A writer of letters to the editor since the 1950s, Mohamed Hussein Hegazi tells Osama Kamal what has kept him going These days, articles on the web often invite readers' comments. But not so long ago, the only way for a reader to voice an opinion was to write a letter to the editor and hope that it would get selected for publication, usually in a shortened form. This was a time before bloggers came along. Among those who managed to break into the public sphere and have their name published as the author of a letter to the editor is Mohamed Hussein Hegazi. His name will be familiar to many who follow the Egyptian press. Born in 1942, Hegazi has a degree in science from Tanta University. But he has never worked in science. Instead, he runs the family business, a cafeteria not far from the famous mosque and shrine of El-Sayed El-Badawi, the Muslim patron saint of Tanta. Somewhere in the "Cafeteria Hegazi", you may get a glimpse of a man who has read more newspapers in his life than most of us ever will. Hegazi is single, has never married, and has never fathered a child. From an early age, he had to take care of the business and bring up two younger brothers. By the time the brothers had grown up and started families of their own, Hegazi's passion for the press had outstripped his urge to start a family. His first published letter appeared in Sabah Al-Kheir magazine on 19 November 1959. Since then, he has never looked back. Some of his letters were published in Rose El-Youssef magazine in the 1960s, when Ismail Diab was editor of the "Readers' Whispers" column ( Hamasat Al-Qorraa ), as the mail section was then called. This was a time when Rose El-Youssef was a major publication, and Hegazi's letters appeared in the same issues as serialised novels by Egyptian novelist Ihsan Abdel-Qoddous. Some of Hegazi's letters can also be found in back issues of Al-Izaa, the radio magazine, when readers' mail was edited by Ali Fayeq Zaghloul, the same man who later became the presenter of the well-known show Variety Theatre ( Masrah Al-Monawaat ). It was Zaghloul who then gave Hegazi the opportunity he had been waiting for, allowing him to write a regular number for the show. Called "The Meanings of Songs" ( Maani fil Aghani ), it ran for four years. Hegazi's first contribution to the magazine Al-Mosawwar 's "Mail Bag" column ( Zekibet Al-Barid ) started when the editor was Ahmed El-Sawi Mohamed. Hegazi often wrote to the magazine Akher Saah when the editors of the letters were Ahmed Ragab, Helmi Salam, Ahmed El-Sawi, and Mohamed Zaki Abdel-Qader. He wrote to the evening newspaper Al-Masaa when Abdallah Ahmed Abdallah, nicknamed "Mickey Mouse", was editor of the "You Ask and Mickey Mouse Answers" column ( Anta Tasaal wa Miki Maws Yugib ) . " Al-Ahram and Al-Akhbar invited comments from readers much later than the rest of the press," says Hegazi, who notes that "the two major newspapers were not initially interested in readers' mail." Al-Akhbar started a mail section after the release of its editor and leading writer Mustafa Amin from prison in the early 1970s. Al-Ahram launched its mail page when Abdel-Wahab Motawea took over what was to become the best known readers' letters section in the Arab press: the "Friday Mail" ( Barid Al-Gomaah ) column in Al-Ahram. Hegazi even met Motawea, who was often willing to invite contributors for a cup of coffee. Hegazi's own favourite topic is singing. And when not writing letters to the newspapers, he has also contributed articles on art. From 1987 to 1992, Hegazi went professional, working as art editor for Sahar and Al-Shabakah, during which time he published interviews with Sabah, Mohamed Sultan, Mohamed Rushdi, Mohamed El-Mogui, Kamal El-Tawil, Abdel-Azim Mohamed, Ahmed El-Sonbati, and Galal Moawwad. A column by Hegazi also appeared regularly in the newspaper Al-Badil, until it folded not so long ago. Currently, Hegazi writes a column in the periodical Shashati called "Add to your Artistic Knowledge" ( Adef ila Maalumatik Al-Fanniya ). Hegazi today spends a lot of his time listening to music stations. "I don't feel alive except when listening to radio shows. I pay attention to everything the commentators say, and take grim note of the smallest lapse on their side." He knows the history of Egyptian singing inside out, and expects others in the same business to do so as well. Umm Kolthoum, he says, is the summit of Egyptian singing. "No one even came close to her. She was the beginning and the end," he says. He started attending her concerts in 1964 and went on doing so until she passed away in 1975. He got tickets for the shows because a friend of his father was head of the radio archives and was kind enough to provide the family with invitations. Having written extensively about the diva, Hegazi was shocked when he visited the Umm Kolthoum Museum in the Manasterli Palace in Cairo and discovered factual errors in the signage. The museum's management, he says, had used only one book for reference, and this book, The Full Texts of Umm Kolthoum ( Al-Nusus Al-Kamela li Umm Kolthoum ) , he says is full of omissions and half truths. For his part, the museum director begged to disagree, and the two men subsequently exchanged some harsh words. Hegazi is friends with other regular letter writers, and he has met many of them over the years. Some of the writers have been writing to Egyptian publications since the 1960s, and Hegazi has made a point of following the ins and outs of their careers. The best letter writers, Hegazi says, are Amin Salama, Mahmoud Mehanna, Mohamed Bahgat El-Badri, Naeim El-Naya, Awad El-Fiqi, Mohamed Amin Essawi, Hani Abdel-Khaleq, Hani Mohamed Seyam and Issa Mewalli. The latter was described by Ahmed Ragab, the veteran satirist, as "the most famous newspaper reader in Egypt". Novelists Youssef El-Sabaei, Mustafa Mahmoud and Abbas El-Aswani are Hegazi's favourite authors. He also admires the late journalists Nabil Esmat and Abdel-Salam Dawoud. Of the current generation, he likes to read Tarek El-Shennawi and says that Galal Amer is currently the country's best columnist. For many years, Hegazi was a close friend of the radio broadcaster Diaaeddin Beibars, who presented the well-known show, "If You Were in my Place" ( Lau Kont Makani ). Beibars once described Hegazi as an "endemic reader" -- a nickname that he cherishes and hugely deserves.
