so limited in comparison with the more popular types of drama. It was such problems in the realm of both production and reception that seem to have led al-Hakim to use some of his play-prefaces in order to develop the notion of his plays as 'théâtre des idées', works for reading rather than performance. However, in spite of such critical controversies, he continued to write plays with philosophical themes culled from a variety of cultural sources: Pygmalion (1942), an interesting blend of the legends of Pygmalion and Narcissus. Some of al-Hakim's frustrations with the performance aspect were diverted by an invitation in 1945 to write a series of short plays for publication in newspaper article form. These works were gathered together into two collections, Masrah al-Mugtama (Theatre of Society, 1950) and al-Masrah al-Munawwa (Theatre Miscellany, 1956). The most memorable of these plays is Ughniyyat al-Mawt (Death Song), the play formed the basis of an Egyptian short film under the same name starring Faten Hamama, a one-act play that with masterly economy depicts the fraught atmosphere in Upper Egypt as a family awaits the return of the eldest son, a student in Cairo, for him to carry out a murder in response to the expectations of a blood feud. Another plays include Sahira (Witch), which formed a popular Egyptian short film by the same name, starring Salah Zulfikar and Faten Hamama. Al-Hakim's response to the social transformations brought about by the 1952 revolution, which he later criticized, was the play, Al Aydi Al Na'imah (Soft Hands, 1954). The 'soft hands' of the title refer to those of a prince of the former royal family who finds himself without a meaningful role in the new society, a position in which he is joined by a young academic who has just finished writing a doctoral thesis on the uses of the Arabic preposition hatta. The play explores in an amusing, yet rather obviously didactic fashion, the ways in which these two apparently useless individuals set about identifying roles for themselves in the new socialist context. While this play may be somewhat lacking in subtlety, it clearly illustrates in the context of al-Hakim's development as a playwright the way in which he had developed his technique in order to broach topics of contemporary interest, not least through a closer linkage between the pacing of dialogue and actions on stage. His play formed the basis