“Chewing Viagra Gum”—Mai Ghoussoub’s groundbreaking essay on culture and Arab media, begins with the Israel plot to undermine “the Arab body” with sexual chewing gum, a story that was first reported in Middle Eastern newspapers in 1996.
Ghoussoub’s essay also critiques patriarchal attitudes in the region, medieval Islamic sexual manuals and Egyptian cinema. Ghoussoub (1952-2007) was an author, artist and publisher known for her writing on gender issues, her plays and art performances. She co-founded Saqi Books, the first Middle Eastern publishing house and bookstore in London, with André Gaspard. Saqi, which means the water-carrier in Arabic, published titles no other Middle Eastern publisher would touch at the time, such as Brian Whitaker’s “Unspeakable Love: Gay and Lesbian Life in the Middle East” (2006) and Ammar Abdulhamid’s debut novel, “Menstruation” (2001).
“Chewing Viagra Gum” first appeared in Imagined Masculinities: Male Identity and Culture in the Modern Middle East, an anthology of essays she coedited with Emma Sinclair-Webb, which Saqi published in 2000. The essay was abridged, in this special reading for the TMR by Malu Halasa, with music by Justin Adams.
