57. 20th century, Cairo

The MiraculousDec/Jan 2023–24Music

Featured in 27 movies and 1,200 musical recordings, this Egyptian singer-actress becomes one of her country’s greatest and highest-paid stars. In her late 20s, shortly after marrying an Egyptian Muslim, she converts to Islam from the Judaism of her birth. A few years later she is named the official singer of the Egyptian Revolution, but infighting among Revolutionary leaders leads to her marginalization. Then she is accused of having secretly visited Tel Aviv and donating 50,000 Egyptian pounds to the IDF. Desperate to save her reputation and career, she releases her bank statements and passport. Even though these documents support her denial of the allegations made against her and even though the Egyptian government clears her of them, her career suffers, compelling her to announce her retirement at the age of 38. What follow are 42 years of ill-health, depression, divorces, political persecution and steeply declining fortunes.

(Layla Murad, born Lillian Zaki Murad Mordechai)

Raphael Rubinstein is the New York-based author of The Miraculous (Paper Monument, 2014) and A Geniza (Granary Books, 2015). Excerpts from his recently completed book Libraries of Sand about the Jewish-Egyptian writer Edmond Jabès have appeared in Bomb, The Fortnightly Review and 3:AM Magazine. In January 2023, Bloomsbury Academic will publish a collection of his writing titled Negative Work: The Turn to Provisionality in Contemporary Art. Since 2008 he has been Professor of Critical Studies at the University of Houston School of Art.