Nawal El Saadawi is an Egyptian author born on October 27, 1931 in Kafr Tahla, Egypt. She demonstrated a natural intelligence and poise at a young age as well as an interest in the medical science. She attended Cairo University to become a doctor. While a student in college, she immediately recognized the discrimination against women who pursue an education. These abuses led to her writing a book entitled Woman and Sex, which confronts societal prejudices against women.
In 1955, Saadawi wrote and published another feminist novel, Memoirs of a Woman Doctor. While Woman and Sex honed in on the topic of women’s sexuality in a patriarchal community, this book focuses on discrimination in the workplace. As a child, Saadawi was taught by her mother that men were natural leaders and biologically superior to women. Upon attending university, she realized that this statement had no validity and that she was, in fact, fully capable of outdoing her male peers.
Saadawi’s work is provocative and revelatory about issues of gender equality. Her words ring true even in the modern day where abuse and discrimination are still prominent across all places of work. Saadawi reminds women that they are strong and are equal to men no matter what.
