Taha Hussein Quotes

Most of the book is an anthropological exploration of human evolution, culminating in a chapter where the author argues that the development of culture (which he defines as a set of evolving environmental, intellectual, existential, social, and psychological characteristics) must run through state planning

In Towards a Changing Culture, he argues most clearly that a progressive secular culture should be built through coordination among state institutions, an overall strategy for cultural and economic development, faith in scientific development, freedom of choice, and a modern secular state

cultural producers, intellectuals and politicians are asking foundational questions about the role of government in the field of culture and vice versa”

Knowledge is like water and air: it is every citizen's right to enjoy it for free.

If we apply all the energy and intelligence we can muster to the enrichment of Egyptian culture, it will greatly contribute not only to our national growth but also to that of mankind.

The future of this cultural work—its continuity or its decline—hinges on the existence of a (political and cultural) national agreement between state and society on the fact that culture is a strategic necessity that cannot be delayed, partitioned or rely on individual or private initiative. It is, in short, institutional work, a state project worthy of a country with an ancient civilization established on a mindset shaped by the arts. This project represents a building operation for a people’s spirit, a nation’s conscience, an identity’s anchoring, and a revolution’s triumph over the advocates of obscurity and backwardness.

....the Egyptian Government has an obligation not only to spread culture among all the classes of our population, but to export it to the various peoples beyond our borders who are capable of deriving enjoyment and profit from it.

After mentioning some possible paths, Naguib concludes that the answer will vary according to one’s conception of culture

It would be a waste of time and effort to set forth in detail the ties binding Egypt to the ancient Greco-Aegean civilization.

Egypt was one of the earliest among the Islamic states to recover her ancient, unforgotten personality.

In an ominous shift, he goes on to ask, “What is needed for Culture to join the bandwagon of Revolution?”

...new Egypt will not come into being except from the ancient, eternal Egypt. I believe further that the new Egypt will have to be built on the great old one, and that the future of culture in Egypt will be an extension, a superior version, of the humble, exhausted, and feeble present.

Egypt has a culture which is international but which, at the same time, reflects the calm, eternal personality of ancient Egypt. It can nourish and enlighten other peoples and afford them a kind of pleasure which they may or may not be able to derive from their own cultures.

Saudi Arabia is a country where foreigners have not had the right to build schools and where the people lack the means to educate their children properly.

culture, cultural formations and intellectuals (…) exist and are made possible by virtue of a very interesting network of relationships with the State’s commanding, almost absolute power”