One Text, Two Receptions: Mahfouz's Children of the Alley

Abstract

Received wisdom in translation studies tells us that both source and target texts should enjoy the same reception by the source and target cultures. However, Mahfouz's Children of the Alley has been negatively received in the East, banned in all Arab countries for alleged blasphemy over its allegorical portrayal of Allah and faiths, but positively received in the West, even the Nobel Committee referred to it when Mahfouz was awarded the Nobel Prize for literature in 1988. Taking Children of the Alley as its case study, the aim of this thesis is to explore the reasons behind different receptions of the same text. The East-West duality is examined to establish why and how reception of this text is different. The thesis examines examples from Mahfouz's original Arabic text as well as its English translation by Peter Theroux. It may be concluded that the English translation of the novel seems to manipulate reception.