Karnak Café (novel)

Karnak Café (Al-Karnak, Arabic: الكرنك) is a novella written in 1974 by Egyptian writer Naguib Mahfouz, winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1988. The novel was made into a film of the same name in 1975. Set against the discussions between the patrons of a café in Cairo, the Karnak Café, the book follows the stories of three individuals during the 1960s, including the Six-Day War (1967) and the War of Attrition (1967–70). It therein explores some of the political currents vying for control over Egyptian politics in the 1960s as well as political persecution, the deep state, and state violence.