I watched the cart carrying the enchantress of Crimson Lane coming, and drawing it was a winged stallion. I got in and sat at the rear. The steed responded by spreading its wings, and the cart began to fly until we were higher than the rooftops and minarets--and in seconds we arrived at the Great Pyramid's pinnacle. We started to pass over it, just an arm's height above it.

And then I rashly leapt down onto the pyramid's summit, my eyes never parting from the seductive girl as she soared upward and upward--and the nightfall descended, the darkness ever deepening, until she was fixed in the heavens as a luminous star.

EDITOR'S NOTES

• "The enchantress of Crimson Lane" recurs in Mahfouz's dreams--a girl he had a crush on decades ago.
• The winged horse and the girl's ascent to Heaven echo Muhammad's ascent via flying horse, hinting just how much Mahfouz idealizes this girl, or at least her memory.
• So why leap to the summit of the Great Pyramid? Does he feel unworthy of her? Or unready for Heaven? It's a wonderfully ambiguous dream. Does he choose life over death here? Convalescents face a choice, and the spirit world can be tempting.

ON THE DREAMER

Egyptian writer Naguib Mahfouz won the Nobel Prize for literature in 1988. In 1994, an Islamist stabbed him; during his convalescence, he was unable to write anything long. He published a series of ultrashort stories, called Ahlam Fatrat al-Naqaha meaning "Dreams of the Recovery Period," published in English as The Dreams in 2004, translated by Raymond Stock. It's a collection of 104 dream-stories, undated and untitled. Steeped in longing, eerie with dislocation, haunted by dead friends (Mahfouz was pushing 90 at the time) and authorities worthy of Kafka, his dreams are universal in feeling yet echo both his and Egypt's troubles. The style is elusive; I'm unsure if that's the writer or the translator.

I have excerpted three dreams to encourage you to read the other hundred. Mahfouz simply numbers them (this is dream 83); I've titled them here for convenience. The sketch is mine as well.

--Chris Wayan

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