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review
Master
of poetic imagery
Zia
Mohyeddin column
review By Dr Abrar
Ahmad Urdu literature,
these days, is astir with the issue of its relevance and role as an agent of
change in our society. The question of “social responsibility” of a
writer is voiced far more loudly during troubled times and, undoubtedly, it
has become extremely valid during recent years. There are certain other
aspects inherently attached to this responsibility that need to be addressed.
It was Albert Camus who wrote in Myth of Sisyphus: “Considered as artists,
we perhaps have no need to interfere in the affairs of the world. But as men,
yes.” Are the artist and the man
in him two separate independent entities? Perhaps. Considering the literary
values, a creative piece needs to fulfill the demands of formal standards and
expectations born out of tradition and its universally accepted parameters. The more talented authors
succeed in striking a balance when they attain both literary and social
relevance. Faiz is one such example as compared to Habib Jalib whose
political struggle dominated his literary pursuits. It may be noted here that
by creating alone, the authors spell out their intent to re-make the world,
under any political influence or without it. Creative arts in fact always
serve as the tools of resistance. If anything more decisive is to be done,
then obviously it is the “man” who needs to come to the front and fight. In Urdu literature, Anjuman
Taraqqi Pasand Musanaffeen (The Progressive Writers Movement) of 1936 remains
the sole example of a coherent and well-organised literary movement aimed at
socio-political objective. It was led by exceptionally gifted literati and
had a clear ideology i.e. Marxism for propagation in the ranks of the
authors. It succeeded in creating a clear and vibrant wave that swept across
the subcontinent. The movement finally faded away but not without leaving its
impact. A couple of years back, a
cluster of some brilliant intellectuals from Karachi joined hands to work for
“literature for change”. Ijra was the periodical published by these
charged souls as the prime tool of propagation and effectively getting the
message conveyed to literary circles. Shaheen Niazi was the
patron-in-chief and Ahsan Saleem, a celebrated modern poet, the editor. Those
in the editorial board included Enwar Sajjad, Shakeel Aadalzada, Sabir Zafar,
Syed Ayaz Mahmood and Fahim Shahnas Kazmi. Ijra’s tenth issue has
recently hit the bookshops. Each issue of Ijra offers two editorials
addressing this “change” and the role of literature to make it happen. A
special section is reserved for some select intellectuals to give their
opinion and this format has been consistently followed since the initiation
of the magazine. In the issue under review,
Shaheen Niazi in the opening article defines an “intellectual” and his
role as a responsible member of society that is facing some real threats to
its existence. He speaks of the errors of judgment committed by the
intellectuals in the past — reminding us of the American intellectuals who
applauded the atomic bombing of Japan as a national triumph. Niazi is
bitterly critical of the apathetic attitude of our own literati during the
dictatorial regimes in the past and implores them to rise to the occasion
this time at least. Ahsan Saleem is also critical of the indifference of our
creative lot. He also reminds the readers how through the World Congress of
1935 in France, a firm response was registered to combat the challenges of
the time. As a guest writer, Qazi
Akhtar Jonagrhi sees no possibility of success of the movement in a society,
which has a miserably low literacy rate and considers the massive defence
budgets in the region responsible for it. He goes on to observe:” Where an
author gets his book published from his own pocket, where no book receives
advertisements and literature is the passion of the select few, where
religions extremism dominates everything — are we justified to dream of
bringing about a change through literature??” Zaki Ahmad in his essay,
“Insaan Aur Aalmi Mazahib” pleads for a scientific approach towards
interpretation of religion. In his opinion mysticism can work as a bridge
between science and religion. He goes on to expand on it in the essay. The remaining sections are
similar to the other contemporary literary magazines. In the section of
translations, Dr Mohammad Hanif has contributed with the translation of
“What Must Be Said,” a controversial poem by Nobel Laureate Gunter Grass,
written against the handing over of a U-boat to Israel by the German
Government that may facilitate an attack on the nuclear installations of
Iran. Shaheen Mufti gives an
exhaustive introduction of the Korean poet Chang Soo Ko with fine
translations of his select poems. In the poetry section, the
offerings of senior poets like Rasa Chughtai, Aftab Iqbal Shamim, Asad
Mohammad Khan and Anwar Shaoor and of some young promising poets like Adnan
Bashir, Tauqeer Taqi, Ali Zubair, Ahmad Atta, Qaiser Munawar and Shabbir
Wazish make it a representative section of our current poetic scenario. Five short stories by Qasim
Khursheed are pleasant reading while Rashid Amjad recalls his friend, the
late Mansha Yaad, in a tender captivating account. Ali Taha writes on the
late Shehryar. Ijra Issue 10 Edited by: Ahsan Saleem Publisher: Beyond time
Publications Pages: 576 Price Rs 400 Email: ijrakarachi@gmail.com
Master
of poetic imagery By Naveed Abbas Ye khawab hai, khusbo hai,
khe johnka hai ke pal hai Ye dhund hai, ke badal hai
ke saya hai ke tum ho What is the worth of
life’s work of a man or his words that came out of sheer sensitivity for
his fellow people’s plight—one really wonders. Few
words evoke such awe and respect as the poetry of Ahmed Faraz commanded.
Endowed with a rare intellect and transcendental vision, his poetry lives and
will certainly continue to impact our social psyche for a long time to come
as works of all great men of similar standing have done over the ages. His poems and ghazals are
reminiscent of his classic diction: Ye meri ghazlen ye meri
nazmein Tamam teri hikayaten hain Ye tazkare tere lutf ke
hain Ye she’r teri shikayaten
hain Mein sab teri nazr kar raha
houn Ye un zamanoon ki sa’aten
hain Faraz, a master of poetic
imagery, a pan- humanist of the rarest sort, alluring composition of magnetic
expressions, sublime blend of life and love, was bold enough to experiment
with many genres of poetry and is credited with creating a distinct style,
rhythm and diction. Romanticism, realism, human
rights, political oppression, mythology, nostalgia, haunting romance and a
belief in the supernatural are some of those themes that find frequent
mention in his effortless poetry. His poetry is bitter and
sweet; imbued with love for the common man, and strong revolt against a
system that denies human rights and freedom of speech. Faraz was awarded
Hilal-e-Imtiaz 2004, in recognition of his literary achievements. He returned
the award in 2006 after Musharraf came into power. “My conscience will not
allow me if I remained a silent spectator of the sad happenings around us.
The least I can do is to let the dictatorship know where it stands in the
eyes of the concerned citizens whose fundamental rights have been usurped. I
am doing this by returning the Hilal-e-Imtiaz forthwith and refuse to
associate myself in any way with the regime,” from the
statement issued by Faraz. Columnist par excellence
Khalid Hasan once said; “Are we going to lose Faraz, the supreme poet of
romance, whose poetry we have loved and lived with all these years? It is a
horrible thought and I want to banish it”. His thought-provoking style is
reflected in these lines: Shahr walon ki mohabbat ka
mein quayal houn magar Mein ne jis haath ko chuma
wohe khanjar nikla Faraz was a tall,
mild-mannered Pathan with a wry sense of humour and looks that still win him
a gushing female following. Born in Kohat in a Pushto-speaking family, Faraz
did his masters in Persian and started his career as a scriptwriter for Radio
Pakistan. Faraz started his poetic
career as a romantic poet but soon began to concern himself with the stark
realities of the time. The Progressive Writers Movement also influenced him;
this influence showed itself in his liberal humanism and his rebellion
against political oppression and exploitation. Faraz suffered imprisonment
and persecution under Zia rule and was so heartbroken that he left the
country like Faiz and lived in exile for six years. His great poem Mohasra
remains one of the most powerful indictments of military rule. Who else but
Faraz could have written: Peshavar qatilo tum sipahi nahin. Faraz knew the art of
maintaining equilibrium between a theme and its aesthetic expressions. His
ghazals and related love poems were, and are, distinguished for both these
qualities i.e. an unusual degree of intensity of feeling combined with
ingenuity of expression to establish its own distinctive style. This brought
him immediate popular acclaim, particularly among the youth who felt in this
part of his writings the pulse of their own heartbeat. The legendary Faiz Ahmed
Faiz once said; “Faraz is the most facile poet because it provides the poet
with a lavish store of ready made images, symbols, metaphors and other
imaginative paraphernalia perfected by the great masters in Urdu and Persian
to choose from and to pass as his own.” Faraz was the people’s
poet. He always proclaimed; my pen is the trust of my people:
“my pen is the judge of my conscience.” His tribute to a pen is
classically inventive: “Qalam surkhuru hai Ke jo us ne likha Wohi aaj mein houn Wohi aaj tu hai Qalam ne likha tha Ke jab bhi zabannon pe
pehrai lagey hain Tuo bazu sanan totley hain Ke jab bhi laboon par
khamoshi ke talay partey hon Tuo zindaan ke diwaar-o-dar
boltey hain Kejab haraf zanjir hota hai
Shamshir hota hai akhir Tuo amir ke taqdeer hota
hai akhir Ke jo harf hai zisst ke
abroo hai Qalam surkhuru hai Ke jo us ne likha”
Zia Mohyeddin column Looking at the shop
window of a men’s boutique in London, I see that suits with narrow lapels
and narrow trousers are in vogue again just as in the hippie age. Come to
think of it there was no such thing as men’s fashion in England before
1960. The nobs had their special outfits for special occasion: plus fours for
golf, striped jackets, white flannels and boaters for a regatta or a visit to
the lords, tails and top hats for Ascot and dinner jackets for formal
dinners. The middle class men wore three piece suits, a bowler hat and
carried a rolled umbrella to work. Most of the ordinary people dressed in
sports coats (now referred to as jackets) and flannels. And then came 1960, and
Peter Cook, that supremely gifted young satirist-cum-stand-up comic, who set
a new trend by wearing short overcoats, bum-freeze jackets, narrow trousers
and winkle-picker shoes. I think many of the boutiques that sprang up in
Carnaby Street, located in London’s Soho district, took a great deal of
inspiration from Peter Cook’s attire which was a mixture of a mixture of
“Mod and hippie.” What can I say about Peter
Cook? He was the genius who could tap a flow of zany verbal inventions for as
long as he wanted, turning an audience so weak with laughter they could
hardly respond to any act after he finished his impromptu monologue. His
appearance in the revue called “Beyond the Fringe,” which became the talk
of the town, shot him to stardom. The revue was written and presented by four
young graduates, fresh from Oxford and Cambridge all of whom were absolutely
brilliant, but I have not hesitation in saying that Peter Cook outshone them
all. Cook’s life-long friend,
the playwright, Alan Bennet, records in his memoirs that even when some of
his talent for verbal exuberance deserted him, Peter Cook never complained
about the generation of comic writers who had drawn their inspiration from
him. Nor did he ever resent that his colleague, Dudley Moore, had gone on to
great success in Hollywood and he hadn’t. The only regret he ever voiced
was that in Fairfield Connecticut, he had saved David Frost from drowning.
This is the kind of wit you don’t find nowadays. * *
* *
* The scruffier parts of
Birmingham, Sparkhill and Sparkbrook, used to have many junk shops which
stored apothecary’s jars, slightly damaged stained glass windows,
odd-shaped teapots, paintings with sylvan scenes, fishermen’s gear, old
tennis balls, oriental ivory artefacts and other knick-knacks. Somewhere in
these shops you found a couple of cardboard boxes full of second-hand books.
They were all marked sixpence each. The books on the top of
pile were always thrillers but sometimes, digging deep into the box, you
could come across a real gem. I was once lucky enough to find a set of five
beautifully bound editions of “Discovering Antiques” for half a crown. Such shops have all been
converted into laundrettes, and stores selling electronic gadgets. Thus when
I found not a single junk shop in the patch of Sparkhill that I used to
visit, I hummed “Fings ain’t they used t’be” and quickly reminded
myself that I was falling prey to the most common malady prevalent among
people of my generation: extolling the virtues of by-gone days. Fings was the title of a
musical that ran in the West End for over two years. It was about East End
life, which is why everyone spoke cockney. I went to see it because it had
been directed by Joan Littlewood, the left-wing director, who had set up the
Theatre Workshop and, with a group of like-minded, dedicated actors, had
taken up residence in Theatre Royal Stratford East. Joan Littlewood was
called “The Mother of Modern Theatre”. Her productions of Oh What A
Lovely War and A Taste of Honey had made such an impact that they were
transferred to the conservative West-End where they ran for years.
I didn’t think much of
Fings. It didn’t have the same bite as her other work. Even the music by
the renowned composer, Lionel Bart, wasn’t particularly exciting except for
the title song — which became a catchphrase — and still is. * * * * * Our teen-agers don’t like
to eat home-made food any longer; they prefer to eat a stodgy pizza. I often
wonder whether this is because their mothers have forgotten how to cook or
because they feel that eating a burger (which in our chain restaurants tastes
like muesli wrapped in cotton wool) elevates them to a better class. We have even forgotten the
taste of water. We drink water from a plastic bottle which has no taste. I
often yearn for water poured into a katora ( a paper-thin silvery bowl) out
of a surahi, that exquisitely shaped and carved earthen vessel, which is
almost extinct nowadays. I don’t know whether it
was the clay in which water was stored, or the wafer-thin silvery substance
of the bowl, or the mixture of a precious metal and the humble clay, but the
taste of water was as divine as the taste of Mai Jhando’s roti. As a school-boy, I used to
take home-made dough my mother had prepared to the open maidan where the
tandoor was situated and watch, fascinated, as the flames leaped and danced
on the crinkled, leathery face of Mai Jjando, who presided over the affairs
of the tandoor. She first prodded and
pummelled the ball of dough and then, expertly expanding it into a perfect
round shape, leant forward into the mouth of the tandoor to place the roti on
the inner wall. My heart leapt every time she did this for fear the flames
would devour her. I used to be so absorbed watching her that I never knew
when the day’s dusky light turned into and night. She would scoop the last
roti with an iron rod, lift it with her charred hands, immune to burns, give
it a twirl and flick it towards me to catch.
I did, but never without squirming up because the roti was too hot to
handle. She would then give me a toothless smile. I would wrap the roti along
with the others in the printed square cloth which we called dastarkhan and
walked home. I don’t remember ever resisting the piquant, appetising
mouth-watering aroma of the roti. By the time I reached home I had eaten half
the roti. All things evocative like a
piece of music or the taste of bread take you back. The fantasy of a past
more beautiful, more blessed than the present, is a standard mode of human
condition. Who doesn’t long for a past when all our yesterdays, we think
nostalgically, were carefree?
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