A Moment of Truth

Description

“My sunken, blind gaze fell upon something… a face… a child’s face? A girl’s face? A man’s face? I don’t know… my weary eyes couldn’t discern whose face it was… but I saw his face. And I saw a smile on his face… and the smile suddenly drew me to the world, just as a diver’s hook pulls a pearl from the bottom of the sea to the surface. It was as if I had been in a deep, dark, distant depth, and then they had pulled me with a rope to the light and air… as if my lips had forgotten to smile! I looked at his face, astonished, not knowing how to respond to this strange smile… which seemed to me a new language I hadn’t learned… I shook my head involuntarily and meaninglessly to respond to his smile, my eyes fixed on his face, clinging to his lips like a team clinging to a lifeline. I felt the weight of my feet lighten slightly, and my iron body soften a little… I opened my mouth unconsciously and found myself uttering involuntarily: Thank you.” Whatever the truth may be, it conceals within it something magical, more magical than itself, whatever it may be. This is something that will only be revealed in the moment of honesty with which we confront it. From who it is, or from the illusion of that moment, or perhaps from its reality, emerges: Nawal El Saadawi’s imaginations venture into the labyrinths of life, or rather, into the labyrinths of the soul, to discern the premonitions and implications of that moment they call “the moment of honesty.”