Encyclopedia of Fantasy (1997)
Cairo
Tagged: Theme.
Cairo is a venue for Urban Fantasy. As such, it tends to be used in tales whose attitude towards the Land of Fable of Arabian Fantasy is ironized (see Revisionist Fantasy) or negative. Robert Irwin's The Arabian Nightmare (1983), for instance, treats Cairo as part of the nightmare, not as a backdrop. Fantasies of History – like Edward Whittemore's Jerusalem Quartet, and Name of the Beast (1992) by Daniel Easterman (1949- ) – routinely evoke Cairo as a place of allure and suffocation. [JC]