The Yacoubian Building

Zaki Bey is the first character the author introduces. As he walks along the street, a 10-minute stroll turns into an hour. He stops and talks with everyone he knows. His reputation proceeds him; he is known as a womanizer and a lothario, a man who has fallen on slightly harder times, although this has in no way diminished his love of women. Young men come up to him and ask him questions about sex, which he is more than happy to answer. This amalgamation of life on the Cairo streets, this openness about sex, and the importance of a public reputation are all important themes within the novel, and all of them are embodied in Zaki Bey’s introduction.

More than just embodying the novel’s themes, however, Zaki is also a useful bellwether for the narrative structure of the novel. He begins the novel as a womanizer, is chastened by his humiliating experiences with his sister, and then falls in love with a woman who is attempting to trick him out of his money. Throughout all of this, there is an innate pathetic nature to Zaki’s character. Even at the beginning of the novel, his life seems somewhat hollow.