DR Mubashar Hasan’s study of Ghalib came as a pleasant surprise to me. Hastily I attached a motive to it. And I had some justification for it too. After all, Dr Sahib is an activist with a progressive outlook on life. He can hardly be counted as someone believing in poetry for poetry’s sake. That, according to the progressives, is a reactionary approach to the genre. Poetry, they insist, must have some purpose to serve, a purpose relevant to the times we are living in. A critic or an intelligent reader while studying a poet is expected to discover some such purpose in his work. Dr Mubashar should have no difficulty in tracing out a purpose in Ghalib’s verse, which at present is most dear to him. And who else other than Ghalib can better serve the noble purpose of Indo-Pak peace process?
But no, Ghalib has been read and discussed here in a far wider context. The study has been presented under the title Ghalib: Kainat Mein Insaan Ka Muqam. How different it appears from the works of those ideological critics who approach poetry with the exclusive purpose of extracting meaning of their own liking out of it. Ghalib has so often been subjected to this kind of treatment. I am tempted to quote two such instances. One is of those critics who in their progressive exuberance once asserted that Ghalib had ample social and political consciousness. They picked out from his Diwan a few couplets, which, according to them, were expressive of his sense of sorrow at what had happened in 1857. But Ghalib’s researchers were quick to point out that the couplets had been written long before 1857. Such critics did not have the patience for allowing poetry to speak of its own accord. Had they been patient, they would have soon found glimpses of a situation which eventually culminated in the catastrophe of 1857.
As another example I may refer to our respected scholar Khwaja Manzoor Husain, who detected in Ghalib’s poetry influences of the Wahabi movement as represented by Syed Ahmad Shaheed. We can only marvel at imagining Ghalib, who relished in calling himself Rind-ai-Shahidbaz coming under the influence of a movement, which is known for its puritanism and fundamentalist approach to religion.
Dr Mubashar’s study of Ghalib is of a different kind. He is in no hurry to wrest from his verse meanings suited to the cause dear to him. So he doesn’t approach Ghalib’s poetry with the exclusive purpose of extracting any meaning out of it. He provides enough space for poetic imagination to move freely and lets it soar high in the realm of cosmic ideas. He asserts that the moment a poet comes down on earth, he will speak in terms best suited to the cause he stands for. So let us observe calmly or rather share his worry about the place of man in the scheme of universe.
What is universe and how is man placed in the cosmic order? That, according to Dr Mubashar, is the basic question with Ghalib. That leads to a quest for cosmic dimensions. He has discovered four phases in the quest. Each phase turns into a revelation of some new phenomenon, most significant being the manifestation of beauty. The whole cosmic order appears to be the manifestation of beauty, and man being a part of it. But man aspires to be the man than being simply a man. Insaan and Admi are in fact two different species. Not every creature known as Admi is destined to gain the status of Insaan.
Admi kau bhi mayassar nahin insaan hona
With this awareness the poet looks at people around him, more particularly the kind of people known as the Waiz, Zahid, Abid, Nasah. All their sermons, their pious assertions, their moralistic verdicts appear to him hollow and devoid of any meaning. He has now transcended the current categories of Kufr and Iman, Sheikh and Barahman, Rind and Parsa. And so stands aloof from the spate of denunciations and hatred these categories carry with them.
It is this kind of a study in which the critic remains strictly faithful to the text. In fact, it is a series of Ghalib’s couplets so arranged and explained that slowly and gradually we find Ghalib’s ideas transformed into a well-conceived system of thought.
Dr Mubashar hardly feels the need to step outside the bounds of Ghalib’s verse and make his own comments. He lets Ghalib to speak for himself. He just helps us to understand what Ghalib has said in a given couplet. And he explains in simple words avoiding critical phraseology and philosophical references.
DR Mubashar Hasan’s study of Ghalib came as a pleasant surprise to me. Hastily I attached a motive to it. And I had some justification for it too. After all, Dr Sahib is an activist with a progressive outlook on life. He can hardly be counted as someone believing in poetry for poetry’s sake. That, according to the progressives, is a reactionary approach to the genre. Poetry, they insist, must have some purpose to serve, a purpose relevant to the times we are living in. A critic or an intelligent reader while studying a poet is expected to discover some such purpose in his work. Dr Mubashar should have no difficulty in tracing out a purpose in Ghalib’s verse, which at present is most dear to him. And who else other than Ghalib can better serve the noble purpose of Indo-Pak peace process?
