It's a most distressing affliction to have a sentimental heart and a skeptical mind.

When you spend time with your friends, what do you talk about? Those things which made an impression on you that day, that week ... I write stories the same way. Events at home, in school, at work, in the street, these are the bases for a story. Some experiences leave such a deep impression that instead of talking about them at the club I work them into a novel.

History is full of people who went to prison or were burned at the stake for proclaiming their ideas. Society has always defended itself.

We are like a woman with a difficult pregnancy. We have to rebuild the social classes in Egypt, and we must change the way things were.

Writing is for men who can think and feel, not mindless sensation seekers out of nightclubs and bars. But these are bad times. We are condemned to work with upstarts, clowns who no doubt got their training in a circus and then turned to journalism as the appropriate place to display their tricks.

We used the Western style to express our own themes and stories. But don't forget that our heritage includes The Thousand and One Nights.

God did not intend religion to be an exercise club.