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Mada
3 days ago
- Politics
- Mada
Cairo, undelivered: A conversation with Mai Serhan
I read CAIRO: the undelivered letters the morning after Mai Serhan's book launch. I came home carrying the book with a quiet urgency to meet it on my own terms. Not through someone else's framing, not through a room's impression. Just me and the work. CAIRO: the undelivered letters is a book of epistolary poems: each one a fictional letter written to the city, tracing what remains unsaid, unread or unheard. So is its author, both letter and city, both voice and witness. Mai is someone I've come to know recently, as a writer and a confidante. Her voice carries a steadiness that feels earned. She doesn't seek approval. She moves through the page with clarity, each line a product of something lived, not just observed. That kind of authorship demands a space that listens. So I gave her that. I woke up the next morning and read the book straight through. Not out of duty, but because something in me needed to. The book had already drawn me in with its physical form. The airmail aesthetic, the modest production, the sense that you weren't holding a product but something closer to a secret. Reading it felt like unlocking a drawer: hers, or at times, mine. Mai's writing doesn't seek to provoke. It seeks to reveal. She carries resonance that cuts through time and place. As a Palestinian-Egyptian woman, a mother, a witness, she writes Cairo from within: without apology, without compromise. It isn't aggression that defines her voice, but the refusal to make what's true more bearable. This isn't a book that asks to be liked. It doesn't ask to be read, even. It asks you to look inward. To notice what stirs, and why. In that way, it reminds you of what art is for. Not to decorate, but to disrupt. Not to charm, but to charge. Cairo doesn't always listen. But Serhan writes anyway, each letter a quiet defiance, meant for anyone still willing to feel. Beneath that defiance is a deeper question: What do we do with the things we never get to say? That's the question that stayed with me. I wanted to understand how someone keeps writing into silence. How do you sustain a voice when the city around you is unwilling to respond? It's that courage to speak without knowing who might be listening. That's what made me want to ask her more. *** Adam Makary: Why letters? Why 'undelivered'? What drew you to this form — a dispatch that knows it may never arrive? Mai Serhan: A letter as a literary device holds enormous dramatic potential. It bridges and emphasizes distance, which leads to conflict. It's private and intimate, often risking exposure. It seldom brings closure and can only provide fragments. A letter-writer may speak with conviction, but because they can only offer their own version of truth, that very limitation became an invitation for me to explore multiple perspectives. The inspiration came from Bareed el-Gomaa, a popular advice column that ran in Al-Ahram for over 30 years. People wrote in with their problems, and the editor responded. When I finally read the compiled letters, I had an immediate aversion to his advice. It felt paternal, moralizing, rooted in state-approved ideas of what a 'good' person should be. It didn't speak to me. So I thought, why not dispense with the advice altogether? That shift gave me creative license to invent the letters. Ones that hadn't been published, and others that were too raw, too uncomfortable, too much. AM: Who, or what, is the Editor in your mind? Is he a real figure, an imagined authority, or something more metaphorical? MS: The editor stands for the system at large. He's a kind of Zeus figure on the mountain. A removed and impotent god-like voice. He's supposed to stand for truth, hope and justice, but he doesn't deliver. AM: The book moves between the hyperlocal and the mythic. How do you hold Cairo as both city and symbol? MS: My interest in Cairo was two-fold: Cairo as material reality and Cairo as literary imaginary. I wanted to map the city's underbelly and position it alongside its grand history and authoritarian present. You can do that with Cairo. Its timelessness allows you to collapse time altogether. I saw Cairo as Al-Qahira, the vanquisher. Pride and pressure. Mother and monster. Capital of the motherland. A city of mythical dimension. How can it possibly mother more than a hundred million people without depleting, without aborting the task? That paradox charged the language forward. I wanted to match that emotional intensity with an equally heightened imaginary. What happens when you're contained too long and suddenly released? You explode. That was the space I wrote from. Awe and terror. AM: These poems feel channeled, almost trance-like. What was your process like? Were they written quickly, compulsively, or built slowly? MS: I do believe creative thinking is a kind of channeling. It's a generative state that demands your full attention. You enter it with guideposts, and you yield to what the space offers in return. You summon the paradox and start connecting disparate ideas. You listen for that other voice — the voice of your character. I write compulsively, but not always quickly. Some poems arrive like a baby ready to pop, whether you're ready or not. ' Red Dress ' was one of those. I was emotionally charged and wrote it in 20 minutes. When that happens, the poem finds me, I don't find it. AM: There's an ache in the voice, exhaustion, but not silence. What kind of response were you hoping for? Did you expect the letters to be read, or was the act of writing itself a form of survival? MS: Writing is survival. A personal urge to find meaning in chaos, reconcile and connect. Being read is a blessing, of course. It means others connect to you through the writing. But it's also surreal. You work alone for years, then suddenly you're in conversation with a stranger about your inner workings. It's jarring and beautiful at once. AM: The book doesn't flinch. It names violence without spectacle. How did you avoid turning trauma into performance? MS: George Saunders gave some of the best advice. He said to move as quietly as possible toward what you feel is heat. The quieter the approach, the more space the reader has to feel. I try to name things without describing them in detail. That invites the reader's imagination to do the work. You suggest, tease, woo, and leave the door ajar. Whoever's meant to enter will. AM: One letter ends with 'the petals torn for a false spring.' Can you speak about revolution as a metaphor in your work? MS: Yes, metaphorically the undelivered letters are, in some ways, an act of protest. They rebel against their original inspiration, Bareed al-Gomaa. These are the letters that don't get selected for publication, that don't make it to print, which, I suppose, ultimately raises questions of censorship. The way I see it, there is the official narrative, embodied in the person of the editor in a state-run newspaper. He gets to decide who gets to speak and who doesn't. What content is permissible, and what isn't. What kind of advice ensures law and order. Then there's the alternative narrative of the letters, which speak up, or scream, despite being coerced into silence. I wouldn't go so far as to call it revolutionary, but there is defiance there, and a refusal to disappear. AM: When does a poem fail? And what does a failed poem still leave behind? MS: A poem fails when it doesn't startle me with recognition. We need to find each other. That moment needs to feel like discovery. Even if a poem fails, it leaves behind the attempt — the possibility of connection, the attempt at resolution. AM: There's a tenderness in how the characters appear: maids, scribes, ghosts. Who are y ou responsible for as a writer? Who are you carrying? MS: I'm responsible for every character in this collection. I carried them all and delivered them to you. I wouldn't have bothered if I didn't care about each of them. AM: Do you consider yourself a poet? MS: I love poetry. I love writing it. I use its techniques across all kinds of writing. But no, I don't call myself a poet. I get awkward when others do. Maybe it's because the perfect poem still feels out of reach. There's one by Dorothea Grossman I come back to: I have to tell you, there are times when the sun strikes me like a gong, even your ears.
Egypt Today
07-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Egypt Today
Randa Shaath Launches "Al-Qāhirah 90" Exhibition Within the Proceedings of Cairo Photo Week
For the first time, Palestinian-Egyptian photographer Randa Shaath launches an independent exhibition within the proceedings of the fourth Cairo Photo Week (CPW) under the slogan "Finding the View", organized by Photopia. It is held under the auspices of the Ministry of Tourism and Antiquities and Tourism Promotion Authority, Ministry of Cultural between (8-18) May. "Al-Qāhirah 90" exhibition is to be held in Beit Babelouk at Sheikh Reyhan street at Downtown and showcases 20 photographs documenting different aspects of life in Cairo during the nineties in order to highlight defining moments in the capital, Cairo, before the great urban expansion since the beginning of the millennium. Shaath worked as a photographer for Agence France-Presse in Egypt and Gaza during the nineties, as well as Al-Ahram newspaper. Additionally, she was the first to hold the position of photo editor-in-chief at Al-Shorouk newspaper. Shaath noted that selecting "Al-Qāhirah 90" as the key theme of her exhibition is linked to her connection to the nineties which highlights the peak of her career in journalism. At that time, she witnessed multiple changes in the Egyptian capital and captured them through her lens, like the excavation of the subway and the construction of the second phase of October Bridge. Her work documents life in places no longer exist, such as the area located behind the ancient El-Oyoun stream wall -including "Al Jaiarah", sugar, lemon, and gypsy monsters- and the Maspero area which has changed now. Shaath added, "The photos I selected for the exhibition don't highlight nostalgia for the nineties, for each era has its merits and demerits. As for Cairo Photo Week, I wanted to highlight different themes about Cairo and document the place where I live, particularly during that period. People are the same. Changes occur in places, clothing, professions, and everyday life details. This is what I was keen to capture, document and display in the exhibition". Photopia's founder and executive director, Marwa Abu Leila, stated, "The participation of artist Randa Shaath in 'Al-Qāhirah 90' exhibition is a significant addition to Cairo Photo Week. Shaath has previously participated in symposiums and workshops. Her exhibition will grant audiences the opportunity to get to know her photographic vision that combines artistic and human documentation". Shaath is a Palestinian-Egyptian photographer. She holds a BA in Middle Eastern Studies from the AUC and a MA in Journalism and Mass Communication from the University of Minnesota in the USA. She took part in multiple international exhibitions and institutions and published four books, such as "My Homeland is but a Stone's Throw Away" (1989), which presents daily life in the Canada Palestinian refugee camp in Rafah. She also published "Egypt, the Mother of the World" (1990), which explores the history and culture of Cairo over 1300 years, and "Under the Same Sky" (2003), which documents scenes from life in Cairo. In 2020, she published her autobiography; "Sand Mountain", through which she tackled her personal and professional journey and experiences in photography and identity. It is noteworthy that the fourth Cairo Photo Week includes over 20 individual and collective exhibitions for professional local and international photographers. They also include international institutions, such as World Press Photo, Vogue, National Geographic, and Getty Images, in 14 locations in Downtown. Furthermore, Cairo Photo Week is to host over 100 discussion sessions, workshops, and live demos, with the participation of international experts and artists, in collaboration with multiple embassies, such as the Netherlands, Italy, Spain, France, Switzerland, and Denmark, along with the British Council and the European Union.
CairoScene
24-03-2025
- Entertainment
- CairoScene
Ma-Beyn Live at Women in Music Cairo
The Palestinian-Egyptian singer delivered stripped-down performances of two of her latest tracks, 'Matafi' and 'Ya Ghali'. Mar 24, 2025 Earlier last month, at the first 'Women in Music' event in Cairo, Palestinian-Egyptian singer and rapper Ma-Beyn treated the crowd to a stunning stripped-down performance of two of her latest tracks, 'Matafi' and 'Ya Ghali'. Co-hosted by SceneNoise, Little Pink Book and Takwene at Yellow Tape Records in Maadi, the event brought together some of Egypt's top female artists and industry professionals in the first-of-its-kind intimate gathering to connect, inspire and celebrate the women shaping the region's music industry today. Watch the full performance below:
Arab News
06-03-2025
- Entertainment
- Arab News
REVIEW: Arab Australian debut cultivates hope, solidarity in rural New South Wales
JEDDAH: Escaping personal strife, a Muslim single mother carves a space for herself in the heart of rural Australia in 'Translations,' an engrossing debut novel by Australia-born Palestinian-Egyptian writer Jumaana Abdu. Set in New South Wales in the period just after the COVID-19 era with the threat of bushfires looming, the novel explores one woman's efforts to cultivate not only the land but also a sense of belonging and identity on foreign soil. In this story of self-discovery and resilience, Abdu intricately weaves in the broader theme of solidarity between First Nations of Australia and Palestinians — two nations grappling with colonization, dispossession and cultural erasure. The novel's title could be a reference to not just the transformation of the land through re-vegetation and restoration, but also the translations that characters undertake to bridge linguistic, cultural and emotional gaps between them — translation in this sense is portrayed as the language of solidarity and resistance. Hidden within the trope of new beginnings in a small town, Abdu paints a powerful picture of mutual recognition and respect, of shared struggles, and the healing potential of intercultural bonds. This is unveiled through Aliyah's interactions with the community into which she slowly, and sometimes reluctantly, begins to integrate, including her conversations with Shep, the reserved Palestinian man from Gaza who she hires as a farmhand, and Billie, the wise and nurturing Kamilaroi midwife. Love and faith are also focal elements in the story. Love in its many forms — romantic, familial, and communal — acts as a balm to past wounds for the Arab and Aboriginal characters, while faith, both in the divine and in human resilience, guides Aliyah, and her childhood friend Hana, through despair toward hope. 'Translations' is a profound exploration of not just the complex interplay between identity and trauma, but also a look at how love can bridge divides, and how shared histories of resistance can unite different peoples in their quest for peace and understanding. In one pivotal moment in the story that carries a deep message, Shep discusses displacement and the 'chain of loss and expulsion' with Billie's husband Jack, an Aboriginal character, who poignantly says: 'You want to wish for something, wish for the return of the land's dignity.'
