Zaynab (novel)

Originally intended to be a short story, Haykal found that his work had more mileage than he had first appreciated, becoming a full novel in three parts. The story deals with a beautiful young peasant girl named Zaynab and the three men who strive for her affections: Hamid, the plantation owner's oldest son; Ibrahim, the young peasant foreman with whom she falls in love; and Hassan, a slightly more well-to-do peasant who enters into an unhappy arranged marriage with her. An early liberal critique of arranged marriage, the veil and enforced seclusion of women, the novel ends tragically with the heroine's psychological deterioration and death by "consumption." ==Literary significance & criticism==

Despite the structural flaws of the novel (its unrestricted romanticism, its poor division of the focus on Zaynab and Hamid, and a letter by Hamid which is unashamedly Haykal's own recapitulation of all the events that have transpired thus far), the novel is hugely important as the beginning point of the era of the modern Egyptian novel, infused with vernacular language, local characters, and a liberal politico-social dimension. ==Film, TV, or theatrical adaptations==

The novel became the basis for an Egyptian silent film, Zaynab, which was produced in 1930. ==References==