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HERITAGE
th
16
ANNI V ERSARY
ROMANCE OF THE EAST:
MIRZA GHALIB AND
THE GENIUS OF URDU
The enduring legacy of the Mughals in the Indian subcontinent
is the gift of the Urdu language. Urdu is truly a
romance language of the East. And during the time of the
Mughals, Urdu poetry reached its zenith with the mystical pen
of Mirza Assadullah Khan Ghalib.
by: Roy Joseph
Heard melodies are sweet, but those unheard are sweeter;
therefore, ye soft pipes, play on; not to the sensual ear
but…to the spirit ditties of no tones. Hapless John Keats
should not be faulted for cherishing the lyricism of the
ineffable over the poetry of the senses. But that young
reprobate should have been chastised for not letting his imagination
drift eastward. The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam, the poetry of Rumi,
the whirling dervishes and the Sufi-inspired poetry of Persian-Mughal
writers such as Mirza Ghalib occupy an imaginative space between the
eloquence of spoken word and the ravishing silence of the sublime.
Perhaps, Keats might have thought otherwise had he listened to the
Ghalib is remembered for penning exquisite
verse in the classical ghazal form lending
both meter and music to his verse.
hauntingly beautiful cadence of the classical ghazal.
The heyday of the Mughal dynasty that preceded the British Raj
is generally looked upon as a dark saga in Indian history by Indians
who look at culture purely
through the monochromatic
lens of nationalism. If we are
honest with ourselves, we must
acknowledge that the tragicomic
script of human history
is for the most part a gory tale
of blood-letting in which one
form of tyranny is replaced by
another. Yet, there is plenty of
comic relief to be found in acts
of compassion and also in the
creative artifacts of culture.
Despite the ambivalence or
hatred modern nationalists might
have towards the Mughals,
Indian culture has at least been
partially enriched by it. An
analogy is in order.
Picture a pious Protestant
raging against the genius of
the brush that painted the vault
of the Sistine Chapel largely
because indulgences were used to
beautify the ornate Basilica. The
man who miffs at Michelangelo
for this reason is falling prey to
the unfortunate tendencies of
philistinism. Politics aside, great
art is great art.
The enduring legacy of the
Mughals in the Indian subcontinent
is the gift of the Urdu
language. Urdu is truly a romance
language of the East. Urdu
poetry reached its zenith with the
mystical pen of Mirza Assadullah
Khan Ghalib, even though the
author was well-versed in Persian
as well.
Just as the Mughal dynasty
was being eclipsed into oblivion
by the superior, technological
prowess of the English, a poetic
jewel was born almost as a
testament to the abiding power
of reflection against the mindless
onslaught of both materialism
and machinery. If the pen is
indeed mightier than the sword,
the ethereal glow from the poetic
canons of Mirza Ghalib is far
more effulgent than the firepower
of destructive cannons.
Ghalib is remembered for
penning exquisite verse in the
classical ghazal form lending
both meter and music to his
verse. His verse sublimates
the pain and suffering of his
turbulent period by turning
heart-rending lamentations
into achingly beautiful verse.
Such a sentiment could easily
turn into trivial nostalgia at the
hands of inferior poets. The
idealization of love in Ghalib’s
verse is not unlike Dante’s idealization of love through the poetic
persona of Beatrice in the latter’s Divine Comedy. Idealization, in
this case, should not be mistaken for a meaningless abstraction but
as a deliberate strategy to render the chasm between true love and its
imperfect manifestation in human form painfully obvious.
The enduring legacy of the Mughals in the Indian
sub-continent is the gift of the Urdu language.
Urdu is truly a romance language of the East.
One could contend that the influence of Sufi mysticism in Ghalib’s
lyricism emboldened him to simultaneously make bold statements
of faith and embrace the mysteries of life as well. Paradoxically, the
sensuality in his verse points to a realm beyond the senses. While
the theological content of Christianity is widely divergent from Sufi
Mysticism, the sacrament of the Eucharist is the closest analog in that
it is both corporeal and a foreshadowing of the eternal. Similarly,
Ghalib rejects the monastic impulse and embraces the beauty of both
the sensual and the eternal.
Consider one of his oft-quoted lines:
Let the ascetics sing of the garden of Paradise—
We who dwell in true ecstasy can forget
their vase-tamed bouquet
In our hall of mirrors, the map of the one Face
Appears
As the sun’s splendor would spangle a world
made of dew
When it comes to poetry in particular, critics warn us that we should
be wary of overly-confident interpretations. Yet, one could gather at
least the following – Ghalib celebrates echoes of the eternal in the
‘here-and-now.’ Thus the ‘other-worldly’ monasticism that might
usually lead the religious to reject this world gives way to a lifeaffirming
principle that sees the goodness in creation as a reflection of
the Eternal.
If the city of Agra boasts of an architectural monument of astonishing
beauty, it should also boast of a poetic monument of similar symmetry.
It indeed gave birth to Mirza Ghalib.
Roy Joseph was born in Pondicherry and now resides in Chicago.
He is currently working on a literary play.
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The International Indian
The International Indian 79