Synopsis
A Bugatti at the foot of the Pyramids, a local sailboat transformed into a sumptuous yacht, a few tourists in white suits and Panama hats...these are the images of a voyage in Egypt under the last kings, Fuad and Farouk, between 1917 and 1952. Writers such as Rudyard Kipling and Andre Gide testify to the fascination of Egypt's "golden years" where - in a country turned towards Europe and "protected" by the British army - a very individual social set blossomed in Cairo and Alexandria. Not satisfied with simply visiting the sites, these cosmopolitans - beset on pleasure of all kinds - lived all the more intensely in the knowledge that their lifestyle was under threat. It is the Egypt of the Alexandria Quartet by Laurence Durell. Cinema flourished, as did avant-garde theater, literary groups, and the press, all testimony to the cultural vitality of a nevertheless ephemeral world. The indifference and futility of king Farouk, injustice, corruption, and the ambitions of a few officers brought an abrupt end to the mirage. Fascinating accounts of this universe have been left by Egyptian writers or travellers to the country.
They offer us a rare glimpse of Egypt before the era of mass tourism. Extraordinary period photographs also survive; unearthed in Cairo or Beirut, in museums or private homes, and published here for the first time, they reconstitute the fragile yet effervescent glamour of Egypt under the last kings.
