Neamat El-Diwany associates the practice of art, the repeated act of bringing beauty into the world, as an essential response to the ugliness of our current historical moment. There is a sense of urgency in her tone.

Sometimes an individual is representative of the times and deeply engaged with a specific locale. And at times that same individual goes beyond both and opens up uncharted possibilities that are worth contemplating in oral histories. Zeinab Khalifa is just such an individual.

Alaa al-Aswany, a prominent Egyptian writer with a broad array of interests and accomplishments, is a lively man with a penchant for playful conversation. I sat down with him one spring afternoon in his Brooklyn apartment, and was easily drawn into the world he conjured, one small detail at a time.