The next wife syndrome is fuelling the boom in satirical literature, and its scope is wide enough to encompass some critical social issues. Rania Khallaf turns the pages of a new book on polygamy is the straightforward title of a new book that will fit neatly on the shelf alongside similar satirical books published over the past couple of years. It takes a sideways look at the issue of polygamy in Egyptian society, a topic with religious overtones that might pose a tough subject for discussion. Yet it is very funny, and you might need to hold on to your sides while reading it. The author, who defines himself on the back page as an interior designer, illustrator and announcer, discusses one of society's most critical issues as an optimum means of solving the problem of the ever-increasing divorce rate in Egypt. According to statistics, there are about 10 million women in Egypt outside wedlock, some single (i.e. never having married), some widowed, and some divorced. Meawad's decision to write on this subject was provoked by "a dramatic event: my best friend, Wael Abdel-Fatah, decided to make a confession before he committed suicide. 'To hell with you!' Abdel-Fatah said. 'I want to remarry; I need a second wife. I know you might think that I am a bad man, and that a second marriage will lead me to lose everything, including my children, but I don't care.' "So I decided to write this book to find out why my friend said, 'To hell with you!' before he killed himself," Meawad writes. Whether or not this account is true, it certainly grabs the reader's atttention." The book is written in colloquial Arabic and divided into several chapters, each written in a different format. "I wrote the book in colloquial Arabic because I am not a professional writer, and it is surely an easy way to address millions of people who do not read religious books. I think that the subject is a social issue in the first place," Meawad told the Weekly. The author has dedicated the book to men, divorced and widowed women and to women over 30 who have never married. The author's argument throughout the book makes it clear that polygamy was legalized in Islam to protect widows and divorced women, who might otherwise be abandoned by society. He also shows that it was intended to "protect" another section of society: those alpha males who possessed "super sexual energy" and, through polygamy, could be preserved from committing adultery. Using humor, Meawad argues that the problem with polygamy is that men (husbands) have become increasingly pathetic, while women (wives) have grown ferocious. A husband, he suggests, is unable to face his wife and tell her he needs a second wife because he has super sexual energy. "Women have become more authoritative than the government itself," is his sarcastic comment. However, asked straightforwardly if he has the courage to have a second wife, Meawad murmurs, "me? No, well I am not sure about that yet." In the first chapter, the author adopts the interview technique to ask what people in the street think of polygamy, which is increasingly perceived in Egypt as a despised custom even though it is fully recognized as a right for men in Islam. The four interviews Meawad conducts, hilariously recorded in colloquial Arabic, reveal that society's disregard and disrespect for polygamy has no real grounds in logic, and that it is our tradition that gives us the tendency to disrespect a man who feels he needs to take a second wife, in the meantime dishonoring the woman who accepts to be a second wife. "Some wives would prefer to have their husbands cheat on them rather than have a 'whore' as a wife, for fear that the new wife and her future children will get her husband's money," he argues. "It is surely a schizophrenic society; while people assume they are so religious, they tend to engage in illegal sexual relationships outside wedlock," he told the Weekly. The second chapter takes place in a mock court room, where individual cases are accused of polygamy. Some of these imaginary trials reveal the undesirable side of polygamy, such as when a wealthy husband takes another wife just for fun, and then divorces her as soon as their sexual desires are satisfied. Another "trial", very amusingly written in spite of the seriousness of the subject, reveals the authority of the mother--in-law (the first wife's mother), who can ruin her son-in-law's life by humiliating him to the extent that he divorces his new wife. The all-powerful influence of the media a great impact on people in Egypt, the author argues in the next chapter. "This is actually the reason for all the ailments of society. While there are various types of media in modern society, TV has the greatest influence on the minds of the majority; this is because people are too lazy to read," Meawad writes. He attributes what he calls the "false notions" that polygamy is "bad" to films and soap operas which have, since the 1930s, disseminated such "untrue" values, depicting men who take more than one wife as an immoral, liars or sexually obsessed, when they simply desire an "extra" marriage; or are still on good terms with their first wives but have accidentally fallen in love with another woman. Meawad argues that the films of the 1960s and 1970s, as well as earlier examples such as those starring the famous comedian Ismaeil Yassin, My mother-in-law is An Angel and The Luscious Mothers-in-law, depicted mothers-in-law as demons to the extent that they loomed as a nightmare in the popular imagination, threatening men if they dared even think of taking a second wife. Meawad notes that polygamy was a way of life at the time of Al-Sahaba, or Prophet Mohamed's companions, so as to protect the wives of martyrs, or divorced women, from poverty and sexual abuse by other men. And here is, he argues, a notable shift in today's drama concerning second marriages. "This might be caused by the country's nascent social circumstances and new liberal values that have obliged the media to stop wagging their fingers at second marriages. He cites the example of the new film of Love and Fancy starring the popular Ahmed El-Saqqa. In this film, a husband falls in love with a married woman, who subsequently gains a divorce and marries the man in secret. When the first wife learns that her husband has taken another wife she asks him for a divorce, although she once confessed that she enjoyed having sex with her husband while he was secretly married to the other woman. And so the given concepts prevail. The first wife gets her divorce; while the viewers feel sympathy for the husband who cannot help but marry the woman he fell in love with. The soap opera Haj Metwali's Family, which depicted a wealthy but uneducated businessman with an above-average sexual appetite that led him to have four wives --all living in peace in the same big house--marked "a new shift in the media's view of polygamy", according to Meawad. "I do wonder why the feminist association has criticized this serial so harshly, and has not lifted a finger to speak up for the rights of the millions of divorced and widowed women in society--and has not criticized the cheap employment of women's bodies in television commercials and video clips," Meawad writes. Other chapters discuss in a tongue-in-cheek way examples of polygamy in other religions and countries. Meawad cites a list of precautions that a husband should follow to prevent his wife learning he has married to another woman. "Do not let her tie your tie; do not accompany her to tall places like the Cairo Tower; get rid of any knives and metal tools in the kitchen, plastic tools are the best in this situation." First published by Kayan in June 2010, has proved so popular that it was reprinted four times before the end of last year. It is an easy book to read, but with the author's persistence in using different writing techniques to set down his argument, and with his highly polished humor, the message of the book resonates in one's mind and the false, traditional concepts of polygamy actually start to fade away.
