At a glance A shorthand guide to recent publications compiled by Mahmoud El-Wardani Magazines

Al-Kutub: Wujhat Nazar (Books: Viewpoint), monthly review of books, Cairo, May 2003. Most articles and reviews in this issue of Wujhat Nazar revolve around the Anglo-American invasion of Iraq, with a portrait of "the emperor from Texas" by Mohamed Hassanein Heikal and one of Saddam Hussein by Youssef El-Qa'id. Iraqi archaeologist Taleb Baghdadi reminisces about his times in the now burned out old Baghdad, while the translation of an Independent article by Robert Fisk discusses aspects of the city's fall. There is even an article by Iraqi musician Nasir Shamma discussing the contribution he has attempted to make, through art, to his country's well being. Oil, the Kurds, psychological warfare and neocolonialism are among the many topics touched on by, among others, Galal Amin, Ibrahim Abdel-Gelil and Dorreya Awni.

Adab wa Naqd (Literature and Criticism), Cairo: Tagammu' Party Publications, May 2003. Again, in its last issue this left-leaning monthly is wholly devoted to the war in Iraq, from the cover (a painting by Iraqi artist Jawad Selim) to the choice of literary texts. The translation of an anti-war statement signed by some 55,000 Americans, including congressmen and intellectuals, a new translation of the late Allen Ginsberg's America, extracts from texts by Che Guevara and Franz Fanon all establish the insurgent mood of the issue, while a poem by Amal Donqol, accompanied by two testimonies, commemorates 20 years since the poet's death.

Sutour (Lines), cultural monthly magazine, Cairo, May 2003 The main folio of this issue of Sutour, edited by Karim Abdel-Salam, revolves around "the occupation of Iraq", with contributions by, among others, Inas Taha, Mohamed El-Kholi and Fouad Fawwaz discussing a range of questions from the Arab world's new geographical orientation to the future of Iraq. Ashraf Abu Zeid provides a thorough reading of war-related cartoons in the British press, while translations of British and American articles illuminate the issue further. Literary texts by the likes of Ibrahim Farghali and Ibrahim Nasralla are also featured.

Al-Adab (The Arts), monthly cultural magazine, Beirut: Dar Al-Adab, March-April 2003. The newly resurrected prestigious Beirut-based magazine produced this issue right after the war started. It opens with articles by Faisal Darraj and Yassin Alhajali on "Washington's assassination of Iraq" and "Arab intellectuals vis-à-vis the Iraqi crisis", respectively. Highlights include a file of 15 American poems written on the occasion of war. Another interesting and expansive folio deals with gender issues, especially in the context of Arab society and culture.

Ruwaq Arabi, occasional publication, Cairo: Cairo Institute for Human Rights Studies, Winter 2003. This issue of the magazine, also published right after the war, opens with a statement of purpose by the editor, Mohamed El-Sayed Said, "Why we oppose the war on Iraq". The magazine publishes a portrait of the Lebanese activist Suha Bishara as well as articles on democratic transformations in Egypt and minorities in the Arab world, by Mohamed No'man Galal and Nader Mustafa, respectively. Three articles relating to Islam and Islamic radicalism probe various aspects of this increasingly prevalent political and cultural force, while Abir Mohamed Saad reports on the conditions of Egyptians working in Gulf countries. A review of the latest book by Tareq El-Bishri, a poem by Hassan Teleb and a short story by Said El-Kafrawi, among other literary texts, serve to round off the issue on a less disturbing note.

Diwan, Arab-German bi-annual poetry review, Berlin: Diwan, April 2003. In its last issue this bilingual cultural magazine, published twice a year in Berlin and edited by the Iraqi poet and German resident Amal Al-Jabbouri, deals in depth with Nobel laureate Günter Grass's recent visit to Yemen, covering his meeting with the Yemeni president in Sana'a, encounters with Arab intellectuals, including poets Mahmoud Darwish and Adonis, as well as politicians and public figures -- with whom he discussed issues like terrorism, globalisation, poverty, development and censorship. The magazine publishes, in addition, the text of Grass's statement against the war and selections of his poetry.

Tiba, occasional periodical, Cairo: New Woman Centre, January 2003. The last issue of this women's theory magazine includes four articles on women and resistance, two of which deal with Palestinian resistance. The first discusses the dual burden of resisting not only Israeli oppression but male supremacy, while the second chronicles the role of woman in the Intifada from 1988 to 2000. The third article deals with the Arab-American woman's struggles in US society, while the last takes stock of the Woman and Memory Forum project, Qalat Al-Rawiya (The Narrator Said). Three reviews of American books illuminate the articles further, while Riyad El-Kholi presents two historical documents, using them as a basis from which to discuss Arab women's struggles during the late 18th and early 19th century.

Click to view caption Anna's Egypt Anna's Egypt: An Artist's Journey, Anna Boghiguian, Cairo and New York: The American University in Cairo Press, 2003. pp135 Anna Boghiguian, one of Egypt's foremost contemporary artists, has traveled the globe and recorded her artistic reaction to each new place in drawings and paintings in the notebooks she carries everywhere. But her roads through India or Cambodia, Canada or France always come back to the land of her birth, Egypt. Her drawings of Egypt reflect her instinctive and emotional responses to the country's many layers of history and myth, and to the people, ancient and modern, grand and everyday, who populate those histories and myths with such entrancing spirit. In this very personal presentation of Egypt, Anna Boghiguian shares both her visual and her verbal thoughts, as she leads readers on a tour of this land of fact and fiction, across space and in and out of time, through her words that paint pictures and her drawings that tell stories. Born in Cairo in 1946, Boghiguian has studied art under Fouad Kamel in Egypt and then obtained her BFA in visual arts and music from Concordia University, Montreal. She has held exhibitions in Egypt, Yemen, France, Greece and Canada.

Books

Aliha Saghira (Little Gods), Sahar El-Mougi, Cairo: Miret for Information and Publication, 2003. pp103 The latest book by Sahar El-Mougi, Aliha Saghira includes 15 short stories that come across as variations on the same, multifaceted theme. States of loss, frustration and insecurity seem to recur like the many sides of a single translucent structure. The language is poetic, its intense lyricism facilitating the flow of emotions to the reader. "The girl let her hair grow long, and rubbed her body with warm olive oil after a long bath," El-Mougi writes. "The pores of her body expanded, letting out the heat of waiting. While she sat before the window at noon she recollected the tall, dark boy leaping, becoming twice his height. The moon had promised her something, and when it came back with a few stars on the palm of its hand a smile rose to her lips."

Al-Mashhad Al-Qasasi (The Fiction Scene), Edwar El-Kharrat, Cairo: Centre for Arab Civilisation, 2003. pp245 The veteran experimentalist, wearing his critic's hat, deals with 11 new texts in this, his 77th book. Badr El-Dib's Awraq Zumuruda Ayoub (The Papers of Zumuruda Ayoub), Mohamed Afifi Matar's Awail Ziyarat Al-Dahsha (The First Visits of Surprise) and Hosni Hassan's Ism Aakhar lil-Dhil (Another Name for Shadow) are among the remarkably heterogeneous raw material from which El-Kharrat forges his latest theories concerning Egyptian narrative -- drawing unexpected connections between writers and texts from a broad variety of temporal, cultural and literary backgrounds. It was with the notion of "the new sensibility" that El-Kharrat gave birth to a new and significant critical discourse, and in this book, though the role of that theory is drastically reduced, El-Kharrat's ideas are informed by the same creative and forward-looking orientation. To him literature is not so much about a good read as about the drive to reinvent the text.

Dawwamat Al-Hanin (Whirlwinds of Nostalgia), Na'im Sabri, Cairo: Al-Hadara Publications, 2003. pp369 Na'im Sabri's sixth novel, this book is set, once again, in Shubra, where most of the author's unpretentious explorations of middle-class life take place. Centred on two generations within one such middle-class family, the novel's cast of characters is increasingly narrowed down until it is reduced to the youngest, Medo, tracing his upward mobility through Egyptian society, his numerous love affairs and concluding with his death. Reminiscent of Naguib Mahfouz's naturalistic phase, the book proceeds slowly, sedately, revelling in detail. The writer, who has produced three collections of poetry and two verse plays, seems to have found his voice increasingly in the novel -- a fact to which the present book bears testimony.

Taraf Gha'ib Yumkin An Yab'ath Fina Al-Amal (An Absent Party That Could Induce Hope In Us), Alaa Khaled, Alexandria: Amkena Books, 2003. pp144 This book does not belong to a specific literary genre, being neither a collection of short stories, prose poems nor a novel. Rather, it comprises a form of completely unaffected writing, texts that seek the fascination of discovery, providing answers to the questions of existence and posing its own questions. Technically faultless, the texts deal with cafés, blind people, hysterics and people who are obsessed with old, old objects. Alaa Khaled, whose previous two books of prose, Khutout Al-Da'f (Weakness Lines) and Al-Musafir (The Traveller), testify to an interest in such genre-less writing, seems to have reached his goal of a compelling text that results solely from the need to explore, through writing, the self in relation to its surroundings. His is a world that eschews and surpasses literary convention, reaching a uniquely unprecedented height.

Al-Asmaa (Names), Shaher Khadra, Tunis: Tombakto Books Series, 2003. pp165 The Syrian poet Shaher Khadra's most striking feature is the diversity of his output: in the same collection he publishes amoudi and taf'ila verse as well as prose, managing to construct a moving poem every time. As Palestinian critic Ezzeddin Al-Manasra points out in his introduction, the poems combine an interest in everyday detail with an obsession with abstraction. The poet's principal concern, as the title indicates, concerns names, the names given to the things and to people, and the act of naming. The 45 poems make a satisfying read.

Emadeddin Al-Isfahani's Al-Fath Al-Qissi fil-Fath Al- Qudsi (The Christian Struggles in Jerusalem), ed. Mohamed Mahmoud Subh, Cairo: General Organisation for Cultural Palaces (Dhakhair Series), 2003. pp695 A combination of history and literature, this Ayyoubid tome, an entertaining read if ever one existed, chronicles part of the Arab struggle against the Crusades. Its author was a high-ranking official during the reign of Nureddin Mahmoud and Saladin, and his insights into the dynamics of decision making prove invaluable in understanding an essential historical episode and the mentality of an age.

Books is a monthly supplement of Al-Ahram Weekly appearing every third Thursday of the month. We welcome contributions and letters on subjects raised in this supplement. Material may be edited for length and clarity; and should be addressed to Mona Anis, Books Editor, Al-Ahram Weekly, Galaa St., Cairo, Arab Republic of Egypt; Fax: +202 578 6089; E-mail <m.anis@ahram.org.eg> For advertising call +202-5780233; Fax +202-3941866.

Books

Dawwamat Al-Hanin (Whirlwinds of Nostalgia), Na'im Sabri, Cairo: Al-Hadara Publications, 2003. pp369 Na'im Sabri's sixth novel, this book is set, once again, in Shubra, where most of the author's unpretentious explorations of middle-class life take place. Centred on two generations within one such middle-class family, the novel's cast of characters is increasingly narrowed down until it is reduced to the youngest, Medo, tracing his upward mobility through Egyptian society, his numerous love affairs and concluding with his death. Reminiscent of Naguib Mahfouz's naturalistic phase, the book proceeds slowly, sedately, revelling in detail. The writer, who has produced three collections of poetry and two verse plays, seems to have found his voice increasingly in the novel -- a fact to which the present book bears testimony.

Emadeddin Al-Isfahani's Al-Fath Al-Qissi fil-Fath Al-Qudsi (The Christian Struggles in Jerusalem), ed. Mohamed Mahmoud Subh, Cairo: General Organisation for Cultural Palaces (Dhakhair Series), 2003. pp695 A combination of history and literature, this Ayyoubid tome, an entertaining read if ever one existed, chronicles part of the Arab struggle against the Crusades. Its author was a high-ranking official during the reign of Nureddin Mahmoud and Saladin, and his insights into the dynamics of decision making prove invaluable in understanding an essential historical episode and the mentality of an age.

Aliha Saghira (Little Gods), Sahar El-Mougi, Cairo: Miret for Information and Publication, 2003. pp103 The latest book by Sahar El-Mougi, Aliha Saghira includes 15 short stories that come across as variations on the same, multifaceted theme. States of loss, frustration and insecurity seem to recur like the many sides of a single translucent structure. The language is poetic, its intense lyricism facilitating the flow of emotions to the reader. "The girl let her hair grow long, and rubbed her body with warm olive oil after a long bath," El-Mougi writes. "The pores of her body expanded, letting out the heat of waiting. While she sat before the window at noon she recollected the tall, dark boy leaping, becoming twice his height. The moon had promised her something, and when it came back with a few stars on the palm of its hand a smile rose to her lips."

Taraf Gha'ib Yumkin An Yab'ath Fina Al-Amal (An Absent Party That Could Induce Hope In Us), Alaa Khaled, Alexandria: Amkena Books, 2003. pp144 This book does not belong to a specific literary genre, being neither a collection of short stories, prose poems nor a novel. Rather, it comprises a form of completely unaffected writing, texts that seek the fascination of discovery, providing answers to the questions of existence and posing its own questions. Technically faultless, the texts deal with cafés, blind people, hysterics and people who are obsessed with old, old objects. Alaa Khaled, whose previous two books of prose, Khutout Al-Da'f (Weakness Lines) and Al-Musafir (The Traveller), testify to an interest in such genre-less writing, seems to have reached his goal of a compelling text that results solely from the need to explore, through writing, the self in relation to its surroundings. His is a world that eschews and surpasses literary convention, reaching a uniquely unprecedented height.

Al-Mashhad Al-Qasasi (The Fiction Scene), Edwar El-Kharrat, Cairo: Centre for Arab Civilisation, 2003. pp245 The veteran experimentalist, wearing his critic's hat, deals with 11 new texts in this, his 77th book. Badr El-Dib's Awraq Zumuruda Ayoub (The Papers of Zumuruda Ayoub), Mohamed Afifi Matar's Awail Ziyarat Al-Dahsha (The First Visits of Surprise) and Hosni Hassan's Ism Aakhar lil-Dhil (Another Name for Shadow) are among the remarkably heterogeneous raw material from which El-Kharrat forges his latest theories concerning Egyptian narrative -- drawing unexpected connections between writers and texts from a broad variety of temporal, cultural and literary backgrounds. It was with the notion of "the new sensibility" that El-Kharrat gave birth to a new and significant critical discourse, and in this book, though the role of that theory is drastically reduced, El-Kharrat's ideas are informed by the same creative and forward-looking orientation. To him literature is not so much about a good read as about the drive to reinvent the text.

Al-Asmaa (Names), Shaher Khadra, Tunis: Tombakto Books Series, 2003. pp165 The Syrian poet Shaher Khadra's most striking feature is the diversity of his output: in the same collection he publishes amoudi and taf'ila verse as well as prose, managing to construct a moving poem every time. As Palestinian critic Ezzeddin Al-Manasra points out in his introduction, the poems combine an interest in everyday detail with an obsession with abstraction. The poet's principal concern, as the title indicates, concerns names, the names given to the things and to people, and the act of naming. The 45 poems make a satisfying read.