Cairo Swan Song, shortlisted for the inaugural International Prize for Arabic Fiction in 2008, follows Mustafa, a disillusioned former student radical making a documentary about Cairo’s street children with his American girlfriend. The novel moves through downtown Cairo’s artists, intellectuals, activists, opportunists, and outsiders, tracing a city where private desire, political defeat, and social abandonment have become almost impossible to separate.
Reviews
“[…] given the city’s political and social climate, that may be about right. Either way, it seems hard to argue with the air of desperation and resignation Said’s characters and prose evoke.” — The Independent (AUC Press)
“At its best, Cairo Swan Song does hold up a mirror to something very real about the line between art, charity, and profiting off other people’s exotic misery.” — Rain Taxi (Full review)
“For all of Mekkawi Said’s characters’ bad decisions, false starts, and negative pursuits, it is their humanity that ultimately crystallizes and redeems them as characters, fascinating characters. The translation by Adam Talib is vibrant and totally engaging” — CounterPunch (AUC Press)