FAIZ AHMAD FAIZ: Salute to a great Punjabi a fantastic Urdu poet and a giant Pakistani

Categorized | Current Affairs, History, India CA, Pak CA, Pakistan hist, S. Asia History

FAIZ AHMAD FAIZ: Salute to a great Punjabi a fantastic Urdu poet and a giant Pakistani

Posted on 27 November 2007. Tags: Faiz Ahmed Faiz, History of Pakistan, Pakistani poet, Poetry

FAIZ AHMAD FAIZ: Salute to a great Punjabi poet and giant Pakistani
by MOIN ANSARI

Here is an introduction to the son of Punjab that we really enjoy reading. His revolutionary and descriptive writings are an inspiration to us all. The purpose of this writing is to solicit the people who enjoy poetry to help us collect more literature on Faiz Ahmad Faiz. Faiz Ahmed Faiz on Alama Iqbal: Revolutionary on patriot

Faiz Ahmad Faiz in pictures

Faiz Ahmad Faiz (February 13, 1911-November 20, 1984)

The anthology of poems of Faiz Ahmad Faiz represent a cacophony of the cultural mosaic of todays Pakistan. The conglomeration of poems and prose by this Punjabi poet represent new directions in our common Pakistani literature. Faiz Ahmad Faiz represents the wonderful confluence of Urdu-Punjabi culture that has been developing for centuries between neighboring Punjab and the birthplace of Urdu-the Delhi-Lucknow corridor.

While Delhi was in the Punjab, and Lucknow was in Oudh United Provinces-Utter Pardesh, many Urdu poets germinated the rich and profound literature that now represents the cultural heritage of Northern India (Punjab, Kashmir, UP) and Pakistan (Sindh, Baluchistan, Sarhad and Kashmir). The Urdu poets and authors were Sikh, Hindu, Buddhists and Muslim.

Alama Iqbal, a son of Sialkot (Punjab) and Ghalib son of Delhi (old Punjab of British India) wrote only in Urdu and Persian. Faiz Ahmad Faiz wrote both in Urdu and Punjabi. His Urdu writings represented the urban culture of Pakistan. Many of his revolutionary poems are in Urdu. His Punjabi writings represented the rural culture of the Punjab and Pakistan. Many Pakistanis today use the language of Urdu or Sariki, Gujjar, Pahari, Punjabi, Pushto, Baluchi,Sindhi,Mekrani,and Kashmiri in a similar manner

…they use Urdu in many formal, official and literate settings and use another language in the informal settings. Many of us switch on different linguistic channels to express ourselves. Punjabi wedding resound with sounds of joy in Urdu and other languages. Urban Sindhi marriage vows are incomplete without Punjabee and Sindhi and Baluchi songs. Like a painter choosing his tapestry, Faiz wrote in the language of his choice based on his mood. While many disagree with his politics, they always enjoyed his writings. Always controversial, Faiz sure did touch the hearts of millions.

“Faiz Ahmad Faiz is recognized as one of the foremost Urdu poets of the Indo-Pak subcontinent. His poems are popular not only in Pakistan, where Urdu is the genreal language of literature, but also in the regions of India and where Urdu is spoken

Faiz in one of the few poets of our age who have been prominent in public affairs. The events of his life have been intervowen with those of the last decades of British rule in India. The partition of India and Pakistan and the subsequesnt troubled history of Pakistan’s efforts to build a new national life. Faiz wrote some of his best known poems while a political prisoner. He has always been on the side of progress and against
oppression, and this has helped to make his work popular in other countries, for instance in the USSR where his poems have apperaed in translation;” (Source: Back cover of “Poems by Faiz” Tanslated by Victor Kiernan)

A NOTE ON FIAZ BY VG KIERNAN

Faiz Ahmed Faiz was born in 1911 in Sialkot the small town in what is now Pakistan where a few decades earlier the poet philosopher Iqbal was born. Faiz had a varied career as a teacher, army officer, journalist, trade union leader, broadcaster and script writer. Educated at the Scotch Mission High School, Sialkot and Government College Lahore, Faiz obtained his Masters degree in English and Arabic Literature and taught English literature in Amritser and Lahore. In 1941 he joinded the British Indian army, rose to the rank of Lt. Colonel in three years amd received the MBE in 1944. In January 1947 he resigned his commission to edit the daily Pakistan Times which while he was Editor-in-Chief was to develop into the largest chain of newspapers in Pakistan.

Faiz served as Vice-President of the Pakistan Trade Union Federation and twice respresented Pakistan at ILO conferences as workers representative. He spent several years in jail on political charges and relinquished journalism with the Pakistan Times and associated newspapers were taken over by Ayub Khans military regime in 1959. For a number of years he served as principal of the Ahji Abdullah Haroon College, administering a complex of charitable institutions in one of the poorest areas of Karachi and was Vice-Preseident of the Arts Council of Pakistan and a member of the Executive Board of the World Peace Council. He was awarded the Lenin International Prize for peace in 1962. Since the events of 1971 and the seperation of bangladesh from Pakistan, he accepted the post of Cultural advisor to the Bhutto government in Pakistan. Faiz died in 1984.

Ahmad Faiz was so enamoured of Urdu poetry that he used to read it in the prisons where he was confined. He told Amrita Pritam, in an interview (printed in the book “Faiz Ahmad Faiz” edited by Khaliq Anjum) that his knowledge of Punjabi poetry did not go beyond the hearing or reading of qissas or verses of Waris Shah and Bulleh Shah.

In a letter (dated 9.7.52) to his wife he writes: “I have been thinking for so many days why I should not start writing in Punjabi and see how it comes in my mother-tongue. Urdu is such an ornate language that it baffles me and I am at sea to understand how should I use it for removing the communication gap between me and my people. I know the opponents of Punjabi like you will be disturbed over it but it is preposterous to have narrow mindedness and prejudice against any language (“Saleeben Mere Dariche Mein”).

The pro-Punjabi movement in West Punjab and his friendship with Ustab Chiragh Din Damar who ran a literary society called Punjabi Sangat brought Faiz closer to Punjabi poets.

His Punjabi poems and songs are printed at the back of his anthologies called “Sham-e-Shahaer-e-Yaran” and “Mere Dil, Mere Musafir”.

Faiz hurt Urdu lovers when he said (“Faiz Ahmad Faiz” edited by Khaliq Anjum) that Urdu is sophisticated language and revolutionary verses cannot be written in it. He also hurt Punjabi lovers saying Urdu is an urban language and verses about tillers can be written only in Punjabi, and not in Urdu.

In a book entitled “Hum Ke thaihre ajnabi” edited by Dr Ayub Mirza Faiz wrote: “After reading a lot and undergoing some hard work I may, perhaps, compose some verses like Ghalib but I cannot compose a single verse like that of Bulleh Shah or Waris Shah after life-long labout even. They are very great poets.”

INTROUDCTION TO POEMS BY FAIZ

Poets in this century like leaders of nations have emerged form some unexpeced nooks and corners. Faiz Ahmeds forbears wer Muslim peasnts of the Punjab, that rich green patch between mountain and desert, between middle India and Asia. His faterh, born with the instincts of a awanderer……….

Here is a poem by Faiz:

Freedom’s Dawn (August 1947)
This leprous daybreak, dawn nights fangs have mangled—-
This is not that long-looked-for break of day,
Not the clear dawn in quest for which those comrades
Set out, believing that in heavens wide void

Somewhere must be stars, last halting-place
Somewhere the verge of nights slow washing tide
Somewhere an achorage for the ship of heartbreak

When we set out, we friends, taking youths secret
Pathways, how many hands plucked at our sleeves
Brom Beuty’s dwellings and their panting casements
Soft arms are invoked us, flesh cried out to us
But dearer was the lure of dawns bright cheek
Closer her shimmering robe of fairy rays;
Light winged that longing, feather-light that toil

But now the word goes, the birth of day from darkness
Is finished, wondering feet stand at their goals

Our leaders ways are altering, festive looks
Are all the fashion, discontent reproved;—
And yet this physic still on the unslaked eye
Or heart fevered by severance works no cure.
Where did that fine breeze, that the wayside lamp
Has not once felt, blow from—where ahs it fled?
Nights’ heaven is unleashed still, the hour
Of mind and spirits ransom has not struck;
LET US GO ON,our goal is not yet reached.

OH CITY OF MANY LIGHTS
Listless and wan, green patch by patch, noonday dries up;
Pale solitude with venomed tongue licks at these walls;
Far as the skyline, like a fog, an oozy tide
Of blockish misery swells and shrinks, heaves up and fails,

Beyond that fog the lights of my thronged city lie.
Oh city of many lights!-
Who could make out what way from here your lights are?dark
As a towns ramparts isolation hems me in,
And war-worn hope’s faint soldiery droops on every side

Today doubt fills my soul
Oh city of many lights
Let hop’s armed ranks not turn from their night-marching yet!
Fortune befriend your loving haerts; say to them all-
This evening,when the lamps are lit,turn the wick high.

QATA BY FAIZ IN PUNJABI
UTH UTAN NOO JATTA
MARDA KION JAEN
BHOLIA! TOON JUG DA
UNDATA
TERI BANDI DHARTI MATA
TOO JUG DA PALAN HARA
TAY MARDA KION JAEN
UTH
UTAN NOO JATTA
MARDA KION JAVAIN

MORE LATER