Why did an Egyptian intellectual keep a painting of cockroaches on a cake?

Ideas & Philosophy · Published 3 October 2026 Swipe more like this →

In short: Abbas Mahmoud al-Aqqad was a self-taught polymath who shaped 20th-century Arabic thought. Yet, his private life was defined by intense, symbolic rituals—including a bizarre painting in his bedroom that served as a daily reminder of his cynical view on fame, beauty, and the corrupting nature of the public spotlight.

Born in Aswan in 1889, Abbas Mahmoud al-Aqqad rose from modest beginnings to become one of Egypt’s most influential literary figures. With only an elementary education, he transformed himself into a polymath by spending his entire allowance on books, eventually mastering English, French, and German literature. His intellectual output was staggering, spanning over a hundred books and thousands of articles on philosophy, history, and religion. He was a founding member of the Al-Diwan poetry school and a vocal political commentator, a stance that led to his imprisonment between 1930 and 1931 for criticizing the government.

Al-Aqqad’s life was marked by a fierce independence and a complex relationship with the public sphere. During World War II, he fled to Sudan to escape potential reprisals from Nazi forces after writing 'Hitler in the Balance' in 1940, a scathing critique of Nazism. His personal life was equally dramatic. He famously ended a relationship with the actress Madiha Yousri because of her career, viewing the entertainment industry as a destructive force. This disillusionment was immortalized by a painting he kept in his bedroom: a beautiful cake covered in crawling cockroaches. He viewed this as a symbol of purity—the cake—being tainted by the glamor of the spotlight—the cockroaches.

Despite his often abrasive public persona, al-Aqqad was a titan of Egyptian letters. He was a member of the Academy of the Arabic Language and received the State Appreciation Award in Literature in 1958. He is perhaps best remembered for his 'Abqarīyat' (Geniuses) series, which explored the lives of key historical figures, including the Sahabah. When he died in 1964, he left behind a legacy that was later dramatized in the television series 'The Giant'. Today, his influence persists, not just in his vast body of work, but in the streets of Cairo that still bear his name.

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