introduction

Arabic Literature in the Post-Classical Period is the latest, and probably the last, of a series of volumes entitled The Cambridge History of Arabic Literature, the first of which was published in 1983. While it is the latest, its subject matter is not the most recent period in the Arabic literary heritage; the publication date of the volume devoted to that topic, entitled Modern Arabic Literature (ed. M. M. Badawi), precedes that of this volume by several years. The current work thus finds itself challenged to find a place in the midst of an organizational matrix that has already been established, in one way or another, by the other volumes in the series. Before proceeding with a discussion of the rationale for this volume, I propose to step back and consider some of the ramifications that have inevitably resulted from not only the subject matter of this volume but also the principles that have been adopted in its preparation as part of this series of works devoted to the Arabic literary tradition.

The term ‘post-classical period’ has not been frequently used in order to delineate a specific period in the development of the heritage of Arabic literature. Its use as the title of this volume is intended as a form of shorthand for what might otherwise have been dubbed (were it not for the cumbersome nature of the result) ‘the post-classical and pre-modern period’. In other words, this substantial central segment in the history of Arabic literary creativity suffers the fate of everything that is characterized by being in the ‘midst’ (as I noted above).