Qift
Qift ( ; ''Keft'' or ''Kebto''; Egyptian Gebtu; ''Coptos'' / ''Koptos''; Roman Justinianopolis) is a city in the Qena Governorate of Egypt about north of Luxor, situated a little south of latitude 26° north, on the east bank of the Nile. In a ...
, an administrative division of
Qena Governorate
Qena () is one of the governorates of Egypt. It is in Upper Egypt, the southern part of the country. It covers a stretch of the Nile valley. Its capital is the city of Qena.
Overview
The rate of poverty is more than 60% in this governorate but ...
on 23 June 1940. His father had gotten his
Habilitation
Habilitation is the highest university degree, or the procedure by which it is achieved, in Germany, France, Italy, Poland and some other European and non-English-speaking countries. The candidate fulfills a university's set criteria of excelle ...
degree from
al-Azhar University
The Al-Azhar University ( ; , , ) is a public university in Cairo, Egypt. Associated with Al-Azhar Al-Sharif in Islamic Cairo, it is Egypt's oldest degree-granting university and is known as one of the most prestigious universities for Islamic ...
that same year, and so named him "Amal", meaning "Hope" in Arabic, despite it being a typically female name. Dunqul's father wrote Classical ("Vertical")
Arabic poetry
Arabic poetry ( ''ash-shi‘r al-‘arabīyy'') is one of the earliest forms of Arabic literature. Pre-Islamic Arabic poetry contains the bulk of the oldest poetic material in Arabic, but Old Arabic inscriptions reveal the art of poetry existe ...
, and owned a large library of books in various Arabic literary traditions. He was a very strict parent, preventing his son from playing with other children. He died when Dunqul was ten years old, and at such an early age, Dunqul had to financially support his mother and two younger brothers, an experience which hardened him and shaped his infamously harsh personality.
In 1958, Dunqul enrolled in the Faculty of Arts at
Cairo University
Cairo University () is Egypt's premier public university. Its main campus is in Giza, immediately across the Nile from Cairo. It was founded on 21 December 1908;"Brief history and development of Cairo University." Cairo University Faculty of En ...
. Before the end of his first year, he dropped out to work at the
Qena
Qena ( ' , locally: ) is a city in Upper Egypt, and the capital of the Qena Governorate. Situated on the east bank of the Nile, it was known in antiquity as Kaine (Greek Καινή, meaning "new (city)"; Latinized transliteration: Caene) and ...
Court of Justice, the Customs Departments in Suez and Alexandria and the Afro-Asian People's Solidarity Organization. He was raised in a very religious household, and thus was very devout. He later lost his deep devotion to religion and developed
Marxist
Marxism is a political philosophy and method of socioeconomic analysis. It uses a dialectical and materialist interpretation of historical development, better known as historical materialism, to analyse class relations, social conflic ...
sympathies, reading the works of
Marx
Karl Marx (; 5 May 1818 – 14 March 1883) was a German philosopher, political theorist, economist, journalist, and revolutionary socialist. He is best-known for the 1848 pamphlet '' The Communist Manifesto'' (written with Friedrich Engels) ...
Lenin
Vladimir Ilyich Ulyanov ( 187021 January 1924), better known as Vladimir Lenin, was a Russian revolutionary, politician and political theorist. He was the first head of government of Soviet Russia from 1917 until Death and state funeral of ...
, but never joined a political party due to his suspicion of all political organizations.
Artistic career
Dunqul met his future wife, Egyptian journalist Abla El-Rowainy, after she decided to conduct a series of interviews with him for her newspaper,
Akhbar el-Yom
''Akhbar el-Yom'' (, ) is an Arabic language government weekly newspaper published in Egypt.
History and profile
''Akhbar el-Yom'' was founded by the Amin brothers, Mustafa Amin and Ali Amin, on 6 November 1944. The paper is released weekly on ...
. However, the senior editors objected due to Dunqul's leftist views and his opposition to the then-president
Anwar Sadat
Muhammad Anwar es-Sadat (25 December 1918 – 6 October 1981) was an Egyptian politician and military officer who served as the third president of Egypt, from 15 October 1970 until Assassination of Anwar Sadat, his assassination by fundame ...
.
Dunqul would continue to find persistent difficulty in publishing his writings due to his political views.
El-Rowainy conducted several interviews with Dunqul. During the second interview (conducted at a bar over a bottle of beer, much to El-Rowainy's astonishment), he presented her with a brief "identity card".
Upon moving to
Cairo
Cairo ( ; , ) is the Capital city, capital and largest city of Egypt and the Cairo Governorate, being home to more than 10 million people. It is also part of the List of urban agglomerations in Africa, largest urban agglomeration in Africa, L ...
, Dunqul cultivated friendships with Egypt's new generation of artists, especially with Abdel Rahman el-Abnudi and Yahya Taher Abdullah. Dunqul shared a room with the latter for a month which he would call later "The Month of Hell" due to Abdullah's chaotic personality, which clashed with Dunqul's love of silence. Despite this, the two remained close friends. Upon Dunqul's cancer diagnosis and surgery in 1979, Abdullah visited Dunqul in the hospital, asking El-Rowainy “Why should people like Amal die while the bastards remain alive?” and promptly running out of the room, crying. Abdullah would predecease Dunqul by two years due to a car accident. Dunqul refused to attend his funeral, saying that he wanted to grieve for him in private.
Dunqul had a tenuous friendship with fellow poet Naguib Surur, with whom he would quarrel constantly. On one occasion, an argument between them escalated to blows, and despite that, they drank together in the evening at a highbrow bar. A similar uneasy friendship existed between him and Safinaz Kazem, who accused him of ruining her projects. El-Rowainy claims that Kazem once threw a cup of hot tea at Dunqul in frustration. A less turbulent friendship existed between Dunqul and the Palestinian poet . When Dunqul unexpectedly attended a poetry festival in
Beirut
Beirut ( ; ) is the Capital city, capital and largest city of Lebanon. , Greater Beirut has a population of 2.5 million, just under half of Lebanon's population, which makes it the List of largest cities in the Levant region by populatio ...
in 1981, Dahboor was overjoyed to see him.
Dunqul's caustic personality and sharp tongue became notorious. Fellow poet Badr Tawfiq wrote in his obituary:
El-Rowainy disputes this characterization, claiming that Dunqul was a scrupulously honest man who hated mincing words and fake courtesy.
''Crying in Front of Zarqa al Yamama'' (), Dunqul's first
poetry collection
A poetry collection is often a compilation of several poems by one poet to be published in a single volume or chapbook. A collection can include any number of poems, ranging from a few (e.g. the four long poems in T. S. Eliot's ''Four Quartets' ...
, was published by Suhayl Idris, the Lebanese editor-in-chief of Al Adab. Idris would go on to publish and defend many of Dunqul's most controversial poems, including ''The Stone Cake'' (), which was written in praise of the
1977 Egyptian bread riots
The Egyptian "bread riots" of 1977 (, ''intifāḍhat-ul-khobz'', “The Bread Intifada”) were a spontaneous uprising against the increase in commodities' prices on the 18th and 19th of January after the Egyptian government cut subsidies for b ...
against President Sadat. When asked, Idris would reply: “If the poet was brave enough to write such a poem, would it be too brave for me to publish it?” Due to Dunqul's reputation as a fighter who courted political controversy as well as his frequent usage of themes from Greek mythology and history, he was nicknamed "
Hercules
Hercules (, ) is the Roman equivalent of the Greek divine hero Heracles, son of Jupiter and the mortal Alcmena. In classical mythology, Hercules is famous for his strength and for his numerous far-ranging adventures.
The Romans adapted the Gr ...
" by critic
Hasan Tawfiq
Hasan Tawfiq (, ; 31 August 1943 – 30 June 2014) was an Egyptian poet, literary critic and journalist. He belongs to the third wave of the Arabic and Egyptian literary movement known as "The New Poetry." A major part of Tawfiq's poems c ...
and "
Spartacus
Spartacus (; ) was a Thracians, Thracian gladiator (Thraex) who was one of the Slavery in ancient Rome, escaped slave leaders in the Third Servile War, a major Slave rebellion, slave uprising against the Roman Republic.
Historical accounts o ...
" by the future Egyptian Minister of Culture Gaber Asfour.
El-Rowainy relates that during her and Dunqul's wedding, he absentmindedly called a taxi instead of taking the ornate, flower-covered limousine that traditionally would take the bride and groom to their home. Their marriage was troubled and yet passionate, ever plagued by Dunqul's alcohol habit. The day after the wedding, which the couple would traditionally spend together at home, he disappeared in the morning and returned at 8p.m. after spending his time with friends at a bar, toasting to the groom, much to his newlywed wife's chagrin.
Dunqul was present at the meeting at Ahmed Hijazi's home on August 15, 1981, where Bahgat Osman's harsh criticism of Salah Abdulsaboor caused the latter a fatal heart attack. Osman said: “You sold out, you sold out for a millieme!” an insult upon which Abdulsaboor was so agitated as to trigger a heart attack which killed him the same night.
Illness and death
Dunqul was diagnosed with
lung cancer
Lung cancer, also known as lung carcinoma, is a malignant tumor that begins in the lung. Lung cancer is caused by genetic damage to the DNA of cells in the airways, often caused by cigarette smoking or inhaling damaging chemicals. Damaged ...
in September 1979, only 9 months after his wedding. He refused to quit smoking despite his doctor's remonstrances. He had surgery soon after, but a second tumor emerged in March 1980. In February 1982, Dunqul was admitted to room #8 at the
National Cancer Institute
The National Cancer Institute (NCI) coordinates the United States National Cancer Program and is part of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), which is one of eleven agencies that are part of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. ...
in Cairo where he would spend the last year and a half of his life with his wife. The couple decorated the room with newspaper clippings of Dunqul's poems and, among other things, a get-well-soon card from
Yasser Arafat
Yasser Arafat (4 or 24 August 1929 – 11 November 2004), also popularly known by his Kunya (Arabic), kunya Abu Ammar, was a Palestinian political leader. He was chairman of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) from 1969 to 2004, Presid ...
and a portrait of their recently deceased friend Yahya Taher Abdullah. The room would become a meeting place of Cairo's intelligentsia, hosting more than a 20 visitors a day, and after published the room's address, hundreds of letters arrived daily from all over the
Arab world
The Arab world ( '), formally the Arab homeland ( '), also known as the Arab nation ( '), the Arabsphere, or the Arab states, comprises a large group of countries, mainly located in West Asia and North Africa. While the majority of people in ...
. An editorial by
Yusuf Idris
Yusuf Idris, also spelled Yusof Idris (; May 19, 1927 – August 1, 1991) was an Egyptian writer of plays, short stories, and novels.
Biography
Idris was born in Faqous. He originally trained to be a doctor, studying at Cairo University. He ...
appeared in
Al-Ahram
''Al-Ahram'' (; ), founded on 5 August 1876, is the most widely circulating Egyptian daily newspaper, and the second-oldest after '' Al-Waqa'i' al-Misriyya'' (''The Egyptian Events'', founded 1828). It is majority owned by the Egyptian governm ...
, titled "By God, Amal, do not die!" and an unsuccessful campaign was mounted to have the government cover Dunqul's treatment costs.
Room #8 saw the writing of Dunqul's last 6 poems, which were posthumously published in the collection ''Papers of Room #8'' (). They are, in chronological order:
* ''Against Whom?'' ()
* ''Flowers'' ()
* ''Endgame'' ()
* ''The Horses'' ()
* ''The Bed'' ()
* ''The Southerner'' ()
While Dunqul initially showed promising signs of recovery in response to
radiotherapy
Radiation therapy or radiotherapy (RT, RTx, or XRT) is a treatment using ionizing radiation, generally provided as part of cancer therapy to either kill or control the growth of malignant cells. It is normally delivered by a linear particle ...
, he suffered from sudden
kidney failure
Kidney failure, also known as renal failure or end-stage renal disease (ESRD), is a medical condition in which the kidneys can no longer adequately filter waste products from the blood, functioning at less than 15% of normal levels. Kidney fa ...
and
uremia
Uremia is the condition of having high levels of urea in the blood. Urea is one of the primary components of urine. It can be defined as an excess in the blood of amino acid and protein metabolism end products, such as urea and creatinine, which ...
, and his health started to decline dramatically. He quickly became bedridden and unable to turn in bed. He entered an intermittent
coma
A coma is a deep state of prolonged unconsciousness in which a person cannot be awakened, fails to Nociception, respond normally to Pain, painful stimuli, light, or sound, lacks a normal Circadian rhythm, sleep-wake cycle and does not initiate ...
shortly after. He died on May 21, 1983, at age 42 upon asking for the glucose drip to be stopped. His last spoken words were to Nasser al-Khateeb, the branch manager of Al Riyadh newspaper in Cairo, who asked Dunqul to “Please resist, Amal!” Dunqul replied: “All I can do is resist.”
Legacy
Abla El-Rowainy would go on to write her husband's posthumous biography in 1992, ''The Southerner'' (), named so after his last poem and due to Dunqul's
Sa'idi
A Ṣa‘īdī (, Coptic: ⲣⲉⲙⲣⲏⲥ ''Remris'') is a person from Upper Egypt (, Coptic: ⲙⲁⲣⲏⲥ ''Maris'').
Etymology
The word literally means "from Ṣa‘īd" (i.e. Upper Egypt), and can also refer to a form of music ori ...
background, having been born and raised in
Upper Egypt
Upper Egypt ( ', shortened to , , locally: ) is the southern portion of Egypt and is composed of the Nile River valley south of the delta and the 30th parallel North. It thus consists of the entire Nile River valley from Cairo south to Lake N ...
.
In 1990, Egyptian filmmaker Ateyyat El-Abnoudy, Abdulrahman El-Abnoudy's wife, produced and directed ''Memories of Room #8'', a documentary about Dunqul's life. The documentary included interview footage with Dunqul telling the story of his childhood, as well as interviews with his mother.
Dunqul's popularity and works saw a revival upon the
Egyptian Revolution of 2011
The 2011 Egyptian revolution, also known as the 25 January Revolution (;), began on 25 January 2011 and spread across Egypt. The date was set by various youth groups to coincide with the annual Egyptian "Police holiday" as a statement against ...
alongside other leftist poets and songwriters such as Ahmed Fouad Negm, with excerpts of his poems being shared widely on social media as well as appearing in numerous graffiti. ''Do Not Reconcile'' particularly saw a surge of popularity, being applied to resistance against military rule in addition to its original anti-Israel meaning.
An event was held on May 24, 2013, to commemorate the 30th anniversary of Dunqul's death, organized by Abla El-Rowainy. In attendance was poet Shaban Yusuf.
Poetry
Dunqul's style was influenced by
Greek mythology
Greek mythology is the body of myths originally told by the Ancient Greece, ancient Greeks, and a genre of ancient Greek folklore, today absorbed alongside Roman mythology into the broader designation of classical mythology. These stories conc ...
as well as pre-
Islam
Islam is an Abrahamic religions, Abrahamic monotheistic religion based on the Quran, and the teachings of Muhammad. Adherents of Islam are called Muslims, who are estimated to number Islam by country, 2 billion worldwide and are the world ...
ic and Islamic imagery. He wrote
Arabic poetry
Arabic poetry ( ''ash-shi‘r al-‘arabīyy'') is one of the earliest forms of Arabic literature. Pre-Islamic Arabic poetry contains the bulk of the oldest poetic material in Arabic, but Old Arabic inscriptions reveal the art of poetry existe ...
mostly in
free verse
Free verse is an open form of poetry which does not use a prescribed or regular meter or rhyme and tends to follow the rhythm of natural or irregular speech. Free verse encompasses a large range of poetic form, and the distinction between free ...
().
Dunqul published six
poetry collections
A poetry collection is often a compilation of several Poetry, poems by one poet to be published in a single Volume (bibliography), volume or chapbook. A collection can include any number of poems, ranging from a few (e.g. the four long poems in ...
:
*''Crying in Front of Zarqa al Yamama'' () (1969)
*''Comments on What Has Happened'' () (1971)
*''The Death of the Moon'' () (1974)
*''The Next Testament'' () (1975)
*''New Sayings on the Basus War'' () (1983)
*''Papers of Room #8'' () (1983)
Some of his most famous poems include ''The Last Words of
Spartacus
Spartacus (; ) was a Thracians, Thracian gladiator (Thraex) who was one of the Slavery in ancient Rome, escaped slave leaders in the Third Servile War, a major Slave rebellion, slave uprising against the Roman Republic.
Historical accounts o ...
'' (), which starts:
The poem alludes to the refusal of
Satan
Satan, also known as the Devil, is a devilish entity in Abrahamic religions who seduces humans into sin (or falsehood). In Judaism, Satan is seen as an agent subservient to God, typically regarded as a metaphor for the '' yetzer hara'', or ' ...
to prostrate himself before
Adam
Adam is the name given in Genesis 1–5 to the first human. Adam is the first human-being aware of God, and features as such in various belief systems (including Judaism, Christianity, Gnosticism and Islam).
According to Christianity, Adam ...
in Islamic tradition. Another widely-circulated poem is ''Do Not Reconcile'' (), which starts:
This poem was written in the context of the Israeli-Arab conflict, and contains a refusal to reconcile with Israel, which earned him the moniker "Prince of Refusers" (). The poem spread across the Arab world as a refusal of the Camp David peace treaty with
Israel
Israel, officially the State of Israel, is a country in West Asia. It Borders of Israel, shares borders with Lebanon to the north, Syria to the north-east, Jordan to the east, Egypt to the south-west, and the Mediterranean Sea to the west. Isr ...
, signed by Egyptian President
Sadat
Sadat () is a suffix, which is given to families believed to be descendants of the Islamic prophet, Muhammad. In Iran, after the revolution, it is mandatory to mention "Seyed" or "Sadat" in the names of or whose descent from Muhammad has been men ...
.
A further example of the theme of refusal in Dunqul's poetry comes from ''An Exclusive Interview with the Son of Noah'' (), which is written from the perspective of Noah's fourth son Yam who, in Islamic tradition, refused to board Noah's Ark and so drowned as a disbeliever.
This was considered deeply blasphemous, since it portrayed a traditionally rebellious disbeliever punished by God as a brave, principled man who refused to leave his homeland.
It was confirmed by Dunqul's brother Anas that there exist works that are yet unpublished, including two poetic plays titled ''The Error'' () and ''
al-Hakim bi-Amr Allah
Abu Ali al-Mansur (; 13 August 985 – 13 February 1021), better known by his regnal name al-Hakim bi-Amr Allah (), was the sixth Fatimid caliph and 16th Ismaili imam (996–1021). Al-Hakim is an important figure in a number of Shia Ism ...