So the proposer of the Higgs boson, the so-called – but erroneously called – ‘God’ particle,  has died. At the age of 94. Not bad going.

It seems he was a fairy humble man and the attention his Nobel Prize brought him wasn’t to his taste.

The discovery of the Higgs boson was a fine example of the scientific method. Its existence was predicted by Higgs’s calculations but failure to find it at the appropriate energies would have necessitated the theory underpinning his ideas would need to be abandoned. As it is the reason why particles have mass seems to have been established beyond doubt.

Peter Ware Higgs: 29/5/1929 – 8/4/2024. So it goes.

Due to Eastercon I also missed commemorating the passing of Colombian writer and Nobel Prize winner Gabriel García Márquez.

I have read only two of his novels, One Hundred Years of Solitude and Love in the Time of Cholera but do not regret reading either of them and would happily sit down to other works of his were my tbr pile not so high already. Maybe when it’s shrunk a bit, then.

Gabriel José de la Concordia García Márquez: 6/3/1927 – 17/4/2014. So it goes.

Black Swan, 2013, 309 p. Translated from the Arabic Al-Sukkariyya by William Maynard Hutchins and Angele Botros Samaan.

Originally published in 1957, this third part of Mahfouz’s Cairo Trilogy has al-Sayyid Ahmad abd al-Jawad entering old age and so dwells more on the younger members of his family. His children reflect that their youngsters seem to know it all and do not listen to their words of wisdom. ’Twas ever thus. The book takes place in the run up to and during the Second World War so mirrors the First World War setting of Book 1, Palace Walk.

While political events of the times tend to happen in the background, it seems that in this respect Egypt doesn’t change much; indeed one character reflects that tyranny is the nation’s most deeply entrenched malady. Here, hope is raised when King Faruq takes over from his father Fuad, but disillusionment soon sets in. Politicians sell out their principles for power and inspire contempt. The group named herein as the Muslim Brethren (nowadays that “Brethren” is translated as Brotherhood) have become active in the political arena. According to them all answers are to be found in the Qu’ran. “We attempt to understand Islam as God intended it to be: a religion, a way of life, a code of law and a political system.” This is immediately subject to the rejoinder, “Is talk like this appropriate for the twentieth century?” – which is a good question; and more so in the twenty-first. There is also mention of girls in the family not being educated beyond the elementary certificate – not that that was a specifically Egyptian failing in those times.

To illustrate the darker undercurrents at play Mahfouz has a Copt say, “in spite of everything we’re living in our golden age. At one time Shaykh Abd al-Aziz Jawish suggested that Muslims should make shoes of our hides.”

al-Jawad’s grandson Abd al-Muni’m Ibrahim Shawkat is a firm believer while his brother Ahmad Ibrahim Shawkat is a communist. Towards the end both are detained for sedition. The first claims it is because he believes in God, the second asks what, then, his own offence could possibly be, as he doesn’t. Ahmad’s earlier declaration of affection for a female classmate founders on his relative lack of means. “It was amazing that in this country where people allowed emotion to guide their politics they approached love with the precision of accountants.”

Other perceptions include, “Politics is the most significant career open to a person in a society,” “When we’re in love we may resent it, but we certainly miss love once it’s gone,” and, “Life is full of prostitutes of various types. Some are cabinet ministers and others authors.”

Once again the USian translation was prominent, with piasters for piastres, “darn it” as an imprecation, soccer and diapers all intruding on my suspension of disbelief.

Doubleday 1990, 501 p. First published in 1956. Translated from the Arabic Bayn al-Qasayn by William M Hutchins and Olive E Kenny.

This is part 1 of Mahfouz’s Cairo trilogy, said to be one of his major works and a contributor to his being awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1988.

al-Sayyid Ahmad abd al-Jawad is an overbearing father and husband who does not allow his daughters or wife outside the house (nor anyone bar family members to see their faces) and rules his sons with a rod of iron. He is also, to Western eyes, an outrageous hypocrite – pretending to religious rectitude but spending his evenings carousing with his friends, drinking, and being “entertained” by female singers. In this respect he is not too different from those friends, though. His much put upon (second) wife, Amina, waits on him – literally hand and foot – and is consoled only by her strong religious belief and her love for her children. The family’s story is set during the First World War (there are frequent references to Kaiser Wilhelm, Hindenburg and zeppelins.) In the background the tensions associated with the British (the text frequently says English) occupation of Egypt at that time are laid out. While hating the English, a particular ire seems to have been reserved for Australians – and Indians are mentioned once as being hardly better.

The text is saturated with religiosity, both the dialogue and the characters’ thoughts make frequent reference to suras from the Qur’an (chapter and verse) – sometimes, as is the way with many observers of a faith, to provide support for their dubious position or actions.

Gradual alterations of the internal relationships in the family occur as time goes by, the two daughters, Aisha and Khadija are married out (to the youngest son Kamal’s distress and confusion,) Yasin, al-Sayyid’s son by his previous marriage, disgraces himself and forces his father to arrange a marriage for him too, his wife also being made by al-Sayyid to accept his strictures, and Amina’s eldest son, Fahmy, becomes embroiled in the revolution.

The claustrophobia and sexual repression within the household are striking. Offspring here are allowed no say in whom they are to marry, have not even seen their intended till after the engagement. The wider culture does allow sexual outlets, but only clandestinely. Life in Cairo in the early part of the Twentieth Century is illuminated almost incidentally. A local cleric occasionally drops in to al-Sayyid’s shop to dispense warnings and advice but mostly to receive a present.

The revolution, when it happens, comes as an apparent intrusion to the narrative which up to that point had closely focused on the family members and their interactions. While it continues to do so, there is a noticeable broadening out thereafter.

The text tends to the wordy. I must assume this reflects the original Arabic but while the characters are being established – each of the family has sections to her- or himself in various alternations – it can sometimes be unwieldy.

The translation is into USian and can be fussy. “Why did not the revolution achieve its objectives quickly?” has that “not” awkwardly placed. There were other infelicities. Skirt chaser didn’t seem correct as a term for womaniser in an Egyptian context and the British General Allenby is called a son of a gun when he releases the Egyptian revolutionary Sa’d Zaghlul from custody; surely too approbatory for a man whom the speaker despised. A man is “plunked” down; in Britain that would be “plonked.”

While it took a while to become engaged with the characters and the milieu things picked up latterly and I was encouraged sufficiently to read part 2 of Mahfouz’s Cairo Trilogy soon.

Faber and Faber, 2005, 436p. Translated from the Turkish, Kar, by Maureen Freely

Turkish poet, Kerim Alakusoğlu, who dislikes his name and wishes to be known only as Ka, has returned temporarily from Germany to undertake an investigation for the Istanbul newspaper Republican into a spate of teenage girl suicides in the remote city of Kars in Anatolia and also to report on an upcoming election there. The suicides are by girls who were being forced to remove their headscarves in order to attend state run school. Also on Ka’s mind is the possibility of reacquainting himself with the beautiful İpek, recently divorced from her husband.

The situation he finds himself in unlocks Ka’s writer’s block and poems flow from him – 19 in the few days the story encompasses. He notes these down in a green notebook and assigns them to positions along three axes, Memory, Logic and Imagination, on a diagram of a snowflake.

The narrative is mostly third person from Ka’s viewpoint but chapter 29, where the snowflake appears, and the concluding ones are first person by the author.

Kars is one of those unfortunate places which has seen many upheavals and changes of country in its history. Local factions include Kurdish nationalists, Islamists, secularists, even a few die-hard communists from the Soviet era. Ka’s visit coincides with a snowstorm cutting Kars off from the rest of Turkey giving opportunity for the various simmering discontents to come to the boil. In the middle of a live TV broadcast of a stage show dealing with the headscarf issue a local coup takes place.

The importance of football in modern Turkey is underlined by its several mentions in this book (as it was also in the other two Pamuk novels I have read.) Not a typical reference to find in a literary novel. Imagine the guffaws were the Beautiful Game to feature with any prominence in a British novel by a Nobel laureate.

Another presence here common to those two previous books is the appearance in the narrative of a certain Orhan Pamuk, a friend of Ka and telling his story for him. Is this the secret to winning the Nobel Prize? Put yourself into your books as a character?

Due to its history the tension between religion and secularism is particularly intense in Turkey and it is no surprise the story turns on this. The propensity for such disagreements to turn into violence is given due weight here as is the potential for long memories and grudges to be held.

There is more incident in this novel than in The Museum of Innocence but the background of Turkish society continues to be fascinating and as in that book the translation flows admirably.