Egypt and the Arab World lost one of the greatest and most poignant satirical writers in their histories a year ago, on Feb. 12, 2012. Galal Amer died at 59 after suffering a heart attack while participating in a demonstration in his native Alexandria against the military’s continued grip on power in Egypt. The demonstration was attacked by men supportive of the military, which led to clashes between them and the demonstrators. Watching in agony the regrettable sight unfolding in front of him, Amer was said to have suffered the heart attack and rushed to the hospital where he eventually drew his final breath. There was an immediate state of shock and an outpour of grief by his fans, in Egypt and elsewhere, who were — and remain — a huge and dedicated crowd.
It’s not only that Amer had become immensely popular while he was alive, but a big reason for the immense shock and grief was the fact that we had only recently come to know of the man and his seemingly effortless genius. Amer, a man of whose face exuded kindness and sharp humor, had begun to gain some real national recognition only a year or two before the revolution. I myself had only begun following him 2011, shortly after the revolution. But somehow, he suddenly skyrocketed to immense stardom after the uprising that brought down Hosni Mubarak. Some suggest it was because of the explosion in the use of social media in Egypt for which Amer’s sharp, often short, progressive and powerful satirical quotes and aphorisms served as a goldmine for tweets and Facebook posts, often by regular people claiming them as their own. His Twitter page was already one of the most popular in the Arab world, and there was a time when my Twitter timeline consisted significantly of his quotes being shared around by so many people, whether with or without attribution. Others suggested it was just because he had begun to get the national media attention he long deserved but rarely got.
