Critical Analysis

"The Mummy Awakens” has all the trappings of a mummy story,

complete with the obligatory disclaimer that prefaces many tales of the
supernatural. It isn’t just any mummy who wakes, it is General Hor,
likely based on the last 18th Dynasty ruler, as Stock notes. Other
pharaohs have been brought to life in fiction, but Hur isn’t like the
lumbering, enigmatic but ultimately becomes like a real, speaking,
moving, and living character.

Like most of Pharaoh Tales “The mummy Awakens” is also very much
enjoyable. This is a story of an exploration of human nature. This is a
tale with an overt political message set in a satire on the mummy genre.
It is a satire on modern Egypt’s relationship with the old; the story,
written in a clear, easy-flowing style, paints a vivid picture of social
injustice. Mahfouz’s works range from the reimagining of ancient myths
to subtle commentaries on contemporary Egyptian politics and culture.
As the author has himself said, "I am the son of two civilizations that at
a certain age in history have formed a happy marriage. The first of these,
seven thousand years old, is the Pharaonic civilization; the second, one
thousand four hundred years old, is the Islamic civilization.”

To see his works as mainly political fables or allegories is fallacious. It

is a most misleading simplification, with an exception of “The Mummy
Awakens”, since there are many levels of interpretation and reception.
His short stories are works of art. They picture Egyptian milieus from
the most ancient of times to contemporary everyday life, deal with
questions of broad human concern, raise philosophical and existential
questions. The author is always guided by a belief in Egyptian continuity
and greatness, from time to time shaken to its foundations by tumultuous
history, the corruption of thought, and disaster. In his stories, there is a
staunch belief in moral rights and a constant seeking for Egyptian
identity behind the weft of illusion and reality. A dweller in truth, unable
to define it, Mahfouz is – as the investigator perpetually pursuing his
own self.

In most of the literary works written after WWI, there is a close

reference to imperialism. No matter how deep goes the setting of any
literary piece into the annals of history, it is, in fact, written for the
present. The story “The Mummy Awakens” also deals with the theme of
imperialism. This theme is stressed upon through the character of Pasha
Mehmud al-Arn’uti who is stocking every valuable relic of Egypt in his
mansion. He is not only occupying these relics but also intended to
transport them to France if needed. As he says to his friends, “As long as
my own artistic conscience feels unhappy about the possibility of these
wonders of art remaining here among this animal populace, you can rest
assured that they will never stay buried here.”

Pasha hates and despises the Egyptian people like a true imperialist. For
him, they cannot be called even human beings. They are crude, beast,
and domesticated animals. He terms them as “domesticated animals,
docile by nature and submissive by temperament.”
The frightening economic disparity among the masses is always a direct
result of ineffective political policies. This economic gulf is also present
in the story. The peasant who steals meat baked for Pasha’s dog
represents the exploited community whose life is worse than the life of
dogs belonging to the privileged class. After ordering his servants to
take the peasant down to the police station Pasha looks at professor
Daryen and remarks: “Now you can get some idea of the difference
between down-and-outs in our country and yours, can’t you? In your
case, they will steal a loaf of bread if they are hungry, but here loaves of
bread aren’t hard to get and so they are only satisfied with cooked meat
if you please!”

Pasha’s statement carries dual satire. First, he considers the “down-and-

outs’ of his country inferior to those belonging to France. Here, he
forgets that he is prospering on the wealth of these underdogs who die
with hunger while his beloved Beamish eats meat, bones, milk, and
broth daily. Second, it might be an allusion to the people who are lazy
and do nothing to ward off hunger. They do have opportunities to earn
their bread and butter but are unwilling to exploit them. A part of
Pasha’s statement can be referred to in this connection, “….. but here
loaves of bread aren’t hard to get and so they are only satisfied with
cooked meat….” The episode of beating the ‘thief’ is a symbol of misery
blanketing the life of the peasant community. It presents a sheer contrast
between the privileged and the deprived classes.

Mummy of Hur can be taken as the spirit of Egypt that speaks after a
silence of 3000 years. The mummy awakes when Pasha’s greed crosses
all the limits. The act of excavation can be taken as any possible danger
posed to the greatest Egyptian heritage. The injection of this event into
the story can also be interpreted as the role of history curing the ills of
the present. The way Hur admonishes Pasha and reminds him of his
origin shows the social, economic, and political changes that occurred
through centuries. He addresses Pasha as “….. Don’t you remember how
I brought you here from the North during one of our successful
campaigns? Do you pretend not to know me?….. your white skin which
is a sure sign of your slave status gives you away.”
Again he says how the slaves of yesterday have become the masters of
the present: “What’s happened in the world so that the mighty are
brought low and humbles are raised up high? Have slaves become
masters and masters slave?”

Hur is well aware of the fact that the peasant community of Egypt is
suffering a lot at the hands of men like Pasha who knows nothing but
plundering, exploiting, and inflicting pain on others. Their inhuman
behavior forces others to starvation. Their dogs prosper on meat and
milk while their human fellows suffer unspeakable miseries. In this
regard, Hur thunders at the Pasha and says, “You beat him with your
cane because he was hungry, and you forced his fellow human beings to
the beating for you. Are Egyptians really starving in their own country?
A curse upon you, slave!”

To conclude we can say that the writer has very skillfully mixed past
with the present, myth with reality, and supernatural with the world of
vision and insight. He does so to achieve his purpose of bringing out
social, economic, and political disparities existing in society. He makes
the reader understand how the disgusting and horrible clutches of
imperialism and exploitation render the life of the poor miserable. As it
has been commented in Philadelphia Inquirer, “Mahfouz presents us
with a different concept of the world and makes it real. His genius is not
just that he shows us Egyptian colonial society in all its complexity; it is
that he makes us look through the vision of his vivid characters and see
people and ideas that no longer seem so alien.”

Language, Setting, and Narrative Technique

The pharaonic setting of Naguib Mahfouz’s tales is enhanced by his

straightforward writing and the viewpoint of his protagonists, which
sometimes borders on naivety or wondering. ‘The Mummy Awakens’ is
set in modern Egypt as we are told by the narrator at the very outset of
the story,” I paid a visit to the late lamented Mahmud Pasha al-Arna’uti
in his huge country mansion in Upper Egypt” but is influenced, as ever,
by the ancients. For Mahfouz, Egypt was not just a place, but an idea—
even a racial myth, drawn from historical sources through the filter of
personal experience but this didactic vision of Egypt—which he viewed
as the cradle of civilization and wisdom, and a potential model for
modern enlightenment—resulted in a number of highly effective stories
and “The Mummy Awakens” is one of them.
This tale finds a Francophile Turkish/Albanian pasha discussing art and
his contempt for the native Egyptians, descendant from the ancients,
with urbane Westerners in his palace. Enticed by the prospect of finding
ancient relics on the palace grounds, and despite his contempt for the
locals, he allows a native Shaykh to dig. The results are, to say the least,
as surprising to the Pasha as they are to the reader. A mummy from the
Eighteenth Dynasty awakens in fury to reproach Pasha for his arrogance.
The story conducts timeless truths over the course of thousands of years.
Summoning the power and mystery of a legendary civilization, it
exemplifies the artistry that has made Mahfouz among the most revered
writers in world literature.

Along with the setting, Mahfouz has used language and different other
literary devices to exploit his thematic concerns. He uses literary devices
such as allegory, symbolism, and experimental narrative techniques.
About his use of language, Denys Johnson has aptly stated: “Mahfouz
also rendered Arabic literature a great service by developing, over the
years, a form of language in which many of the archaisms and clichés
that had become fashionable were discarded, a language that could serve
as an adequate instrument for the writing of fiction in these times.”

The Mummy Awakens is told through a first-person narrative point of

view. It involves a myth from ancient Egypt that is why the writer tells
us about it. He wants to make us ready to take seriously whatever he is
going to say during the course of narration. The writer hands the
narrative over to another person, but before doing so he introduces the
narrator to us as a learned intellectual. He is ‘honest’ and
‘unimaginative’ Professor Dryen. Daryen is a professor of Egyptology at
Fu’ad the First University in Cairo. He tries to convince the readers to
believe him in quite a suggestive manner. He says, "I am deeply
embarrassed to tell this tale–for some of its events violate the laws of
reason and by nature altogether. If this were merely fiction, then it
would not cause me to feel such embarrassment. Yet it happened in the
realm of reality….”
The writer wants to establish a ‘willing suspension of disbelief that is
quite a poetic device. Slowly with a careful argumentative style and
selection of words, he succeeds in doing so. The result of this effort is
that when we confront with an awakening, walking and talking mummy,
we believe every word spoken by it. The use of words like ‘slave’,
‘speak’, ‘plunder’ and ‘my descendant’ in Hur’s statements seem to be
used for creating a sort of poet justice. Hur admonishes the Pasha by
using harsh words like, “why aren’t you groveling at my feet?” These
words spoken by mummy create a balance between Hur’s treatment with
Pasha and Pasha’s treatment with the poor peasant.

In the narrative stream of his short stories, the reader encounters a great
variety of characters, people described as soon as they appear before us.
They leave lasting impressions but also hold back something essential
that does not come within our grasp. They turn up and disappear; leaving
traces and clues but remain enigmatic, ambiguous. They are figures in a
greater story or pieces in a puzzle. Their lives are texts, continually
being written and rewritten, as is Egyptian history. Their appearance
changes as the context alters with time and setting. Likewise, their
meaning and purport depend upon viewpoint and perspective, and there
are many layers of interpretation, from the gross to the subtle and
inexpressible.

To sum up keeping in view the setting and the language it can be said
that Mahfouz, like a number of Egyptian writers, is a leader of the
movement that has claimed that by history and culture Egypt is more
pharaonic than Arab. This movement was very lively and strong until
the rise to power in 1954 of President Jamal Abd al-Nasir, who
propagated Arab nationalism in Egypt and gave it a great impetus in the
Arab countries. It is in this pharaonic context that Mahfouz’s stories
should be read and appreciated.