Naguib Mahfouz Quotes About Literature
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The criminal is trying to solve his immediate problems.
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My countrymen have the right to shake my hand and talk to me if they so wish. Don't forget that their support and their reading of my works is what brought me the Nobel prize.
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I defend both the freedom of expression and society's right to counter it. I must pay the price for differing. It is the natural way of things.
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The Koran and the laws of all civilized nations legislate against the vilification of religions.
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There are no heroes in most of my stories. I look at our society with a critical eye and find nothing extraordinary in the people I see.
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It is simply not part of my culture to preserve notes. I have never heard of a writer preserving his early drafts.
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The Nobel Prize has given me, for the first time in my life, the feeling that my literature could be appreciated on an international level.
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I've never worked in politics, never been a member of an official committee or a political party.
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I love Sufism as I love beautiful poetry, but it is not the answer. Sufism is like a mirage in the desert. It says to you, come and sit, relax and enjoy yourself for a while.
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We are like a woman with a difficult pregnancy. We have to rebuild the social classes in Egypt, and we must change the way things were.
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The writer interweaves a story with his own doubts, questions, and values. That is art.
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I thought they would never select an Eastern writer for the Nobel. I was surprised.
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As the tension eases, we must look in the direction of agriculture, industry and education as our final goals, and toward democracy under Mr Mubarak.
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My wife thought I deserved it, but I always thought the Nobel a Western prize.
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If the urge to write should ever leave me, I want that day to be my last.
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I was suffering from a peculiar and persistent sense that I was being pursued, and also the conviction that under the political order of the times, our lives had no meaning.
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Winning Nobel imposed on me a lifestyle to which I am not used and which I would not have preferred.
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God did not intend religion to be an exercise club.
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I wake up early in the morning and walk for an hour. If I have something to write, I prefer to write in the morning until midday, and in the afternoon, I eat.
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In Egypt today most people are concerned with getting bread to eat. Only some of the educated understand how democracy works.
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History is full of people who went to prison or were burned at the stake for proclaiming their ideas. Society has always defended itself.
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I didn't make any money from my writing until much later. I published about 80 stories for nothing. I spent on literature.
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I am practically in the employ of Mr. Nobel. I have to meet everyone he sends my way.
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We are passing through a very sensitive time, and on the whole, this country is facing very big problems.
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One effect that the Nobel Prize seems to have had is that more Arabic literary works have been translated into other languages.
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At my age it is unseemly to be pessimistic.
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The Arab world also won the Nobel with me. I believe that international doors have opened, and that from now on, literate people will consider Arab literature also. We deserve that recognition.
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Without literature my life would be miserable.
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I accepted the interviews and encounters that had to be held with the media, but I would have preferred to work in peace.
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Events at home, at work, in the street - these are the bases for a story.
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