place? It doesn't make sense. It doesn't make sense, O Lord" (174). It is telling that these are the last words of the entire book. Mahfouz does not offer the reader any escape from life or its many contradictions and disappointments. What he is trying to do is turn the reader back to confront that mystery face-to-face. He simply does not in any story try to say that some social, economic, or political change will change the basic fact of this mystery of life and death. In the same story, Mahfouz mentions politics only briefly: "Days followed one upon the other, one leader died and another took his place" (170). The suggestion is that the political or social leadership of Egypt does not make much difference to most people's lives. For most of the people in Mahfouz's stories, life is hard and money is short, but there is no sign from the author that a political program will change things much. No matter who is in power or what political or social or economi
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