I approached 'Palace Walk' aware that it is the classic novel of modern Egyptian literature but without knowing much about Egypt's modern history and culture. The book itself is a great teacher of the contradictions of early 20th-century Egyptian society and of the human heart.

It is a delectably juicy book dripping with family scandals that make for irresistible reading. This book would work as well for a book club as it would for a seminar. The tone of the novel is at times delightfully dramatic, but it is also punctuated with moments of sobering wisdom and is deeply engaged with social issues, most notably the harmful effects of patriarchy and colonialism on society. Al-Sayyid Ahmad's oppression of his wife and children at a familiar level is a reflection of England's oppression of Egypt at a geopolitical level.

Spoiler

The novel's tragic end underscores the underlying tragedy that Al-Sayyid's last words to Fahmy, his "best son" in his own words, were characteristically harsh.

At the same time as I enjoyed the writing (and the DRAMA) immensely, I have some conflicted feelings about it, too. I enjoyed that fatness is revered as a marker of status in men and beauty in women, but the novel reinforces Eurocentric beauty standards by repeatedly associating Aisha's blond hair and blue eyes with her beauty. Mysoginistic reflections by al-Sayyid, Yasin, and even upstanding Fahmy are pervasive throughout the book.

Spoiler

Also, the reason why everyone became so upset over Yasin's attempted rape of the servant wasn't because of the damage he did to her but because he had harmed his reputation forcing himself on a Black woman, a point that is reiterated several times.

I found these aspects of the novel disagreeable, but rather than pass critical judgment on its characters' flaws, the narrator instead shows their day-to-day comings and goings between tradition and modernity, between oppression and freedom, and "between two palaces."