The Picnic at Sakkara is a 1955 novel by P. H. Newby. It is about a lecturer at Cairo University, Edgar Perry, during the rule of King Farouk. He becomes tutor to a pasha, and is swept into a conflict between Western ways and the Moslem Brotherhood. It is a comedic novel. It is the first novel of the Anglo-Egyptian comic trilogy, the others being Revolution and Roses (1957) and A Guest and His Going (1960).
Reception Anthony Thwaite called it "wonderful", and said that it was Newby's "most successful and memorable achievement."Obituary:P.H. Newby, in The Independent; published September 9, 1997; retrieved September 11, 2019 Kirkus Reviews, however, found it to be "idiosyncratic" and an acquired taste.THE PICNIC AT SAKKARA, reviewed in Kirkus Reviews; first published August 23, 1955; retrieved September 11, 2019
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