Ahmed Toughan, who began his career as a teenager in the early 1940s and was one of the young stars of the Rus Al-Yousef era (far predating the sham publication it later became). A man who lived a simple life, avoided the limelight, enjoyed his drink and cigarette all the way into his late 80s. Most importantly was his commitment to tackle imperialism in all its forms. His 50,000+ cartoons on British colonialism, decades of Israeli aggression, the Algerian revolution, petrocultures, third world predicaments (poverty, unemployment, authoritarianism, ignorance, illiteracy, sectarianism, radicalism etc), and the US invasion and occupation of Iraq are a hefty legacy to leave behind. While he may not have had the political acumen to foresee or anticipate how matters unfolded in the region, he nevertheless drew from his heart--which explains his equivocation and uncertainty over the years. Despite this, he knew who his adversaries were. His cartoons aside, he was a storyteller par excellence and laughed incessantly even in the most dire of times. He often described his life as one of an "itinerant vagabond."
Adel Iskandar
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| Published in Al-Gomhorriya on October 19, 1956. It represents a British soldier being told by his superior, "your father died defending the Trading Co. in India, and your uncle died in Malaya for the Rubber Co., so you are from a very reputable family that defended its country"! |
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| Toughan loved the character of the "ghafeer" who he represented in different ways--both admirably and critically. He was part of the security apparatus of the state and he was the guardian of people's lives. Here is a utopian image of a ghafeer on guard in a rural village as everyone slept. (1948) |
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Ahmed Toughan 1996 |
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Ahmed Toughan 1996 |
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Ahmed Toughan 1996 |
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