Author: Gopi Chand Narang
Translator(s)/ Editors(s): Gopi Chand Narang/Baidar Bakht & Marie - Anne Erki
Publisher: Sahitya Akademi
Year: 2010
Language: English
Pages: 167
ISBN/UPC (if available): 9788126028665
Description
Shahryar is fundamentally an intellectual poet, whose poetry strongly expresses an ideological non-commitment, whose roots lie in the poet’s desire for self-realization and his attempt to understand modern problems.
Combining economy of picturization and imagery with suggestivity, he has dealt even in his brief poems with the problem of contemporary life in an extraordinarily metaphoric way.
Shahryar is not concerned in his poetry with messages or conclusion, rather, he expresses the spiritual suffering and psychological anguish of what he regards as the wounded modern man. Suspended between the two harsh realities of time and death, yet wanting to ‘live’ in the present moment of the present, he tries to see the true face of life in brief fleeting moments of realization of joy and sorrow.
ABOUT THE TRANSLATORS:
Baidar Bakht, born in 1940, took his first degree in civil engineering from Aligarh and M. Sc. And D. Sc. From London University. He is a bridge engineer by profession. Now retired from full-time employment, he is Adjunt Professor of civil engineering at the universities of Toronto and Manitoba. In Urdu literature he is known for his many English translations of modern Urdu poetry. Since 1947, Baidar Bakht lives in Toronto, Canada, with his family.
Marrie – Anne Erki, with Ph. D. in Structural engineering, is a professor of civil engineering at the Royal Military College of Canada. She has collaborated with Baidar Bakht on many English translations of Urdu poetry. Fluenty bilingual in English and French, she has a keen eye on the literature of the two languages. She lives in Kingston, Ontario, Canada, with her husband.
Contents
Shahryar: New poetry and its magic – Gopi Chand Narang
Part I – The Name Most High (1965)
1. Dreams
2. The time
3. The death
4. What’s this custom
5. The graveyard
6. Contrast
7. Haze
8. The cure
9. New day, new punishment
10. The essence of life and reality
11. Shadows
12. The spell of today
13. Deception within deception
14. A scene
15. Anguish of awareness
16. Endless silence
17. Shadows
18. The Judgment Day is near
19. In the desert of time
20. The death of a shadow
21. The nectar of life
22. Ghazal verses
Part II – The Seventh Door (1969)
23. Longing for a dream
24. The flight
25. In the desert of darkness
26. Another birthday
27. Before and after dreams
28. Alluring creatures of the present time
29. The siren for danger
30. New question of new times
31. The first headline of the first page
32. Night, day and night again
33. A new story
34. Warning
35. The desire for life
36. Still life
37. The reign of haze
38. The diagnosis
39. To heirs of the dream of Hussain
40. Poem No. 7
41. Ghazal verses
Part III – Times of Parting (1978)
42. Confession
43. Shadows
44. If the wind pauses
45. Ghazal verses
Part IV – The Gateway to Dreams is Closed (1985)
46. The gateway to dreams is closed
47. In the memory of Khalilur Rahman Azmi
48. The square earth become round
49. An admission of helplessness
50. Stay close to me
51. In defence of staying awake at night
52. A beam or two worth of sunlight
53. The downfall of nightly vigils
54. The remaining half tale
55. Glad tidings of a revolution
56. His share of earth
57. Loneliness
58. So much light
59. For those who have given up dreams
60. Lampooning sadness
61. I am ready again
62. Ghazal verses
Part V Shards of Sleep (1995)
63. I am One of Them
64. An excuse to last forever
65. Make a deal with sleep
66. I shall not wake up
67. But I wanted to
68. Unspeakable words
69. The river of blood
70. fetters of the body
71. You’ ll lose again
72. Letter written with fingers
73. Both afraid of each other
74. Nothing but lust
75. Release from the thirst
76. You’ve been with me
77. From the other shore of the night
78. This crumbling wall
79. Ghazal verses
Part VI – The Evening is about to Fall (2004)
80. For Mughni Tabassum
81. The Stage beyond sleep
82. It’s not so bad to dream
83. The result of long silence
84. How could I escape
85. Continually
86. Admitted to the bounds of the desert
87. I am afraid
88. Lust for life
89. The focus of long kisses
90. Addiction to living
91. Ghazal Verses
Part VII – Poetry written after 2004
92. For Irfan Siddiqui
93. Helplessness
94. Ghazal Verse
95. Shahryar
96. Footnotes