Who is Taha Hussein?

Taha Hussein was born on 14 November 1889, in Al-Menya province, Upper Egypt, and was the seventh of thirteen children, in a lower middle-class family.
At a very early age, he contracted a simple eye infection and due to faulty treatment by an unskilled local practitioner, was blinded, causing him great anguish throughout his life.

Taha Hussein

He attended the Kuttab (a school where children learn the Holy Quran, as well as reading and writing) the later joined Al-Azhar University, where he acquired thorough knowledge of religion and Arabic literature in the traditional manner. He felt deep discontent with the narrow thinking and conservatism of his tutors.

University education

In 1908, he learned of the founding of a new, secular university as part of a national effort to promote education in Egypt under British occupation and was very keen on joining it. Although he was blind and poor, he was able to overcome many obstacles and was admitted to that university.
Taha Hussein stated later in his book Al-Ayyam (The days) that the doors of knowledge were, from that day onwards, widely opened to him. He was the first graduate of his university to receive a PhD on the skeptic poet and philosopher Abu Ala’a Al-Ma’arri.

Marriage

Again with difficulty, Taha Hussein was sent to study in France, through the university’s educational mission. His blindness caused him continuing anguish, aggravated by a careless brother, presumably sent to take care of him. It was in France that he met his ‘sweet voice’, Suzanne, who read to him, since not all the references he needed were available in Braille. She later became his wife, his mentor, advisor, assistant, mother of his children, great love and best friend.
He stated that since he first heard that ‘sweet voice’ anguish never entered his heart. After his death, she wrote Ma’ak (With you), published in Arabic, a touching remembrance of their life together.

Sorbonne PhD