Abstract:

This article analyses how a creative writing workshop in 2017 Cairo dynamically engaged with cultural memories of the 1967 defeat of the Arab armies. The article first situates 1967 as a crucial reference point in discursive attempts to tie personal life stories to national history and in making sense of a widespread feeling of postcolonial disenchantment. It is in the ruinous aftermath of the 2011 uprisings, when a view on a political horizon beyond the stifling present temporarily was reopened, that the workshop critically examined the relations between cultural memory, family history, and everyday life with, at its center, the notion of defeat in all its shapes and intensities. The article argues that the workshop can be seen as ‘an intimate public,’ carving out a space for survival lying largely outside of the sphere of politics. Nevertheless, in its affective plurality that stimulated modes of irreverence, the workshop tentatively opened up new political dispositions under the strenuous conditions of post-2013 Egypt.

摘要：

本文分析了 2017 年开罗的创意写作研讨会如何动态地参与 1967 年阿拉伯军队战败的文化记忆。这篇文章首先将 1967 年作为一个重要的参考点，试图将个人生活故事与国家历史联系起来，并理解普遍存在的后殖民幻灭感。正是在 2011 年起义的毁灭性后果中，当暂时超越令人窒息的当下的政治视野重新打开时，研讨会批判性地审视了文化记忆、家族史和日常生活之间的关系，其中心是各种形式和强度的失败概念。文章认为，研讨会可以被视为“亲密的公众”，开辟了一个基本处于政治领域之外的生存空间。尽管如此，