reality and history, in a nexus of modernity and tradition. In cAbd al-Xabnr’s
readings as well as in the readings of other poets of his generation and their
disciples and opponents, prose as a mediated genre, and prose as prosimetrum
(i.e. a mixture of prose and verse) emerges in its own right. Its genealogical
succession assumes significance, as the modern poets go beyond the early
classical discussions of rhetoric toward autobiographical investigation of self-
hood at the thresholds of modernity, postmodernity, and tradition with its
variegated legacy of Odes, lyrics, short sayings, aphorisms, popular poetry,
and embeddings. As the next chapter argues, poets’ concerns and engage-
ments with their past gained more urgency under the pressure of modernity,
yet the proximity of the latter stimulated new outlooks and enhanced new
insights into the past and the present, demanding a corresponding critique of
multiple accentuations and a variety of strategies to cope with the growing
corpus of modern poetry.
THE TRADITION/MODERNITY NEXUS