Midaq Alley, a story written by Naguib Mahfouz, talks about the residents of one .
of the crowded back passageways of Cairo. This story is made to be very believable .
because the author portrays plausible characters with a believable plot and setting. .
Although some characters in the book do not even exist in real life and make .
no sense whatsoever, like Zaita the cripple-maker, there are other characters that keep us .
fascinated about the book because of the way they are depicted in the story.
The book starts off by describing Midaq Alley, and from the first page we realize .
that the author is going to display real life characters and troubles that people in real life .
might have. The author, Naguib Mahfouz, describes Midaq Alley from beginning to the .
end. Just like any street in any country, on one side of Midaq Alley is a shop, a .
cafA(C) and a bakery and on the other is another shop and an office and it ends .
immediately with two adjoining houses each of three stories.The most important item in a .
book is how to attract the reader and how to catch the reader’s attention and the fact that .
Midaq Alley is so realistic that the reader would actually be interested because it displays .
problems from everyday life.
The characters that are in the book are shown exactly like real life people. For .
example, Uncle Kamil who is the owner of the sweet shop is described to be “a hulk of a .
man- and “his behind large and rounded-,”” has a belly like a barrel- (p.2), we realize .
here that Mahfouz is showing us that Uncle Kamil is fat and in reality when we read that .
Uncle kamil owns a sweet shop we expect him to be fat because sweet shop owners .
would definitely not be thin. The descriptions that Mahfouz uses for Uncle Kamil are .
very existent and we can certainly find whatever kinds of characters he has described in .
his book in real life. Another Character just like Uncle Kamil is Sheikh Darwish who had .
