Essays on Literature and Philosophy

Naguib Mahfouz (1911–2006) was the greatest Arab writer of the twentieth century. Born in the old Islamic Quarter of Cairo in 1911, he began writing when he was seventeen before entering university to study as a student of philosophy in 1930. He is the author of over thirty novels – including a number of masterpieces, such as The Cairo Trilogy and Children of the Alley. In 1988 he was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature.Rasheed El-Enany is Professor of Arabic and Comparative Literature at Doha Institute for Graduate Studies, as well as Professor Emeritus of Modern Arabic Literature, University of Exeter. He has authored several books on Naguib Mahfouz, including Naguib Mahfouz. His Life and Times.Aran Byrne is an Arabic language graduate of SOAS (University of London) and Oxford University. He was co-translator of Democracy Is the Answer by the best-selling Egyptian writer Alaa Al Aswany.

• ContentsIntroductionTranslator's PrefaceThe Demise of old beliefs and the Emergence of New onesWomen and Public OfficeThe Development of Philosophy in the Pre-Socratic EraThe Philosophy of SocratesPlato and his PhilosophyAnton Chekhov (The Russian author)Three of our WritersLove and the Sexual impulsePhilosophy according to the PhilosophersWhat is the Meaning of Philosophy?Psychology: its Trends and Methods, ancient and ModernAnimal Life and PsychologyThe Senses and Sensory PerceptionConsciousnessTheories of the MindLanguageArt and CultureI have Read (Part 1)I have Read (Part 2)Of art and HistoryConcerning the book Artistic Imagery in the Qur'an

‘At this time in the 21st century when reactionary and fundamentalist religious currents are forcefully asserting themselves wherever one looks, it is wonderful to read these essays on art and culture, on love, on democracy, on Umm Kulthum, on Philosophy, on psychology, written when the Arab world’s only Nobel Laureate in Literature was a young man, and showing that the humanity and depth of his literary oeuvre was part and parcel of his tolerant, open-minded and secularist world view.’