As she puts it herself, Shereen El Feki tells us everything we wanted to know but were afraid to ask about sexuality in the Arab world. The daughter of an Egyptian father and a Welsh mother, El Feki uses her Egyptian circle of mainly female relatives and friends and her gift for sociological investigation to elicit people’s intimate sexual habits and concerns. She contrasts the time, a millennium ago, when there was an ample supply of Arabic writing on sex, full of openness and joie de vivre, with modern Islamic societies where leaders attempt “to sweep sex under the prayer rug”. In a work remarkable for its depth of research and range of source material (for details, see sexandthecitadel.com), El Feki strives to provide “neither an encyclopaedia nor a peep show”. She succeeds admirably and, writing in the midst of the Egyptian uprising of 2011, is able to place the Egyptian people’s yearning for private sexual freedom and equality in the context of their struggle for a democratic society.
