Vijay Prashad has a nice review of a new collection of Urdu poetry up at this month’s issue of Himal Southasian. 
The book is called Anthems of Resistance, and it’s edited by Ali Husain Mir and Raza Mir, two brothers from Hyderabad who now teach at universities in the U.S. (While it’s not for sale in the U.S. yet, this Indian book-seller will send it to you for $7.00 USD + postage.)
Prashad’s opening by itself raises some interesting questions (and memories):
In 1981, the cinema theatre near my home in Calcutta became a mehfil-e-mushaira. At the end of each show, majnoohs walked out of the darkness humming tunes and reciting ghazals. Muzaffar Ali’s Umrao Jaan allowed non-Urdu speakers to revel in the richness of Urdu culture, which most of us non-Muslims saw as exotic and attractive, yet distant. (Muslim culture would be further rendered exotic in 1982 in two films, Nikaah and Deedar-e-yaar.) These are all films of decline, where a supposedly homogenous Muslim culture is rife with problems – some easy to overcome (divorce rates), and others intractable (the demise of the kotha culture). The elegance of the language thrilled many urbane Indians, who enjoyed the patois but felt uncomfortable with the working-class and rural sections that actually spoke it. (link)
This is an interesting analysis of the appeal of Ghazals and the musical Mehfil culture of to many non-Muslims. Of course, the cinematic culture (i.e., the tawaif, or courtesan film) he’s referring to is now long dead, as the writers who wrote the songs and scripts of Bollywood’s early Urdu films are now gone (Kaifi Azmi died in 2002). Recent films like Fanaa have temporarily revived popular interest in Shayari (the recitation of poetic couplets), but in my view it’s more a gimmick than anything else. (I frankly don’t know what to make of Aishwarya Rai’s recent remake of Umrao Jaan.)
The rest of Prashad’s review is about the poets themselves — the writers of the Progressive Writers’ Association — who wrote as much about politics as they did about love. (I wrote about another PWA writer, Ismat Chughtai, here. Also, see Saadat Hasan Manto, who was not a member of the PWA as far as I know, though he did have certain things in common with them)As their name implies, the PWA writers leaned left politically — and not just a little left! And while the communist slant of some of this writing may not be appealing to many readers, the radical stance they took gave these writers the freedom (and will) to openly criticize the failings of the post-independence governments of India and Pakistan. Here’s Sahir Ludhianvi:
Zara mulk ke rahbaron ko bulaao
Ye kooche, ye galiyaan, ye manzar dikhaao
Jinhen naaz hai Hind par unko laao
Jinhen naaz hai Hind par voh kahaan hai?
Go, fetch the leaders of the nation
Show them these streets, these lanes, these sights
Summon them, those who are proud of India
Those who are proud of India, where are they?(link)
And just to be clear, Anthems of Resistance also contains selections from poets critical of Pakistan’s various failings. (Prashad quotes from the feminist poet Kishwar Naheed, who criticizes the Islamization initiatives of Zia-ul-Haq)
Incidentally, while Googling the word “Tawaif” for this post, I came across this review of a documentary film on “Gurias, Gossip, and Globalization,” which may be of interest to readers curious about Indo-Islamic courtesan culture.
thanks, amardeep. i do know there are some university cultural celebrations trying to revamp the mehfil (how postmodern, hehe) concept but i don’t know if they are particularly successful as most of these shows still focus on the bhangra/bollywood elements.
Gurias looks great!
Ooohh! Excellent! Thanks for the seller/Gurias links! As far as the recent Umrao Jaan- it was a pop-culture remake of a pop-culture movie that dealt with the ‘urbane Indian’ fascination of Urdu/Muslim/Kotha culture- cleaned up, as it were, for popular consumption; i.e.: it was terrible. At least, that’s what I thought.
Nice post and thanks for all the articles.
Nice post amardeep. cant pretend to be a connoisseur but i have enjoyed the works of saahir ludhianvi. some links below.
here’s a piece from a selection of urdu poetry posted here.
someone please help. here’s my attempt – “i may be able to speak, but my emotions are in check. the state of my heart is the state of mankind”
you can also purchase his collected works here. at $3.25 thats quite a steal
Thanks for this post. The links look like great edumucation!
The new Umrao Jaan was abjectly painful.
For those who are interested, Muzzafar Ali is alive, well and (when he is not running against Vajpayee for the Lucknow parliament seat), he is making wonderful music (my favorite is Jahan-e-Khusrau starring Abida Parveen) and runs a fine fashion boutique (Kotdwara) in Delhi.
Gulzar is still around.
PWA, poetry, but no Faiz? Hmm…
thanks for this. looks like an amazing book. ali and raza are both great thinkers and activists. and of course i’m a big vijay prashad fan. will check this out…
Love the songs from Umrao Jaan and Nikaah – very beautiful. I have never formally learned Urdu, but it’s funny how I “think” I get the essence of the poetry in these songs. The songs from the NEW Umrao are bland and melody-less…. blech.
Has anyone read the book on which the film was adapted?
Raven, I believe Faiz is in the book (Prashad quotes from him in the review).
Sonny, when is your band going to play in Philly? Hm?
Amardeep – thanks for these links. I’m especially fascinated by the last reference regarding the film about present-day tawaifs. How can regular folk get to see these movies?? This topic reminds me of a book called the “Dancing Girl” by Hasan Shah, which was written 200 years ago.
nice post. i will be perusing the links in my leisure. thanks!
i havent seen either of these movies but i can relate to your comment on the ‘essence of the poetry’. it is such a charming language – calm, urbane, mellifluous – one cant but help be carried away. if you’re fond of urdu poetry, i’d recommend the movie ‘pyaasa’ – amazing cinematography, poetry by saahir saahib and the brooding melancholy that is just so deliciously depressing. the couplet used by prashad found its way into the movie.
p.s. are you A of M with the twitchy nosed friend?
Hey Amardeep, great post!
Can anyone vouch for how secure and reliable that site is? I’d really like to order the book
If you’re interested, there is a huge collection of excellent mushaira clips on youtube: http://www.youtube.com/profile_videos?user=mahakavi
Check it out
Amardeep: Nice and timely post. I will pick this book up as I am currently in India. I wrote about great Urdu Shair Sahir Ludhinyanvi over a year ago. Among other contemporary Shair is Gulzar, Javed Akhtar (Shabana Azmi’s husband), Saba Afgani, and many more. It is hard to find these days Urdu poets like Shakeel Badayuni, Firaq Gorarkhpuri, Kamar Jalalabadi, etc. By the way, Rekha’s acting was superb in the original Umrao Jaan. A Gujarati poet known as Dr. Raish Maniar has translated Kaifi Azmi and Javed Akhtar great Shairy into Gujarati. I go crazy buying these books when I am in India. Of course no one even come close to THE GREAT ASSAD ULAA KHAN MIRZA GHALIB.
Great post, Amardeep.
Dalrymple’s The Last Mughal (which isn’t out in the US yet) covers the mehfil and khota culture in some detail.
Shayars were the celebs in pre-1857 Delhi and their rivalries and various peccadiloes were the mirch-masala of the desi press. The most famous rivalry was between Ghalib and Zauq (‘the Salieri to Ghalib’s Mozart’). Zauq was the nice guy, while Ghalib played the rebel, making much of his drinking, gambling, womanizing, and run-ins with the law. He wrote of Zauq: “How can he be a poet? He has never tasted wine, nor has he ever gambled;he has not been beaten with slippers by lovers, nor has he once seen the inside of a jail”.
The age of courtesans, it seems however, was already waning by then, with people still reminiscing of the most famous, Ad Begum, from almost a century earlier, “who would famously turn up stark naked at parties, but so cleverly painted than no one would notice.”
The revolt of 1857, of course, swept away the mehfil culture. The self-absorption disappeared, and as Amardeep described the poets ‘wrote as much about politics as they did about love’. This beautiful (and accessible) nazm by Josh Malihabadi against the British empire is another good example (besides Sahir’s, mentioned in the post).
I’d certainly add Nida Fazli to that list, who writes in extremely accesible Urdu.
There’s been interest in ghazal writing in the english language(short essay here). The most successful probably is Adrienne Rich. Some of her ghazals are actually quite good. An excerpt:
Oui, c’est moi. But what’s this “M” business about?? Maybe if you turn it upside down you’ll be on the right track! 🙂
ps. And the twitchy nose friend is still just as cute as you remember… she’s currently enjoying her kong toy in between bouts of barking at the construction workers on my street… truly a dog’s life.
By the way, you can listen to full tracks of both Umrao Jaan and Nikaah, and probably others mentioned here on a website called dishant.com I highly recommend both soundtracks if you can get a hold of them. Come to think of it, “Pakeezah” was pretty good, too! I don’t care for bollywood films very much, but occasionally a soundtrack gets my attention.
Thanks for the post Amardeep,
No comments on the new Umrao Jaan…..as soulless as one can get….
The entire urbane Urdu theme is very closely linked to the post-independence quasi-renaissance in big cities(not just the metros,Allahabad,Amritsar etc).
Urdu was the language of the (relative) nobility and obliquely,the progressive thought in North India(Bengali being the other major one) in the immediate post-independence period.
Even most of the film industry at that time had strong leftist leaning and familiarity with Urdu language and the refined elan it represented.
Gulzar and Javed Akhtar are of course seeped in those ?ideals but their works hardly make it to even fringes of popular culture these days.Its really sad to see because these guys have done nothing but quality work all their life and especially Gulzar,the dreaminess of his poetry is as simple as it is enchanting.
For those who are interested,a young musician in Delhi came out with a really nice album a few years back.Sort of jazzification of Gulzars poems called Raat Chaand aur Main……sorry but i dont have the link.
And yes,I have been searching for Muzaffar Ali’s album Husn-e-jana since forever…any links or tips would be greatly appreciated
🙂
Toba! Toba! 😉
Will do, metric! Thanks. Actually I’m surprised you listen to hindi songs at all. Here’s one song from ‘pyaasa’ that’s a total male fantasy but lovely lyrics. male fantasy in the sense of ‘me against the world’ – nothing racy. ohh.. love it love it.
hairy_D,
Nice song – I’ve heard it before. My dad has good taste in music. Would be melodramatic in english, but it works perfectly in hindi. Reminds me of another “sad what the hell is wrong with our duniya?!” song, by one of the great lyricists mentioned in Amardeep’s post, the late, great Kaifi Azmi:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yGwU__T5G70
Note: try to ignore Raj Kumar’s (Raj Kumar, right?) “drunk because all love is lost(noted by the lack of shaving and washing) yet stoic” look. He invented that look. It might ruin the song if you’re not a bollywood enthusiast. I can sometimes appreciate bollywood for what it is – just a warning to those who only watch indie films and/or can’t stand bollywood.
Shakeel Badayuni penned the lyrics for the Baiju Bawra and the unforgettably moving Man tarpat Hari Darshan ko aaj. All the way from Delhi South East through UP and on to the Dar Banga (or the gates of Bengal) or the borders of Jharkhand or ancient Mithila; there are many flavours of the Northern languages; Braj Bhasha, Khadi Boli, Awadhi, most notably. The different varieties of Urdu are infused with these strands of saffron.
Guru Dutt’s Pyaasa was based on an older Bengali novel that was fast forwarded in the screenplay to the India of the ’50s. The Nehruvian dream had already begun to unravel and nothing depicts it as dramatically as Pyaasa does.
After Marasim, Gulzar and Jagjit Singh are back at it again with Koi Baat Chale
They recently released an enhanced dvd version of Mughal-e-azam. My dad was talking about how when the movie first came out, everyone would go around quoting lines from the movie. Great movie though, worth a watch.
I envy all of you, knowing so much about our culture and literary works, I always try to read and read and learn and learn but to my dismay I am a slow reader and there is much to learn and read and understand. I feel that I know so very little, but this book seems like a great read, after I finish reading the autobiography of malcolm x and gitanjali I will grab this. Thanks for the link Amardeep Paji, I find that your blogs are the most insightful and that I come closer and closer to knowing and feeling my culture and history, so I thank you, you don’t know how greatful I am! By the way does anyone know where I can purchase some Kazi Nazrul Islam?
Thanks, Amardeep, for choosing a topic so precious to so many Indians of my generation. Of course, the fondness for ghazals and shairi among the younger generation did not escape my attention. Good upbringing, that’s all I can say.
A couple of notes. Ghazal and its origin, urdu shairi, have always been a performing art in the sense that they call for a performer, stage and an audience. Poetry of other languages, on the other hand, has usually been a medium of one-on-one writer-reader connection. Neither has most poetry contributed to music. The recent attempts to revive poetry in America through the coffee house culture has had a very limited success. I guess some things cannot be forced.
I am trying to dig into my old Literature background to understand why urdu shairi has been so uniquely different in that respect. Perhaps the court and kotha culture that fostered it has a lot to do with turning what might have remained only a written medium into a shared, congregational and performing art. But without getting into a long explanation, we all know and enjoy the one uniqueness of urdu poetry that calls for a shared experience and that is its element of surprise, both in thought and expression. The craft, and I almost want to say craftiness in a positive sense, is paramount in urdu poetry, and the “wah, wah” is the natural response to the surprising turn of phrases and thoughts dealt out by the shayar.
On the subject of ghazals, of course the medium has evolved over the last fifty-plus years as any living art form should. I am still stuck on Talat Mahmood, though, because he was the first FILMI ghazal singer, and he sang the lyrics of almost every famous shair mentioned in the posts above.
amardeep, i appreciate your attempts to make “pro-muslim culture” posts on this site. it seems the muslim culture is very alive in your heart, is ur family originally from west punjab or something? props.
Don’t know where to post this..anyhow I was listening to East Midlands Apnapunjab radio last night and was shocked to hear that that dude Rupe Dhillon was on it and has sucessfully had his novel Nila Noor published in Punjabi by a British publisher! Even weirder.. he was called the Godfather of British PunjabiLit.
I went through the net today and discovered that Amazon sells his book as do a company called Diggory. May be of interest to someone. I can’t read Punjabi but it would be great to hear the opinion of someone who can. Maybe Preston or Amarjeet can preview it?
Heard he’s been heavily marketed, like some kinda actor in Des Pardes, Sanjh Savera and Ajit…don’t know if that is true or false.
floridian
“Poetry of other languages, on the other hand, has usually been a medium of one-on-one writer-reader connection.”
urdu poetry is not unique in being a poet-to-audience type of poetry. not only was all poetry in india like this but all poetry in the world. i mean can you get any more obvious than examples like chaucer and shakespeare? Japanese kabuki? Poetry of ancient Greece?? France had its troubadours about 800 years ago. i could go on and on.
obviously with capitalism more and more people became literate and capitalism kind of did away with the street performer. massed produced publishing also didnt help.
was this the classic urdu arorgance at work? urdu culture believes itself to be haughty, it fans its own hype. some of the poets went on about how great they were supposed ot be half the time (in their own poetry!). talk about the emptier vessel making the most noise!