14 - 20 March 2002
Issue No.577
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Al-Ahram Weekly Online 14 - 20 March 2002 Issue No.577 |
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At a glance
A shorthand guide to the month compiled by Mahmoud El-WardaniMagazines and Periodicals
Al-Kotob: Wughat Nazar ( Books: Viewpoints), monthly magazine, issue no. 38, March 2002, Cairo: The Egyptian Company for Arab and International Publication
Weghat Nazar, now in its fourth publication year, has established itself as the leading monthly review in the Arab world. This issue boasts the usual array of prestigious analysts and scholars writing on a wide range of topics. While the leading article of this month's issue entitled: "Contemporary Religious Discourse," is written by Ahmed Kamal Aboul-Magd, the newly appointed Arab League Commissioner for Dialogue of Civilisations; Mohamed El-Stouhi interviews Francis Fukoyama author of The End of History with special emphasis on his opinion about the clash of civilisations post-11 September. In fact a major part of this issue deals with the aftermath of the attacks on the World Trade Centre and the Pentagon with the Algerian writer Mohamed El-Melli "Reading 11 September," from a wide range of Western media -- especially French -- documents, and Gamal Amr translating the testimony of the deputy head of the Union Oil of California Corporation, John Mareska, to the US Congress House Committee on International Relations about the importance of Central Asia to US oil strategic interests.
Elsewhere in this issue Mahmoud Abdel-Fadil, chair of the Economics Department at Cairo University, reviews Paul Krugman's The Return of Depression Economics, novelist Abdel-Rahman Mounif reviews the memoirs of Gertrude Bell, and Egyptologist Ahmed Osman reviews Nicholas Reeves' Akhenaton: Egypt's False Prophet.
Al-Hilal (the Crescent), monthly magazine, March 2002, Cairo: Al-Hilal Publishing House
The main theme of this issue of the Cairo monthly Al-Hilal is "Islam and the Human Voice," with Gamil Mattar contributing an article entitled "From Orientalism to Occidentalism and Back," Omar El-Farouk writing on "Islam and the West: Image of the Other of the Other," Abdel-Rahman Shaker on "War against Compromise," Mohamed El-Mahdi on "Where is Man's Voice?" and Mahmoud Ahmed on "The Transition from Revolution to Globalisation in Iran." Elsewhere in the issue, Mustafa Soueif resumes his memoirs, dealing this month with the 1977 Cairo riots, Rushdi Said comments on a recent symposium at the Anba Bishoy Monastery at Wadi Al-Natrun, and Amani Abdel-Hamid discusses developments in cartography.
In the magazine's arts section, Ezzeddin Naguib reviews a number of recent Cairo exhibitions, and Salah Bisar writes on the recent exhibition of works by Mohamed Sabri at the Cairo Opera House Gallery. Mustafa Darwish writes on this year's Hollywood Oscars.
Abdel-Azim Anis, profiled by Lebanese writer Mohamed Dakroub, is Al-Hilal's "personality of the month." Safinaz Qazim writes on the work of Mohamed Farid Abu Hadid, and, still on a historical theme, Wadie Filastin writes on the career of historian Abdel-Rahman El-Rafie, and Ayman Fouad Sayed reviews the latest publication to appear in GEBO's Dhakhai'r (treasures) series, El-Maqrizi's famous work on the city of Cairo, Al-Khitat.
Al-Kitaba Al-Ukhra (Alternative Writing), an occasional publication, issue no. 23/24, December 2001, Cairo: Samizdat
Alternative Writing, a publication of new writing by mostly younger writers that has been edited by poet Hisham Qishta for the last ten years, is concerned to present writing "from the margins", providing a forum for those whose work might otherwise not be published. Printing problems have led to unusual delays in the publication of the two latest issues of the magazine, so much so that this double issue, which hit the newsstands only this month, is dated December 2001.
However, it has been well worth waiting for, since it includes interesting texts by Iman Mirsal, Mahmoud Qurni, Osama El-Dinasouri, Yasser Abdel-Latif, Edwar El-Kharrat, Hamdi Abu Goleil, Muntassir El-Qaffash, Ibrahim Farghali, Abdel-Hakim Haydar, Zahra Yussri, Alaa Khaled and Mona El-Brince, among others, all writing under the banner of experimental writing. Also included in this issue are translations and critical essays, artist Adel El-Siwi writing on "the Image and Power," a historical look at the subject, and Beshir El-Sebaie translating Baudelaire's Spleen de Paris into Arabic for the first time. Abdel-Moneim Ramadan also offers a selection of contemporary Syrian poetry from the work of 21 poets.
Sutoor (Lines), monthly magazine, issue no. 64, March 2002, Cairo: Sutoor Publications
Under the heading of "intellectuals of the age", the most recent issue of the Cairo monthly Sutoor contains provocative articles on this important theme, including Osama Abdel-Fattah on "the half-per-cent Society", Ezzat El-Qamhawi on intellectual corruption, Ayman Bakr on "the Illusion of Culture," Adel El-Nahhas on "The Left Enclosed" and similar pieces by Ahmed Mohamed Saleh, Osama Orabi, El-Sayed Mohamed Awad and Wael Abdel-Fattah. In the same vein, Intisar El-Shatti contributes a survey entitled "Talk but Say Nothing," together with a translation of the late Iranian intellectual Ali Sherati's fine piece on the intellectual and society.
Elsewhere in the magazine, Ahmed Refaat Bahgat looks at the works of Arab film directors who have "flirted" with Israel, while Mustafa El-Naghi writes on the Indian painter Shahla Karim. Poems by Kamal Nashaat and Wasfi Sadek, and a short story by Safaa Abdel-Moneim, are also included. Finally, Bahaa Taher's guest column on his novel Nuqtat Al-Nur, Rushdi Said's column on science in the service of heritage, Abdel-Azim Anis's article on modernising education and Khaled El-Fishawi's report from the recent Porto Alegri World Social Forum, are also worth noting.
Fusoul (Seasons), a literary quarterly, issue no. 58, Winter 2002, Cairo: General Egyptian Book Organization
After a brief interruption, this Cairo journal of literary criticism has now resumed publication under the editorship of Huda Wasfi. In her editorial to the present edition, Wasfi comments on the periodical's historical identity and what she sees as its present role, which is to present a plurality of views and to be strongly committed to disinterested criticism. First published in October 1980, Fusoul was edited first by Ezzeddin Ismail and then by Gaber Asfour.
The present issue includes critical studies by Ahmed Kamal Zaki, Mohamed Abdel-Moteleb, Afaf El-Batayna and Hassan Teleb, the issue's "symposium" section looking at the question of whether literature can be said to have "rules," and eliciting responses from Abdel-Qader El-Qutt, Abdel-Moneim Telema, Abdel-Ghaffar Mekkawi, Salah Fadl, Edwar El-Kharrat, Ibrahim Abdel-Meguid, Mohamed Barrada, Kamal Abu Deeb and Sabry Hafez. In the translation section, Anwar Mughith presents a study of game theory by Zoltan Varga, which inevitably looks at the games of theory, while Naseim Magalli translates an article by I F Stone on the trial of Socrates, and Mona Tolba translates a piece by French critic Richard Jacquemond on marginalised literature in Egypt.
Finally, in the magazine's applied criticism section, Mahmoud El-Dab' contributes a piece on trends in experimental writing, Shaaban Mekkawi writes on marginalisation and punishment, Maha Elewa writes on polyphonism, and Mona Brince reviews Arundhati Roy's novel The God of Small Things.
Books
Samt Al-Rimal (Silence of the Sands), Mohamed Abdel-Salam El-A'mari, Cairo: Riwayat Al-Hilal (Al-Hilal novels), 2002. pp198
In this, his latest novel, Mohamed Abdel-Salam El-A'mari continues to explore themes broached in his earlier writings that have to do with contemporary life in the rich Arab Gulf countries. He presents a world of the enchanting and the exotic, dealing with wealth and questions of behaviour dominated by wealth. Wealth, he says, can bestow a kind of legitimacy on otherwise unconnected activities, such as the purchase of western weapons and the buying up of the libraries and papers of Egyptian and Arab intellectuals. It can also be used to support the activities of Islamist movements throughout the Arab World, movements for which the author does not feel any great sympathy.
Rasail El-Sheikh Ali Youssef wa Safiyya El-Sadat (The Letters of Sheikh Ali Youssef and Safiyya El-Sadat), Ed. Helmi El-Nimnim, Cairo: Mirette, 2002. pp177
In 1904 a social scandal erupted that preoccupied the elite as well as the general public involving the marriage of Sheikh Ali Youssef, owner and editor of Al-Mu'ayyid, the pioneering daily newspaper, to Safiyya El-Sadat, daughter of Sheikh Abdel-Khaleq El-Sadat, one of the ashraf who trace their descent to Prophet Muhammad. The marriage was controversial because it epitomised the conflict between the traditional ideas and customs that the new elite wished to undermine and the new ideas that that elite itself represented.
While Sheikh El-Sadat belonged to a notable family that claimed descent from Ali Ibn Abi Taleb, the Prophet Muhammad's cousin and son-in-law, and therefore enjoyed considerable respect and prestige, Ali Youssef came from a poor peasant family from Upper Egypt. Youssef, however, had managed to climb the social ladder to become editor of an important daily newspaper, and he enjoyed close personal relations with Egypt's ruler at the time, Khedive Abbas Helmi II. After consenting to his daughter's marriage with Ali Youssef, Sheikh El- Sadat started to invent excuses to prevent the wedding, so much so that after four years of delays Ali and Safiyya concluded the marriage behind her father's back. Upon learning of it, Sheikh El-Sadat filed a petition for divorce, claiming that Ali Youssef, by virtue of being a journalist, was not eligible to marry a woman from the Sadat family, and the courts later ruled in El-Sadat's favour. Helmi El-Nimnim's contribution to clarifying what was at stake in the scandal is his publication here of a collection of letters that he obtained from Safiyya El-Sadat's family. This includes 19 letters from Safiyya to Youssef, and 50 from Youssef to Safiyya, written before, during and after the scandal broke.
Al-Iskandariyya Manarat Al-Sharq wal-Gharb (Alexandria, Lighthouse of East and West), Adel Farag, Cairo: Dar Al-Nashr Al-Usqufiyya, 2002. pp.120
This book traces the rise and development of the city of Alexandria since its foundation by Alexander the Great in 331 BC, the author focusing on the particular role played by the Academy of Alexandria in the historical conflicts that plagued the city and region. Farag places particular emphasis on the Library's contribution to the study of philosophy and theology, and on its role in mediating between Ancient Egyptian religious thought and the new Christian theology. He also studies the role of the Jewish community in Alexandria up to the fourth century AD, together with the main schools of philosophy that developed in city. The book's last chapters look at the role of St. Mark in establishing the Church of Alexandria and the theological school that developed there at the end of the fourth century.
Intifadat Al-Aqsa. Durus Al-Am Al-Awwal (The Al-Aqsa Intifada. Lessons from Year One), Ahmed Youssef El-Qora'i, Cairo: Cairo Centre for Human Rights Studies, 2002. pp183
This book is a compilation of articles that the author has published on the pages of Al-Ahram newspaper over the past year, the first in the history of the Al-Aqsa Intifada. Divided into eight sections, the book emphasises the fact that this Intifada has dramatically changed the basics of Israeli military thinking, the Palestinian activists having successfully pioneered new ways of resisting Israeli occupation. Furthermore, the author also argues that attacks carried out at the behest of Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon against Palestinian youths involved in the Intifada will be ineffective, since the Palestinian groups are now better organised and more determined than ever before. The Intifada will continue, the author says, but it also needs to be supported by broad Arab diplomatic and political support, in order to counter the current international influence of the pro-Israeli media.
Ramadan El-Shalashi Ahd Abtal Al-Tarikh Al-Arabi (Ramadan El-Shalashi: Hero of Arab History), Fa'iz El-Shalashi, Cairo: Dar Al-Mustaqbal Al-Arabi, 2001. pp384
During World War I, the Arabs of the Levant and the Arabian peninsula played an important role in support of the British and the French against the Turks, leading to the Arab Revolt against the Ottomans and declaring their independence from the Ottoman Empire. Such Arab actions helped ensure the victory of their Anglo-French allies. However, after the War had ended the secret 1916 Sykes-Picot Agreement between Britain and France was put into effect, dividing the region up under British and French mandates, and the promises of Arab independence given in the Hussein-McMahon correspondence were completely forgotten.
The author of the present book is the grandson of one of the Arab revolutionaries of the period, Ramadan El-Shalashi, who has been ignored by the official histories. Born in 1882 in a village close to the Euphrates, El-Shalashi took part in preparations for the Arab Revolt, as well as in its declaration, joining the Revolt in Mecca and the consequent campaigns. The author has given a comprehensive account of this material, also recounting the struggle that El-Shalashi engaged in against French imperialism. The volume includes a selection of personal photographs and documents belonging to El-Shalashi, as well as selections from his memoirs and maps showing the political geography of the period.
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