2 - 8 August 2001
Issue No.545
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Al-Ahram Weekly Online 2 - 8 August 2001 Issue No.545 |
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A moment of truth
Salah Jahine at Al-Ahram embodied a new national spirit: Youssef Rakha evokes the age of dreams
The West's swinging Sixties had a counterpart in Egypt. It was the same and different: the same in that it incorporated elements of moral transformation; different in that it was not about flower power but about national liberation dressed as socialism.
On the occasion of plans to renovate the Egyptian museum: We are going to throw away the statues with broken pieces and put plastic mannequins in their place. We will also put carpeting inside the sarcophagi and cover them in wood panelling imported from Italy
On the Arab issue: Why do we need a summit? Every Arab is a summit in himself
Summer laughs: (she) What section do you like best at the Faculty of Medicine? (he) Anatomy!
Israelis and their wandering capital: I will solve it for you. Put this sign [which says Al-Quds] over Tel Aviv and the problem is solved!
Thirty-six political parties enter the general elections in Israel: 36 parties or even 100 parties, what does it matter? -- our population is greater than Shubra's
At a bookstore: we do not have the "Lost Mamluk". Would you like the "Runaway Millionaire" instead?
Much remained sedate; conservative by Hippie standards. Yet visions of progress in which Egyptians took charge of their destiny, rising to unprecedented heights of justice and civilisation, had the same mind-altering effect on a unique generation of renaissance men who grew up in tandem with the July Revolution in the fifties. It unleashed creative energy and a sense of belonging that eliminated the gap between the official and the popular, the government and the people. For once, government platforms expressed the feelings of the majority and catered directly to their hopes, fears and conflicts.
In Nasser's time, at least, Salah Jahine -- poet, cartoonist and media figure -- led a remarkable chorus of dreamers who sang the virtues of equality, independence and identity, laying the foundations for what many see as the greatest moments of Egypt's winding century. Egypt was in the throes of a new birth and, even as he resumed his humorous, critical analysis of the historical developments he was living through, Jahine embodied that renaissance.
By the start of 1956 Jahine had established himself at Rose Al-Youssef, Egypt's most widely respected magazine and, during the fifties and sixties, a veritable treasure-mine of purposive, politically and socially engaged writing and draughtsmanship -- a rare model of innovation and journalistic integrity. His caricatures attracted attention and, following the publication of his first book of vernacular poetry, Kilmet Salam (A Word of Peace), he was hailed as the worthiest successor to Bairam El-Tonsi, the father of vernacular poetry in Egypt.
In the wake of the Suez War, Jahine wrote the patriotic song, Walla Zaman Ya Silahi (It's Been Long, My Gun) for Umm Kulthoum, the inimitable diva, which was adopted as the national anthem throughout Nasser's reign. His caricatures, poems and song lyrics had always targeted the most relevant and immediate topics, addressing the everyday life of the small-time bureaucrat, the fellah, the factory worker, keeping up with the news both locally and internationally, tracing patterns and pinpointing problems.
By the early sixties Jahine wanted a platform with a bigger audience and, in 1962, he asked Mohamed Hassanein Heikal for a job as cartoonist with Al-Ahram.
But Al-Ahram was only one of the countless media through which Jahine made an appearance; these ranged from puppet theatre to the national radio and cinema. Yet it was his Al-Ahram job that he kept until his untimely death at 56 in 1986. For years, he had presided over the cartoons department, and readers were said to buy the paper solely to find out his latest view of the world. His wit was delightful, his drawings articulate, his tone life-affirming. Jahine attributed his achievement to the child within, but the innocence of his approach was never naive or short-sighted. The 1967 defeat in the war with Israel left him weaker, bitterer, more willingly critical, but the spirit of simplicity and verisimilitude lived on. The 1970s saw his best remembered, most bitingly satirical caricatures. Some of his most poignant poetry, too, was written following Nasser's death, though it seldom appeared on the pages of Al-Ahram.
Over the years, nostalgia for the fifties became an overriding factor in Jahine's work. In adjusting to Anwar El-Sadat's open-door policy and the rise of neo-capitalism, Al-Ahram's editorial outlook increasingly departed from the values closest to Jahine's heart. And, although the newspaper continued to treasure his contribution, his presence in Al-Ahram gradually edged away from the centre of gravity. The disillusion that was to kill him set in soon after. As he became a household name, Jahine's progressive dreams of social transformation were irrevocably shattered: his politically engaged flower power was no more.
Jahine's association with Al-Ahram is a rare instance of a mainstream institution incorporating one of the more dissident voices of our times. By exploring the deepest recesses of public consciousness in a national newspaper, irrespective of that paper's obligation to the state, Jahine made social commentary an inseparable part of the daily news. This happy marriage could only have grown out of the sixties. Jahine was lucky to be able to tell the truth in Al-Ahram. And Al-Ahram was at least as lucky to be able to accommodate a voice that spoke truly.
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