A Commentary on Mahfouz’s “Akhenaten”
Selection One
The first chapter of Mahfouz’s “Akhenaten” depicts “a city devoid of life”, a city “possessed by silence” and the “spirit of death.” The former “city of wonders” now haunted by past evanescent grandeur holds “a solitary prisoner,” Nefertiti, the “heretic’s wife.” The heretic was a young pharaoh named Akhenaten. Akhenaten challenged the high priests by rejecting his “ancestors’ heritage” and introduced a new religion, the religion of the one and only God.
The war between the old and the new religion, or “the war of the deities” (line 30) devastated Egypt and weakened the whole empire. This is an ironic consequence given that Akhenaten’s religion focused on Light and Life. The war brought Egypt “shadows of gloom and grief” (line 12, 38), Darkness and Death. Akhenaten’s new religion tore the people of Egypt between their loyalty to the pharaoh and their desire to be faithful to their ancestors’ religion of worshipping......
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Approximate Word Count: 660
Approximate Pages: 3 (260 words per double-spaced page) |