What Egyptians wish for
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Loading... - Chiara Accardi
- 23 Jan 2023
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In ‘Shubeik Lubeik,’ a new graphic novel by Deena Mohamed, genies really do come in bottles — but only for those rich enough to afford them
In the opening pages of Deena Mohamed’s graphic novel “Shubeik Lubeik,” we watch a televised public service announcement in which a woman purchases a “delesleep,” a “third-class wish” granted not by a genie in a bottle but one confined to an aluminum can. When the being within emerges, the woman makes a simple request. “I want to lose weight! About,” here she hesitates a moment, “ten kilos?”
The results are as immediate as they are horrifying. Her right leg and left arm fall to the ground, bloodlessly severed by the force she has unleashed. Her wish granted, the woman screams.
Welcome to a Cairo where donkeys talk, dragons destroy villages and posh suburban homes can hide under a cloak of invisibility.
Cairo — the real city, that is — has long been a nerve center of Arab comic art’s revival. Across the Middle East, political cartoonists and caricaturists have been experimenting with strips and visual stories for more than a century, with cartoons often representing the most audacious voices in the press. But graphic novels remain relatively rare. In 2007, the writer and artist Magdy El Shafee published what many consider the first Egyptian one: “Metro,” a Cairo-set noir about a broke young computer programmer driven to rob a bank in a megalopolis plagued by crony capitalism and unfreedom. Read More…
