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A Bar on Adly Street: An Egyptian Memoir
It's 1971. Egypt is still reeling from the sudden death of its “benevolent” tyrant Nasser and teeters on the precipice of Sadat’s era of unrelenting Islamization. Ghabrial is an engineering graduate student and a TA, moonlighting in an office that operates more as a Marxist political and cultural salon, conveniently located between a famous cabaret and the Cairo Opera House. A frustrated dreamer of bygone eras when poetry and freedoms were sacred, he sees the alarming changes happening in front of his eyes altering his reality for good.
Running parallel to the story of a nation in metamorphosis and turmoil is Ghabrial’s troubled love story with Aida, his life-thirsty19 year old student. Their relationship is complicated by many factors controlling that junction of history. Aida “Who can remember us 50 years from now, and who can tell what happened to us?”
The real heroine of the narrative is Cairo of the early seventies with its night lights and escapes, alleys and bars, especially one underground bar, where the misfits of the city find refuge and salvation against a tremulous backdrop of a national unrest above ground.
A Bar on Adly Street is an unflinching first-hand account of an in-between generation in 1970s Egypt whose fathers cherished secular democracy and religious tolerance, while they faced poverty, tyranny, fanaticism and corruption. It carefully layers strata of a life that examines the circumstances that lead to a nation turning against its defenseless minorities. Remnants of Greeks, and Italians, then Copts and even Muslims not subscribing to the MB’s Islamist agenda, all reeling under the new norms and the changing world around them, leaving them with no choice but to run away from home in droves, creating the schism in which the present narrative is at its centre.
Running parallel to the story of a nation in metamorphosis and turmoil is Ghabrial’s troubled love story with Aida, his life-thirsty19 year old student. Their relationship is complicated by many factors controlling that junction of history. Aida “Who can remember us 50 years from now, and who can tell what happened to us?”
The real heroine of the narrative is Cairo of the early seventies with its night lights and escapes, alleys and bars, especially one underground bar, where the misfits of the city find refuge and salvation against a tremulous backdrop of a national unrest above ground.
A Bar on Adly Street is an unflinching first-hand account of an in-between generation in 1970s Egypt whose fathers cherished secular democracy and religious tolerance, while they faced poverty, tyranny, fanaticism and corruption. It carefully layers strata of a life that examines the circumstances that lead to a nation turning against its defenseless minorities. Remnants of Greeks, and Italians, then Copts and even Muslims not subscribing to the MB’s Islamist agenda, all reeling under the new norms and the changing world around them, leaving them with no choice but to run away from home in droves, creating the schism in which the present narrative is at its centre.
413 pages, Kindle Edition
First published July 21, 2022
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Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews
Did Not Finish
May 29, 2026My disappointment is immeasurable and my day is ruined.
Legitimately wanted a story told from a Coptic Egyptian perspective on the turn of the century and the transition of Egyptian society from a relatively secular and liberal society to a far more religious and fractitiously sectarian one.
What I instead got (in the first tenth of the book at least) was overt classism, a very lopsided account of the history of Egypt, meandering descriptions of sexual exploits comparing women to the dishes of countries they are from (what an ick), and so on.
If this is how Copts write, then maybe we should leave writing to the Muslims.
Legitimately wanted a story told from a Coptic Egyptian perspective on the turn of the century and the transition of Egyptian society from a relatively secular and liberal society to a far more religious and fractitiously sectarian one.
What I instead got (in the first tenth of the book at least) was overt classism, a very lopsided account of the history of Egypt, meandering descriptions of sexual exploits comparing women to the dishes of countries they are from (what an ick), and so on.
If this is how Copts write, then maybe we should leave writing to the Muslims.
October 14, 2022
Kudos to Medhat Ghabrial for a very well articulated, sometimes serious and sometimes humorous, narrative of the early phase of his life in Egypt and the circumstances leading to his emigration to Canada.
In addition to the author’s brilliant narrative, his use of imagery is outstanding.
The plot is, to put it mildly, very dark. Between the injustices suffered by Coptic minorities and the dysfunctional families and friends surrounding his life, Ghabrial weaved an account that leaves the reader wondering how much of what he went through applied and still applies to different degrees to many of those who fled Egypt seeking a fair and better life elsewhere.
In addition to the author’s brilliant narrative, his use of imagery is outstanding.
The plot is, to put it mildly, very dark. Between the injustices suffered by Coptic minorities and the dysfunctional families and friends surrounding his life, Ghabrial weaved an account that leaves the reader wondering how much of what he went through applied and still applies to different degrees to many of those who fled Egypt seeking a fair and better life elsewhere.
September 10, 2022
I have to start by stating that this is the only book I ever reviewed and I know the author personally. This may bias my opinion but at least you have been warned.
The book belongs to a genre created partially due to the policies of the post 52 governments in Egypt which sucked the vitality out of the economy and restricted the freedom of speech, creating a suffocating environment that many did not enjoy. These policies led, directly and indirectly, to the immigration of the expatriates followed by the upper middle class, the middle class and finally the poorer sectors of the population. Most of the books in the genre were written by Jewish Egyptians who were dispossessed and thrown out even when they had roots in Egypt for centuries. “Out of Egypt” and “The Man in the Sharkskin Suit” are great examples. A Bar on Adly Street is an interesting variation as it was written by a fellow Egyptian, Coptic in this case. The book can be read on two ways in my opinion:
A quasi documentary of the slow and gradual deterioration of the native middle class that grew in the first half of the 20th century and never felt enthusiastic about the great plans of the Great Leader to say the least.
A coming of age story of a young opinionated and smart Egyptian who was desperately trying to find a place for himself in the quicksand of the early seventies Egypt, only to be defeated on both personal and professional levels, leaving him deprived of any potential for growth within the country of his forefathers.
The book is well written and witty, full of philosophical observations that do not get on one’s nerves. I highly recommend it.
On a another personal level, it is the only book I read so far where the main character is an engineering teaching assistant at an Egyptian university muddling his way through a convoluted system; almost me except the book took place ten year earlier!
The book belongs to a genre created partially due to the policies of the post 52 governments in Egypt which sucked the vitality out of the economy and restricted the freedom of speech, creating a suffocating environment that many did not enjoy. These policies led, directly and indirectly, to the immigration of the expatriates followed by the upper middle class, the middle class and finally the poorer sectors of the population. Most of the books in the genre were written by Jewish Egyptians who were dispossessed and thrown out even when they had roots in Egypt for centuries. “Out of Egypt” and “The Man in the Sharkskin Suit” are great examples. A Bar on Adly Street is an interesting variation as it was written by a fellow Egyptian, Coptic in this case. The book can be read on two ways in my opinion:
A quasi documentary of the slow and gradual deterioration of the native middle class that grew in the first half of the 20th century and never felt enthusiastic about the great plans of the Great Leader to say the least.
A coming of age story of a young opinionated and smart Egyptian who was desperately trying to find a place for himself in the quicksand of the early seventies Egypt, only to be defeated on both personal and professional levels, leaving him deprived of any potential for growth within the country of his forefathers.
The book is well written and witty, full of philosophical observations that do not get on one’s nerves. I highly recommend it.
On a another personal level, it is the only book I read so far where the main character is an engineering teaching assistant at an Egyptian university muddling his way through a convoluted system; almost me except the book took place ten year earlier!
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August 16, 2022An excellent read that gives a very vivid picture life in Cairo in the 70’s with its ups and downs then the beginning of a new life in a far away country
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews