Umm Kulthum and the Years of War Effort

Karim Jamal

An attempt to explore another side of Umm Kulthum, one whose features have largely disappeared since her death in the mid-1970s, and to delve into the hidden secrets of her parallel life—a national life that has positioned her in the popular consciousness as a pillar of Egyptian nationalism. Over the course of her long life, Umm Kulthum played many roles in our modern history, and her presence varied and differed according to the era and its men. However, after 1967, and after Umm Kulthum had imbibed the tears of the setback, she was possessed by a youthful spirit full of hope and capable of conquering the ordeal. Her presence as the most important female voice in the history of Arabism was compounded by a political and national presence, as Umm Kulthum advanced the artistic scene and mobilized her weapon, her voice, to highlight her presence on the battlefield as a symbol of the bold Egyptian will that refused to be broken by defeat, and as a model of the artist who was not broken by severity and whose voice was not silenced, or perhaps as a new image of the Egyptian goddess “Isis” who was resurrected this time from under the rubble of the battle to realize the limits of duty and appreciate the magnitude of the tragedy. She stood behind the war effort, roaming the globe from east to west, in an attempt to resurrect and restore the spirit to “Osiris,” that god embodied in the people who gave her halos Sanctity and infallibility, and raising her to the ranks of the nation’s prophets and heroines of popular biographies.