The first time I met Nawal—at least I think it was the first time—was at a women’s studies conference here in the United States sometime in the early 1980s. All I remember about that conference today was a conversation between Nawal and the woman who had invited her there, a conversation that, for some reason, I was party to. In the course of it, Nawal’s host—I’ll call her Ms. A.—was telling Nawal that she was not to speak about such and such issues. Nawal’s instant response was astonished outrage. “You’re telling me, Nawal El Saadawi,” she said, “what I can and cannot speak about?” This, obviously, was absurd, given that Nawal was famous for having gone to prison for saying and writing exactly what she thought. I joined her in her protest and Ms. A. soon backed down.
The author of more than forty books, Nawal was a dynamo of...
