There are no heroes in most of my stories. I look at our society with a critical eye and find nothing extraordinary in the people I see. – Naguib Mahfouz
Todays interpretations of religion are often backward and contradict the needs of civilization. – Naguib Mahfouz
I defend both the freedom of expression and societys right to counter it. I must pay the price for differing. It is the natural way of things. – Naguib Mahfouz
I believe society has a right to defend itself, just as the individual has the right to attack that with which he disagrees. – Naguib Mahfouz
Rather would I have the love songs of romantic ages, rather Don Juan and Madame Venus, rather an elopement by ladder and rope on a moonlight night, followed by the fathers curse, mothers moans, and the moral comments of neighbors, than correctness and propriety measured by yardsticks. – Emma Goldman