الفهرس 
IntroductionOnly 14 pages are availabe for public view
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Abstract
Anita Desai and Salwa Bakr highlighted the problems that the
individual, in both India and Egypt, faces. Besides the problems
of poverty, health care, education and marriage, which are clear
in their writings, they discuss three psychological issues with
social dimensions, which are the aim of this study. As for
Desai, she is one of those major Indian writers who are
concerned with the psychological stresses, problems and
sufferings undergone by sensitive persons caught in a world of
uncertain values of society and culture. However, she claims
that her ”novels and short stories are no reflection of Indian
society, politics, or character”. Sharma in his book, Anita Desai,
justifies Desai’s claim by saying that, Desai’s desire is not to be
categorized as a realist or a novelist with a purpose. Her novels
and short stories are certainly reflective of social realities,
which are not immediately perceived. She sees these social
realities from a psychic or psychological perspective, and does
not look at them, as a social reformer or a moralist would do.
Rer fiction is not social documentations or reports but a sociopsychological
presentation.
Salwa Bakr, on the other hand, attempts to reflect her
society as much as possible in her short stories, without much
concern for the psychological aI1alysis of her characters.
Sometimes her short stories are like social reports about the
state of the individuals, especially women, in the Egyptian
society. Her short stories feature marginalized and nonconforming
characters usually working-class women who are
struggling to survIve physically, psychologically or
economically. She argues that there is a link between society
and its literature, ”especially in our days we need literature. We
live in a time when the boundaries between good and bad are
obscured, so literature is a means to clarify, to distinguish
between the two”. Her work focuses on criticizing and
disrupting oppressive practices in Egyptian society and
breaking the silence of the oppressed women.