The Lawsuit

by Naguib Mahfouz

ABOUT THE AUTHOR Naguib Mahfouz

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Naguib Abdel Aziz Al-Sabilgi Mahfouz, Born on Dec. 11, 1911 at Cairo (Gamaliya), Egypt. He is both Egyptian & Arabic. The 1919 revolution in Egypt had a strong affect on Mahfouz, although he was at the time only seven years old. From the window he often saw English soldiers firing at the demonstrators, men and women.

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Mahfouz entered King Fouad I University (now the University of Cairo), where he studied philosophy, graduating in 1934. By 1936, having spent a year working on an M.A., he decided to become a professional writer. Mahfouz then worked as a journalist at er-Risala, and contributed to el-Hilal and Al-Ahram. The major Egyptian influence on Mahfouz's thoughts of science and socialism in the 1930s was Salama Moussa, the Fabian intellectual. He began writing when he was 17. His early writings included translations from English and stories about ancient Egypt. He published 34 novels, over 350 short stories, dozens of movie scripts and five plays over a 70-year career. Many of his works have been made into Arabic-language films.

THE SUMMARY
The Lawsuit is about a man who deals with his fathers widows lawsuit demanding for financial support . He and his family witnessed his 50 year old father fall in love with this woman because she was young and beautiful. At first the man did not care much about his father having this new girl, until the announcement was made that they would get married. They ,especially his mother, were scared that they wont inherit anything because their father would give it all to his new wife. After a year his brother died and soon after his father had stroke and followed him. About 20 years later, she begs for financial support from the family, and when he sees her again, he not that time affected her beauty. In the end, the narrator felt inner peace as he granted maintenance as soon as he saw her and conversed with her.

THE THEME
This story is about karma which is what Naguib Mahfouz writes a lot about. Karma is the total effect of a person's actions and conduct during the successive phases of the person's existence, regarded as determining the person's destiny. y At the end, the widow got what she wanted but the man after being furious throughout this story seems to be at peace with himself and with the decisions made. Yes, he is the victim not her, but he felt an inner peace and at the end he tell her Dont worry - let the lord do as He wills" In other words not caring anymore and living it all on karma.
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MY REFERENCES
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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Naguib_Mahfouz http://victor-wordwarrior.blogspot.com/2009/10/lawsuitanalysis.html http://www.kirjasto.sci.fi/mahfouz.htm http://www.answers.com/topic/karma

MY PERSONAL INTERPRETATION AND INSIGHT

The fathers relationship with the woman is not love rather infatuation. She is described as beautiful, young, etc. Hence, it seemed that the father was mesmerized and overpowered by this woman and didnt see past the truth of the matter and his relationship towards his family. y The woman is not that bad because if shes really a gold digger then she should have demanded it from the day her husband died. She was forced by circumstances since shes broke, old and nobody wants to marry her again. y The man giving in to her demands thinking that karma would fall upon her symbolizes our dependency on faith or what we call the bahala na attitude and because of that justice was not served.
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