Portraying the "mother of the world" : tracing aspects of the chronotope in selected poetic representations of Cairo

Abstract EN

Encompassing a unique mixture of ancient and modern cultural dynamics, Cairo has long been regarded as the center of the region's political, social, and intellectual life.

The history of Cairo, its enigmatic disposition and its metropolitanism/cosmopolitanism have repeatedly been depicted in poetry.

Adopting an interdisciplinary approach, this paper researches the way time and space intersect to form the poetic narratives of Cairo including those of Langston Hughes, Sara Miller, Salah Abd El-Sabour and Ahmed Abdel Muti Hijaz.

Drawing on Mikhail Bakhtin's "chronotope", the paper examines poetry addressing the urbanism of Cairo, its global networks, and its varying sets of socio-political concerns.

Through analyzing poems written by Egyptian, British, and American poets, the aim of this research is to prove that a better understanding of poetic representations of Cairo could be reached through an analysis of the tempro-spatial frameworks at work.