CAIRO CONFIDENTIAL
Omar Robert Hamilton’s debut novel, The City Always Wins, chronicles the struggles of the Chaos Collective during the 2011 revolution in Cairo. Closely modelled on the real-life Mosireen Collective, which Hamilton helped found, it’s literature that aspires to a higher truth than history.
Nine months after Tahrir Square, Egypt’s introduction to the so-called Arab Spring, optimism is still running high. The revolution is ‘unstoppable’. In 2011, while the world cheers, Khalil and other members of Chaos are busy broadcasting the revolution from the battlegrounds. Young and idealistic, they are confident of their revolution as they protest, photograph and document the movement while simultaneously offering amateur first aid, supporting the bereaved and rescuing detainees.
The optimism is short-lived, however. In the second half of the book, the revolutionaries plunge into disorienting bafflement after the election of Mohamed Morsi. Punctuated by news headlines, tweets, text messages and lists, the narrative places itself in a country that is deeply divided between supporters of the military and the Muslim Brotherhood. The revolution of their dreams is succumbing to the fatigue of a population beleaguered by constant carnage and uncertainty. The revolution haunts their lives, gnawing at Khalil’s relationship and peace of mind. Before long, the rebels are the hunted, not the heroes, and their lives are buried under regrets, guilt, nightmares and the eternal political struggle.
In the final, first-person section, a battle-worn Khalil leaves for the US besieged by incessant questions about a failed revolution and relationship, and is then drawn helplessly back to Egypt and his unfinished work. Switching between fiction and reportage, The City Always Wins captures the naïveté, idealism, disorientation, despair and eventual resurgence of hope that marked the Arab Spring. It leaves you with a taste of the revolution in your mouth: raw, consuming and vital.
THE CITY ALWAYS WINS LEAVES YOU WITH A TASTE OF THE REVOLUTION IN YOUR MOUTH: RAW, CONSUMING AND VITAL