Huna - by Abdelrahman Elgendy (Hardcover)

Book Synopsis

A gripping, deeply moving memoir of survival, education, and resistance by a student protestor-turned-political prisoner in post-revolution Egypt.

"I will never be the same after reading Huna." --Javier Zamora
"A beautifully written portrait of a radical political awakening." --Hanif Abdurraqib
"The work of a truly liberated writer." --Fady Joudah

In the summer of 2013, Abdelrahman ElGendy was seventeen years old and a budding student activist in Cairo. Two years after the January 25 revolution, hope for a free Egypt had dissipated; that summer's military coup, led by General Abdel Fattah el-Sisi, resulted in unprecedented massacres of civilian protestors by the police and military, spurring a wave of further outrage and mass demonstrations. Abdelrahman knew he needed to be a part of it, and his reluctant father, fearing for his son's safety, accompanied him to a major protest. But before they could so much as leave the car, they were swept up in a brutal police crackdown--and their lives were shattered.

Abdelrahman would spend the next six years as a political prisoner, shuffled, alongside his father, from jail cell, to pre-trial detention center, to The Scorpion, Egypt's most infamous prison complex. Over the years he should have spent as a college student, he was cast into a struggle to preserve his personhood through excruciating conditions, under the grind of incarceration with no end in sight. As his body bore the worst of prison, he turned to the only refuge left to him: the mind. He not only earned his bachelor's degree in engineering while imprisoned, but also taught other prisoners English and literary Arabic, read and wrote voraciously, and cultivated a sense of community and solidarity with all those who have suffered at the hands of authoritarianism.

In his remarkable debut, Abdelrahman refuses the comfort of easy uplift. In the words of the Arab world's most enduring protest song, "Sawfa Nabqa Huna"--We will remain here--Abdelrahman finds not a promise of hope, but a provocation: When hope itself becomes perilous, what else can sustain us? Huna is a testament to the radical act of choosing to remain when erased, and of what endures, perhaps more faithfully, beyond hope.

Review Quotes

"You don't read Huna, you live it, savor it, bite, suck up each word--the taste in your mouth? An untranslatable term Abdelrahman ElGendy teaches us, qahr: an injustice, rage, helplessness, but also a divine retribution. In Abdelrahman ElGendy's hands, the brutal, idiotic DNA of authoritarianism has no chance, its grip is futile. ElGendy has purposely sweetened the nightmare, I hope readers learn the lesson. I will never be the same after reading Huna--a pivotal addition to world literature."--Javier Zamora, New York Times bestselling author of Solito

"Huna is a beautifully written portrait of a radical political awakening--a portrait that does not prioritize the harms and brutalities of the state, even though they are endured. But a portrait that, instead, affords an immense patience and dignity to the land and its people. To the heart and its ferocity. To all of the things that turn a person towards rigorous and principled action."--Hanif Abdurraqib, New York Times bestselling author of There's Always This Year

"This riveting, extraordinary work communicates the literal experience of being a political prisoner within the emotional life of injustice. Abdelrahman ElGendy brings us closer to the physical suffering, the intellectual hunger, the deep friendships, the modes of survival, the petty brutalities of state players--not only of the regime of Egypt's General Sisi, but of its resonance today in the United States."--Sarah Schulman, author of The Fantasy and Necessity of Solidarity

"In documenting the arbitrary brutality of Egypt's carceral system, ElGendy illuminates the plight of thousands of political prisoners suffering just out of sight. This memoir is a testament to the conscience they preserve in the darkest cells of the nation. It is a battle cry for their liberation."--Noor Naga, author of If an Egyptian Cannot Speak English

"Abdelrahman ElGendy's memoir Huna offers a powerful map of interconnected practices of resistance to surveillance, state violence, and the repression of political speech. A vital entry in the long tradition of narratives of political imprisonment, Huna reminds us that freedom is first in the mind."--Zeyn Joukhadar, author of The Thirty Names of Night and The Map of Salt and Stars

"Huna is a clandestine letter, a lyrical act of resistance, and a transcendent song in the darkness. ElGendy recounts his political imprisonment and journey to critical consciousness with unflinching honesty, masterful precision, and radical love. His story is a compassionate call to courage, reminding us of the often-quoted but unheeded truth: None of us is free until we all are."--Nadia Owusu, author of Aftershocks

"Riveting, cinematic memory and poetic prose. ElGendy's soulful attention to detail and method is the work of a truly liberated writer. Huna is much more than 'prison writing.' It showcases ElGendy's instinctive mastery of the hybrid modes of Arabic narrative. But also, dear reader, do not assume that you are outside the prison cell reading another's story and not your own in the West. This, too, is part of the genius of Huna."--Fady Joudah, author of [...] and Exhibit G

About the Author

Abdelrahman ElGendy is an author and translator from Cairo. A winner of the Samir Kassir Press Freedom Award, he holds an MFA in Nonfiction Writing from the University of Pittsburgh, and his work appears in publications including The Washington Post, Foreign Policy, The Nation, and Guernica. His poetry and prose translations from Arabic appear in Ploughshares, Poetry Northwest, Literary Hub, Words Without Borders, and elsewhere. ElGendy's work has received awards or fellowships from the Elizabeth George Foundation, the Heinz Foundation, the de Groot Foundation, Virginia Center for Creative Arts, and the Arab American National Museum. Huna is his debut memoir.