Director, Pioneer, and Godfather of Egyptian Cinema: Remembering Youssef Chahine

July 29, 2008 – 7:59 pm

Earlier this week, the Arab film industry lost one of its foremost figures, as the renowned Egyptian director, Youssef Chahine passed away in Cairo at the age of 82, following a brain haemorrhage.

Born on 25 January, 1926 to a Christian family in Alexandria, his father was an attorney of Lebanese origin, while his mother was Greek.

Growing up, the pentalingual Chahine home was as cosmopolitan as the city in which it rested, although as Chahine later joked, as with other Alexandrines, he failed to master any of the languages completely.

After studying engineering at Alexandria University for one year, Chahine convinced his parents to allow him to pursue his interest in acting through studying in Hollywood, where he passed the years 1946 to 1948 at the Pasadena Playhouse on the outskirts of Los Angeles.

On his return to Egypt, he entered the film industry after embarking on apprentice work with the Italian documentary film-maker, Gianni Vernuccio, and cinematographer, Alvisi Orfanelli, the latter of whom introduced Chahine to the major production companies of the late 1940s.

Orfanelli subsequently assisted in Chahine’s early films, Ibn el-Nil (Son of the Nile) in 1951, Nisa Bila Rigal (Women Without Men) in 1953, and Bab El Haded (Cairo Station) in 1958.

Already a resident of the movie hub of the Middle East – Egypt has been a steady source of movies since the 1930s – Chahine commenced his first film, Baba Amine (Father Amine) in 1950.

Nevertheless, it was his second film, Ibn el-Nil that catapulted him to success as the movie’s début at the 1951 Venice Film Festival drew more crowds than anticipated due to a sudden turn of meteorological fortune.

Caught in a flash rainstorm, festival goers thronged into his showing in gowns and bikinis alike, and discovered a cinematic revelation that would seal the fate of Chahine’s reputation in the movie industry.

With a directing career spanning 58 years, Chahine’s work inevitably has challenged as many boundaries as it has garnered awards. Read More »

By Feature Writer | Posted in arts and literature, current affairs, egypt | Comments (0)

The Woman’s Chalice

July 27, 2008 – 8:27 pm

You see a woman holding a chalice, and think, “she looks proud.”

They say that a chalice is the woman’s weapon, or her gift.

The gift she brings to the lost traveler, burning her bare feet on the sands.

The weapon she bears upward with a steady hand, her cloak on the wind like a standard.

And what you do not know

Is that she squeezed herself for you, drop by ruby drop,

Into her chalice.

By Feature Writer | Posted in arts and literature, romance | Comments (0)

Qahwa Sada at the Egyptian National Theatre Festival

July 21, 2008 – 9:00 pm

The annual Egyptian National Theatre Festival has ended on the 16th of this month and out of the 45 plays on show during its 11 days one play in particular attracted the biggest number of critical reviews all of which have been very positive, this play is Qahwa Sada (i.e. black coffee).

In Egypt black coffee is strongly linked to mourning. After a funeral people who come to offer their condolences are given black coffee to drink, and it is to this tradition that the play refers. What the play mourns is everything that many Egyptians lament the disappearance of, from the lack of tightly knit families to the deterioration in the economy and the degeneration of pop culture.

So many positive reviews and so many friends of mine recommended Qahwa Sada that my expectations were very high and I became obsessed with the idea of attending the play. However, when I finally managed to see it (after an hour of standing in the ticket line and arguing with “organizers” who allowed late comers to enter at the front of the line) I was very disappointed by what I saw. Though the idea and execution of the play was, by Egyptian performed arts’ standards, above average, it was still mediocre by international standards. Read More »

By Feature Writer | Posted in arts and literature, egypt | Comments (0)

On the Wings of Swans

July 14, 2008 – 9:23 pm

On the wings of swans I came, my love, On the wings of swans I came.
With my beating pomegranate heart, In my outstretched hand.

But the river’s dry in the vale, my love, With not a drop to drink.
In the desert the starlight stabs the sky, And dead water sighs in the sea.

You wrung the necks of my swans, my love, You picked clean their fair white breasts.
I cannot find my way back, my love, There’s no one to carry me.

Your tables are set for a feast, my love, And your stone halls are bright.
So stretch out your gentle hand, my love, And take this pomegranate heart.

By Feature Writer | Posted in arts and literature | Comments (0)

1967: A Review

May 18, 2008 – 6:07 am

This is a review of 1967 by Tom Segev. Translation: Jessica Cohen. Little Brown Book Group. Paperback Edition: 2008.

Tom Segev is the columnist of Ha’aretz, a left-wing Israeli newspaper, and a historian who chronicles the lives of Israelis in 1967.

Many of books have analyzed the roots of the Six-Day War and its significance to the history of the Middle East. Segev illustrates how the fear of another Holocaust drove Israel to launch wars against Egypt, Syria and Jordan, grabbing land and starting a tradition of excess.

If you believe in the mainstream discourse regarding the Six-Day War and in the image of an infallible Israel, you may not like this book. It is a book full of controversial ideas, and it makes harsh statements about the Jewish state.

Taking references from thousands of interviews, official and unofficial materials, Segev’s book distinguishes itself because of its reliance on materials both from archives and diaries of regular people. For example, the third section of the book was fully based on the diary of Private Yehoshua Bar-Dayan, who leaves his wife and son to join the army to prepare for war. Read More »

By Feature Writer | Posted in arts and literature, palestine | Comments (0)

My Reading Wife

March 23, 2008 – 2:20 pm

Mine is a “reading wife.” She loves to read practically anything and everything that comes by her way. Her reading habits are interesting, since she comes from a society that puts less premium on reading and more on verbal communications and images.

She is a persistent reader despite the fact that our kind of society may even look down upon people who read, because reading is not yet an integral part of our social, cultural, and psychological make up.

While in other societies it is common to see people holding books and newspapers in public places, such a sight is rare in Jordan, or, for that matter, in the different parts of the Arab world where I have also lived in. This is why I look with curiosity upon my “reading wife” simply because the reading culture or the book culture is not there to support her. In spite of that, she would munch through myriads of words, as if their meanings and extrapolations were Turkish delight.

She was socialized in a “readersless” society and had the tenacity to pick up books, opening her mind and indulge in a literature that took her far from her roots, though she continues to value our Arabic and Islamic traditions.

In between getting the house chores done, taking the kids to and from school, cooking, cleaning, and taking them (and, occasionally, me) to doctors, the flow of her reading today remains at a constant pace, a steady momentum that only she can control.

I don’t really know how she manages to find the time, but she closes herself in, finding “reading time” whenever she can. When she reads about something that really matters to her she might discuss it with me, but most modern novels, some that may be wrongly described as pulp, she leaves to herself.

I don’t mind me telling you she is putting all of us to shame, since we rarely read and looking at words on a page is not really in our blood, despite the fact our Holy Koran has instructed us it to read, and fathom knowledge; even if we have to go to China to acquire it, as the saying goes! Read More »

By Feature Writer | Posted in arts and literature, muslim women | Comments (1)

To Obama

March 12, 2008 – 2:55 pm

Hussein what you wearing
that funny looking turban for?
Man you’re in America now!
The land of opportunity
Judeo-Christian unity
respectable community
So don’t you go consorting with
Louis Farrakhan
when you could be endearing yourself
to the great American clan
Your name is Obama
So don’t you go looking like Osama
Wearing some MOOZLMAN pajama
Man you got yourself a Harvard Degree

to cleanse that impure pedigree
And with Oprah at your side
You’re sure to glide
Tell America about your papa
the one in heaven
In one afternoon a campaign boon

A reverent scene
Beside the media Queen
Spreading the American dream
We are all one in the body of Christ
So don’t you go traveling
among the disbelievers
the Allah deceivers
they may not like your version
of the great conversion
and go after your ass
till you do the reversion
Stay safe man
You’re in America now Obama
The religious freedom nation
of personal salvation

Your name is Obama
Barack allah feek

Baruch ha shem Ya Hussein
you’re related to the Queen!!*

* - See Juancole.com for Arabo/Islamic lineage of British royalty

By Feature Writer | Posted in arts and literature, election 08, humor | Comments (2)

The Phone Call from Kayfoun

March 8, 2008 – 6:01 pm

It was three o’clock in the morning when the phone rang. Sirena sat up in her bed when she heard the second trill break the quiet evening air, and an anxious feeling filled her stomach. There was only one place she hoped that call wouldn’t be coming from: Lebanon, the place her father called “back home.”

There was a war over there.

Her father had once stood with her and spun their globe. His finger covered the entire country. He pointed it out with the white crescent at the top of one nail. Sirena had squinted at the small blot, its name printed in a nearby sea. She imagined that the whole country was probably the size of her elementary school and pictured the blue and red hallways packed with tall men and women who looked just like her dad.

Sirena couldn’t remember when the war had begun. Her father said it started a long time ago. Her sister Aisha was ten now, two years older than Sirena. Aisha couldn’t remember when the war started either, but she said she was six when the first phone call came, and she could remember how things were before it happened. Aisha said Baba smiled a lot more and he used to read stories and sing songs before bedtime. Now he just tucked the covers around you and said, “I love you, baby. Sleep well,” before flipping down the light switch and pulling the door almost shut.

“The war,” Aisha had said, and she said it with authority, “changed everything.” In the last four years, there had been five phone calls, each reporting the death of yet another cousin, aunt or uncle that the girls would never meet. Of the calls, Sirena could only remember two. She was afraid this might be the third phone call she would come to remember. Read More »

By Feature Writer | Posted in arts and literature, lebanon | Comments (0)

Exhausted

March 5, 2008 – 9:45 am

From explaining myself to people who believe that being married to a Muslim is similar to being Frankenstein’s bride, or Jack the Ripper’s victim.

How exhausted am I?

Imagine:

Life as a marathon.

A sweaty marathon runner with a cramp. And someone with a terrible nasal voice nagging at her shoulder, lying to her about her shoelaces. Telling her they’ve come untied.

At every mile.

By Feature Writer | Posted in arts and literature, muslim women, society | Comments (0)

Rasha Mahdi: Egyptian Caricaturist

February 10, 2008 – 8:41 am

Rasha Mahdi has been described as the first female Egyptian caricaturist.

In her bio, Ms. Mahdi lists her mother as her source of support in pursuing her goals. She also lists her background in graphic design and advertising. She has done freelance work for a variety of Egyptian publications, so, if you’re in Egypt, she might already be familiar.

Mahdi looks like she is no friend of the George W. Bush administration, though she takes on other subjects just as freely (Osama Bin Laden, Brad Pitt, and Tony Blair among them - personally, I’m a big fan of the Brad Pitt caricature; considering the fact that this man’s perfectly chiseled face has been staring at me from every newsstand). Read More »

By Natalia Antonova | Posted in arts and literature, egypt, humor, muslim women | Comments (2)