From the "Woman's Talk" Broadcasts on Radio Lebanon

A radio sitting with Miss Samira Azzam, supervisor of the Woman's Program at the Near East Station, presented by her colleague at Radio Lebanon, Edvick Jureidini Shayboub.

At half past four every afternoon the radio set brings us the voice of one of our announcer colleagues at the Near East Arab Broadcasting Station, saying "The Woman's Program." What is this program? And what is the aim of setting aside half an hour daily for women's programs? This is a question I put to myself before the supervision of the woman's corner at Radio Lebanon became my charge, and I recall that I believed, within myself, in the necessity of such a program's existence, and of its running daily if possible; but the station's circumstances do not at present permit more than this weekly corner. There is, however, a sister station, the Near East Station, whose means have allowed it to present the Woman's Program daily...

It was a surprise to me last week to meet a dear guest and a broadcasting colleague who holds the position of supervisor of the Woman's Program at the said station. I wished for a sitting to bring us together around the radio, to which a bond of familiarity ties us both, and I proposed that the atmosphere of the sitting be purely a broadcasting one, so that most of the talk would turn on the mission of radio with respect to woman.

I present to you, madam listener, our guest and colleague Miss Samira Azzam, and I ask her:

Q: Do you believe, as I do, Miss Samira, that the Woman's Program is a necessity for every broadcasting house?

A: That, at least, is what the broadcasting houses themselves believe... otherwise they would not set apart a special corner for woman. The birth of the Woman's Program at the Near East Station, for example, goes back six years... and from that day the men in charge have kept up presenting the corner daily... I personally believe in its necessity... for what concerns woman particularly may not appeal to the male listener... and there are, besides, certain talks of a purely feminine cast for which a special section must be set apart.

Q: Do you believe the program should stand alone... that is, be composed as though it were a comprehensive program?

A: To a certain extent, yes. In laying out the plan of the Woman's Program we take account of two considerations: the first is that this daily half hour is in the nature of an independent women's program, which must include everything apt to open the horizons of true life before the Arab woman, while concentrating its attention in the first degree on what is purely feminine and which the general program does not provide her.

Q: For example?

A: For example... talks on child-rearing, women's medicine, fashion, beauty care, the kitchen, and news of women's activity... unless, of course, matters should be turned upside down, and woman go out into public life... and these things become the specialty of men...

Q: While woman takes to parliament and the bench...

A: And smelting iron and driving tramways.

Q: Very well, and what is the second of the two considerations?

A: The second consideration is that the corner is a part of a whole that brings the listener varieties of culture, enjoyment, and diversion. Woman can therefore find in the whole what her daily corner has not room for.

Q: Cannot a man, for instance, find in your program something to please him?

A: Of course... there are many general treatments that interest both sexes. And that is why you see us present the Woman's Program with our traditional phrase, "Ladies and gentlemen"...

Q: Do you believe, Samira, that the Arab broadcasting houses have succeeded in performing their mission?

A: This question of yours is exceedingly sweeping and embarrassing... so allow me to go a roundabout way in my answer... I will say that some of them are still below the level required of an institution that plays a primary role in directing public opinion and educating the masses; and the listening public may have their share of the responsibility, and the fault of the shortcoming may come back to them...

Q: What exactly do you mean?

A: I mean that the broadcasting houses present what they believe the public relishes... not what the public actually relishes...

Q: And what is the reason for that?

A: Several reasons... among them that the public is passive to the point of not cooperating with those in charge, and does not write to them about what pleases it, what it longs to hear, or what it discerns some profit for itself in... and this is what most vexes those who run the stations...

Q: But this passivity does not keep the public from showing its displeasure with the radio programs.

A: That is ever our way... we are wreckers more than we are builders... we arm ourselves with attacks, while solutions are no business of ours... it is enough for us to criticize...

Q: That is what makes broadcasting work so very difficult.

A: Naturally; and do not forget the diversity of cultures and tastes — it is the first of the stations' obstacles... especially since the stations of the East cannot keep pace with the world stations by presenting three programs of differing levels at one and the same time... In any case, I come back and affirm that the scope for profiting from the radio is very wide indeed, if only the listener knew how to make use of it; and it is regrettable that the majority believe the radio's mission to be the provision of entertainment before all else... nothing in it concerns them but "Akl al-Balah" and "Ma Alli w-Ultillo"... and other such songs which lack true art and spread in the hearer a spirit of cheap flabbiness...

Q: Yes; and I may not be exaggerating if I say that the talks presented are perhaps heard by no one but the writer himself and the announcer...

A: And a very small minority of the interested.

Q: Let us now leave the side of generalities, that I may ask you a personal question... Do you love the work you do at the Near East Station?

A: This is the work that harmonizes with my nature; and my love of it could have grown had I felt a shade more response between me and the women listeners than actually obtains...

Q: And that is my own feeling exactly. I believe, Miss Samira, that the nature of your work as supervisor of the Woman's Program allows you to survey most of women's literary production in the Arab countries; what are your impressions of this activity in general?

A: Let's stay friends, the lady speakers and I... and I hope the listener will understand that what I have arrived at from my work over a short period cannot rightly be called sufficient experience... but that does not prevent my having certain impressions...

Q: Such as!

A: We have some strong women's pens that have won a distinguished place in the world of letters, but they still form a tiny minority... for there are pens still cutting their way; and what I hold against the pen-holders of this second class is that the idea is not the most prominent element of their talks... there are those who care for composition-style more than for the idea, and for the plain ease which the broadcasting style requires... This is a general phenomenon which it would be unjust to confine to women's writing, for it seems to me that most of those who supply the broadcasting houses with programs fancy themselves before an audience facing them, so they mount the steed of eloquence and raise their voices to an oratorical pitch.

Q: At the very time when the microphone demands a calm, even voice...

A: And a style of short, concentrated phrase.

Q: How did you feel when you faced the microphone for the first time?

A: My acquaintance with the microphone — and let us bow to the Language Academy's usage and say "the midhya'"... my acquaintance with it began before I joined my work, for I used to record the stories I sent to the program at the station's office in Beirut; but that did not prevent me from feeling a certain awe when I faced the midhya' for the first time with a live talk — I mean an unrecorded one — though that awe vanished entirely after a short companionship with the midhya'...

Q: Do you take part in the Woman's Program with talks and material you write yourself?

A: Of course, when need requires. And I make a point of presenting a monthly story.

Q: I have discerned in your writings from the start a particular bent toward the story; what incentives drove you to it?

A: The story was, and of course still is, the dearest of literary forms to my heart, since it is — provided it fulfills the conditions of the successful story — a truthful reflection of the human soul and of the environments and circumstances that surround it.

Q: What is the dearest story you have written so far?

A: I cannot specify; each of them has its place in my heart, and each has its own circumstances... In any case I am still at the beginning of the road, and my judgment on my modest collection may be ahead of its time.

Q: That is more modesty than is called for... I know also of your inclination to poetry — why do you not publish?

A: Because of my belief that the poets in any age are four... and my feeling that I shall never get beyond the fourth class... and besides, I hate distribution...

Q: Perhaps, Miss Samira, I have kept you overlong with questions at a time when you are fleeing the atmosphere of the studios... but I am confident that the gracious listeners have found in this sitting of yours much enjoyment and profit, and that from this moment they await your return on a coming holiday to hear you a second time. Thank you, my dear colleague.

A: And I thank you in your turn.