The name "Zaabalawi" was known by a man in a song from his childhood "oh, what happened to the world, Zaabalawi, they upset and took away his taste” (Damrosch, 2009). The man remembers his father speaking of the saint, he searches everywhere for this saint but never finds him and is incapable of realizing the religious and traditional fact which inhabits him. The saint is just a long-awaited memory in the hearts of those who once adored his mere mention: “I was fully convinced that I had to find Zaabalawi” (Damrosch, 2009). Both writers dealt with the social, religious and political changes occurring during this time and the practices and beliefs of both nations seemed to be lost. I believe Mahfouz was more concerned with the progression of the Arabic as a recognized literary people, capable of moving beyond the restrictions of Egyptian religious authority to become a "more modernist and lyrical Arabic novel" (Damrosch, 2009). Rather, Achebe seemed to want to express how his “well-meaning” colonizers changed Africa: whether for good, it must be done.