The Yacoubian Building: The International Bestseller - A Political Novel of Love and Loss in Modern Egypt

This is Egypt. Its past of glorified and often lamented early 20th-Century grandeur as well as its present of turbulence and increasing desperation and repressiveness are artfully laid out for the reader to analyze, contemplate and invariably pity in this impressive literary work. This is Egypt that everyone knows well but rather not talk about. The book captures the collective moral and physical destitution of the post-1970s Egyptian society like no other book has; at least none that I have ever read. The countrywide air of angst and despair is so thick you could cut it with a knife. The characters are drawn so skillfully and so realistically their pain is so intense and palpable it makes you wonder why it took so long for a revolution to erupt. Speaking of characters, this book is rife with a diverse set of characters that are rich with complexity and alive with nuance. The author did an extraordinary job in taking the reader on an unforgettable journey through both the most inexplicable and most banal in Egyptian mores. Each character represents a distinct reflection of Egypt herself. Her defiance, innocence, bitterness, lightheartedness, fanaticism, tolerance, softness, austerity, corruption, venality, hypocrisy, cowardice and hope. Allegory definitely weighs heavily in this work of fiction. Zaki Bey el Dessouki is an aristocrat and a francophile now living a shadow of his pre-1952-revolution posh life. He drowns his disillusion with reality in the pleasures of the…

The Yacoubian Building provides a glimpse into the complicated lives of residents of an Egyptian building. Set in the late 20th century Egypt, after the Egyptian Revolution of 1952, the Yacoubian Building started filling up with people from Egypt's lower class, while some others from the upper and middle classes stayed put. This has given Al Aswany the opportunity to develop many interesting characters. There is a son of the doorman who struggles to make a career as a policeman, even after being good at his studies and what he does after that. His beautiful young girlfriend, who performs sexual favors for little money. A rich homosexual man, whose boyfriend moves into the building with his wife and kid. A religious old man with dreams of being a politician. His second wife, a divorced lady from a porer region of Egypt. A pre-Revolution single rich man whose life has declined dramatically after the Revolution. His girlfriends. His servant and his brother, a tailor by profession, who moves into the building. The lives of these characters overlap and interact with each other; but otherwise, this book "feels" like a collection of short stories. Please note that they are not separate stories though. Al Aswany's characters are well-developed and thought out in detail. The characters go through a change in their lives over the course of several events. The reasons compelling these changes are beautifully pointed out by the author: poverty, sexual desparation, corruption, failure…

This book was recommended to me by a Moslem friend who is both religious and moderate. She said that she had never understood why someone would become a terrorist until she read this account of Egyptian society. Her comments were right on target. This is a remarkable book. I was in Egypt almost exactly one year ago and the picture that emerges in the book reflects the world I saw. It makes it quite clear why there has now been a revolution in the country and what conditions have existed to create fundamentalists as well as political opportunists. I think that reading this book could be extremely useful to anyone who is trying to understand what is now going on in the Middle East. It takes you into a cross section of the country detailing the idealism which has been crushed and then turned towards fundamentalism as well as the secularism that has been so strong and useful in the society. I cannot recommend the book highly enough espcially at this point in history. It is aslo interesting to note that for several years this was a best seller in the Arab world. SETM

A story of post revolution Cairo and how the complexities of colonialism, politics, wealth, corruption, and religion play out in the lives of the residents of the Yacoubian Building. Whether the poor residents of the roof or the rich residents of the tower all are trying to find a path to a better life - but each path has a price, and sometimes that price is a life. Great use of character narratives to create sense of place and time.

Alaa Al Aswany's book The Yacoubian Buidling is an insightful look into modern day Cairo. It is not the most uplifting or happy book I have ever read, but I think Aswany was trying shed light on the city's less fortunate. The characters all suffer from the same troubles that humans have around world have, which makes it easier to identify with their plight. This book shows what it is like for the poor, working class, and those who used to be part of the upper class and how each is struggling to move up in society. Zaki Bey represents the upper class of Egypt before the 1952 Revolution. He studied to become an engineer in France, but once he returned his father had lost the majority of his wealth and political clout with the Revolution and the land reform. Thus, Zaki Bey spends his days drinking and pursuing women because he is not as motivated as his father. He misses the way Egypt used to be and one feels sorry for him right away and his character is similar to that of the building. He is beginning to fall apart and now he wishes he would have married and had a family when there was still an opportunity. The other characters in the story are also revealing. Hatim is a French newspaper editor, but he is also a homosexual who must be careful about revealing his identity. Aswany did a good job of building Hatim's persona, which shows what can happen to children who are neglected by their parents. Hatim is constantly striving for the love and approval he could never find when…