Ahmed al-Aidy

“For decades, Arabic fiction was associated with the name of one man: Naguib Mahfouz, winner of the 1988 Nobel Prize for literature,” observes Hamza Hendawi in an Associated Press wire story. Now, “Nearly four years after his death, his native Egypt is experiencing an unprecedented fiction explosion from a new generation.”

However, Hendawi reports that the new generation …

… has grown bored with tackling big political issues. Instead, they explore the deeply personal, day-to-day life and hidden ills of society, writing candidly on taboo topics.

And they have turned to a more accessible language, peppered with Arabic pop culture and often infused with the writing styles of the Internet, building an audience among Egypt’s younger middle class. The fiction renaissance has fueled — and been fueled by — a spread of “Borders”-style bookstores, complete with cafes and reading areas, and of new prestigious Arab literary prizes.

… While many in the new wave of literature are not overtly political, their focus on personal alienation brings a more subtle call for change in a country that has been ruled by authoritarian governments for decades and where nearly half of the population of 80 million live in poverty or close to it.

One of the “most prominent” of the new authors, Hamdi Abu Golayyel, says, “It is amazing that this kind of fiction has gained popularity when you consider the spread and influence of religious conservatism.”

For example, Hendawi says the new generation is typified by Ahmed al-Aidy‘s Being Abbas el Abd, which is “told in a fragmented form intertwined with pop culture references, often in a sort of ’emoticon’ Arabic used in writing mobile phone text messages. … it tells the story of a video store clerk whose job brings him into daily contact with Western culture. Much of his daily life revolves around his mobile phone and the SMS messages he sends. Poor and socially immobile, the narrator cries ‘glory be to my favorite bar of soap’ — a reference to his habit of masturbating to deal with unfulfilled sexual desires.”

“It is amazing that this kind of fiction has gained popularity when you consider the spread and influence of religious conservatism,” says another of the new authors, Hamdi Abu Golayyel.