Quiz A collection of interesting questions related to Urdu poetry, prose and literary history. Play Rekhta Quiz and check your knowledge about Urdu!
Compilation of top 20 hand-picked Urdu shayari on the most sought-after subjects and poets
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Start playingQuiz A collection of interesting questions related to Urdu poetry, prose and literary history. Play Rekhta Quiz and check your knowledge about Urdu!
Originally a Kashmiri Pandit but truly a Dilli waala by heart, Anand Mohan Zutshi ‘Gulzar’ Dehlvi’s (1926-2020) entire parentage devoted itself selflessly to the progress of Urdu language. Gulzar Dehlvi was a paragon of our composite culture, Urdu language and literature, and our age-old Ganga-Jamuni culture. He revered Hazrat Nizamuddin Auliya and regularly used to visit his tomb to pay his tributes. Whenever he went out of the house, he would be dressed in a Jawahar cut Topi and a sherwani upon which a fresh rose would be inevitably smiling. In his long life, he graced innumerable Mushairas and in his own unalike style held high the banner of Urdu language. He founded Anjuman-e-Ta'meer-e-Urdu in 1946 and organized several poetry festivals and literary summits under it. The likes of Jigar Moradabadi, Maulvi Abdul Haq, Jawaharlal Nehru, Hussain Ahmad Madani, Abul Kalam Azad, Allama Niyaz Fatehpuri, Josh Malihabadi and many others took pride in their companionship with Gulzar Sahib.
Mina Kumari was indeed a great actress, but also a fine poet; her pen-name was Naz. She once said to the songwriter-poet Gulzar, "Ye jo adaa-kaari main karti hun is mein ek kami hai, ye fann, ye art, mujh mein paida nahin hua hai; khayal dusre ka hai, kirdar kisi aur ka, aur hidayar kisi ki. Mere andar se jo paida hua hai wo main likhti hun, Jo main kahna chahti hun, wo likhti hun.” Meena Kumari had entrusted all her poetry to Gulzar. After her death in 1972, Gulzar published a collection of her poems, titled ‘Tanha Chand’.
An album of her poetry in Meena Kumari’s own voice was released by musician Khayyam, titled ‘I write, I recite’. Meena Kumari wanted Khayyam's wife singer Jagjit Kaur to sing her Nazms, but Jagjit Kaur insisted that they would come off better in Mina Kumari’s own voice. And, as it turned out, the album proved to be extremely poignant in her own voice.
In her last years, Meena Kumari had given up caring for herself. He once said to musician Naushad, “Main raat bhar jagti hun is khauf se ki din niklega, aur din is kashmakash mein guzarta hai ki ab andhera hone wala hai.” Naushad picked up a pen and paper and summed up Mina's condition in this verse:
Dekho Suraj Ufuq mein duub gaya
Dhoop ik sar se tere aur dhali
Ek din uljhano.n ka aur gaya
Ik kaDii zindagi ki aur kaTi
Meena Kumari read this Qita over and over again and started crying.
Mirza Rafi Sauda (1713-1781) who is famous for his odes and Hajw (Lampoons), also had a bent for animals and had raised many beautiful dogs. In a Hajw titled ‘Tazheek-e-Rozgaar, Sauda, who appears to be making fun of a horse, is actually satirizing the weaknesses of the Mughal Empire and especially its declining military power. Hajw is a poem in which someone is satirized and made a butt of ridicules. One can’t say whether Sauda really owned horses or not, but in the aforementioned poem, the description of the attributes and body parts of horses are penned so very well that it is in no way less than an equestrian’s know-how of horses. When Sauda was a part of Nawab Asif Ud-Daula’s court in Faizabad, the Nawab had had captured elephants from the jungle of Bahraich. One of the elephants so charmed Sauda, that he even wrote a few couplets on it.
Nastaleeq is a beautiful script in which Urdu is written, which was designed in Iran in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries. ‘Naskh’ is the script in which Arabic is usually written. And Taleeq is a Persian script. Both of them were merged to become Nastaleeq. It is interesting to note that in Urdu the word Nastaleeq is used for a cultured, well mannered and refined person.
Kishwar Nahid is a well-known poetess, writer and translator, much-known for her feminist ideas. She penned a synopsis of the book ‘Second Sex’, written by French author Simone de Beauvoir on women, titled ‘Aurat’, and added precedents from her own society to it. The book became very popular. In a month’s time, five thousand copies of the book were sold in Pakistan. Many students of the university also bought it. But contrarily, in 1997, a case was filed against Kishwar for writing obscene content in this book. Consequently, the book was banned.
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