Reading Response 4: Half a day

     I absolutely loved Half a Day by Naguib Mahfouz. The ending caught me so off-guard, but it still gracefully delivered its point. In Half a Day, the unnamed protagonist starts of giving a retrospective narration of the first day of school.  Nothing arouses suspicion, at least, not for the first read through, but things like "Those who were able took advantage of the opportunities for success and happiness that presented themselves amid the worries."(184) stand out as indicative to the central message. Reaching the end, the narrator begins to exclaim about how the return trip home is radically different and more obtrusive. Eventually, a "young lad" approaches him at a commotion regarding a fire, and addresses the narrator as "grandpa".

     In my opinion, attempting to analyze the literary formula behind this story does it an injustice, but if I were to try to explain how this story works in simpler terms, I would do so in the form of connection/disconnection simply because that's how it stands out to me. The narrator was walking with his father (connection) when he had to depart for the first day of school (disconnection). His father tried to mitigate his worries by reassuring the narrator (connection), but when the child entered his class, he wasn't exactly warmly received by his classmates (disconnection). However, the teacher appeared and lovingly welcomed everyone of the students in the class (connection), but later turned out to be punitive and stern (disconnection). The school day was adjourned, so the narrator was free to go back home to his family (connection) but his father never showed up to get him (disconnection), so the narrator embarked by himself and ran into someone he knew (connection) but then after walking toward his house for a few minutes he realized that everything is very unfamiliar to him (disconnection, crisis). At the fire, the narrator was guided across the street by someone who regarded him as "grandpa" (connection, resolution).

     The whole story lends itself to the idea that life moves by at an almost blurring pace, and I find that message to be both powerful and inspiring. I don't think people are just exaggerating when they say "one day I woke up and I was old" and that's something I think about when I spend my time doing nothing, just killing time until the next thing to do. Of course, that's not to say that there's anything wrong with being old, but I think the moral of the story is that life flies by, and the time gap in the story indicates the narrator not even noticing the change. "Time" by Pink Floyd.