"Monra recited this prayer with an unsteady voice. His eyes flowed with hot tears that trickled down his thin and drawn cheeks. They wet his hoary beard, as he raised his aged head, looking with emotion upon the pallid face of his wife, confined to her childbed."

"He and Raifa each lived in hell, in a world of tedium."

"Some consider that such tragedies afflicting apparently blameless people are signs of revengeful justice, the wisdom of which is beyond the understanding of most people. So you will hear them say that if the bereaved father, for example, thought deeply, he would realize his loss was just a punishment for some sin either he or his forebears committed. Yet surely God is more just and merciful than to treat the innocent as the guilty..."

"[Mahfouz's fiction allowed readers the] rare privilege of entering a national psychology, in a way that thousands of journalistic articles or television documentaries could not achieve."

"Naguib Mahfouz, an Egyptian novelist who was the first Arabic writer to receive the Nobel Prize for literature and who was often considered the greatest writer in the Arab world... lived his entire life in Cairo, which provided the inspiration and backdrop for almost all of his writing... He set most of his works in the ancient Islamic quarter of Cairo, with its mosques and serpentine alleys teeming with shopkeepers, metalsmiths, government workers, peasants, prostitutes and thieves. His vibrant novels portraying life at every level of society were often likened to those of such other writers of urban social realism as Charles Dickens, Honore de Balzac and Emile Zola."

"Why do people laugh, dance in triumph, feel recklessly secure in positions of power? Why do they not remember the true place in the scheme of things and their inevitable end?"

"She was thoroughly amazed that this sin made him more amiable.”"

"We walked along a street lined with gardens; on both sides were extensive fields planted with crops, prickly pears, henna trees, and a few date palms.”"

"I did not believe there was really any good to be had in tearing me away from the intimacy of my home”"

"(Page 35)."

"(Paragraph 5)"

"And while the lady would sometimes smile, she would often scowl and scold”"

"(Narrator, p. 141)"

"Things are no longer what they used to be. In the past you were both a thief and my friend, for reasons you well know. Now the situation has changed. If you go back to burglary you'll be a thief and nothing else""

"(Page 44)."

"(Paragraph 14)."

"A city of silence and truth, where success and failure, murderer and victim, come together, where thieves and policemen lie side by side in peace for the first and last time."

"(Said, p. 84)"

"he silently acknowledged he did love her and that he would not hesitate to give his own life to bring her safely back."

"(Said, quoting the Sheikh, p. 102)"

"(Page 32)."

"It was that dog who betrayed me, in collusion with her. Then disaster followed disaster until finally my daughter rejected me"

""He walked on until he reached the Zahra offices in Maarif Square, an enormous building, where his first thought was that it would be very difficult to break into"

"(Chapters 2, Page 10)"

"(Narrator, p. 89)"

"(Said, p. 69)"

"You always act impulsively, Said, without thinking, but you mustn't rush this time; you must wait until you've arranged things, then swoop like an eagle."

"With this revolver I can awake those who are asleep. They're the root of the trouble. They're the ones who've made creatures like Nabawiyya, Ilish, and Rauf Ilwan possible."

"The silence of the graves is more intense, but you can't switch on the light...Your eyes will get used to the dark."

"(Said, p. 14)"

"She's forgotten too, that woman who sprang from filth, from vermin, from treachery and infidelity."

"If there was a dog in the house—other than its owner, of course—it would now fill the universe with barking."

"Listen, Said. Things are no longer what they used to be. In the past, you were both a thief and my friend, for reasons you well know. Now the situation has changed. If you go back to a burglary you'll be a thief and nothing else.""

"They think my God and I are defeated. But he never betrays not does he accept defeat."

"(Rauf, p. 44)"

"(Narrator, p. 49)"

"(Said, p. 95)"

"The Harafish is a labyrinth where the paths of the lowly and the noble intertwine."

"The Harafish is a reflection of the eternal struggle between good and evil."

"You will never accuse me of meekness hereafter, Father, for I am swept by a sacred desire, strong as the northern winds, a desire to know the truth and record it, as you did in the prime of your youth."

"[....] was struck by the idea of a woman's weakness is her emotions, and that her relationships with men should be rational and calculated. Life is precious, with vast possibilities, limitless horizons. Love is nothing more than a blind beggar, creeping around the alleyways."

"In the Harafish, dreams are carried on the shoulders of ordinary people."

"[...Life] is a sky laden with clouds of contradictions."

"the priests are swindlers” and the “temples are brothels, and there is nothing they hold sacred but their carnal desires."

"There's a lot of intelligence in his eyes. His heart is as spotless as yours. You'll find he'll turn out, with God's will, a truly good man.""

"Didn't Rauf Ilwan used to say that our intentions were good but lacked order or discipline?""