“Itna fresh Urdu shayar main ne nahin parrha” was the impromptu comment made — in an ecstatic tone with a lilt — the other day on Mir Taqi Mir’s poetry by a young literature buff during a literary session in Islamabad. It translates to: “Such a fresh Urdu poet I have never read.”

Even with the English word he inserted in the sentence, the awe and fondness in the admirer’s expression and style will remain untranslatable. This very feeling, evoked in young and old alike, confirms why Mir stands out among those who lived before him, his own contemporaries and the ones coming after him over the past 300 years, who carry on fancying the muse of poetry in Urdu.

What makes Mir so fresh and relatable to this day, besides claiming the highest place among the classical poets in our literary canon, has been discussed at length by major scholars ranging from Professor C.M. Naim, Ralph Russell and Shamsur Rahman Faruqi, to Dr Masihuzzaman and Frances Pritchett among many others.

There is a work of fiction by Indian author Khushwant Singh that includes Mir, and a film that celebrates his life, written by Sarmad Sehbai and directed by Anjum Raza. There are some other works of art also that mention his life and works.

We find six large volumes of his poetry in Urdu and one in Persian. In later years, many selections from Mir’s work were made by people such as Nawab Syed Hussain Bilgrami, Maulana Hasrat Mohani, Maulvi Abdul Haq and others, and this seems to have continued even now.

Muhammad Hameed Shahid recently compiled all the verses of Mir that were referred to by Shamsur Rahman Faruqi in his compendium on Mir, Sher-i-Shor Angez [The Stormy Verse]. Some years ago, Dr Moeenuddin Aqeel discovered and compiled the seventh volume of Mir’s poetry as well.

It is interesting, though, that Mir is not as widely celebrated in popular imagination as Mirza Asadullah Khan Ghalib, who came about a hundred years after him. Notwithstanding that Ghalib himself is a giant of a poet, perhaps a major reason remains that more information and better documentation is available about Ghalib’s life and times. His charm and popularity is further enhanced by his inimitable wit and luminous prose.

We also see that the three greatest Urdu language poets — Mir, Ghalib and Allama Muhammad Iqbal — largely employ a Persianised diction in their Urdu work, in addition to writing in Persian, whether the content is romantic or social. However, Mir, who predates Ghalib and Iqbal by almost a hundred and 150 years respectively, is the least Persianised.

Neither in Mir’s overall sensibility nor in most of his diction will you find content, themes, feelings or experiences that are drawn from anywhere else but his habitat. As I have written before but wish to reiterate, Mir is the most native poet from among the greats in Urdu poetry in terms of both his attitude and treatment.

He is not overawed by Persian idiom or sensibility. He draws upon the Persian lexicon on his own terms and combines it seamlessly with local words and idiom. Past-o-bulandiyaan hain arz-o-sama se zaahir/ Dekha jahaan ko hum ne kitni kudhab jagah hai [The rises and falls are manifested by the earth and the sky/ This world we witness is an intractable place].

The use of the Hindi word ‘kudhab’ with the Persian terms ‘past-o-buland’ and ‘arz-o-sama’ is one such example from hundreds, if not more, in Mir’s work.

Political activism and political consciousness are two separate things. It is not always required for an artist to be a political activist. However, being politically conscious and having a deep sense of history have, somehow, become common traits among those who have produced mentionable works of art.

These bring depth of emotions, layers of meaning, interplay between inner consciousness and the external world and historic insights to their craft and expression. That, somehow, tends to bring a distinct flavour to their love poetry as well.

For instance, when Mir says: “Kin neendon ab tu soti hai aey chashm-i-girya naak/ Mizhgaan tau khol shehr ko sailaab le gaya” [How could slumber prevail upon you, the tearful eye/ Open your eyelashes and see your city washed away by the flood], we can feel the reverberations of this couplet to this day.

An important work that reflects on Mir’s historic sensibility and political consciousness is his autobiography, Zikr-i-Mir, originally penned in Persian. Some scholars say that it covers the first 60 years of his life, while there is another opinion that it covers the first 50.

Mir died at the age of 87 in 1810. In 1928, Maulvi Abdul Haq published a new edition of the book. Also, it is mentionable that Professor C.M. Naim translated it into English. Zikr-i-Mir’s translation in Urdu by Dr Nisar Ahmed Farooqi appeared first in India in 1957. Majlis-i-Taraqqi-Adab, Lahore, has published its two editions in Pakistan, first under the stewardship of Ahmed Nadeem Qasmi in 1996 and then by Dr Tahseen Firaqi in 2016.

Zikr-i-Mir is a brief autobiography that begins with Mir introducing us to his ancestors, particularly his father, and the life his father led and the beliefs and values to which he subscribed. When writing about himself, Mir does tell us about how shabbily he was treated by some of his close family and his spell of madness because of a beloved, who turns from a real person to an imaginary presence.

He mentions his travels and then migration from Delhi to Lucknow where Nawab Asaf-ud-Daulah welcomes him. But he does not write in detail about his life as much as one would wish. Mir moves on to dedicating a significant portion of his narrative to the wars being waged among the Marathas, Sikhs, Rajputs, Afghans and many others.

He captures the chaos of his times, making Zikr-i-Mir an important book for understanding 18th century India, the infighting among Indians and the machinations of the colonisers.

The columnist is a poet and essayist. He has recently edited Pakistan Here and Now: Insights into Society, Culture, Identity and Diaspora. His latest collection of verse is Hairaan Sar-i-Bazaar

Published in Dawn, Books & Authors, February 12th, 2023