Written Homework Assignment #6: Adrift on the Nile
- As you read Adrift on the Nile for Wednesday’s class, please consider the questions below and write a 1-page response (Times 12, one inch margins) to the question assigned to you. Be prepared to share your response in class and to discuss the questions not assigned to you as well.
- Questions:
- How does Adrift on the Nile diverge from the “realism” of Midaq Alley? What do the differences between the narrative tone and techniques of the two novels communicate to you? (Kizzy, Rubi)
- How does Adrift on the Nile weigh in on the contest between literary commitment and artistic freedom? What side of the debate do you think that Naguib Mahfouz fell on at the time he wrote Adrift on the Nile? (Nataliah, Kathleen)
- How does the character of Anis Zaki confound or confirm your notion of a novelistic protagonist? Does the character of Anis Zaki resonate with any characters from Midaq Alley? If so, how can your reading of Midaq Alley inform your reading of Adrift on the Nile? (Becca, Alex)
- Roger Allen, one of the finest historians of the Arabic novel writing in English, remarks that “[Adrift on the Nile] is one of Maḥfūẓ’s richest essays in the use of symbolism” (Roger Allen, The Arabic Novel [1982]: p. 106). What do you think that Allen means by “symbolism” and how does this “symbolism” play out in Adrift on the Nile? Why might Mahfouz have adopted a “symbolist” mode when writing this novel? (Jordan, Mayed)
- How does space and the setting of the novel – and the movement of the protagonists through them – define the basic premises of the novel? (Clair, Lorenzo)
- How do the past and the present intermingle in the character of Anis Zaki? What relevance or importance does the past hold for Anis Zaki and for the broader thematic context of the novel? (Toni, Oakley)