Academic literature on the topic 'Urdu poetry'

Allama Muhammad Iqbal started his poetry from Urdu ode or amatory verses. But very soon he started his poetry in Persian. Iqbal realized that the skirt of Urdu language is very narrow for his ideas and thoughts. He recognized that Urdu is a young inexperienced language. Urdu is spoken, written and reading in a limited part of the subcontinent. On the other hand person is an old and experienced language of the world and is spoken, written and reading in a vast part of the Muslim world. Persian language keeps the most valuable assets of poetry and prose. The Persians odes of Allama Iqbal are found in Piyam-e-mashriq and Zaboor-e-Ajam. Some Urdu odes of Iqbal are found in Bang-e-Dara and Zarb-e-kaleem, but the most important odes are found in his famous book of Urdu poetry named as Bal-e-jibreel. This collection of poems by Allama Iqbal is very important, because what is clearly stated in his Persian odes, is what is indicated in Bal-e-Jibreel. The first part of Bal-e-Jibreel consists of ghazals. Essentially, these ghazals portray the same meaning that the Persian ghazals imply. However, the experimental writing of these ghazals, the sheer talent employed in this book are as climactic in terms of poetry.

This essay aims at understanding the development and struggles of a ‘female voice’ within Urdu poetic tradition through the writings of women poets of the Nineteenth century in contrast to the women poets of the twentieth-century feminist movement. The women in traditional Urdu poetry have remained a silent cruel beloved, the image offered is that of a ‘feckless beloved, endowed with heavenly beauty, reigned: fair to face, doe-eyed, dark hair, tall and willowy, a woman who vacillated from indifference, shyness and modesty to wanton cruelty. The essay is an attempt to understand the level of autonomy of the female voice in the poems of women poets through the years. To portray the development of a feminine expression in Urdu poetry the paper will be ranging from the poems of tawaifs (courtesan) of the eighteenth century like Mah Laqa Chanda, their attempts to acquire a place within the patrilineal Urdu literary tradition; the rekhti tradition where men wrote poems in a female voice, to the twentieth century feminist poets like Kishwar Naheed and Fehmida Riaz. The paper is based on Hakim Fasihuddin Ranj’s anthology ‘Baharistan-i-Naz’ which provides a brief yet important introduction on the status of various tawaif poets within the Urdu literary circle; Rahat Azmi’s Halat-i-Mah Laqa, a biographical work on the life and works of Mah Laqa Bai Chanda; and Rukhsana Ahmad’s ‘We Sinful Women’, a compilation of the original and translated works of feminist women poets of twentieth-century Pakistan. Various secondary sources have been used to understand the dynamics behind the writing style of these poets and how similar terms came to be used for portraying completely distinct themes.

Anglophone literary works usually refer implicitly or explicitly to the culture, language and literature of authors’ native lands. Nadeem Aslam is one such author who makes explicit use of native language and literature in his fiction. Most of his works refer to classical Urdu poetry, phrases and extended adjectives to embellish as well as celebrate the rich legacy of the classical Urdu poetry tradition. Thus, intertextuality is a predominant feature of Aslam’s latest novel, The Golden Legend (2017). It is is not only an intertextual narrative but also an intercultural and inter-linguistic text because it incorporates popular classical Urdu poetry’s diction, metaphors and symbols. Aslam employs old poetic expressions and connects them to specific contexts of the characters in his novels. For instance, Urdu expressions like zamana and chaaragar are of special importance in the narrative structure of the novel. Moreover, the spatial structures of ‘garden’ and ‘Cordoba Mosque’ connect this text with classical Urdu literary tradition. Additionally, the English translations of many Urdu verses enrich the implied meanings of this novel. This study conducts a hermeneutic textual analysis of Aslam’s novel according to the theoretical frameworks of ‘intertextuality’ proposed by Julia Kristeva and Gerard Gennette. This paper contends that the use of Urdu language and literature is not random but a deliberate narrative technique that demonstrates the relevance of Urdu classical poetry to the contemporary socio-political situation of Pakistan. The Golden Legend illustrates the continuing relevance of Urdu classical poetry for present-day Pakistan and forges a new literary tradition of Urdu inspired poetic-prose in the mainstream contemporary Anglophone fiction.

This study delves into the use of English Diction in modern Urdu poetry and its impact on the stylistic context. The research focuses on selected poets and their incorporation of English words and phrases into their Urdu poetry. The study aims to understand how this inclusion affects the literary style and meaning of the poetry. It also explores the sociolinguistic implications of this phenomenon on the Urdu language and the relationship between the poets and their audience. This article aims to explore the stylistic implications of this trend through a stylistic analysis of the selected Urdu poets: Asad Muhammad Khan, Iftikhar Jalib, Salim-ul-Rehman, Akhtar Usman, Azra Abbas, Afzal Ahmed Syed, Zahra Nagah, Parveen Shakir, Zee Shan Sahil, Naseer Ahmad Nasir, Ali Muhammad Farshi, Waheed Ahmad, Rawish Nadeem and Arshad Meraj. The influence of English on Urdu can be seen as a reflection of the increasing globalization and Westernization of Pakistani society. The poets included in this study represent different generations and come from different parts of Pakistan, but they all share a common experience of growing up in a society that is increasingly exposed to English. The stylistic implications of the use of English Diction in Urdu poetry are varied and complex. On one hand, it can be seen as a way of enriching the poetic language, bringing new nuances and connotations to the Urdu lexicon.

The contemporary needs, demands, and challenges and their impact on our modern poetry are very pertinent to mention here that contemporary consciousness is very necessary for modern poets and poetry. Challenges of the modern era and contemporary consciousness are the main sources to impress the mind and soul of the Creator and such literature plays a significant role in society. The poets realize, analyze and judge the surrounding issues of their era and discuss them in their poetry. Succinctly we can say that the contemporary demands and challenges have a deep impact on modern poetry.

Translation of poetry is a hard nut to crack. Especially, when it is loaded with cultural connotations. Beyond any doubt, translation demands linguistic and cultural skills from a translator to express meanings. Hence, the process of translation becomes challenging when both the source language and the target language belong to two different language families. The present study explores the linguistic challenges faced by translators when translating Faiz Ahmad Faiz’s Urdu poetry into English. The researchers have found that translating Urdu metaphorical expressions and compound words used in Faiz’s Urdu poetry is near to impossible as these expressions are rooted in specific cultural, social, political and historical backgrounds.

In Baluchistan, the inception of Urdu poetry was delayed compared to other major literary centers of Urdu. There are several important reasons for this, which, along with the unfamiliarity of this remote region with Urdu as a language, the unavailability of chronological links from a research point of view bears specific importance. According to the known facts, the first voice of Urdu poetry was Mulla Muhammad Hassan Brahui; even after him, this region's poetic journey seems to have been divided into large time gaps. This paper presents an analytical study of Urdu Ghazal, which was created in Baluchistan until the establishment of Pakistan. These initial relics of Urdu Ghazal in Baluchistan are not more than practiced forms, so they mostly fail to present a high specimen of creativity. However, under the influence of this poetic capital, this tradition of Urdu Ghazal got strengthened here in Baluchistan, and afterward, through this route, high and unique features of Urdu Ghazal appeared here, which can be proudly compared to the overall Urdu Ghazal.

Abstract This essay shows how the Islamic Persianate poetic tradition is a critical conceptual resource for imagining futures in which poetry is a technology of congregation through which futures are postulated, negotiated, and lived. The essay engages the multilingual poetic milieu of Kashmir (Urdu, Persian, and Kashmiri) in the first half of the twentieth century, offering an inaugural analysis of the itinerant nature of Persian, Urdu, and Kashmiri poetry in relation to the form of ghazal and its consequences for future making. Kashmiri poets and critics, in poetry as well as prose, made prominent contributions to the literary and political debates about the purposes and potentialities of poetry as a socially aware public form in an anti-imperial context, a theme that animated multiple Urdu and Persian literary circles from the 1930s.

Mirza Asadullah Khan Ghalib is amongst the most eminent poets & writers of India. His poetry & letters, both in Persian & Urdu, remain a significant part of India’s literary history. Ghalib not only proved his command in Urdu poetry but also showed his abilities and mastery in Persian verse. He was proud of his Persian poetry and is rightfully considered amongst the most prominent Persian poets of his time. Many translators and critics have attempted to translate & write commentaries on his Persian poetry, both in prose and versified. Amongst these critics & translators, several individuals had the potential of taking forward the translations of Ghalib’s Persian Poetry into Urdu and produced many notable translations. In This study, we shall first introduce their translations and then present a comparative analysis of their prose translations to determine which translator was more successful in terms of considering all the minute textual details.