A few years ago a small publishing house started making its way within the cultural arena. The Merit Publishing House, which makes its home in an apartment in Qasr al-Nil Street in Down Town Cairo, is owned and run by Muhammad Hashem, whose philosophy is to revive the stagnant Egyptian literary arena. Watani met Muhammad Hashem
Who is Muhammad Hashem?
It is very hard to know oneself. However, I consider myself a humanitarian in the first degree. I have nationalist tendencies, and I adopted communist thought at an early stage of my life.
My ID says I was born in 1958 and hold an industrial diploma. In 1980, a group of young leftists were detained for forming the Communist Labour Party, and we demonstrated at their trial which was held secretly. I was arrested and detained for three months. Two years later, I joined the army but was stripped from the military service because of my political activities. In November 1983 I travelled to work in Jordan and took up menial work such as working on building sites. It was in this period that I began writing short stories and sending them to Jordanian newspapers. Among the ones that were published were The Constitution, Opinion and The Arab thought forum. After I returned to Egypt I became a reporter for the Jordanian magazine Afkar (Thoughts).
I then worked with my friend Khaled Zaghloul who was manager of Dar al-Mahrousa publishing house. At the time I had the opportunity of offering Dr Farag Fouda—the Egyptian enlightened writer who made it his mission to fight fundamentalist thought and was consequently shot to death by the Islamists in 1992—a file containing articles about national unity and extremism which was praised. I really admired Fouda’s courage and honesty, and respected how he separated religion from State. He respected citizenship and had staked his life on defending these issues.
Do you think Dr Fouda received the recognition he deserves?
Unfortunately he has been given neither official honour nor popular esteem. He was denied popular recognition because of his stance on the peace agreement with Israel, which he supported. He called for normalisation of relations, which is against the prevalent opinion of the average public who cannot accept anything that has to do with Israel. Personally, I believe Israel is the only enemy. This has the benefit of making it the hidden conspirator behind all our problems.
So do you believe in the conspiracy theory?
I am totally convinced that the ‘enemy’ is making use of all means to destroy our lives, from implanting the seeds of sectarianism to provoking disturbances in Nubia. There are already some elements that poison our lives for the sake of Israel.
Is Israel responsible for the successive sectarian attacks against Copts?
The first sectarian incident I witnessed was Khanka. It happened at a time when Sadat appeared to nurture a ‘state of science and belief’, and he unleashed the reins of the Muslim Brothers who worked on shaking the foundations of this nation. I believe that Israel is the head of the serpent and its main purpose is to fragment the unity of this nation.
How was Miret born?
I disagreed with the owner of Mahrousa. I was dreaming of another sort of publication. At that time most of the established publishing houses were Islamic, and the books they published were subsidised by anonymous sources. I was searching for a true Egyptian entity able to adopt the issues of the nation and make a print. We wanted to publish all kinds of progressive writing, but literature has prevailed over our publications because we leaned towards new ideas and new thoughts. We took the risk and published novice writers. We did not flirt with the government to buy our publications. We took the initiative and had the audacity to publish books that went against the regime, for instance Anti-President by Abd al-Halim Kandil.
What are the best-selling literary works?
Novels attract many readers, especially such books as The Yacoubian Building by Alaa al-Aswani, Retired Thieves by Hamdi Abu-Gleila, and To be Abbas the Slave by Ahmed al-Aydi. We obtained prizes from the Sawiris Organisation. Because there is not much of a market for ideological and political works, we offer the reader a miscellaneous choice of novice literary and sociology books.
Many of the books you published were confiscated. What do you think about censorship?
Indeed many of our publications were confiscated, including Life Here is better than Paradise and The Period of Formation in the Life of al-Sadeq al-Amin (the honest, loyal person). But I believe it is hard nowadays to prevent or curb any kind of thought. There are several means of expression. To confiscate anything now is no more than a foolish act.
What do you think of the Family Library project initiated by Suzanne Mubarak, which prints a variety of books and sells them to the public at very affordable prices?
It is a very good project. But now the problem is that they recently publish a small quantity of books, not like in previous years.
Is there a future for the book in Egypt?
Absolutely, because the fact that the books we publish are not by famous writers and not translated is proof that the reader still feels a warm intimacy while holding the book and turning its pages compared with staring at a computer screen.