- ʿAlī ʿAṭṭā (?, Egypt) – Ḥāffah al-Kawthar (‘The edge of al-Kawthar’, 2017). The novel describes the life of news agency employee Ḥussayn, who suffers from depression and enters the al-Kawthar mental hospital three times. His distress is a result of social pressure, especially from his first wife. His isolation in Cairo is further increased by his nostalgia for his rural childhood. The novel describes Ḥussayn’s experiences in the mental institution and the different ways in which the depression affects his life (reference). It also portrays Egyptian society from 1963 until the June 30 revolution in 2013.
- Sumayah Ramaḍān (1951-, Egypt) – Awrāq al-Narjis (2001, English trans. Leaves of Narcissus, 2002). A young Egyptian woman, Kīmī, travels to Dublin, Ireland, to study, but struggling with living in exile, she becomes increasingly depressed and is eventually hospitalized. The novel continues to describe her experiences in the hospital, such as her refusing medication. She still has a clear memory of her childhood and throughout the novel these memories are revisited while the narrator also recounts fairy-tale and folktale tradition. This novel won the Naguib Mahfouz Medal for Literature in 2001.
- ʿInāyāt al-Zayyāt (1936 – 1963, Egypt) – al-Ḥubb wa al-Ṣamṭ (‘Love and silence’, 1967). Set in Egypt of the 1950s, this novel portrays Najlāʾ, an 18-year-old woman who falls into a depression when her brother dies. Having a revolutionary personality, she regains confidence and eventually enrols in the College of Fine Arts and joins the Free Officers Movement of July 1952. The novel is a semi-autobiographical portrayal of the author own emotional duress. It was her only novel before committing suicide in 1963. The novel was made into a movement in 1973. Egyptian author Imān Marsāl (1966-, Egypt) wrote a book about al-Zayyāt’s life Fī Athar ʿInāyāt al-Zayyāt (‘In the footsteps of Enayat al-Zayyat’, 2019) (reference).
Refrences:
In order of appearance
- Shākir ʿAbd al-Ḥamīd. 2017. “‘Ḥāfat al-Kawthar’.. Aḥzān laysat ʿābirah.” www.alfaisalmag.com, August 31, 2017 https://www.alfaisalmag.com/?p=6083 (last accessed 21 August 2021)
- Ursula Lindsay and Marcia Lynx Qualey, hosts. 2022. “Love and Silence: Rediscovering Enayat El Zayat.” Bulaq Podcast, 5 November 2020. https://www.sowt.com/en/podcast/bulaq-bwlaq/love-and-silence-rediscovering-enayat-el-zayat (last accessed 23 March 2024)