Nawal El Saadawi

(1931 - 2021)

In 1972 novelist and doctor Nawal El Saadawi lost her job as director general of public health in Egypt as a result of her book Women and Sex, which criticized the practice of female genital mutilation. In 2002 an Islamist lawyer filed suit to have her forcibly divorced from her husband of nearly four decades on the basis of apostasy. The case was dismissed.