Samir1 was born in Egypt in 1931 to an Egyptian father and a French mother.
Both his parents were medical doctors and came from bourgeois society, but they were not reactionary, he says. His mother came from a family of convinced Jacobins, whereas his father was a left-wing ‘wafdist’, a bourgeois democrat with nationalist beliefs, but modernist nationalist beliefs that, culturally speaking, were not anti-European.
Samir completed his primary and secondary education in Egypt at the Lycee Frangais, of which he has fond memories.
According to him, this establishment was of a high level of culture and disseminated very progressive ideas. He says that he learnt a lot about the history of Egypt there, more than Egyptians do in Egyptian schools. His secondary school years took place during the Second World War. During these times, Egyptian students from the Lycee Frangais, who represented a significant minority, were extremely politicized. They were divided between two groups, the communists and the nationalists. The latter were somewhat anti-British, though not pro-German, let alone pro-Nazi. The students belonging to the communist trend granted more importance to the social dimension of the problem and saw links between imperialism and colonialism and the class structure of Egyptian society. Samir belonged to this latter movement.1.1
More on the topic Samir1 was born in Egypt in 1931 to an Egyptian father and a French mother.:
-
World history -