Alexandrian Cosmopolitanism: An Archive Contributor(s): Halim, Hala (Author) |
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ISBN: 0823251764 ISBN-13: 9780823251766 Publisher: Modern Language Initiative OUR PRICE: $73.15 Product Type: Hardcover - Other Formats Published: September 2013 |
Additional Information |
BISAC Categories: - Social Science | Archaeology - Literary Criticism | Middle Eastern - History | Middle East - General |
Dewey: 809.933 |
LCCN: 2013009212 |
Physical Information: 1.6" H x 6" W x 8.9" (1.85 lbs) 448 pages |
Themes: - Cultural Region - Middle East |
Descriptions, Reviews, Etc. |
Publisher Description: bHonorable Mention for the 2014 Harry Levin Prizer Interrogating how Alexandria became enshrined as the exemplary cosmopolitan space in the Middle East, this book mounts a radical critique of Eurocentric conceptions of cosmopolitanism. The dominant account of Alexandrian cosmopolitanism elevates things European in the city's culture and simultaneously places things Egyptian under the sign of decline. The book goes beyond this civilization/barbarism binary to trace other modes of intercultural solidarity. Halim presents a comparative study of literary representations, addressing poetry, fiction, guidebooks, and operettas, among other genres. She reappraises three writers--C. P. Cavafy, E. M. Forster, and Lawrence Durrell--whom she maintains have been cast as the canon of Alexandria. Attending to issues of genre, gender, ethnicity, and class, she refutes the view that these writers' representations are largely congruent and uncovers a variety of positions ranging from Orientalist to anti-colonial. The book then turns to Bernard de Zogheb, a virtually unpublished writer, and elicits his Camp parodies of elite Levantine mores in operettas one of which centers on Cavafy. Drawing on Arabic critical and historical texts, as well as contemporary writers' and filmmakers' engagement with the canonical triumvirate, Halim orchestrates an Egyptian dialogue with the European representations. |
Contributor Bio(s): Halim, Hala: - Hala Halim is Assistant Professor of Middle Eastern Studies and Comparative Literature at New York University. |