Al-Ahram Weekly 18 - 24 February 1999 Issue No. 417
Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875

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New novels, old histories

By Mahmoud El-Wardani

Bada'i Al-Zuhur fi Waqa'i Al-Duhur (The Wonders of Blossoms in the Events of the Ages) 2 vols, Mohamed Ibn Ahmed Ibn Iyas, ed. Mohamed Mustafa. Cairo: Cultural Palaces Organisation, 1999

Written by the only historian to provide us with a first-hand account of the turbulent period between the defeat of the Mamelukes who ruled Egypt for many centuries and the Ottoman take-over of 1517, this reprint of Ibn Iyas' chronicle is a most welcome addition to any historian's library. The narrative of the fall of the Circassian Mamelukes and the ascent of the Ottomans unfolds through a series of annuals, which portray in great detail the plight of the ordinary Egyptian and the suffering of the poor. Ibn Iyas also touches upon the state of politics, the military, jurisprudence, literature and art during this period of upheaval and transition. First republished in 1982 in an edition by the late Mohamed Mustafa, the text has now been reedited as part of a valuable series which aims to provide accessible versions of canonical Arab texts.

Asafir Al-Nyl (Nile Birds), Ibrahim Aslan. Beirut: Dar Al-Adab, 1999
In this, his latest novel, Aslan returns to the world portrayed in his first novel, Malik Al-Hazin (Heron) which was highly acclaimed by the critics and was subsequently made into a hit film. Night Birds relates the decline of a poor Egyptian family which migrates from the countryside to the Kitkat district of Cairo -- and with the decline of the family, that of an entire era. Aslan brilliantly paints a panoramic picture of the lives of his protagonists, but one which is nevertheless permeated with a sense of irony exploting the fertile paradoxes of the lives he portrays. In terms of structure, the novel is impressive indeed, refusing linear narrative for a series of images and symbols which recur throughout various episodes and vignettes, to create an overall coherence of pattern and theme.

Painting by Ramsis Younan; the doorway to the mosque of Mameluke ruler Qalawun (photo: Yves Paris)

Al-Madi Al-Mushtarak bayn Al-'Arab wa'l-Gharb (The Past We Share: The Near Eastern Ancestry of Western Folk Literature), E.L. Ranelah, tr. Nabila Ibrahim. Kuwait: National Coucil for Culture and Arts, 1999
Ranelah argues that the Mediaeval West was immersed in the Arab literary heritage, and that the impact of this relationship can still be felt today. Arab civilisation had itself absorbed earlier traditions through their integration into the Islamic world, and this study seeks to describe the amalgamation of these rich multiple traditions in both historical and cultural perspective. One of its most distinctive features is that its author does not simply look to key individual works to support the thesis advanced, but instead focuses on the evidence of popular oral traditions. Thus the author deals with Solomon and the queen of Sheba, Alexander the Great, Antar and Abla, and the Thousand and One Nights, among other topics. The writer thus describes a far-reaching trajectory, illustrating the extent of the Arab influence on Western literature. There is also a discussion of the nature of Western medieval culture as a synthesis of Greek, Roman and Arab sources.

Qasidat Al-Nathr min Boudleyr hatta Al-Waqt Al-Rahin (Le Poème en prose de Baudelaire jusqu'à nos jours), Suzanne Bernard, tr. Rawia Sadiq. Cairo: Sharqiat, in collaboration with the French Centre for Culture and the Arts, 1999
The prose poem is currently enjoying a tremendous vogue, as well as causing a great deal of controversy, not only in Egypt, but throughout the whole Arab world. Hence the relevance of this book, which has suffered twice before at the hands of incompetent translators. An abridged and mutilated edition appeared in Baghdad in 1993, only to be followed by an equally inadequate translation published in Cairo in 1996. Now, however, we have a complete and accurate translation of the first part of the book by artist and writer Rawya Sadeq. The resulting text dicusses the prose poem before Baudelaire, the historical context of the prose poem up until Baudlaire's time, and Baudelaire and modern lyricism. It also includes chapters on Rimbaud, Lautréamont and Mallarmé.

Al-Seif wa'l-Hilal: Turkiya min Atatork illa Arbacan (The Sword and the Crescent: Turkey from Ataturk to Arbacan), Reda Hilal. Cairo: Dar Al-Shorouq,1999
This book is the fruit of a number of journeys, beginning with a visit to Turkey immediately after the 1980 coup d'etat and ending with a trip through Kurdistan in 1998, at a time when relations between Syria and the Kurds were extremely tense. The Sword and the Crescent discusses the relation between the Turkish army and the political life of the country: focusing on the conflict between the Ottoman military apparatus and political Islam, the book details the development of Turkey as a military society, the role played by the army in the establishment of the modern nation, the abolition of the Caliphate by Ataturk, and the role of the army and the shift towards party politics and political pluralism.

Al-Bayt (The House), Bahiga Hussein. Cairo: Dar Al-Thaqafa Al-Jadida,1999
This is Bahiga Hussein's fourth novel, following Ra'ehat Al-Lahadhat (The Smell of Moments), Ajnehat Al-Makan (The Wings of the Place) and Merayat Al-Roh (The Soul's Mirror). Al-Bayt describes the daily life of a rural Egyptian family, and intertwines their story with that of Rouben, an Armenian doctor who is also a painter and an art lover. It is a difficult work to summarise in only a short space. Hussein has matured greatly as a writer and honed her style considerably. This is a cohesive novel, which does not show the same tendency towards experimentation that readers may remember from her earlier works.

Al-Musarnamoun (Sleepwalkers), Hosni Hassan. Cairo: Dar Sharqiyat, 1999
The second novel by a writer who is clearly committed to his own particular style and vision, "Sleepwalkers" takes the concept of sleepwalking as a psychiatric condition of the individual and extends it into the realm of social analysis. Though the protagonists are intellectuals from the generation of the 1970s/1980s -- witnesses to the demise of leftist politics and the rise of religious fundamentalism -- the result is not a crass political allegory, but rather a detailed investigation of specific human states of being with which today's reader will easily identify.

Al-Kitaba Al-Okhra (The Other Writing), ed. Hisham Qishta. Cairo: 1999
The latest issue of this occasional publication devoted to alternative and experimental writing includes an extended section celebrating the 60th birthday of the Art and Freedom Group, founded in 1939 on the initiative of George Henein and Ramsis Younan. Other active members of the Group included Anwar Kamel, Kamel El-Telmesani and Fouad Kamel, and among the texts gathered here is the transcript of a 1939 debate in which all three participated. There is also an extended paper by Henein entitled, "An Introduction to Arabic Poetry", and a review of his 1939 book, Counter-Justifications of Existence. Otherwise the publication offers its usual fare of young writers' creative contributions.

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