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Midnight in Cairo: The Divas of Egypt's Roaring '20s

2021-03-09 History
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Release : 2021-03-09
Genre : History
Kind : eBook
Book Rating : 142/5 ( reviews)

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Book Synopsis Midnight in Cairo: The Divas of Egypt's Roaring '20s by : Raphael Cormack

Download or read book Midnight in Cairo: The Divas of Egypt's Roaring '20s written by Raphael Cormack. This book was released on 2021-03-09. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A vibrant portrait of the talented and entrepreneurial women who defined an era in Cairo. One of the world’s most multicultural cities, twentieth-century Cairo was a magnet for the ambitious and talented. During the 1920s and ’30s, a vibrant music, theater, film, and cabaret scene flourished, defining what it meant to be a “modern” Egyptian. Women came to dominate the Egyptian entertainment industry—as stars of the stage and screen but also as impresarias, entrepreneurs, owners, and promoters of a new and strikingly modern entertainment industry. Raphael Cormack unveils the rich histories of independent, enterprising women like vaudeville star Rose al-Youssef (who launched one of Cairo’s most important newspapers); nightclub singer Mounira al-Mahdiyya (the first woman to lead an Egyptian theater company) and her great rival, Oum Kalthoum (still venerated for her soulful lyrics); and other fabulous female stars of the interwar period, a time marked by excess and unheard-of freedom of expression. Buffeted by crosswinds of colonialism and nationalism, conservatism and liberalism, “religious” and “secular” values, patriarchy and feminism, this new generation of celebrities offered a new vision for women in Egypt and throughout the Middle East.

Midnight In Cairo

2021-05-06 History
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Release : 2021-05-06
Genre : History
Kind : eBook
Book Rating : 384/5 ( reviews)

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Book Synopsis Midnight In Cairo by : Raphael Cormack

Download or read book Midnight In Cairo written by Raphael Cormack. This book was released on 2021-05-06. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: 'Beguiling and original...' Marina Warner The thrilling story of Cairo's decadent nightlife in the early 20th century, told with women at the centre. 1920s Cairo: a counterculture was on the rise. A passionate group of artists captivated Egyptian society in the city's bars, hash dens and music halls – and the most dazzling and assertive were women. Midnight in Cairo tells the thrilling story of Egypt's interwar nightlife, through the lives of these pioneering women, including dancehall impresario Badia Masabni, innovator of Egyptian cinema Aziza Amir and legendary singer Oum Kalthoum. They exploited the opportunities offered by this new era, while weathering its many prejudices. And they held the keys to this raucous, cosmopolitan city's secrets. Introducing an eccentric cast of characters, Raphael Cormack brings to life a world of revolutionary ideas and provocative art. This is a story of modern Cairo as we have never heard it before. 'A spectacular parade of the extraordinary, bold and brash Egyptian women who shot to fame in the early years of globalised celebrity culture.'-- The Times 'A revelation ... in this tremendous act of historical discovery, Cormack has unearthed the regal figures and buried treasures of Cairo's golden age. He is the Howard Carter of the demi-monde.' -- The Telegraph 'Midnight in Cairo delivers a place, time and people you'll wish you'd personally known. ... Cormack deftly outlines the shifts in political mood and popular tastes that Cairo's entertainment scene both responded to and inspired.' -- TLS 'A captivating journey through [Cairo's] bars, cafes, cabaret clubs and music halls during a magical era when some of its biggest stars were women.' -- The Herald 'Fascinating ... Midnight in Cairo is a fizzing tale of an underexplored period ... [These female performers] changed the terms of Egyptian popular culture and blazed a path for women.' David Gardner, Financial Times

Just One of the Boys

2018-01-04 Performing Arts
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Release : 2018-01-04
Genre : Performing Arts
Kind : eBook
Book Rating : 169/5 ( reviews)

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Book Synopsis Just One of the Boys by : Gillian M Rodger

Download or read book Just One of the Boys written by Gillian M Rodger. This book was released on 2018-01-04. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Female-to-male crossdressing became all the rage in the variety shows of nineteenth century America, and began as the domain of mature actresses who desired to extend their careers. These women engaged in the kinds of raucous comedy acts usually reserved for men. Over time, as younger women entered the specialty, the comedy became less pointed, and came to center on the celebration of male leisure and fashion. Gillian M. Rodger uses the development of male impersonation from 1820 to 1920 to illuminate the history of the variety show. Exploding notions of high- and lowbrow entertainment, Rodger looks at how both performers and forms consistently expanded upward toward respectable ”and richer ”audiences. At the same time, she illuminates a lost theatrical world where women made fun of middle class restrictions even as they bumped up against rules imposed in part by audiences. Onstage, the actresses' changing performance styles reflected gender construction in the working class and shifts in class affiliation by parts of the audiences. Rodger observes how restrictive standards of femininity increasingly bound male impersonators as new gender constructions allowed women greater access to public space while tolerating less independent behavior from them.

Acting Egyptian

2019-12-02 Performing Arts
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Release : 2019-12-02
Genre : Performing Arts
Kind : eBook
Book Rating : 182/5 ( reviews)

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Book Synopsis Acting Egyptian by : Carmen M. K. Gitre

Download or read book Acting Egyptian written by Carmen M. K. Gitre. This book was released on 2019-12-02. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: At the turn of the twentieth century—during the “protectorate” period of British occupation in Egypt—theaters and other performance sites were vital for imagining, mirroring, debating, and shaping competing conceptions of modern Egyptian identity. A central figure in this diverse spectrum was the effendi, an emerging class of urban, male, anti-colonial professionals whose role would ultimately become dominant. Acting Egyptian argues that performance themes, spaces, actors, and audiences allowed pluralism to take center stage while simultaneously consolidating effendi voices. From the world premiere of Verdi’s Aida at Cairo’s Khedivial Opera House in 1869 to the theatrical rhetoric surrounding the revolution of 1919, which gave women an opportunity to link their visibility to the well-being of the nation, Acting Egyptian examines the ways in which elites and effendis, men and women, used newly built performance spaces to debate morality, politics, and the implications of modernity. Through scripts, playbills, ads, and numerous other sources, the book brings to life provocative debates and dissent that fostered a new image of national culture and echoed urban life in the struggle for independence.

The Lady of Zamalek

2021-05-11 Fiction
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Release : 2021-05-11
Genre : Fiction
Kind : eBook
Book Rating : 764/5 ( reviews)

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Book Synopsis The Lady of Zamalek by : Ashraf El-Ashmawi

Download or read book The Lady of Zamalek written by Ashraf El-Ashmawi. This book was released on 2021-05-11. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A thrilling rags-to-riches tale that spans twentieth-century Egyptian history and deftly combines real life and fiction It was in the spring of 1927 that Cairo's attention was captured by the shocking murder of prominent businessman Solomon Cicurel in his Nile-side villa in the upscale Zamalek district. It was a burglary that went wrong and four culprits were soon arrested. Their trial was concluded swiftly, their punishments were decisive, and society breathed a sigh of relief. In Ashraf El-Ashmawi's telling, however, there was a fifth accomplice, Abbas, who escaped back to his home in the countryside to lay low until the murder trial blew over. He had not left empty-handed and had kept some documents from Cicurel's villa, ones that he realized would lead him to a hidden safe. Abbas hatched a plan to return to the capital, find the safe, and make his fortune. The first step was to place his sister Zeinab with Cicurel's widow, Paula. A web of twists and intrigues run through the life of Abbas, in what unfolds as a tale of modern Egypt--taking in the Second World War, the 1952 revolution and the rise of Gamal Abdel-Nasser, the 1967 war, the Sadat and Mubarak eras--from the 1920s through to 1990.

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