An Egyptian Dystopia: On Ahmed Khaled Towfik’s Novel Utopia

Marek M. DZIEKAN

Katedra Bliskiego Wschodu i Północnej Afryki, Wydział Studiów Międzynarodowych i Politologicznych, Uniwersytet Łódzki, ul. Narutowicza 59a, 90-131 Łódź, Poland , Poland

Abstract

The article focuses on a critical analysis and interpretation of the novel Utopia (2008) by the Egyptian writer Ahmed Khaled Towfik. The analysis in question is preceded by a short introduction which outlines the history of utopian, or rather quasi-utopian, concepts in the Arab and Muslim cultures.

Ahmed Khaled Towfik’s Utopia includes a vision of the Egyptian society of year 2023, which is depicted as marked by a deep social stratification, and divided into the sector of well-off Egyptians who are inhabitants of the city Utopia and the impoverished other social sectors living in the slums of the Cairo district Shubra. The Utopia must be then considered in terms of a social and political dystopia rather than in terms of a utopia.

Translated by Dorota Chabrajska

Keywords:

utopia, dystopia, Egypt, Arabs, society