LONDON: Novels by Egyptian Nobel laureate Naguib Mahfouz garnered a lot of interest at the Riyadh International Book Fair 2018 this week.

The pavilion of Dar El-Shorouk, one of the most recognized names in independent publishing and book sales in Egypt, showcased more than a thousand publications at the fair.

The publishing house said that the works of Mahfouz were the best sellers at the pavilion.

Mahfouz published 34 novels, over 350 short stories, dozens of movie scripts and five plays over a 70-year career. Possibly his most famous work, “The Cairo Trilogy,” depicts the lives of three generations of different families in Cairo from World War I until after the 1952 military coup that overthrew King Farouk.

Mahfouz was awarded the 1988 Nobel Prize in Literature, the only Arab writer to have won the award. Shortly after winning the prize Mahfouz was quoted as saying: “The Nobel Prize has given me, for the first time in my life, the feeling that my literature could be appreciated on an international level. The Arab world also won the Nobel with me.”

Mahfouz passed away, at the age of 94, in Egypt, in 2006.

Among his bestselling books at the Riyadh fair were “Bayn Al-Qasrayn” aka The Palace Walk; “The Harafish”; “Awlad Haretna” aka Children of Gebelawi; “Tharthra Fawq el-Nile” aka Chitchat on the Nile.