英语名人堂：纳吉布·马哈富兹

纳吉布·马哈富兹（1911年12月11日—2006年8月29日），埃及作家和阿拉伯世界最重要的知识分子之一。纳吉布四岁时就被送到私塾学习《古兰经》，接受宗教启蒙教育。1988年他被授予诺贝尔文学奖，他是第一名获诺贝尔文学奖的阿拉伯语作家。获奖理由：“他通过大量刻画入微的作品—洞察一切的现实主义，唤起人们树立雄心—形成了全人类所欣赏的阿拉伯语言艺术”。

Naguib Mahfouz was born in 1911 and died in 2006. He was an Egyptian novelist and winner of the 1988 Nobel Prize for Literature. He is considered as the father of modern Arabic literature and is popular throughout the Arab world. Many of his books were about Egyptian nationalism. He said politics “is the very axis¹ of our thinking”.

 

Mahfouz came from a lower middle-class Muslim family in Cairo, the youngest of seven children. He had a very strict Islamic upbringing. He later wondered how “an artist would emerge from that family". Mahfouz was an avid² reader and spent his early years with his head buried in books. His interests included traditional Arab literature and Western classics and detective stories.

 

He graduated in philosophy from the University of Cairo and decided³ to be a professional writer. He got a job in the Ministry⁴ of Culture, where he stayed until 1972, as a movie censor⁵. While working as a civil servant, Mahfouz wrote 34 novels, 350 short stories, dozens of movie scripts and five plays. Many of his works were made into Arabic-language movies.

 

Mahfouz was not a stranger to controversy⁶. Many Arab countries banned his books because of his support of Egypt’s peace treaty with Israel. He also supported Salman Rushdie after Iran’s Ayatollah Khomeini condemned⁷ the author to death. Mahfouz received many death threats, and he survived an assassination⁸ attempt in 1994. He is the only Arabic-language writer to win the Nobel Prize for Literature.

1 axis   

n.轴，轴线，中心线；坐标轴，基准线

参考例句：

• The earth's axis is the line between the North and South Poles.地轴是南北极之间的线。
• The axis of a circle is its diameter.圆的轴线是其直径。

2 avid   

adj.热心的；贪婪的；渴望的；劲头十足的

参考例句：

• He is rich,but he is still avid of more money.他很富有,但他还想贪图更多的钱。
• She was avid for praise from her coach.那女孩渴望得到教练的称赞。

3 decided   

adj.决定了的，坚决的；明显的，明确的

参考例句：

• This gave them a decided advantage over their opponents.这使他们比对手具有明显的优势。
• There is a decided difference between British and Chinese way of greeting.英国人和中国人打招呼的方式有很明显的区别。

4 ministry   

n.(政府的)部；牧师

参考例句：

• They sent a deputation to the ministry to complain.他们派了一个代表团到部里投诉。
• We probed the Air Ministry statements.我们调查了空军部的记录。

5 censor   

n./vt.审查，审查员；删改

参考例句：

• The film has not been viewed by the censor.这部影片还未经审查人员审查。
• The play was banned by the censor.该剧本被查禁了。

6 controversy   

n.争论，辩论，争吵

参考例句：

• That is a fact beyond controversy.那是一个无可争论的事实。
• We ran the risk of becoming the butt of every controversy.我们要冒使自己在所有的纷争中都成为众矢之的的风险。

7 condemned   

adj. 被责难的, 被宣告有罪的 动词condemn的过去式和过去分词

参考例句：

• He condemned the hypocrisy of those politicians who do one thing and say another. 他谴责了那些说一套做一套的政客的虚伪。
• The policy has been condemned as a regressive step. 这项政策被认为是一种倒退而受到谴责。

8 assassination   

n.暗杀；暗杀事件

参考例句：

• The assassination of the president brought matters to a head.总统遭暗杀使事态到了严重关头。
• Lincoln's assassination in 1865 shocked the whole nation.1865年，林肯遇刺事件震惊全美国。