Through a detailed study of Mayy Ziy?dah's literary salon, Boutheina Khaldi sheds light on salon and epistolary culture in early twentieth-century Egypt and its role in Egypt's Nahdah (Awakening). Bringing together history, women's studies, Arabic literature, post-colonial literature, and media studies, she highlights the important and previously little-discussed contribution of Arabic women to the project of modernity.

"In writing this book about Mayy Ziy?dah and her early twentieth-century Cairo salon, which for the first time brought together the male and female literati of the Arab world, Boutheina Khaldi has contributed a crucial missing element in the construction of the modern Arabic literary canon." - Miriam Cooke, professor of Asian and Middle Eastern Studies, Duke University

Autorentext
Boutheina Khaldi is Assistant Professor of Arabic and Translation Studies at the American University of Sharjah, United Arab Emirates.

Inhalt
The Ambivalent Modernity Project: From Napoleon's Expedition to Mayy Ziyadah's Salon The Salon as a Public Sphere They Discuss The Letter as Annex Style as Persuasion: Pleading the Case for the New