| The Picnic at Sakkara | |
| Author: | P.H. Newby |
| Country: | UK |
| Language: | English |
| Genre: | Fiction |
| Publisher: | Jonathan Cape |
| Published: | 1955 |
| Pages: | 239 |
The Picnic at Sakkara is a 1955 novel by P.H. Newby.[1] It is about a lecturer at Cairo University, Edgar Perry, during the rule of King Farouk. He becomes tutor to a pasha, and is swept into a conflict between Western ways and the Moslem Brotherhood. It is a comedic novel.[2] It is the first novel of the Anglo-Egyptian comic trilogy, the others being Revolution and Roses (1957) and A Guest and His Going (1960).[3]
Anthony Thwaite called it "wonderful", and said that it was Newby's "most successful and memorable achievement."[4] Kirkus Reviews, however, found it to be "idiosyncratic" and an acquired taste.[5]