- Aḥmad Muḥammad ʿAbduh (1950-, Egypt) – Banāt 6 Ibrīl (‘Girls of April 6’, 2019). This novel takes its title from the several women who joined the movement ‘Ḥarakah Shabāb 6 Ibrīl’ that formed in 2008 out of solidarity with workers’ strikes, and that played an important role in the uprisings of 2011. Focusing on the story of the youth and women, the novel discusses the roots causes of the revolution and shows how it evolved ‘behind the curtains’, such as the crimes that happened in its margins. Throughout the novel, a 300-year-old turtle also shares his point of view in a popular tv-program.
- Aḥmad al-ʿAṭṭār’s (?, Egypt) play Qabla al-Thawrah (‘Before the Revolution’, ?) recalls major incidents caused by state negligence and fundamentalist violence before the revolution that caused many casualties as well as personal stories that portray sexual harassment and unhappy relationships. These events gradually mix with the revolution. The play is performed by two actors standing in a bed of protruding nails telling their dialogue independently and simultaneously while always facing the audience (note). Al-ʿAṭṭār had to adapt the play over the years due to censorship in Egypt (reference).
- Raḍwāʿ Āshūr (1946 – 2014, Egypt) – Athqal min Raḍwā (‘Heavier than Radwa’, 2013). In this memoir, the author and political activist interweaves her fight against brain cancer with the setbacks and victories of Egypt’s 2011 revolution (reference). The memoir describes the treatment of her sickness as she undergoes five surgeries and 25 chemotherapy sessions, but also her steadfastness and patience. Her physical pain is related to the pain resulting from oppression, injustice, persecution, and even torture by a repressive authority (reference) (also in D: Disabilities, Illness, and Disorders: Illnesses: Cancer).
- ʿAlāʾ al-Aswānī (1957-, Egypt) – Jumhuriyyah Kaʾinna (‘So called republic’, 2018). This novel combines the personal troubles and collapse of the marriage of its main character Ashraf Wassif, whose apartment overlooks the Tahrir Square, with the developments of the revolution. Among others, the novel describes the close ties between the military, characterized through the General Aḥmad Alwānī, and the Muslim Brotherhood, which eventually fell apart and led to the June coup and Rabia al Adawiya massacre in 2013 (reference).
- ʿAmrū ʿAzzat (?, Egypt) – Ghurfah 304: Kayf Ikhtabʾatu min Abī al-ʿAzīz 35 ʿĀman (2018, English trans. Room 304: How I Hid From my Dear Father for 35 Years, 2020). This autobiographical novel focusses on the relationship between a father and a son at a time of revolution, that of the 2011 Arab Spring in Egypt (reference). The developments of the revolution are chronicled next to the protagonist’s process of becoming independent from his parents, especially his father, and his participation in the protests. As the nation goes through turmoil, the narrator reflects on the relationship with his father in the different phases of his life in a fashion that is representative for his generation (reference) (also in F: Children and Family Life: Parent and Child: Father and Child).
- Dāliyyā Basiyūnī (?, Egypt) and her theater group Sabīl lil-Fanūn (‘Way of the arts’) produced a play titled Sūlītīr (‘Solitaire’, 2011) which links 9/11 attacks with the 2011 revolution in Egypt as both being important events that changed and shaped the modern Arab identity both in Arab countries as in Western countries (reference) (see also 2001 9/11 Twin Towers Attack).
- Sāmih Bassīyūni’s (?, Egypt) play Rāʾīs Jumhūriyyat Nafsuhu (‘President of his own republic’, 2015) is an adaption of Ruman’s play al-Dukhān (‘The smoke’, 1962) (see in D: Drug Addiction and 1952: Revolution in Egypt). It addresses socio-political issues that confront Egyptian youths in post-2011 Egypt, as did Ruman’s play in post-1952 Egypt. Its hero is Ḥamdī, who is forced by his father, after he has obtained a high school diploma, to help the family financially and not continue into higher education. After his father died, he was forced to take a job as a typist, which he loathed, and which made him feel as if his human existence was reduced to be a machine. He becomes addicted to drugs (reference).
- Maḥmūd Diyāb’s (1932 – 1983, Egypt) play Rijāl la-hum Ruʾūs (‘Men Have Heads’). Originally written in the 1960s after the 1952 revolution, it was preformed again after the 2011 by a group of students at the Department of Drama, Faculty of Arts, ʿAyn Shams University. The director, ʿUmar Tawfīq, notes that the play manages to reflect a situation that is disarmingly like what Egypt witnessed in the post-Nassar era (reference) (also in 1952 Revolution in Egypt: Before and after the revolution).
- ʿAzzāladdīn Shurī Fashīr (1966-, Egypt) – Bāb al-Khurūj (‘Exit door’, 2012). Set in 2020, this novel is narrated from the viewpoint of a father who sends his son letters about the history of their home country Egypt, the events that led to the 2011 uprisings and the nine years after the uprisings. The father writes from a ship in the South China Sea heading for Egypt which secretly carries nuclear bombs for an attack on Israel but is raided by the US before it arrives. ʿAlī, the father, has betrayed Egypt’s planned attack. The novel first appeared in serial form in the newspaper Taḥrīr.
- Nāṣṣir ʿIrāq (1961, Iraq) – al-Balāṭ al-Aswad (‘Black Tiles’, 2017). When Salih was a young man, he told the Egyptian secret service that his gardener was a member of the Muslim Brotherhood, which earned him an educational program and government job. Later he establishes a social-political magazine which is initially affiliated with the ‘strong man’ in office, but eventually switches its affiliation along with whoever is in office. Salih also provides jobs for his family members, one of which a young man whose father he murdered, and he wants to keep an eye on. Nevertheless, Salih falls victim to personal grievances and dies (reference).
- Omar Robert Hamilton (1984-, Egypt) – The City Always Wins (2017). This novel is a reflection on the 2011 revolution in Egypt, which was quickly followed by the tides of counter-revolution, a Muslim Brotherhood government, and the rise of the Sisi regime (reference). The novel centers Khalil, a US-born Palestinian-Egyptian who co-founds the media collective ‘Chaos’, broadcast of the revolutionaries. In the novel, the city of Cairo is a lively character, which, like the hopes of a new era, increasingly falls victim to the revolutions failure (also in C: Cities: Egypt: Cairo).
- Yūsuf Rakhā (1976-, Egypt) – al-Timāsīḥ (2012, English trans. The Crocodiles, 2014). This novel is structured in prose-poem like paragraphs and is narrated by a man looking back at his revolutionary years in Egypt, filled with drugs, passive politics, and intellectual bravado, when he started a secret poetry club, The Crocodiles Groups for Secret Poetry, in 1997. The novel explores the relationship between literature and politics in Egypt from the 1990s until the Arab Spring of 2011 (reference) (also in O: Occupations, Professions and Hobbies: Writing).
Refrences:
In order of appearance
- ʿAmmār al-Maʾamūn. 2021. “‘Qabl al-Thawrah’.. fī intiẓār laḥthat (al-ḥarakah).” www.raseef22.net, 27 July 2021, https://raseef22.net/article/1083425-%D9%82%D8%A8%D9%84-%D8%A7%D9%84%D8%AB%D9%88%D8%B1%D8%A9-%D9%81%D9%8A-%D8%A7%D9%86%D8%AA%D8%B8%D8%A7%D8%B1-%D9%84%D8%AD%D8%B8%D8%A9-%D8%A7%D9%84%D8%AD%D8%B1%D9%83%D8%A9 (last accessed 6 July 2024)
- Mahmoud el- Wardani. 2013. “Book review: Ashour battles cancer, old regimes in newest work.” Ahram online, 18 November 2013 http://english.ahram.org.eg/News/86782.aspx (last accessed 16 February 2019)
- Nayera El Miniawi. 2017. “Heavier Than Radwa: ‘Radwa’, a Human Being, a Mountain, a Nation.” Research on Humanities and Social Sciences 7(2): 16-19, p. 16
- Elias Khoury. 2018. “Taḥiyyah li-dhākirat al-alam al-maṣrī wa lilkātib al-shujāʿAlāʾ al-Aswānī.” Qantara, https://ar.qantara.de/content/rwy-jmhwry-knwa-twthq-thwr-ynyr-2011-lmjhd-fy-msr-thy-ldhkr-llm-lmsry-wllktb-lshj-l-lswny (last accessed 14 April, 2019)
- Bilāl Khabīz. 2021. “Riwāyah ‘Ghurfah Raqm 304’ … Fī an al-Thaqrah Shʾan Wirthat Mutakhaffīn.” www.ultrasawt.com, 18 April 2021, https://www.ultrasawt.com/%D8%B1%D9%88%D8%A7%D9%8A%D8%A9-%D8%BA%D8%B1%D9%81%D8%A9-%D8%B1%D9%82%D9%85-304-%D9%81%D9%8A-%D8%A3%D9%86-%D8%A7%D9%84%D8%AB%D9%88%D8%B1%D8%A9-%D8%B4%D8%A3%D9%86-%D9%88%D8%B1%D8%AB%D8%A9-%D9%85%D8%AA%D8%AE%D9%81%D9%81%D9%8A%D9%86/%D8%A8%D9%84%D8%A7%D9%84-%D8%AE%D8%A8%D9%8A%D8%B2/%D8%A3%D8%AF%D8%A8/%D8%AB%D9%82%D8%A7%D9%81%D8%A9 (last accessed 1 June 2023)
- Wiʾām Mukhtār. 2019. “‘Al-Ghurfah 304’, aw Kayf Ikhtabʾanā Jamīʿan min Ābāʾina.” www.7iber.com, 29 July 2019, https://www.7iber.com/culture/%D8%BA%D8%B1%D9%81%D8%A9-304/ (last accessed 1 June 2023)
- Māhir Ḥasan. 2011. “Sūlītīr’ Masraḥiyy ʿan al-Maraʾah wa al-Thawra.” www.almasryalyoum.com, 24 April 2011, https://www.almasryalyoum.com/news/details/127489 (last accessed 19 November 2021)
- Anaar Abdelkhalik Abdalla. 2014. “A New Perspective on Mikhail Ruman’s ‘Smoke’ in ‘A President of His Own Republic’.” Arab Stages 1(1): p. 3
- Mona Hashish. 2012. “Echoes of the January 25th Revolution. A recent performance of Men Have Heads by Muḥmūd Diyāb.” MEL 15(2): 223-225
- ʿAbd al-Fatah Badawī. 2017. “al-Balāṭ al-Aswad, al-Jānib al-muẓlim li-Ṣaḥāfat al-Sulṭah.” www.almasryalyoum.com, 5 August 2017, https://www.almasryalyoum.com/news/details/1172684 (last accessed 12 July 2024)
- Robin Yassin-Kassab. 2017. “The City Always Wins by Omar Robert Hamilton review – an astonishing debut novel.” www.theguardian.com, 4 August 2017, https://www.theguardian.com/books/2017/aug/04/city-always-wins-omar-robert-hamilton (last accessed 15 February 2024)
- Maha El Dahan. 2015. “Rakha sees Egypt through poet’s eyes in ‘The Crocodiles’.” www.reuters.com, 16 July 2015, https://www.reuters.com/article/us-books-authors-rakha-idUSKCN0PQ19020150716 (last accessed 8 January 2019)