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History of Urdu Poetry
Urdu poetry has to its credit an interesting history. It has passed through about eight centuries for its growth and development to its current point of time. Its basic root lies in Arabic literature specifically in Arabic ghazal of the Pre-Islamic era which was an important contributor to the poets at the top whom ranks al-Qais. From there it travelled to the Indian Subcontinent through Iran. It did not migrate alone rather it was also accompanied by the rules of rhythm and meter along with it. The metric health of couplets in Urdu poetry particularly the ghazal is examined on the basis of certain sets of Arkan (Syllables) each called Bahr (Plural-Bahoor). There are fifteen fundamental Bahrs from which many have been derived to constitute a huge number that is difficult for common man to receive. Thus here only the first fundamental Bahr called Hahr-e-Hazaj is written below to illustrate the mechanics of rules that are applied to judge the metric balance of Urdu Poetry:
Faalen Faalen Faalen Faalen (Four Words)
Faa len Faa len Faa len Faa len (Eight Syllables)
This bahr basically consists of four words each broken into two to constitute overall eight arkan or syllables. The format of ghazal and rules governing it were well received in Iran in Iran on its way to India. This reception ultimately translated into the production of long series of ghazal writers. Two top examples may be those of Hafiz Shirazi and Kaani. The track also bears Turkey, Afghanistan and the whole Indian Subcontinent with present Bangladesh as the end in the South. All that progressed with invasions of Arabs on Turkey, Iran and India
Urdu poetry in spite of its proportionate growth with the growth and development of Urdu language has its root in twelfth century even when Urdu syntax had not taken its proper shape. It has grown and developed with the growth and development of Urdu language in Indian Subcontinent. Urdu is a mixture of many tongues and languages. The credit of its growth and development goes to Muslims who transfused into the local languages many languages with a wealth of different words depending on the origin of invaders of India that ultimately led to the establishment of strong Muslim rule in India with Delhi as the capital of Muslim Empire in the late 12th century. At that time the local languages around Delhi, such as Brij Bhasha, Sauraseni and others became extensively mixed with Persian, the language of the Muslim rulers with origins in Iran. This initial mixing by Persian was followed by entrance of other languages namely Turkish, Arabic and English at different points of time partly depending on Muslim affiliation with Turkish and Arabic and partly due to the establishment of British rule in India as was the case of entrance of Persian. Thus the vocabulary of the original languages changed, keeping the basic grammar intact. The compound language was called Hindi with significant component of Sanskrit and thus it at that time was written in devanagri script: the script of Sanskrit. The Hindi was introduced in Hyderabad Deccan a southern province of India, by the armies and followers of the Tughlaq and Khilji kings in fourteenth century where it had an impact of the Southern dialects and subsequently became known as Deccani which adopted the Persian script and replaced Persian in offices as the official language. It was renamed as Urdu during imperial rule of the Mughal Emperor Shah Jehan (1627-1658) and finally became the official language of the court in Empire of India. During the British rule, it also accepted many words from English.
In eighteenth century Urdu poetry had a great rise after Urdu replaced Persian. It, being a derivative of Persian, Turkish, Arabic and regional local dialects, started being understood as common man’s language. That also formed the basis of exchange of socio-political ideas with each other in Urdu and also of addressing the public gatherings by political leaders. The major tool used for popularization of Urdu poetry was Mushaira that were the gatherings or assemblies where poets gathered to cite their self created poems as natural products of reaction to the action of the emotional sentiments on the interior of the heart, equipped mostly with a metrical pattern subsequently checked and toned to bring them in the metric balance. There were also held special mushairas in which the poets came with ghazals crafted and written on pre-circulated line from a ghazal of a senior and an honored poet that dictated a specified pattern. The poems were appreciated not only on the basis of the choice of words, and the beauty of thought but also for the strict metrical pattern. The Urdu poetry had a royal patronage in the Mughal Period to the extent that the poets were enlisted as friends of the kings, queens, princes and princesses, Urdu poets were the major stimulus for transformation of some Mughal kings into poets. Bahadur Shah Zafar, is an important example.
One can say that Urdu was the language which was well understood by majority in the subcontinent and did qualify as a fairly good vehicle for communication between the Indian subjects. After partition of India into Bharat and Pakistan the same language is called Hindi in Bharat and Urdu in Pakistan with the major difference that Hindi is written in devanagri script while Urdu is written in Persian script. The tragedy is that the same contents of books written in Urdu/Hindi and filling the libraries remain unread on both sides; the reader in Bharat cannot read printed materials in Persian script and that in Pakistan cannot in devanagri script,
The popular forms of poetic expression were folk songs that remained limited to the local environment and ghazal, This illustrates the start of Urdu poetry with ghazal as its primary form which has never lost its integrity and grace and is even fresh today in spite of its intense opposition by the advocates of modern school of thought in Urdu literature, Its Arabic roots are authenticated by rules that govern the diction and format of Urdu ghazal even today are Arabic with their original form. This does not mean that other forms of Urdu poetry which will be talked about in detail later were not in the field. Long poems describing some heroic performance particularly in battles and wars (Epic) were also written in Persian and later in Urdu. The other major form that developed side by side with ghazal is called “Nazm”. Nazm and its types will be the subject of next post by the Grace of God.
As this is not the place where it is advisable to involve in details, the discussion on these forms of meter will be resumed at a later juncture. Of course, it is pertinent to illustrate what is ghazal because it is the foundation stone of Urdu poetry.
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