November 11, 2023
WoEgypt

Oxford University, UK, celebrated Dr. Reem Bassiouney’s novel “Al Qata’i: Ibn Tulun’s City Without Walls” translation, as well as her nomination for the Sheikh Zayed Book Award. The event and book signing ceremony were held at the Center for Middle Eastern Studies, where Dr. Eugene Rogan, the distinguished historian and professor of Islamic history and director of the Middle East Centre at Oxford University, discussed her works.

Al-Qata’i: Ibn Tulun’s City Without Walls tells the epic story of visionary Egyptian leader Ahmad Ibn Tulun who built Al-Qata’i (now Cairo) into a thriving multicultural empire. The novel begins with the rediscovery of the Ibn Tulun Mosque in 1918 and recounts Ibn Tulun’s life and legacy in the ninth and tenth centuries. Bassiouney presents Ibn Tulun’s benevolent vision to unify all Egyptians in a new city, Al-Qata’i. He becomes so focused on his vision, however, that he cannot see the impact it has on his family or the fate of Egypt. When a betrayal leads to his demise, the rival Abbasid caliph threatens to regain control of Al-Qata’i. In the aftermath of Ibn Tulun’s death, his daughter Aisha emerges as a pivotal figure, bravely taking a stand against the Abbasids to preserve her life, the city, and the iconic mosque.

Reem Bassiouney was born in Alexandria, Egypt. She obtained her MPhil and PhD from Oxford University in linguistics. She has previously taught Arabic language and linguistics at universities in the U.K. and the U.S., including Cambridge, Oxford and Utah. She currently works as the series editor for Routledge studies in language and identity and is Chair of the Department of Applied Linguistics at the American University in Cairo. 

She published 9 novels. In 2022, Reem Bassiouny received the State Award for literary excellence for her collective works of faction. Her Mamluks trilogy won the Naguib Mahfouz Award 2010/2020 for the best Egyptian novel.

In 2009, she won the Sawiris Foundation Literary Prize for Young Writers for her novel “Dr. Hanaa”. Her novel ‘The Pistachio Seller’ was published by Syracuse University Press in 2009.

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