Barra and Zaman: How The Mummy reveals a nostalgia for Egypt s lost past
Youssef Rakha s latest book re-examines Shadi Abdel Salam s 1969 classic The Mummy from a timely and personal perspective
Set in 1881, The Mummy follows the discovery of a hoard of dozens of mummies, including their burial treasures known as the Royal Cache in Luxor (Alamy) By Published date: 13 February 2021 08:24 UTC | Last update: 1 month 3 weeks ago
The first thing I tell writer Youssef Rakha when he picks up the phone, him in Cairo, me in Beirut, is: I wish yours was the kind of reading I had been assigned while I was studying media and culture 15 years ago. We talk about how academia can ruin your love for the very subject you had been drawn to - and I thank him for managing to achieve the opposite with his essay.