Obituary:
Hassan Khalifa:
Fondly remembered
I don't remember the year I met Dr Hassan Khalifa. I know it was some time before the 1956 Suez Crisis. When I was appointed sequestrate of the British Council -- relations with Britain were interrupted in the wake of the crisis and the council was placed under Egyptian administration -- he was librarian there. We got particularly close when the library was reopened; relations with Britain had been resumed, I remember, with a trade representation headed by Sir Colin Crowe. The library was temporarily housed in a large hall attached to the embassy, now the visa department of the British Consulate. By the time the council moved to its present site, Khalifa was a senior staff member. He became responsible for educational relations, including the supervision of GCE exams.
A man of boundless ambition, Hassan eventually left the council and started his own business, the Cairo Trade Centre (CTC). He also became the Egyptian representative of Heineman, and in this capacity supplied English-language schools with textbooks and organised book exhibits in Cairo, Alexandria and other cities. Our interactions were confined to chance meetings at British Embassy receptions until, very recently, I started a translations project with the Supreme Council for Culture, working to bring African literature to readers of Arabic. Heineman is the most active English publisher of African novels, and since most of the translations would be made from English texts, this naturally resulted in frequent meetings with Hassan, who welcomed the project and took immediate steps to procure the Heineman headquarters' support. I last met him at a dinner party given by the British ambassador, Sir Derek and Lady Plumbly, to celebrate the reopening of a newly renovated British Council in Cairo.
We agreed, Hassan and I, that we would meet after the feast, to discuss the way the project would be realised. But as fate would have it, that meeting was never to take place. If it ever sees the light of day, let that project be a tribute to Hassan -- my honoured colleague and friend.
Al-Ahram Weekly Online : 4 - 10 December 2003 (Issue No. 667)
Located at: http://weekly.ahram.org.eg/2003/667/cu2.htm