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Anthems of aspiration

In an age when Ghalib is reduced to `Galib'and ghazal to `gajal', Ali Husain Mir brings a fresh breeze, says ZIYA US SALAM

It is an irony of life. A conversation on the Progressive Writers' Movement and the evolution of Urdu poetry is conducted largely in English with a professor who divides his time between the U.S. and India, speaks fluent English and admits to limitations in Urdu. Ali Husain Mir, the co-author of "Anthems of Resistance" is an unassuming man of many talents - some of them he keeps hidden until the very end of the conversation. His parents were well schooled in Urdu, and they taught him the language. The man, all of long locks with an endearing smile, never studied the language in a formal school. That is to say, formally. He did it well enough in the school of life though. And along with Raza Mir has made bold to document a precious segment of the evolution of Urdu, the way that makes it safe from "the condescension of history" and "a living tool for posterity". "Anthems of Resistance", an exhaustive work published by Roli Books, will be launched in New Delhi this coming Tuesday.

"Nostalgia has its place. Our purpose here is to retrieve the spirit of the Progressive Writers' Movement. The idea is to present the poets and the periods with certain aesthetics. The choices may be arbitrary but the principle is noble," says the man who did not get "Urdu in virasat" but would probably leave a trace for posterity.

However, this celebration of Progressive Urdu poetry comes at a time when, as a poet would say, everyone is a stranger here, in this crowded world no one knows the other. Ghalib, forsaken by many, mutilated by others, is Galib now, just as ghazal is gajal. Yet the celebration of Urdu poetry goes on. Unshackled of romance, beyond the goblet and the brim, and into the life of the common man, still persevering, still perspiring for his daily bread. There is room still for Kaifi Azmi's `Makan', there is a pulse still for Faiz's `Lahu ke Suragh' even if the prisoners of heart recall only "Mujh se pehli si mohabbat mere mehboob na maang".

Yet it is a work that comes a shade late in the day. It comes after Ali Sardar Jafri's paeans to Vajpayee, it comes when few talk of "Tarkash", and Javed Akhtar is reduced to "Ek ladki ko dekha..." It comes when spring is no longer around, when Progressive Writers and activists are part of what the cemetery chooses to provide an abode. No one in the Urdu world talks of the struggle of bread and butter any more. No one talks like Kaifi and his "Ek roti kay takaub mein chala hun itna, ki mere paanv kisi aur hi ke paanv lage". In the age of multiplexes, the activist-poet has gone to sleep. Says Ali, "Sure, resistance is not silenced but its articulation through poetry is no longer in fashion. The focus of the struggle has changed. Opportunist politics has not withered away."

This, he hastens to add, is not to say that all was fine when the movement was launched in the 1930s to "rescue literature and other arts from the priestly, academic and decadent classes in whose hands they had degenerated so long, to bring the arts into the closest touch with the people, to deal with the problems of hunger and poverty, social backwardness and political subjugation, so as to understand these problems and through such understanding, act."

Spirit of resistance

Even as the standards of beauty have changed over the years, so have the preferences of poets. Defends Ali, "What we are attempting to celebrate with this book is not the individual, but the spirit of resistance embodied in their work. Different poets have followed a personal trajectory that can be seen as expedient, but here is an attempt to show that Progressive Urdu poetry was not just an art for art's sake, it was art for life's sake. The book goes beyond the consumerist popular culture. We understand that contemporary poetry often reflects the well-heeled, but one must realise that the audience for Urdu poetry has always been middle class. The middle class of 1947 was different. Now people have learnt to live with the system, they no longer want to change it."

Will the poet ever reflect the aspirations of the common man again? Ali takes recourse to a couplet, "Woh subah kabhi to aayegi" It is a faint dream in a world that has bid goodbye to Josh Malihabadi and his `Husn Aur Mazdoor', a world where Kaifi is often remembered through Bollywood, and Javed Akhtar depends on films for anything more than a nodding acquaintance with the next generation.

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