Dialogues of Naguib Mahfouz: Tale of the gas bottle By Mohamed Salmawy On Thursday 13 October 1988, I was at my office at the Ministry of Culture, performing my duties as the then- deputy minister for Foreign Cultural Affairs. I received a telephone call from the Egyptian Academy in Rome, which is affiliated with the Department of Foreign Relations. On the line was Mustafa Abdel-Moati who, besides being a good friend and a great artist, was head of the Egyptian Academy at the time. He asked me, a touch of embarrassment in his voice, if Naguib Mahfouz was dead. "No, Naguib Mahfouz is just fine. Why are you asking?" I said. He told me that there was unusual interest in the media about Mahfouz. Since the early morning, journalists were coming to the Academy asking for Mahfouz's biography and wondering if any of his novels were translated into Italian and if the academy had some. "Perhaps there is a new Italian translation of one of his books and they're launching it, as publishers do abroad? Journalists wanting to attend the launch would be interested in learning about the writer," I replied. This happened in the morning. Before leaving my office at about four, the news was officially announced in Stockholm. Mahfouz had won the Nobel Prize. I called Culture Minister Farouk Hosni and relayed the good news and sent congratulation cables in my name and the minister's name. Then I went to Mahfouz's home. In the morning of the same day, as Abdel-Moati was calling me from Rome, Mahfouz was sitting in Al-Ahram offices with some friends. They talked, among other things, about the Nobel Prize and wondered who would win. Mahfouz was the least interested in the event. "Tomorrow we'll all read about it in the papers, why worry now? It will be a small news story on the front page as usual," he said. What he didn't know was that the story would make the headlines this time. Mahfouz later told me that the first one who told him about the prize was his wife, Atiyatallah. She woke him up from his afternoon nap. He chided her for that "silly joke" and said he didn't appreciate being disturbed from his nap. While the argument went on, the phone rang. On the phone was the late Mohamed El-Basha, Al-Ahram managing editor, wishing to congratulate Mahfouz. "Are you sure?" Mahfouz asked. El-Basha gave the phone to Salama Ahmed Salama, then-foreign editor, who confirmed the news. Mahfouz put down the telephone and the doorbell rang. His wife went to open the door, still in her kitchen apron. She found the Swedish ambassador at the door, coming to break the news in person. When I arrived at Mahfouz's apartment I found the door wide open and dozens of journalists milling about, inside the flat and on the stairs. Mahfouz later told me that one of his two daughters came back from work to this unusual scene and was frightened. Her first thought was that the gas bottle had exploded and something bad had happened.
