Characters and Setting in Half a Day Essay

Naguib Mahfouzs short story Half a Day captures the essence of each persons time on earth and the changes that we all encounter throughout our life. During Mahfouzs short story he uses the setting of his home country of Egypt to display a theme of modernization. He also effectively uses the unraveling of the plot to keep the imagination of the reader guess what will happen next. The characters of the story help show the changes in the world as well as the changes in ones self over time.

The plot of Half A Day helps the story affectively flow and paint a wonderful picture for each and every reader to interpret. At the very beginning of the story the narrator is being forced to go to his first day of school. He acts as if his father is punishing him for making him go to school. He is reassured by his father that when school is over his father will be waiting for him. The narrator goes to school to find that he enjoys it very much. When school is over he goes over to the school house gate to find his father to be a middle aged man. The narrator is shocked to find that everything around him has changed and is still changing. He attempts to find his way home but nothing seems familiar. At the end of the novel it appears that he has turned into an old man.

The setting throughout the story drastically changes. At the beginning of the short story, the narrator describes his walk to school surrounded by gardens and fields of henna plants and prickly pears. It seems to be a very rural area of the city. When he is a school, it seems as if the setting is in a secluded area. After he is out of school, he finds himself in the middle of a bustling metropolis with tall buildings and busy streets. The place he once remembered is now the complete opposite.

There was only one major character in the story which was the narrator. As for the characters of story seemed to only change in their outer appearance. I saw no maturing of the narrator or the father, they only appeared to look older. At the beginning before going to school the narrator was a young child. After attending school the child turned into an adult. While attempting to find his way home he appeared to be an old man.

This short story was written to take you on a journey through ones life to make you realize how fast life can past you by before you realize it. Therefore it is always best to do what you feel is right and be your own person. Half A Day is represented as a great piece of literature because of the authors expression through the literary elements of plot, setting, and characters.