René Guénon’s first learned of Sufism from the Swedish Sufi Ivan Aguéli, who was also one of the most important contributors to Guénon’s first journal, La Gnose (1909-12). This was not the only journal for which Aguéli had written, however. He had previously been one of the main contributors to an Egyptian journal, Il Convito/Al-Nādi (1904-1907, with some later issues), published bilingually in Italian and Arabic. Il Convito/Al-Nādi is of importance to those who are interested in the origins of Traditionalism, as well as being of importance for the history of Italian colonial policy in the first decades of the twentieth century.
Aguéli and the journal are covered in a new book by Paul-André Claudel, Un journal "italo-islamique" à la veille de la Première Guerre mondiale : Il Convito / النادي [al-Nâdî] (Le Caire, 1904-1912) [An "Italian-Islamic" newspaper on the eve of World War I: Il Convito / النادي [al-Nâdî] (Cairo, 1904-1912)], published in Alexandria by Centre d'Etudes Alexandrines, 2023, €40, available in Europe from Peeters in Leuven (here)
Claudel’s book is half study, half anthology of texts from Il Convito/Al-Nādi, published here in both their original language (Italian or Arabic) and in French translation. It is illustrated by facsimiles of the various forms taken by Il Convito/Al-Nādi over the years and also by photographs of key actors and a small number of Egyptian street scenes.
The study consists of an introduction, seven chapters, and an epilogue. The seven chapters start with the history of the journal, the main actors—Aguéli and Enrico Insabato, the Italian who ran it—and their networks: Italian, French, Egyptian, and (less importantly) Turkish. Then comes “One newspaper, three languages,” looking at other comparable newspapers of the time, the relationship between the Italian, Arabic, and finally also Ottoman Turkish sections, at translations, and the linguistic role of Aguéli himself. This is followed by chapters on the journal’s positions on Islam and its polemics with other journals, especially concerning the question of the caliphate, a mosque named after Italy’s King Umberto I, and Italian policy in Tripolitania. The study then closes with a chapter on “Reception, influence, legacy.”
The chapter on Islam is one of the most important, given the relationship between Traditionalism and Islam today. Its sub-sections are:
- To know and to make known: the first editorial
- Reconnecting with spiritual and initiatory Islam
- Philo-Islamism and pan-Islamism
- Unmasking the "enemies of Islam”
- Deconstructing colonization
- Promoting Italy
- Between orientalism and colonialism
The anthology translates twenty texts, mostly by Aguéli, some by Insabato, and some anonymous (and probably also by Aguéli). In addition, the book contains a full index of all articles published and short biographies of all the main persons mentioned.
Claudel’s book provides us (if we read French) with almost everything we need to know about Il Convito/Al-Nādi and about Aguéli’s role in it. It supplements and deepens two discussions in English on the same topic in Anarchist, Artist, Sufi: The Politics, Painting, and Esotericism of Ivan Aguéli (ed. Mark Sedgwick, 2021, Bloomsbury, paperback now only £26.99), one by Claudel, “Ivan Aguéli's second period in Egypt, 1902–09: The intellectual spheres around Il Convito/Al-Nadi,” and one by Alessandra Marchi, ”Sufi Teachings for pro-Islamic Politics: Ivan Aguéli and Il Convito.” The book is also beautifully produced and printed, and reasonably priced.
