Egyptian playwright Ibrahim El-Husseini will present “Protests, Poets and Playwrights: The Artistic Response to the Egyptian Revolution” at 3:30 p.m. Thursday, April 5, in the Tom H. Jackson Building.

Ibrahim El-Husseini

El-Husseini will discuss his recent play “Comedy of Sorrows (Commedia Al-Ahzaan),” which he wrote following the 2011 Egyptian revolution. It follows a diverse group of people who gather in a public square to overthrow the existing regime.

The focus is a college-educated young woman named Doha, who learns how little she understood about her country as she encounters fellow rebels, including two university-educated young men living in a garbage dump and a village fiancé of a martyr killed in the square.

El-Husseini’s previous plays include “The Final Days of Akhenaton,” “Tattoo Birds,” “The Piper,” “Museum of Human Organs,” “Garden of the Drunk” and “Seduction.” He has said that he wants to provide his audiences “with Arab reality, especially Egyptian reality, and ways that the theater in particular is able to absorb that reality.”

The English translation of “Comedy of Sorrows” has been produced by Dr. Mohammed Albakry, associate professor of applied linguistics at MTSU, and Rebekah Maggor, lecturer in English at Vanderbilt University.

El-Husseini’s presentation is free and open to the public. The MTSU Middle East Center and the MTSU Office of International Affairs are sponsoring the event.

For more information, contact Dr. Allen Hibbard at 615-494-8809 or allen.hibbard@mtsu.edu.

— Gina K. Logue (Gina.Logue@mtsu.edu)