Nawal El Saadawi was born in Kafr Tahla in 1931 and studied medicine at the University of Cairo.
She worked for women's rights, against female genital mutilation and was imprisoned for her views in 1981. In 1982, she founded the Arab Women's Solidarity Association, an organization that was later abolished by the authorities.
During Sadat's rule, Nawal El Saadawi went into exile in Europe, and from 1992 to 1996 she was a guest lecturer at Duke University in the United States, before returning to Egypt.
She participated in the demonstrations in Cairo in the Arab Spring of 2011.
Nawal El Saadawi debuted as a writer with a collection of short stories in 1957 and several of her works have been translated into Swedish, including "Revolutionsskrivarna" and "Den stulna romanen".
She was awarded the Stig Dagerman Prize in 2012.
Most recently in 2018, Nawal El Sadaawi visited Sweden and the Book Fair in Gothenburg, where she participated in a conversation with Swedish Radio's foreign correspondent Cecilia Uddén.