Sara Mobarak’s Reviews > The Anchor Book of Modern Arabic Fiction > Status Update

I’m having to do some side-reading for this. I hope I get it right.

He asked himself, he doesn’t know how many times he had asked himself: Was that an act of self-destruction or an act of self-liberation from the rubble of a previous, repetitive, and unending destruction?

I never thought I could imagine the colour pink as Cherry Gel, or that I could call the colour green A Lazy Forest, a Fermented Apple Skin, or a River Pebble. How do you come up with such magic, Father? Is this what my mother meant when she said that you seduced her with your descriptions of the East?

The boy eats greedily; perhaps he’s not thinking about anything. He is drawn to what is taking place around him, be it only in a mechanical manner. He has discovered the pleasure of smoking, chasing after the neighbours’ daughters, also the football craze…

“The stronger his love for Egypt grew, the greater his irritation with Egyptians. None the less, they were his flesh and blood, and the fault was not theirs. They were victims of ignorance, poverty, disease, and chronically long oppression.”