Time traveling with the Egyptian child : a study of two plays for children

Abstract EN

Time and the change that is supposed to be coupled with temporal progression is the main topic of this study which investigates the development of children’s theatre in Egypt by comparing one of the very early texts written for children in the 1960's by the renowned Egyptian poet.

Salah Jahin, to a more recent text written by Shawky Hegab, a contemporary and equally prominent figure in the field of children’s literature.

The texts I propose to examine are :Salah Jahin’s When Sahsah Awakes (1963) and Shawky Hegab’s The Gazelle Lala (2007).

The drastic changes that Egypt has gone through over the past fifty years would naturally be dovetailed by a correspondent ideological and structural development reflected in the sclcctcd texts- This study will not only focus on the differences between the authorial perspectives but most importantly on the re- routing and the changes that took place in the modes of addressing the child and specifically when considering that whereas Jahin's play was written during an age in which television was a novelty, Hegab writes his play, set against a highly mediatized and globalized age.

The temporal span be ween the two texts dictates another equally significant variance determined by cultural andsocio-political changes Generally.

The basic question upon which this study is centered is: How do such changcs determine and affcct play writing for children?