The Book of Epiphanies An Egyptian Novel

by al-Ghitani, Gamal; Abdel Wahab, Farouk

• ISBN13: 9789774165467
• ISBN10: 9774165462
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2012-09-15
• Publisher: The American University in Cairo Press

Summary

In this surrealist novel with political and religious aspects and an edge of satire, the narrator is an unseen, unheard presence with the privilege of observing events from the past, mostly those involving his father and grandfather. Inanimate objects that have "witnessed" events (such as a date palm, or a brick in a hospital wall) report to the narrator, who seems to know no temporal or physical boundaries. A sense of displaced time saturates the blending of real and unreal events, such as the fight in the desert around Karbala against Israel and the forces of the West (including William Casey (the former CIA director), the narrator's father, Gamal Abdel Nasser, and al-Husayn). Nasser, who has miraculously reappeared after his death, is shocked and appalled to find that peace has been brokered with Israel and that Israelis have made Egypt a holiday destination.

Author Biography

Gamal al-Ghitani, born in Upper Egypt in 1945, is the author of The Mahfouz Dialogs (AUC Press, 2007), Pyramid Texts (AUC Press, 2007), and The Zafarani Files (AUC Press, 2009).


Farouk Abdel Wahab is Ibn Rushd Professorial Lecturer in Arabic at the University of Chicago. His most recent translation is Gamal al-Ghitani's The Zafarani Files (AUC Press, 2009).