Urban Space in Contemporary Egyptian Literature: Portraits of Cairo PDF
Preview Urban Space in Contemporary Egyptian Literature: Portraits of Cairo
Urban Space in Contemporary Egyptian Literature Literatures and Cultures of the Islamic World Edited by Hamid Dabashi Hamid Dabashi is Hagop Kevorkian Professor of Iranian Studies and Comparative Literature at Columbia University. Hamid chaired the Department of Middle East and Asian Languages and Cultures from 2000 to 2005 and was a founding member of the Institute for Comparative Literature and Society. His most recent books include Islamic Liberation Theology: Resisting the Empire; Makhmalbaf at Large: The Making of a Rebel Filmmaker; Iran: A People Interrupted; and an edited volume, Dreams of a Nation: On Palestinian Cinema. Published by Palgrave Macmillan: New Literature and Philosophy of the Middle East: The Chaotic Imagination Jason Bahbak Mohaghegh Literature, Gender, and Nation- Building in Nineteenth- Century Egypt: The Life and Works of `A’isha Taymur Mervat F. Hatem Islam in the Eastern African Novel Emad Mirmotahari Urban Space in Contemporary Egyptian Literature: Portraits of Cairo Mara Naaman Poetics and Politics of the Shahnameh, Iran’s National Epic Mahmoud Omidsalar (forthcoming) Urban Space in Contemporary Egyptian Literature Portraits of Cairo Mara Naaman urban space in contemporary egyptian literature Copyright © Mara Naaman, 2011. Softcover reprint of the hardcover 1st edition 2011 978-0-230-10865-3 All rights reserved. Map of Greater Cairo reprinted from Sabry Hafez’s article, “The New Egyptian Novel: Urban Transformation and Narrative Form,” courtesy of the New Left Review. Isma‘il’s Cairo (1869– 1870) (after Abu- Lughod) reprinted from André Raymond’s Le Caire, courtesy of Études et Cartographie (Lille), Editions Fayard (Paris), and Harvard University Press (Cambridge). Map of downtown Cairo (the east bank) originally published in Samir W. Raafat’s Cairo, the Glory Years and reproduced by permission from Harpocrates Publishing, Alexandria, Egypt. Photograph of Tal‘at Harb Square (1986) reprinted by permission from Zbigniew Kosc. First published in 2011 by PALGRAVE MACMILLAN® in the United States— a division of St. Martin’s Press LLC, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, NY 10010. Where this book is distributed in the United Kingdom, Europe, and the rest of the world, this is by Palgrave Macmillan, a division of Macmillan Publishers Limited, registered in England, company number 785998, of Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire RG21 6XS. Palgrave Macmillan is the global academic imprint of the above companies and has companies and representatives throughout the world. Palgrave® and Macmillan® are registered trademarks in the United States, the United Kingdom, Europe, and other countries. ISBN 978-1-349-29143-4 ISBN 978-0-230-11971-0 (eBook) DOI 10.1057/9780230119710 Library of Congress Cataloging- in- Publication Data. Naaman, Mara. Urban space in contemporary Egyptian literature : portraits of Cairo / Mara Naaman. p. cm. — (Literatures and cultures of the Islamic world) 1. Egyptian literature—History and criticism. 2. Public spaces in literature. 3. Cities and towns in literature. 4. National characteristics, Egyptian, in literature. I. Title. PJ1488.N33 2011 892.7'093586216—dc22 2011002892 A catalog record of the book is available from the British Library. Design by Scribe Inc. First edition: July 2011 For my mother Mary Jacqueline Namen It may turn out, then, that going back can be a way to go forward: that remembering the modernisms of the nineteenth century can give us the vision and courage to create modernisms of the twenty-f irst. This act of remembering can help us bring modernism back to its roots, so that it can nourish and renew itself, to confront the adventures and dangers that lie ahead. To appropriate the modernities of yesterday can be at once a critique of the modernities of today and an act of faith in the modernities— and in the modern men and women—o f tomorrow and the day after tomorrow. — Marshall Berman, All That Is Solid Melts Into Air: The Experience of Modernity Contents List of Figures ix Map of Greater Cairo x Note on Transliteration xi Acknowledgments xiii Note from the Editor xvii Preface xix Introduction: The Urban as Theoretical Frame 1 1 Specter of Paris: The Staging of Cairo’s Modern City Center 11 2 Reconstructing a National Past: Radwa ‘Ashur’s Revisionist History of the Downtown 37 3 The Indigenous Modernism of Khayri Shalabi: Popular Intellectuals and the Neighborhood Ghurza 71 4 The Proletarian Revolution That Never Was: Idris ‘Ali’s Nubian Perspective 105 5 The Nation Recast through a National Bestseller: Alaa al- Aswany’s Ode to Downtown Cairo 139 Conclusion: Wust al- Balad as Neo-Bohemia: Writing in Defense of a Vanishing Public Sphere 169 Afterword 177 Notes 179 Bibliography 205 Index 215 Figures 1.1 Isma‘il’s Cairo (1869– 70) 22 1.2 The Shepheard’s Hotel 23 1.3 Ramsis Railway Station 24 1.4 Opera Square 26 2.1 Fire at the Rivoli Cinema, Fu’ad Street, January 1952 38 2.2 The triangles of Sulayman Pasha Square, 1949 48 2.3 Mustafa Kamil Square 49 2.4 Map of downtown Cairo 52 2.5 Café Americain pictured at the intersection of Fu’ad and ‘Imad al- Din Streets 54 5.1 Tal‘at Harb Square, 1986 149 5.2 Modernist plans for the area of Tahrir along the Nile Corniche, 1962 150 5.3 Tahrir Square, also known as “Liberation Square,” 2006 150 5.4 The Mugamma‘ Building in Tahrir Square, 2006 151 Map of Greater Cairo
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