Category: the petri dish

Two French amateur Egyptologists (one a realtor, the other an architect) have challenged Egypt’s leading eminence on the subject of pyramids, the big Zee himself, Dr. Zahi Hawass. For two years, the Frenchmen have asked for permission to put a 15mm lens through a floor of the Great Pyramid at Giza, behind which, they believe, lies the burial chamber of Cheops (Khufu). After Hawass refused to grant their request, the amateur egyptologists went on a campaign to challenge his scholarship.

The Frenchmen’s challenge to the Big Zee’s authority has ruined the image of Egyptology as the gentlemanly pursuit of studied introverts. What has emerged since the Frenchmen went public in September with their accusations is a backstabbing world of academic ambition, national pride, tourism dollars and television ratings. “Dr Hawass treats Egypt as his private hunting ground,” says M. Verd’hurt, from Lyon. “They are speculators, amateurs!” comes the retort from Dr Hawass.

There is more to this fascinating saga, at the heart of which is essentially a struggle between modern-day Egyptians and foreigners on who gets to study what, where, and how, who funds the excavations, and in what language the results are published.

Here’s an interview with filmmaker Gurinder Chada (Bend It Like Beckham) . She’s adapting Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice into a Bollywood musical called Bride and Prejudice, starring Aishwarya Rai.

But Chadha confessed that she still cast her uncles and aunts in Bride and Prejudice.
‘I like to cast relatives in certain family situations because they always look the part where often extras don’t,’ she said. But her mum has refused to be in her movies again. ‘My mother is sick of it now. After Beckham she didn’t like people coming up and taking a picture with her. ‘Fame didn’t work for her,’ said Chadha with a laugh.

The movie comes out in the U.S. on Christmas Day.

Ramadan Kareem to all my Muslim readers!

The image at left is from a Koran illuminated by 18th century calligrapher Ahmet Karahisari (1469?-1556). You can view similar manuscript pages online here.

Roberto Benigni, whose film Life is Beautifulwas set during the Holocaust, is currently shooting a comedy about the Iraq war.

In spite of the subject matter, Oscar-winner Benigni intends the film – which is due for release in 2005 – to be a comedy.
Benigni plays the part of a poet who is in Iraq by chance and is caught up in the events.
“War naturally is the background of the film and my character is directly involved in it. This poet ends up in Iraq by pure chance,” Benigni told Italian Rai radio.

Check out the British Library’s digitized versions of twenty-one of Shakespeare’s plays in quarto form. (Quartos are cheap pamphlets, the size of the fourth of a sheet of printing paper. ) (Link via Maud.) While I was on the site, I checked out the BL’s extensive Arabic section, which contains some of the oldest available manuscripts.

The schedule for Mizna‘s second Arab Film Festival is now available. Among the movies to be shown is a short film by Moroccan filmmaker Kamal El Mahouti.