– – This book explores the role of journalism and Egypt in affecting and promoting the development of modern Arabic literature from its inception in the mid-19th century until the late 20th century.

– What specifically, this book examines the role of the independent journal in fostering literary developments concentrating on the 1960s in the pivotal role of the avant-garde journal gallery 68.

– A single rider my belong to several literary generations, nor can one speak of a specific 60s Aesthetic

-Avant-garde indicates that a work or writer is advancing away from the dominant norms and tastes.

Chapter 1: literary journalism in Egypt, its emergence and development

-A necessary prerequisite for the emergence of literary journalism and Egypt was Muhammad Ali‘s educational program which came to fruition under ismail’s reign

-ismail supported ezbekiyya theatre in 1868, cairo opera 1869

-The real birth of a Gyptian journalism with both political and literary impact came through the efforts of Yaqub sanu and Abdallah al-nadim who identified with ordinary EGyptian‘s in a way in which the Syrians couldnt. Before the Urabi revolt conditions were right for their papers to Floreis – it ships national consciousness had reached a fever pitch with the eminent threat of European domination

-Egyptian theater was big in the 1870s.

–al-tunisi was banished in 1919 but zajal was A regular feature in the popular press of the 1920s and 30s with several journals having their own poet performing a function similar to today’s editorial columnist

-The two principal general cultural journals in Egypt at the end of the 19th century were alhilal and almuqtatif

– The former was more literary and the second was more scientific.

-hadith isa bin hisham modern maqama

-The golden age of literary journalism was from the mid-1920s to the second world war.

– As a quest for national and political identity matured encouraged by advances such as the 1919 revolution of the 1923 constitution, you knew more subjective fictional writing emerged in the 1920s, designed to reflect intellectuals perceptions of national debt identity.

– 1930-40s islamoc arab focus takes over western (israel gershoni) attributes this cultural shift to setbacks in the parliamentary Egyptian just order which resulted in the loss of political hegemony by the secular pro-Western elite. (Could this be thought of as the failure o bourgeois hegemony as well)

-al hilal had literary heavyhitters in 1923-9 with salama musa as editor: taha hussein, ahmed amin, mahmud abbas al-aqqad, abdal qader al-mazini, muhammed huseein haykal

-diary of a country prosecutor was actually written in 11 different parts as it was serialized which helps to explain its structure.

– 2K journals of the period of the 1920s which played an avant-garde role is a literary scene was the dawn 1925 to 7 for the short story and Apollo 1932 to 4 for poetry.

– Al-fajr significance lay in it introduction of European ideas about creative literature and its role in society shifting the focus from the works political relevance to his artistic form while retaining its social and didactic role

-Apollo had extended encouragement and patronage to promising young poets and greatly stimulated the Romantic movement which had a significant impact on the course of modern Arabic literature.

– Al-majalla al-jadida became home to a kind of surrealist writing and literature formed an integral part of the groups bold Marxist program which led to its closure by military decree in 1944.

– By the 1940s literary journalism had gained a momentum of its own it was no longer reliant on nationalist zeal to act as it’s essential impetus.

Chapter 2: literary journalism and Egypt increasing polarization

-Account of literary journalism in the 1950s and 60s.

– In general literary journalism suffered during the second world war as it has during the first with paper shortages and many journal shrinking.

– The Egyptian writer was a literary journal in the late 1940s which introduced modern European writers and experimentalism it was close in 1948. Louis wad called it probably the finest cultural organ Egypt has ever known. Baja also said it was very important for the 60s generation.

-it also published adunis bayati and malaika

-The 1940s witnessed a flurry of activity and organization among the far left with the birth of several radical cultural groups many of which publish their own journals. Marxist ideology greatly influenced the development of modern education literature.

– jamaat al-fan wa al-hurriya 1939 – ramsis yunan, kamil al-tilmisani, fuad kamil

-al-tatawir published some of the earliest examples of surrealist tendencies in Arabic literature as well as translating forward thinkers and poets like Sigman Freud Paul Ella wired and I thought our Rambo.

-follow up journal al-majalla al-jadida in 1941 call that self a journal for social struggle and renewal which included articles on Marxist thought by awad and Al-sharuni and was close by military degree when a picture of Lenin appeared on the cover

-lots of other good stuff in here about left-wing journalism in the 1940s.

-many of the marxist writers poets and artists from the democratic movement for national liberation which had cooperated with the free officers movement in the July 1952 revolution began to fall out with the new regime. Factionalism am on the far left intensified with the Soviet union is condemnation of the officers movement as an American plot

-their journal was al-ghad many writers published the first story here like idris ghanem and sharqawi 1953, 1959

-The latter half of the 1950s witnessed a search and cultural activity there was a dramatic increase in the number of students in higher education but also increased state intervention.

– Literature was institutionalized in the 1960s with the political and cultural fields in extra bleach and twined the political disillusionment and unrest that dominated the 1960s was inevitably reflected in a cultural domain. Left wing leaders were arrested after 1959Because of the rivalry with qasim in iraq.

• Nationalization of literature was a double edged sword with many financial benefits but very much censorship and control which culminated in the increasing stagnation of cultural activity in the 1970s.
• Leftist intellectuals under mass arrest in 1966: ghitano, abnudi, ghali shukri, sabry hafez
• In the middle of the 60s there was a brief cultural surge but after a decade of state control young experimental writers felt excluded and frustrated.
• An avant-garde responded to this with the new sensibility.
• While nasser
• respected intellectuals he did not trust their political tendencies and while he let them work with in the institutions he left real power in the hands of others and maintained a sort of control.
• The cultural seen deteriorated after 1967 as the reverse outcome of the state monopoly on culture made it self felt, most of the journals sponsored by the Ministry of culture we’re close down in 1971 to 1973
• The remainder of the book focuses on gallery 68.There was not a disagreement about the portrayal of working class realities, it was the static socialist realist approach to this portayal. Page 167