Modern Urdu Poetry: Iqbal, Faiz and the Progressive Movement

Modern Urdu poetry (جدید اردو شاعری) begins with the late-19th-century reformist verse of Altaf Hussain Hali (حالی), peaks with the philosophical-cum-political poetry of Allama Muhammad Iqbal (اقبال), and is renewed in the 1930s by the Progressive Writers' Movement of which Faiz Ahmad Faiz (فیض) is the supreme lyric voice.

Aligarh and the reformist turn

The mid-19th-century reformist Sir Syed Ahmed Khan founded the Mohammedan Anglo-Oriental College (Aligarh, 1875) and inspired a new prose-and-poetry that addressed Muslim decline.

• Altaf Hussain Hali (حالی, 1837–1914) — Musaddas-e-Madd-o-Jazr-e-Islam (مسدسِ مدوجزرِ اسلام, 1879), the great "tides of Islam" poem on Muslim rise and decline. Also wrote Yadgar-e-Ghalib (the canonical biography of Ghalib, 1897) and the critical treatise Muqaddama-e-Sher-o-Shairi (مقدمہ شعر و شاعری, 1893) — the first systematic Urdu poetics.
• Mohammad Hussain Azad (آزاد, 1830–1910) — Aab-e-Hayat (آبِ حیات, 1880), an influential history-cum-tazkirah of Urdu poetry.
• Akbar Allahabadi (اکبر, 1846–1921) — satirical poet of cultural collision under colonial modernity.

Allama Muhammad Iqbal (1877–1938)

Born in Sialkot; educated at Lahore (Government College), Cambridge (Trinity), Munich and Heidelberg. PhD in 1908 on The Development of Metaphysics in Persia. Iqbal is the Poet of the East (شاعرِ مشرق) and Pakistan's spiritual founder.

Major Urdu works

Work	Year	Theme
Bang-e-Dara (بانگِ درا)	1924	Three phases of Iqbal's Urdu poetry; Tarana-e-Hindi, Tarana-e-Milli
Bal-e-Jibril (بالِ جبریل)	1935	Mystical philosophy of khudi (selfhood)
Zarb-e-Kalim (ضربِ کلیم)	1936	"A declaration of war against the present age" — political verse
Armughan-e-Hijaz (ارمغانِ حجاز)	1938 (post.)	Final Urdu and Persian poems

Major Persian works

• Asrar-e-Khudi (اسرارِ خودی, 1915) — "Secrets of the Self".
• Rumooz-e-Bekhudi (1918).
• Payam-e-Mashriq (پیامِ مشرق, 1923) — response to Goethe's West-östlicher Divan.
• Zaboor-e-Ajam (زبورِ عجم, 1927).
• Javid Nama (جاوید نامہ, 1932) — Iqbal's "Divine Comedy".

Prose

• Reconstruction of Religious Thought in Islam (1930) — Iqbal's English lectures.
• Allahabad Address (1930) — articulated the case for a Muslim political entity in north-west India.

اقبال: khudi ko kar buland itnaa ke har taqdeer se pehle / khuda bande se khud puchhe bata teri raza kya hai

("Raise your selfhood so high that, before every decree of destiny, God Himself asks of His servant: tell me, what is your will?")

The Progressive Writers' Movement (1936–)

Inspired by the Indian Progressive Writers' Association (formed in London, 1934 by Sajjad Zaheer, Mulk Raj Anand, and others; first All-India PWA Conference at Lucknow, 9 April 1936, presided by Premchand).

• Marxist humanism, anti-colonialism, anti-feudalism, anti-fascism.
• Manifesto called for literature engaged with social reality.

Major Progressive poets

• Faiz Ahmad Faiz (فیض, 1911–1984) — lyric of revolution and beloved.
• Sahir Ludhianvi (1921–1980) — film lyrics and Talkhiyaan.
• Asrar-ul-Haq Majaz (1911–1955) — Aawara.
• Ali Sardar Jafri — Asia jaag utha.
• Makhdoom Mohiuddin (Hyderabad).
• Habib Jalib (1928–1993) — anti-Ayub Dastoor (1962).
• Ahmad Faraz (1931–2008) — Dard-e-Aashob, Tanha Tanha.

Faiz Ahmad Faiz

Pakistan's pre-eminent post-1947 poet. Lenin Peace Prize (1962); Nobel-nominated. Imprisoned in the Rawalpindi Conspiracy Case (1951–55).

Major collections:

• Naqsh-e-Faryadi (1941) — Mujh se Pehli si Mohabbat.
• Dast-e-Saba (1952) — Subh-e-Azaadi.
• Zindan Nama (1956) — prison poems.
• Dast-e-Tah-e-Sang (1965).
• Sar-e-Wadi-e-Sina (1971) — on the 1971 war.
• Sham-e-Shehr-e-Yaaraan (1978).

فیض: bol ke lab azad hain tere / bol zubaan ab tak teri hai

("Speak, for your lips are still free; speak, your tongue is still yours.")

فیض: yeh daagh daagh ujaala, yeh shab-gazida sehar / vo intizaar tha jiska, yeh vo sehar to nahin

("This stain-strewn dawn, this night-bitten morning — surely this is not the dawn we awaited.") (Subh-e-Azaadi, August 1947.)

Modernists and post-Progressive currents

In the 1950s and 1960s a "Halqa-e-Arbab-e-Zauq" (Circle of Connoisseurs, Lahore, founded 1939 as Majlis-e-Dastangoi) championed introspective, modernist verse against the political directness of the PWA.

• Noon Meem Rashid (ن م راشد, 1910–1975) — Mavra (ماورا, 1940), pioneer of azaad nazm (free verse). La = Insaan (1969).
• Miraji (میراجی, 1912–1949) — surrealist, modernist; Geet hi geet (1943), Pabandi. Brought psychoanalytic insight.
• Akhtar-ul-Iman (اختر الایمان) — modernist; film lyricist (Waqt, Dharamputra).
• Munir Niazi (منیر نیازی, 1928–2006) — symbolist; Dushman ke darmiyaan shaam. Famous for Hamesha der kar deta hoon main.
• Mustafa Zaidi, Iftikhar Arif, Parveen Shakir (1952–1994) — Khushboo (1976) brought a female confessional voice.
• Kishwar Naheed, Fahmida Riaz — feminist Urdu poetry.

پروین شاکر: vo to khushboo hai havaaon mein bikhar jaayega / masla phool ka hai phool kidhar jaayega

("He is a fragrance — he will disperse in the breeze; the problem is the flower's — where shall it go?")

Forms in modern poetry

• Nazm-e-musalsal — thematic nazm with sustained subject (Iqbal, Hali).
• Azaad nazm (free verse) — first systematised by Rashid and Miraji.
• Nasri nazm (prose poem) — flourished from the 1970s.
• Geet — song-lyrics.
• The ghazal retains its dominance; Faiz, Faraz, Nasir Kazmi, Bashir Badr.

Major Pakistani ghazal poets after 1947

• Nasir Kazmi (ناصر کاظمی, 1925–1972) — Burg-e-Nai.
• Ahmad Nadeem Qasmi (1916–2006) — Jalal-o-Jamal.
• Ahmad Faraz (1931–2008) — Janaan Janaan.
• Ahmad Mushtaq.
• Jaun Elia (1931–2002) — Shayad (1991).
• Mohsin Naqvi (1947–1996) — Karbala themes.

Themes and concerns

• Anti-colonialism and freedom — Iqbal, Faiz, Jalib.
• Selfhood and the Muslim renaissance — Iqbal.
• Class and labour — PWA.
• Partition and exile — Faiz's Subh-e-Azaadi.
• Authoritarianism — Jalib's Dastoor against Ayub's 1962 Constitution.
• Feminism — Parveen Shakir, Kishwar Naheed, Fahmida Riaz.
• Existentialism — Rashid, Jaun Elia.