Quotes By Naguib Mahfouz

I wake up early in the morning and walk for an hour. If I have something to write, I prefer to write in the morning until midday, and in the afternoon, I eat.

Winning Nobel imposed on me a lifestyle to which I am not used and which I would not have preferred.

It's clearly more important to treat one's fellow man well than to be always praying and fasting and touching one's head to a prayer mat.

If you want to move people, you look for a point of sensitivity, and in Egypt nothing moves people as much as religion.

As the tension eases, we must look in the direction of agriculture, industry and education as our final goals, and toward democracy under Mr Mubarak.

I thought they would never select an Eastern writer for the Nobel. I was surprised.

My countrymen have the right to shake my hand and talk to me if they so wish. Don't forget that their support and their reading of my works is what brought me the Nobel prize.

We used the Western style to express our own themes and stories. But don't forget that our heritage includes The Thousand and One Nights.

I believe society has a right to defend itself, just as the individual has the right to attack that with which he disagrees.

I love Sufism as I love beautiful poetry, but it is not the answer. Sufism is like a mirage in the desert. It says to you, come and sit, relax and enjoy yourself for a while.

I am practically in the employ of Mr. Nobel. I have to meet everyone he sends my way.

The Nobel Prize has given me, for the first time in my life, the feeling that my literature could be appreciated on an international level.

The writer interweaves a story with his own doubts, questions, and values. That is art.

If the urge to write should ever leave me, I want that day to be my last.

You can tell whether a man is clever by his answers. You can tell whether a man is wise by his questions.

The criminal is trying to solve his immediate problems.

God did not intend religion to be an exercise club.