Stream of Consciousness

In his famous novel “The Thief and the Dogs”, Naguib Mahfouz illustrates many distinctive writing techniques new to the Arabic literature. Being the first Arabic author to use stream of consciousness, Mahfouz creates an illusion that the reader is aware to sensations and uncensored thoughts within a characters mind before the character has ordered them into any rational form or shape.

There are three shifts of narration used by Mahfouz, direct and indirect internal monologue, third person narration, and soliloquy. Mahfouz shifts through these narration techniques heavily throughout the novel, and throughout these shifts he is able to control and speed of the plot, and develop characters, as well as providing readers with all the necessary background information.

The first narrative technique commonly used throughout the novel is interior monologue, which expressed the characters feelings and thought in the form of a narrative. An example of this can be found in chapter one:

“No one smiled or seemed happy. But who of these people could have suffered more than he had, with four years lost, taken from him by betrayal?”.

Indirect internal monologue is usually harder to identify, because it is not directly the characters thoughts yet it cannot be described as a third person narration, which it is usually confused as.

Next is the direct interior monologue. This is where the characters thoughts are presented directly, and we are presented with all of what goes on in the characters mind. For example

“And Sana? What about Sana?

…..

I wonder how much the little one even knows ”.

Here the protagonist appears talking to himself. This is done in order for the readers to understand the character’s process of thought and get an insight into how the character thinks and feels.

Direct interior monologue may sometimes be confused with a soliloquy. A soliloquy is a commonly used literary device in order to find out how one character perceives another. Most of the soliloquys within the novel are italicized. As seen in the first chapter as Said is exposed to freedom he says to himself “Nabbawiyya. Ilish. Your two names merge in my mind. For years you will have been thinking about this day, never imagining, all the while, that the gates would ever actually open. You’ll be watching now, but I won’t fall into the trap. At the right moment, instead, I’ll strike like Fate.” Here he is addressing two characters who are not even there, this gives insight into how he feels towards them, an appropriate example of a soliloquy.

With Mahfouz’s technique, although there are many advantages to these narrative styles as discussed above, there are also many limitations of this technique. Firstly the plot of the novel is negatively impacted. The plot is not linear, for we begin the story with Said’s rebirth as he leaves the prison. Throughout this narration on the other hand, Mahfouz moves back and forth throughout events thus neglecting the value of time within the novel, therefore diminishing the value of the plot of the story. 

In addition to the impact on the plot, this narrative technique also negatively impacts the characters, for modern day writers tend to focus more on the psychological description of the characters, as opposed to a normal 1^st or 3^rd person narration, we would get insight into how people feel about the characters through what they say, as well as physical descriptions. Both of which we don’t see throughout this narration.