The Story Archive

The Thief and the Dogs

Naguib Mahfouz · 1961 CE · Novel · Arabic · Contemporary

Said Mahran walks out of prison after four years to find his wife married to the apprentice who informed on him, his daughter unable to place his face, and the intellectual who taught him that theft was politics installed as a columnist with a villa and a pool. He goes to a Sufi sheikh whose answers he cannot use and to a prostitute who takes him in, and he buys a gun. Mahfouz drops the nineteenth-century frame here for interior monologue.

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Attributes

Genre
Crime / NoirPsychological
Theme
BetrayalJustice & RevengeIsolation & AlienationGuilt & Conscience
Archetype (Jung / Campbell)
AvengerAnti-HeroShadow
Plot structure
Revenge CycleUnreliable NarratorThe Chase
Symbol / motif
The PrisonThe CityLight & Dark
Conflict
vs Societyvs Self
Mode / tone
NoirIronic
Culture / tradition
Arabic

Closest analogues