Dialogues of Naguib Mahfouz: Art, heart and mind By Mohamed Salmawy The great Naguib Mahfouz didn't care much for the grand titles many -- including myself -- were eager to give him. One day, he explained his position. A teenager, the son of a colleague, asked him for an interview for the school magazine and Mahfouz agreed. The student had the questions ready, and I learned later that they were reworded by a teacher from his school. The boy started asking, "as a great author and thinker ..." Mahfouz interrupted him. "Author yes, thinker no." Mahfouz proceeded to explain the difference between the two. "We often mix up things. We think that to honour someone, we should impart upon him traits that aren't his. Such behaviour doesn't bring any more honour to the person in question. The opposite is true, for we're neglecting the real traits of that person. And we make him look like someone who's sending others to steal in his place. Just as people would call any writer or even journalist a thinker, others would call anyone who holds a pen a writer. This is not true. Take, for example, the column writers who should be called columnists, not writers or authors. This doesn't mean that the author is something better than the journalist. Some journalists are much better and more influential than some writers. And some of them are more proud of their journalist status than anything else. Mohamed Al-Tabei, Mustafa Amin, Ali Amin and Mohamed Hassanein Heikal are good examples. We need to be accurate in our descriptions." Our colleague, the student's mother, stepped in at that point. "But you are a thinker, and a great thinker at that. I wouldn't be exaggerating to call you a philosopher, not only because you studied philosophy, but because there is a clear and undeniable philosophical aspect in your work," she told Mahfouz. "Literature cannot be literature without the ideas," Mahfouz responded. "Some of the ideas expressed through literature are of the best we have. Literature isn't a maker of ideas, but rather a consumer of ideas. I don't regard myself as a thinker, but as someone who benefits from thinking and philosophy in the course of my work. My work is art and not theory," he added. Looking at the boy, Mahfouz added, "my son, I am a man of the heart, not of the mind. In art, everything is placed at the service of the heart, even the mind itself. This is what distinguishes art from other things. The main object of art -- whether it is literature or music or painting -- is the heart. Art is a transaction in soul and feelings. Art must go through the mind as well as the senses. But in the end, it has to reach out for the heart. This is what makes me an author. You don't need to describe an author as a thinker or a philosopher." Mahfouz waited for the student to proceed with the interview, but the boy had other ideas. Eyes gleaming, he said to Mahfouz, "you have given me something more beautiful and important than any interview. With your permission, I am going to publish it as it is."
