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]

The Picnic at Sakkara
First edition
AuthorP.H. Newby
LanguageEnglish
GenreFiction
Published1955
PublisherJonathan Cape
Publication placeUK
Pages239

Reception

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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]

References

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  1. ^ Newby, Percy Howard (13 August 1964). "The Picnic at Sakkara". Faber & Faber. Retrieved 13 August 2019 – via Google Books.
  2. ^ "The Picnic at Sakkara". Retrieved 13 August 2019.
  3. ^ Blamires, Harry (1986). Twentieth-century English literature. Macmillan history of literature (2nd ed.). Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire: Macmillan. p. 200. ISBN 978-0-333-42810-8.
  4. ^ Obituary:P.H. Newby, in The Independent; published September 9, 1997; retrieved September 11, 2019
  5. ^ THE PICNIC AT SAKKARA, reviewed in Kirkus Reviews; first published August 23, 1955; retrieved September 11, 2019