Italy-based Al-Mutawassit publishing released the “Biography of Arabic Theater Choirs in 19th Century---Memoirs of Actors Omar Wasfi, Mariam al-Sammat,” a new book by novelist and researcher Taysir Khalaf.
Egyptian actor Omar Wasfi, his real name is Omar Mohammad Mikati, was born in 1874 to a conservative family from Cairo. His father was a Quran reader and the “muadin” at Al Hussein Mosque.
Marian Sammat was born in Beirut, in 1870, but her family’s origins go back to the city of Mahardah, near Hama. The harsh conditions pushed her father, a jewelry merchant to migrate to Cairo in 1888.
The title of the book in Arabic features the world “Al Ajwak”, the plural of “Jawk,” which refers to “Al-Jawk al-Masrahi,” a term used in the 19th century to refer to today’s so-called “theater choirs.”
“This book explores the artistic memoirs of Omar Wasfi and Mariam Sammat, who witnessed the emergence of professional theater choirs in Egypt during the 1880s and 1890s. It also includes two introductions that shed lights on the influence of those two leading actors in the history of the Arabic theater,” writes the publisher.
The two actors met in many important events and occasions, especially when they worked together in the “Egyptian-Syrian Jawk (theater choir) of Abu Khalil Qabbani (from 1894 to 1901). This gives the researchers in the history of Arabic theater a rare chance to compare the different stories on the foundation of Arabic theater choirs in Egypt, the circumstances that led to their end, and their merge with other choirs or reemergence under new names. The description of theater choirs doesn’t hold any ideological message, mainly because they defined their work as Arabic theater. Also, most of the choirs’ actors came from Ottoman Syria and Egypt, so they looked at Damascus, Cairo, Alexandria, Beirut, or Jaffa as different cities in one country connected by one Arabic spirit.”
Taysir Khalaf is a Syrian novelist and researcher, who was born in Syria in 1967. His works include a novel entitled “Notebooks of Leaning Shoulder” (1996), in addition to tens of books in literature, historic studies, memoirs, and investigations, such as the “Encyclopedia of Arab, Muslims Journeys to Palestine,” released in eight volumes, in 2009.
