actually enjoy the experience. He is finally diagnosed and treated by a doctor who informs him the condition is widespread.
The Mummy, “The Mummy’s Awakening”
Would you really want a world to exist without an Egyptian writer of Mahfouz’s standing to have written a mummy story? Be forewarned: this isn’t the Mummy of Universal Horror movies, which is kind of interesting, considering it was written in 1939. Also interesting is that this Mummy—no slow-moving love-obsessed relic of another time—is invested with a strangely Moses-like quality. He has come to liberate his people and chew gum and he’s all out of gum!
Sinuhe, “The Return of Sinuhe”
Another figure from Egypt’s ancient history returns from the past in this story that is actually a reinterpretation of one a mythic parable written nearly two-thousand years before the appearance of Christ. Sinuhe’s story actually kind of mirrors that of another Biblical figure, however. Both Sinuhe and Joseph are semi-epic tales of men who flee from Egypt only to return. Sinuhe’s story, however, is about fleeing in poverty, growing rich, and come back to help out the Pharaoh and die very well. The story really treads a thin line between being merely a creative translation and a genuinely original work heavily indebted to existing material.
The Tea Drinker, “A Cup of Tea”
Many of the author’s characters are unnamed and even if they do have a name they may be thinly described. This is not to be taken a criticism; the best characters in the short fiction of this writer are allegorical figures. And few are considered more distinctly allegorical than the protagonist of this story whose wife desperately wants to talk about the kids, but who insists upon reading the newspaper while he enjoys a leisurely cup of tea first. It is generally accepted that the man is intended to symbolize Egypt as it begins to reawaken from its 20th century slumber to reclaim its independence and autonomy after being yet another national to suffer under the oppressive yoke of British colonialism
