Most Surprising - and Enjoyable Book of the Year

[Ashtree0]

The book I've just finished reading has had me gripped ever since picking it up to read a few weeks ago. During my 35 minute train journey into work and back home again, plus the occasional snatched 30 minutes at lunchtime, I've worked my way through the chapters knowing what the final outcome of the storyline will be but nonetheless, enjoyed the journey until the inevitable end.

This version published in 1973 was purchased from Oxfam's online bookstore which I definitely recommend if you are looking for specialist publications and have no joy through Amazon or Ebay.

This book is full of intrigue, subterfuge, betrayal, strength in the face of adversity and social consciousness. The 'hero' doesn't achieve everything he sets out to do but you are still left with a sense that what this man achieved was something quite incredible.

Architecture for the Poor by Hassan Fathy is quite the best read I've had for sometime.

Some quite rightly so may think that this is a technical book outlining the process of planning and building a village. Of course there are elements of that but not beyond the realms of understanding for the layperson. This is more of a social commentary on the Fellaheen of Upper Egypt from the not too distant past.

Fathy set out to build a village to rehouse the Gourni population living and robbing the ancient necropolis in Luxor's Westbank. This was always going to be met with resistance by the families who had made their living from tomb robbing for generations. However, his aim was to employ the local people to build the new village but to also to observe and consult with them to make them a village that would help change their standard of living but also give the local people skills beyond that of farrning, skills that would give families trades that could be used in future generations.

One of Fathy's biggest challenges was to engage the co-operation of the government officials from the various ministries in Cairo. Naguib Mahfouz's Respected Sir gives a good insight into Egypt's bureaucratic 'condition'. You sense the frustration he must have felt at the betrayal of not only the staff he was working with in Gourna but of the ministry officials that were supposed to be supporting the notion of improving the lives of the Fellaheen. On one trip to Cairo he sought permission to use some of the water pumps from the project to pump clean water in Gourna during an outbreak of cholera. After being passed from one official to the other he finally gets to speak to the representative from the Ministry of Public Health where he is told categorically that the Fellah can 'go to hell'.

This is such a good read – especially for anyone interested in gaining an insight into the lives and customs of the Fella. It's an easy read too – certainly not what I was expecting from a book about architecture.

Definitely recommend.

Next book is The Egyptian Peasant by Henry Habib Ayrout.

[Winged Isis]

I must get the one on HF, as I enjoyed my tour of the village (in 2010, I think).

[Glyphdoctor]

Boy you fell for his propaganda. The project was a failure not because of the bureaucracy but because he thought he as an educated upper class city slicker knew what a peasant's house should be like better than a peasant did himself. Reread the book and see the total disdain and dislike he has for people in the countryside from page 1 and the arrogant self importance he places on himself. Egyptians had been building in mud without architects for 1000s of years before he came along to "teach" them how to build their own houses when they already knew how to do so using a style that actually was suitable to them and liked by them. Instead, he borrowed his architecture style from Nubia and then created a fiction that it was pharaonic. The Egyptians never lived in domed houses since pharaonic times. And no the Gurnawis were not tomb robbers anymore than the Europeans who bought what they dug were trafficking in illicit goods. They only were serving a market and it was not illegal when they did it so the label slapped on them was unfair. The book is worth reading, but it should be seen for what it is, excuses by a man trying to explain away his failure.

[Ashtree0]

Woooah steady on there Glyph. I haven't fallen for anything. Rather in my albeit amateurish "review" was trying to demonstrate that this is not a technical book about architecture but a book that could pass for a novel - it's a great story and a very good, easy read. You do get the feeling when you read the book that it is an attempt to justify the failure of the project. I couldn't care less. I loved the book and urge anyone who is interested in contemporary Egyptian culture to read it.

Please does this forum come with Batfink wings that are like shields of steel? Just to deflect the Glyph bullets!

[Mad Dilys]

Please does this forum come with Batfink wings that are like shields of steel? Just to deflect the Glyph bullets!

Yup, it's consider the source.

Then if you care about the opinion of the person who made the comment, it's an ouch!

If you don't care, Batfink wings installed and working perfectly.

[Who2]

If those that wrote the cheques had helped instead of deliberately hindered him in every way possible his thoughts on construction for 2/3rds of the World that live in Adobe [mud to you ] houses would be a hell of a lot better off, only the stupid misunderstand great men and great minds, but this planet is endemic with stupid individuals...He is, or was, the architects architect as chosen by the world's architects..........8)spit spit
Bloody domes? He understood that heat rises and domes allow that hot air to escape, jesus spare me...There was a bit more to pharaonic egypt than bloody hyroglphys, like living in 45oC for 5 months of the year.