Season of Migration to the North

As stated in the introduction, this novel is supposed to reveal the colonized's intrigue and anger towards the culture of the colonizer. However, the sense of interest and admiration seems to be more prevalent in the early stages of the story, especially when Mustafa tells the narrator his life story. Mustafa's journey for education is particularly important as it seems to reveal a sentiment of superiority within himself, "I used to take their help as though it were some duty they were performing for me" (19). Mustafa not only felt entitled to having certain things done for him, but he expected it. His own native country may have contributed to his arrogance because as the time came for him to go past beginner and intermediate school, the system in place could not provide for him, and he was shipped off to more "European" places that distanced him from home, "I felt as though Cairo, that large mountain to which my camel had carried me, was a European woman just like Mrs Robinson, its arms embracing me, its perfume and the odour of its body filling my nostrils" (20). Mustafa's continuous desire to study led him to leave his native country and attend school in more European places, such as Cairo and later London. He felt as though these places "embraced" him, and he already felt as though he was superior to those in his hometown. Thus, it seems as if his admiration for European-ness stemmed from his want for more education, and how he felt embraced by the European culture which made it more like his home than his actual home.