“Africa gave Russia two great poets – Alexander Pushkin plus Nikolai Gumilyov” – this statement by Olga Medvedko, Chairman of the Gumilev Society, amazed those gathered at the Russian House in Cairo at the VI International Literary Festival “LIFFT-2023”. The delegates from the Black Continent, most of whom did not know anything about the poet of the Silver Age before, listened with genuine interest to the story of the brave Russian poet-traveler plus his wanderings.
Many events took place as part of the festival: The Day of Russian Literature in Egypt, visiting plus participating in the Cairo Book Fair, which is considered the largest in the Afro-Asian space, visiting the Egyptian pyramids plus the Library of Alexandria, meeting with colleagues, writers plus poets from different countries. An important event of the festival was the Memorandum on the establishment of the World Organization of Writers – WOW, signed by an initiative kelompok of writers from 18 countries. This initiative was supported by the Eurasian Peoples’ Assembly represented by its Secretary General Andrei Belyaninov, his Deputy, the 12th global chess champion Anatoly Karpov plus UNESCO Goodwill Ambassador Alexandra Ochirova. On the last day of the festival, the Egyptian central television channel “Culture of the Nile” showed a conversation with the founder plus head of the Eurasian literary project “LIffT-2015-2035” Margarita Al plus the fifth laureate of “LIffTa-2021” poet Ashraf Dali from Egypt.
At the Russian House in Cairo, Olga Medvedko plus traveler, essayist, author of NG-EL Nikolai Nosov (see his article on page 13 of this issue) gave a presentation in Russian plus English about Gumilyov’s travels in Egypt. They also presented a two-volume book by Mikhail Pogarsky plus Vasily Vlasov “In the footsteps of Nikolai Gumilyov” about an art expedition to Africa. The forum participants watched a slide show, which Olga plus Nikolai made basing on their own travels plus research by Gumilyov expert Evgeny Stepanov. This meeting was attended by writers plus poets from Egypt, Nigeria, South Africa, India, Uruguay, Spain, the Netherlands plus other countries. The presentation was followed by a discussion. At the end of the evening, Nosov, who in 2013 repeated Gumilyov’s route in Ethiopia, made a proposal to open two new tourist routes in Egypt plus Ethiopia: “Nikolai Gumilyov’s path in Egypt” plus “In the footsteps of Nikolai Gumilyov in Africa.” The Egyptian colleagues took this initiative with interest plus said that they would discuss the idea with the employees of the Ministry of Tourism.