Mirza Ghalib Love and Longing

What better way to pay tribute to Mirza Ghalib than to begin with a maqta from one of his timeless ghazals? In this beautiful couplet, Mirza Sahab encapsulates the unfathomable depth of his own persona:

Pūchhte haiñ voh ki ‘ġhālib’ kaun hai

Koī batlāo ki ham batlā.eñ kyā

When roughly translated, it means, “They ask , ‘who is Ghalib ?’ , Someone tell me , how should I answer?”. Now is it humility or ostentation?. On one hand, Ghalib sounds extremely humble suggesting that he is beyond comprehension but simultaneously he may be playfully mocking the idea that anyone could ever truly grasp the greatness of Ghalib. He could also be alluding to the fluidity and multifacetedness of one’s identity, because this couplet resonates with an existential question: how does one define the self ?

Born in Agra in a Turko-Persian ancestry family in 27^th December of 1797, Assadullah Beg Khan, popularly known by his pen name ‘Ghalib’, remains one of the most celebrated poets of the Indian subcontinent and of the whole world. Although Ghalib mostly wrote in Persian, he is often celebrated for his breath-taking gazals written in Urdu hence often called the soul of Urdu verse.

The merciless misfortunes: Merely at 5 , he lost his father and then his guardian uncle at the age of 9. He got married early at the age of 13 and unfortunately lost all seven of his children in their sheer infancy. During the 1857 turmoil, a stray bullet hit his brother Mirza Yusuf who had a severe mental illness. Ghalib lived in the bitter era of recent Indian socio-political turmoil. He was a witness to fall of Mughal empire and obviously to the death of his beloved friends and relatives. So, Mirza Sahab’s life may be aptly defined as a repository of agony and helplessness. Misfortunes chased him throughout his life that triggered his heart bleed with the verses of beyond compare magnificence. It would not be wrong to say that heartbreaks developed and matured his metaphysics hence, I reckon, he says, “ Ranj se khogar hova insaan to mit jata ha ranj, Mushkilein muj pay padi itni ki bas asaan hogayi”, that if a human being gets accustomed to grief, then grief disappears, so many hardships befell me that they eventually turned simple to sustain. It resonates with Molana Rumi’s notion of pain and suffering.

Ghalib’s Genius: As said earlier, the timeless realm of Mirza’s kalam is literally indescribable because he is the master of metaphors and melancholy. His rich legacy is woven with the threads of love and loss, heartbreak and hope, vengeance and wisdom and pain and beauty. Ghalib communicates complex meaning in simple verses but despite the simplicity sensed in his verses, there are metaphors, there are traps and trojans hidden in every couplet that he wrote. For instance, consider a beautiful couplet woven with the bittersweet emotions of love and longing, ‘ nukta-chīñ hai ġham-e-dil us ko sunā.e na bane

Kyā bane baat jahāñ baat banā.e na bane’

He is a critic of the sorrows of the heart, sharing them does not work

What can be done in a world where words fail to create understanding?

One could derive limitless connotations and meanings out of it and those still won’t suffice. Trust me, this is not an exaggeration.

Personally, I consider it sacrilegious to merely call him a poet , he is an architect of emotions with deep philosophical treasure. His poetry is the alchemy of human condition that transforms sorrow into beauty and longing into eternity. To read him is to enter into the vast garden of metaphors where every rose emits the eternal fragrance of love and longing. The mystic muse of Ghalib is so deep and subtle that one can’t help reading him over and over again with evergreen taste and proclivity. With every fresh recitation of his Gazal, a new depth unveils and breaths new life into a human heart. His poetry hides treasures hence he remains to be an enigma for his readers and researchers. Hence , he regarded himself as a Nightingale of a garden that is yet to come into existence!

Originally quoted by Hali, there is an incident mentioned by Gopi Chand Narang in his book ‘Ghalib – Innovative meanings and the ingenious mind’ which reads: Among the disciples of Moulana Fazl-e Haq, a great scholar and luminary, there was someone who went to Mirza Ghalib and inquired about the meaning of one of the couplets written by Nasir Ali Sirhindi. He interpreted the couplet. The person came back to Maulana and told him, “You always praise the poetic ability of Mirza Ghalib. Today he interpreted a couplet wrongly.” Then he read the couplet and summarised the meaning provided by Ghalib. Maulana asked, “What is wrong with the interpretation.” ‘There is nothing wrong, but this is not the interpretation that Nasir Ali intended.’ Maulana replied, “if Nasir Ali did not mean what Ghalib understood then he made a big mistake.” This incident brings to my mind a magnificent couplet of Mirza:

Haiñ aur bhī duniyā meñ suḳhan-var bahut achchhe

Kahte haiñ ki ‘ġhālib’ kā hai andāz-e-bayāñ aur ,

which means that although there are many poets and literary giants in the world, but the style of Mirza Ghalib is somewhat ‘different’.

Ghalib was way ahead of his era and detested materialism, sectarianism, close-mindedness, oppression and dogmatism. Being blessed with umpteen spirituality, wit and wisdom, his ideas and notions remained to be mysteries to the scholarly circles of his time. Hence, Hali often mentions that Ghalib couldn’t get the recognition that he richly deserved when he was alive.

Bottom Line: To cut a long story short, Ghalib is the undisputed champion of the literary world and will remain so till eternity. Even if I stretch it to the heavens, this article still won’t suffice. So I end it with a few thought provoking couplets and anticipate that you would read them aloud for yourself with unmatched enthusiasm and try understanding his rich philosophy encoded in them.

Husn ġhamze kī kashākash se chhutā mere ba.ad

Baare ārām se haiñ ahl-e-jafā mere ba.ad

Shama bujhtī hai to us meñ se dhuāñ uthtā hai

Shoala-e-ishq siyah-posh huā mere baad

aae hai bekasī-e-ishq pe ronā ‘ġhālib’

kis ke ghar jāegā sailāb-e-balā mere ba.ad.