War in the Land of Egypt

I found the novel that we read for the first group presentations, War in the Land of Egypt, to be extremely informative as well as entertaining.  The book presented a really interesting representation of different classes in Egypt, the corruption that the lower classes face, and the way that respect is gained in the eyes of the Egyptian people.  The different characters in the book were all of different importance to the development of the story, and yet it seemed that they were all an integral part of what was transpiring.  I was able to grow fond of many of the characters simply because of their nature in the tough situation that they were facing, and others I grew an instant dislike for, such as the Umda.  What was really interesting to me though was that I grew a big fondness for Masri, who was the one character that we never got to hear from directly.  His situation, the pain brought to his family because of his death and the corruption coming from the classes above him as well as the government, was striking and I found that I sympathized the most with him.  

Hearing from Dr. Mughazy on Tuesday only deepened my appreciation of Masri.  Just the fact that the name Masri represents Egypt gave me a sense of what the character meant to the author of the book, and the weight of meaning that the struggles of the character would have carried to Egyptian readers of the novel.  I thought a lot of interesting points came up during our discussion, some of which shocked me.  The amount of studying that Egyptian people must do in order to succeed, and then not even having a good chance of getting a decent paying job?  It's incredible, and a little scary to think about.  It also showed up in our novel, where Masri studied all of his life and was very successful but still felt that the only way to propel his family forward was to serve in the army, and even  then he could not be guaranteed enough to support his parents and all of his sisters.

One of the most striking things that was mentioned during our discussion was when Angela asked about the reaction of Dr. Mughazy's family when he left Egypt, whether or not he met with disapproval from his family when he came to America.  His answer was something along the lines of, if you can get out you are encouraged to do so.  This carried a lot of weight for me.  It made me think that, while the people of Egypt do respect their country, they realize the corruption that it's government is bringing upon them and are looking for a way out.  I found this one statement to be the most intriguing one that came up in the discussion.

Thank you to the group for choosing this book, I really enjoyed reading it.