The Cairo Trilogy and A Suitable Boy - Good Old Laid Back Stories

Every once in a while you come across a voluminous book, which far from intimidating you with its bulk, gives you the feeling of being with an uncle you've met for the first time, who is strangely, someone you've known for years. Within the first few pages, you're able to sink into a world which is comfortable, recognizable and exotic, all at the same time.

Over the last few weeks I've been reading The Cairo Trilogy by Naguib Mahfouz, the Egyptian writer who was awarded the Nobel Prize for literature in 1988. This 1500 page work traces the ups and downs of a Cairo family over three generations against the backdrop of modern Egypt in the making.

One of several reasons I find myself out of place in this day and age is that the word "speed" doesn't figure much in my vocabulary. My life runs super slow all days, on all tracks. I like to do everything at a leisurely pace and always have, from drinking coffee or enjoying a meal to reading a book.

Palace Walk, the first part of The Cairo Trilogy grabbed my attention from the first page. It is one of those narratives which unfolds at a luxuriously slow pace, in whose nooks and crannies and meandering alleys you can snoop around without haste, greeting what you see with mixed feelings of surprise, amusement, dismay or delight. A book in whose atmosphere you can luxuriate, as in a warm bubble bath. From al-Sayyid Ahmad, the much feared patriarch who subjects his family to a rigid puritan existence while cavorting in Cairo's hot spots every night, to his mild tempered affectionate wife, Amina, and their numerous offspring, from al Sayyid's boisterous drinking companions to the countless characters who visit the household or live in the neighborhood - friendly or crabby alike - all begin to grow on you like members of your own extended family. Half way through the book you begin to feel almost surprised at not finding them at the table when you settle down for lunch.

Men and women fall in love. Some courtships end in marriage while other love affairs are nipped in the bud. Babies are born, death stalks the corridors, good things happen, bad things happen, peace gives way to the terror of revolution, known characters age and become decrepit before your eyes while in the course of time those you got to see as babies move up center stage, performing the age old rituals for the umpteenth time. They graduate from school or college, fall in love, exchange vows, have children and the cycle of life starts up all over again. Through it all you feel the texture of the world in which the characters move, the smell of coffee wafting through the family get-togethers every evening, the aroma of freshly baked bread in the kitchen, the softness of a young woman's smile as she gazes down from the window at her admirer on the street.

You get the feeling they don't write books like this any more. People these days want a narrative to move at the speed of a rocket which has to reach the Andromeda Galaxy in two days. Well, just like everybody else I suppose. Every now and then while reading Palace Walk and its sequels, I was reminded of a man who had once attended the weekly meditation and dialog sessions I conduct, and harangued the group for over fifteen minutes about how let down he felt about his visit. The chief purpose of our group is to learn the art of communication. Meaning that we resist the temptation to constantly race forward with arguments, theories and information to substantiate or counteract what has been said, allowing ourselves time instead, to digest what we have heard, before responding. Our would-be hero that evening, who was attending the session for the first (and also last) time had expected to land in a "James Bond fast" as he put it. He was now utterly dismayed to find himself in the middle of what seemed to him like a "Polish slow."

Well at times Mahfouz's narration moves slower than a Polish slow and I can't speak for anyone else but can only say that I love it. The last such work I dawdled through, not quite as lengthy but just as leisurely, must have been Vikram Seth's masterpiece about post independence life in India, A Suitable Boy. The characters, when I think about them, still manage to evoke deep nostalgia in me, like figures from my childhood, whose exploits are still possible to laugh or weep over, years later. These are the kind of novels according to me, in which fiction is used to acquaint you with the truth, and becomes a way to lead you deeper into the sometimes sad, sometimes happy, at all times magical process of life. As far as I'm concerned, it's the true art of story telling -something one rarely comes across any more but feels ecstatic about when one does.