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Al-Ahram Weekly 27 Jan. - 2 Feb. 2000 Issue No. 466 
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Published in Cairo by Al-Ahram established in 1875 |
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Al-Ahram Weekly 27 Jan. - 2 Feb. 2000 Issue No. 466
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| Published in Cairo by Al-Ahram established in 1875 |
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Egypt Region International Economy Opinion Culture Features Profile Travel Living Sports People Time Out Chronicles Cartoons Letters Al-Ahram:
A Diwan of contemporary life (322)
Taha Hussein, who became blind as a child, reached such heights of renown as a literary figure and scholar that he came to be known as the "Dean of Arabic Literature". During two periods in his career, 1921-22 and 1948-53, he published most of his articles in Al-Ahram. He also wrote for other publications, not to mention the numerous books he authored. Dr Yunan Labib Rizk * uses Hussein's articles for Al-Ahram to put together a profile reflecting the man's ideology and the diversity of his interests. The profile also shows that while Taha Hussein was at the top of the ladder as a literary writer and scholar, he may not have been as adept in politics
illustration: Makram Henein
Spotlight on the 'Dean'
Taha Hussein published most of his articles in Al-Ahram for extended periods twice in his lifetime. The first was from 1921 to 1922, when the famous writer and critic was a teacher of ancient history in the national university. The second lasted for more than five years -- from 1948 to 1953, by which time he had become the uncontested "Dean of Arabic Literature". If Taha Hussein had designated Al-Ahram as the outlet for most of his writings during these two periods, that did not prevent him from using other periodicals, in response to the persistent invitations of their editors or because what he had to say for some reason did not befit his home base of the moment.
In all events, Taha Hussein always had close relations with the press. His first newspaper articles appeared in 1909 in Misr Al-Fatat, when he was 20, and his relationship with the press continually deepened and expanded until the last moments of his life. Indeed, even after he died, Egyptian newspapers continued to feature previously unpublished articles. An invaluable study by Dr Hamdy Sakkut and Dr Marsden Jones lists 1,481 newspaper articles written by Taha Hussein. In spite of the extensiveness of this study, we note that for the period of 1921-22, their study lists only 12 out of the 34 articles that actually appeared in Al-Ahram during that period. Were such a ratio to be applied to the remaining articles listed in the study, one could extrapolate that Taha Hussein's newspaper articles exceeded 3,000.
Not only was the blind scholar a prolific writer by any standards, but we note from the Sakkut-Jones study that he relocated frequently. In 1910 he took up a five-year stint with Al-Jarida, the nationalist newspaper owned and edited by Ahmed Lutfi El-Sayyid. Most of Taha Hussein's articles for this newspaper treated literary and educational issues and several were serialised over several editions. For example, Al-Jarida featured "Will Arabic regain its former glory?" in nine instalments and "Arabic and the Ministry of Education" in eight instalments.
Following the closure of Al-Jarida in 1915, Taha Hussein relocated to Al-Sufur, a literary publication that began to appear during World War I and served as a forum for a large number of liberal and, frequently, Western-educated intellectuals. Along with Taha Hussein, Mansour Fahmi, Mahmoud Azmi, Ibrahim El-Shawarbi, Mustafa Abdel-Razeq, Mohamed Hussein Heikal and Aziz Mirhom were some of the many luminaries who had been former contributors to Al-Jarida and who found a new outlet in the weekly Al-Sufur. Although Taha Hussein spent most of the war abroad on a study mission in France, he maintained his links through Al-Sufur to the Egyptian press, with such articles as "Greetings from overseas", "An evening of dance", "On the way" and "Before departure."
In 1921 Taha Hussein began his first round of writings for Al-Ahram. It was a period that differed in many ways from his subsequent five-year stint a quarter of a century later. Like many great literary and intellectual figures, Taha Hussein was something of a noble renegade. But, perhaps as one might expect, his iconoclasm reflected itself much more passionately in the writings of the earlier period, which reflected the heady revolutionary spirit of the times and during which he engaged in heated political, nationalist and literary battles. His later articles, by contrast, were more sober reflections on social and educational theories and issues. But then, during the intervening period, he had held several important posts in the field of education: dean of the Faculty of Arts at the Egyptian university, founder of Alexandria branch of this university, which would become the University of Alexandria, adviser to the Ministry of Education and then minister of education.
The configuration of his political affiliations during his two stints at Al-Ahram also differed greatly. In the early 1920s he supported the faction of dissidents who had broken away from the main body of the Saad Zaghlul-led Wafd, and foremost among whom were then Prime Minister Abdel-Khaleq Tharwat and Al-Jarida founder Lutfi El-Sayyid. If ideological factors accounted for this affiliation, so too did personal motives. Tharwat, who had formerly been a member of the board of directors of the national university, had given considerable personal backing to the young, blind scholar, which had helped him to secure his scholarship to France. El-Sayyid, of course, had opened the doors to his journalistic career. From the mid-thirties onwards Taha Hussein became a Wafd supporter and, in fact, became a regular writer for the party's newspapers, and above all Al-Jihad.
Taha Hussein's early rebelliousness was not always easy for Al-Ahram, if we are to judge by the newspaper's stance against the national university professor during the political squall that erupted over his book On Jahiliyya Literature. This work, published in 1926, precipitated such an outpouring of relentless conservative anger as to earn it the status of one of the most controversial literary works in modern Arabic thought. Evidently, Al-Ahram served as a forum for the vehement attack against that work, for Taha Hussein targeted it for an angry riposte. For this purpose, he used Al-Thabat, a newspaper that was owned by the former owner of Al-Sufur, Abdel-Hamid Hamdi. In an open letter to the editor-in-chief of Al-Ahram, dated 7 October 1926, Taha Hussein charged that Al-Ahram lent itself to writers "given to abandoning constructive criticism so as to indulge in petty vilification and agitation of a nature that has more in common with criminal slander than anything else". As for the newspaper itself, he wrote, "While it may claim to be an Egyptian newspaper for Egyptians, Syrian for Syrians, French for the French and Sudanese for the Sudanese people, its position would be very touchy indeed if it wanted to be Muslim for the Muslims, Christian for the Christians, Jewish for the Jews and atheist for the atheists. If it chooses to embroil itself in these political squabbles in order to survive, it would nevertheless be advisable for it to remain aloof from religious quarrels, for while such antagonisms might benefit it today they may turn against it tomorrow."
Taha Hussein
The falling out between Al-Ahram and the eminent intellectual over On Jahiliyya Literature was only a temporary nadir in their relationship and it would not be long before the rift was mended entirely. Firstly, Al-Siyasa, the newspaper to which Taha Hussein relocated after leaving Al-Ahram had begun to founder in the 1930s. In 1936, this mouthpiece for the liberal constitutionalists folded. But even during the same decade, Taha Hussein made several contributions to Al-Ahram, as he did to several other contemporary periodicals, such as Al-Jihad, Al-Majalla Al-Jadida, Al-Risala, and Al-Thaqafa. In the following decade, the frequency of his contributions to Al-Ahram intensified, paving the way for his second stints and the full resumption of their warm ties. Indeed, in his introduction to Dr Ibrahim Abduh's book Al-Ahram, 75 Years of Egyptian History, published in 1950, he described this newspaper as "the diwan (chronicle) of contemporary Egyptian life, in which are preserved 75 years of detailed records of every aspect of this life, in all its intellectual and artistic profusion and diversity".
While Taha Hussein's relationship with Al-Ahram extended over 30 years, his first stint there is interesting because it has attracted the interest of only a few specialists.
It is interesting to note, above all, that of the 34 Al-Ahram articles by the Dean of Arabic Literature during this phase only a quarter treated cultural concerns, in general, and literary subjects, in particular.
In the process, Taha Hussein engaged in prolonged literary battles that would sometimes extend over several successive Al-Ahram editions. Such was the case with his debate with Dr Mansour Fahmi over Mustafa Lutfi El-Manfaluti's Arabised version of Edmond Rostand's Cyrano de Bergerac.
The crux of the debate, which took the form of an exchange of letters via the newspaper between the two intellectual giants between 20 July and 17 August 1921, centred around the viability and integrity of El-Manfaluti's translation/Arabisation. In Fahmi's opinion, "El-Manfaluti had taken upon himself an extremely arduous task. Such is the eloquence of the original, its verbal craftsmanship, and its distinctive particularities of French expression as to virtually defy translation." In the face of that task, El-Manfaluti's intrepidity, alone, merited praise, all the more so because "he is blessed with an articulate pen and profuse erudition".
Taha Hussein was averse to giving El-Manfaluti such generous leeway. The translator's rhetorical gifts were not the issue. By transforming Cyrano's dramatic verse into narrative prose, El-Manfaluti, in Taha Hussein's opinion, had divested Rostand's work of much of its force. "Is this not a mutilation of the original and a crime against its author?" he asks. He goes on to remark, "I imagine that Egyptians do not yet truly appreciate the power of dramatic dialogue, as the art of the theatre is alien and the Arabic language is unacquainted with it. I imagine that if they could appreciate the power of dramatic dialogue they would not be able to stomach the transformation of plays into storybook form."
The tone of the letters exchanged between Taha Hussein and Mansour Fahmi leaves not the slightest doubt that, in spite of their differences, they shared considerable mutual esteem. The same applied to the relationship between Taha Hussein and Mohamed Hussein Heikal, who, like Fahmi, was a revered colleague from the days of Al-Sufur. This did not prevent Taha Hussein from criticising Heikal's book Jean-Jacques Rousseau: His Life and Works . He writes that "not only did the author attribute to Rousseau opinions and ideas that were not his own, in his impetuous sweep of the man's works he showed little mercy for the reader, supplying what he claimed to be a brief introduction, whereas, in fact, it was too lengthy and packed with concepts, each of which demands an entire chapter." This was not to say that Heikal's book was not without great merit, for he adds, "Were I to give all the virtues and benefits of this work the praise they deserved, I would have to ask Al-Ahram to cede to me a complete edition of its daily newspaper."
There were occasions when Taha Hussein's criticisms rebounded. In response to his critique of Heikal's work, one Al-Ahram reader, Mohamed El-Margoushi, accused him of adopting an ivory tower approach. Addressing Taha Hussein in a letter to the newspaper, El-Margoushi wrote, "You speak to people as though you are talking down at them from a podium, not as though you are standing in their midst. While you may indeed be more knowledgeable and erudite, you should wait until the people lift you to the height you merit, rather than placing yourself there by your own decision."
One of Hussein's pet peeves was that Egyptians were preoccupied with politics only. In one article he charged that Paris demonstrated more concern for the preservation and study of Egyptian antiquities than Cairo. Not that there did not exist mitigating circumstances. Under the headline, "Paris before Cairo," he contends that political issues had, regretfully, so absorbed the Egyptian public, himself included, that people talked of little else. Still, "life is not all politics; it has some other substance that we should neither ignore nor belittle". He returns to this subject in the opening of his critique on Heikal's biography of Rousseau, saying "There is no one in Egypt at present who thinks of anything but independence and heads of delegations. This applies equally to professional men of letters, to academics and practitioners of the various branches of science and to those who have dedicated themselves to a life of contemplation, as well as the farmer, the craftsman and the merchant. Everyone's thoughts are on Adli Yakan and Saad Zaghlul, while all concern for science and literature has been postponed until the political crisis is resolved." Again, in a subsequent article appearing on 6 April 1922, he writes, "Politics have virtually commandeered our country's current revival. The papers are full of politics, conversation is confined to politics and people turn their attention to little else. However, we must beg politics' indulgence, for it is not everything, nor should it be everything. There are many other momentous things going on in our national life."
All of which did not prevent some of Taha Hussein's 34 Al-Ahram articles of this period from addressing political issues. Indeed, an examination of the articles he wrote during his two stints with Al-Ahram reveals that he was more intensely involved in politics during the earlier period. But, then, as we have seen above, Taha Hussein confesses to having been just as prey to the political crisis of 1922 as everyone else. The rift between Prime Minister Abdel-Khaleq Tharwat, a close friend and colleague of Taha Hussein's, and the Wafd had the country divided at a very sensitive juncture in the national drive for independence. Taha Hussein found encouragement in the fact that Al-Ahram, itself, was pro-Tharwat and had cast the blame for the fissure in the Wafdist ranks on Zaghlul and his associates. The newspaper, for its part, was most obliging in furnishing Taha Hussein the necessary space for his own criticism of the Wafd.
It is also interesting to note that when Taha Hussein moved to Al-Siyasa, the mouthpiece for the Liberal Constitutionalist Party which began publication on 30 October 1922, contrary to what one would have expected his political writings decreased. Taha Hussein himself furnishes the reason for this in Wednesday Discussion, a book compiled from his columns in Al-Siyasa. He writes that that newspaper's management needed Taha Hussein as a literary writer-critic rather than a political commentator, since it already had a more than sufficient supply of the latter, including Mahmoud Azmi, Sayyid Kamel and Tawfiq Diab among many others.
Taha Hussein's early political writings for Al-Ahram, therefore, mark a unique stage in his journalistic career. More importantly, they offer ample material to enable us to draw a distinct ideological profile of the young writer against the backdrop of the current issues of the day.
On 15 August 1922, the government temporarily suspended Al-Ahram for having published an article alluding to tensions between the palace and the Tharwat government. This was the third suspension of the newspaper in its then more than 40-year-history and it occasioned an outcry in journalistic circles. As an Al-Ahram writer at the time, Taha Hussein spoke out eloquently against the arbitrary action against this newspaper. He compared Al-Ahram to Prometheus, condemned by Zeus to an eternity of torment for having brought mankind from darkness to light. He wrote, "Prometheus is every journalist who knows and remains dedicated to his duty, while the king of the gods is the government, which inflicts upon journalists various kinds of torment and fetters them with all manner of restrictions."
Earlier that year political contention erupted over the question of proportional representations of Copts in the parliament. Once again, Taha Hussein shared the views of the newspaper's editors and on this occasion he delivered a powerful defence of the secular state, or what he termed the "civil state". Under the headline "Minority and Majority", he wrote that "civil law makes no distinction between Muslim and non-Muslim and, conversely, Muslims and non-Muslims are equal under civil, and especially constitutional, law. Our social and moral orders do not distinguish between Muslim and non-Muslim. Thus, distinctions vanish and unity is achieved." If Egypt is to enshrine the notion of civil government, he continues, its constitution can make no allowances for dual systems, one for the majority the other for the minority, one from Muslims and the other for non-Muslims. "Our new system of government will be grounded on a purely political, non-religious foundation in which our government will not be deemed sacred or in any way founded upon religious authority or divine command."
True to his iconoclastic spirit, he appeared to have little sympathy for the popularist leader Saad Zaghlul. In an article entitled "Leader of a party, not leader of the nation", appearing on 13 October 1921, he writes, "There are people who have not delegated Saad Zaghlul as their leader, yet opted for silence when he declared that the entire nation delegated him. The reason they refused to back him is because they did not approve of his strategy. Simultaneously, we doubt that Saad and his supporters would deny the influence of the National Party, the very existence of which proves that the entire nation has not delegated Zaghlul as its leader." In a subsequent article entitled "What we feared would happen has happened," he castigated the leader of the 1919 Revolution for what he perceived to be a disastrous trip to Upper Egypt. During that trip, "Egyptian blood was made to water Egyptian soil by purely Egyptian hands, not in order to serve the interests of the nation or to defend our national rights, but simply because one group of people took up the cry, 'We want Saad!' while another cried out, 'Long live Adli!'"
One of Hussein's gross mistakes was his extended attack on Zaghlul in 13 articles published between 13 July and 22 September 1922.
Nothing drew out Taha Hussein's ire more than the incessant appeal to "the nation" to support a political view. He engaged in a drawn out dispute with lawyer Abdel-Rahman El-Rafie who, in Al-Akhbar, had called for the resignation of the Tharwat government on the grounds that it had aroused national discontent. Taha Hussein responds, "If El-Rafie truly believes this, then what are the sources on which he bases this belief? It is very easy to say that the nation wants something or rejects something. But it is very difficult to furnish the incontrovertible proof to corroborate what one claims the nation wants or does not want."
Rather than responding to Taha Hussein's demand for substantial evidence of popular discontent with the government, El-Rafie engaged in a bout of groundless accusations and speculation. As Taha Hussein put it, "He talks about reactionary policies and their advocates, about the reactionary composition of the Constitutional Commission, and about the reactionary principles of the constitution. He claims that the parliament will not be representative of the people and that everything in Egypt leads one to fear and pity rather than to confidence. He went to great lengths to avoid answering the question, and that question was very clear and specific, requiring no lengthy elaboration."
Taha Hussein remained steadfast in his defence of the Tharwat government, although his outspoken views exposed him to frequent attack. But then, independent mindedness was one of the hallmarks of this great thinker, as was his determination to withstand all forms of assault in defence of his views. Almost as a parting comment, before leaving Al-Ahram for his next newspaper, he wrote, "It is easy to endure vilification and slander, and I have resolved to bear all such vileness as long as there is hope that in the end we can arrive at the truth."
Hussein showed during this phase of his career that great thinkers do not necessarily make successful politicians.
* The author is a professor of history
and head of Al-Ahram History Studies Centre.
