| Mohammed Hussein Heikal محمد حسين هيكل | |
| Birth Date: | 20 August 1888 |
| Birth Place: | Mansoura, Egypt |
| Death Place: | Cairo, Egypt |
| Nationality: | Egyptian |
Mohammed Hussein Heikal (Arabic: محمد حسين هيكل pronounced as /mæˈħæmmæd ħeˈseːn ˈheːkæl/; August 20, 1888 – December 8, 1956) was an Egyptian writer, journalist, politician. He held several cabinet posts, including minister of education.
Haekal was born in Kafr Ghannam, Mansoura, Ad Daqahliyah in 1888. He obtained a B.A. in Law in 1909 and a PhD from the Sorbonne University in Paris in 1912. While a student in Paris, he composed what is considered the first authentic Egyptian novel, Zaynab. After returning to Egypt, he worked as a lawyer for 10 years, then as a journalist. He published articles in Al Jarida. He was the cofounder of Al Siyasa newspaper, the organ of the Liberal Constitutionalist party for which he was also an adviser[1] and was also elected as its editor-in-chief. In 1937, he was appointed as minister of state for the interior ministry in Muhammad Mahmoud Pasha's second government. In November 1940 he was appointed minister of education to the cabinet led by Hussein Sirri Pasha.[2] In this post he introduced several reforms, including decentralization, by establishing educational zones and making programs and curricula nationally oriented. He was greatly influenced and inspired by the comprehensive reforms of Mohammad Abduh, Ahmed Lutfi el-Sayed and Qasim Amin. One of his protégés was the historian Husayn Fawzi al-Najjar.
Heikal is the father of seven children: Ateya, Taheya, Hussein, Hedeya, Bahiga, Fayza Haikal, and Ahmad. Fayza teaches Egyptology at the American University in Cairo.
Many critics have considered the novel Zeinab, written by Heikal 1913, as the 'first modern Egyptian novel.[3] However, some scholars have debated this, with Elliot Colla reaching a conclusion that this label had more to do with "the needs of national institutions such as the cinema, the Parliament, or Cairo University, at moments of formation or reformation than it does with the texts themselves."[4] Colla went on to conclude that Zaynab became recognized as part of the national literary tradition not at the moment of its initial production but in subsequent circumstances of reception and reproduction tied to other non-literary significances.
His works include: