Shams-ur-Rahman Faruqi is one of the most awe-inspiring critics and scholars in the world of Urdu literature today. ‘Awe’ in the sense that Faruqi with his writings evokes a feeling of reverence as well as wonder, mixed with a bit of fear.
You have to revere him because Faruqi is a no-nonsense type of critic and scholar. Having drunk deeply from the fountain of knowledge, Faruqi possesses a vast area of expertise which includes history, religion, literature, linguistics, rhetoric, prosody, lexicography, fiction, Ghalib, Iqbal, literary theory and ... well, what not. He not only knows many languages but writes in Urdu and English with equal ease, with Persian being his almost first language and Hindi coming in as naturally as Urdu.
This inspires wonder: one wonders how much one can read and how much one can write. Faruqi had devoured most of the classical literatures of Urdu, English and Persian at an early age. After appearing for the BA examinations, writes Faruqi, he began reading Shakespeare and on some nights he had to read by the light of a lantern. By his own account, after reading Shakespeare he realised that whatever he had read and understood till then about literature or life was totally superficial, colourless and barren. Shakespeare had completely conquered him. Ever since then, he wrote, “there is a bond between Shakespeare and me that cannot be explained in words. This kind of connection could not be created with any other poet or writer, except Ghalib”.
One wonders about Faruqi’s writings as well. He is a poet, critic, literary theorist, novelist, short story writer, researcher, lexicographer and editor. His Shear-i-shor angez, a four-volume work on Mir Taqi Mir’s poetry and his art, is truly an epoch-making work. It is a treatise on Urdu poetry and the poetics that entirely changed how we looked at and understood Mir’s poetry and his vocabulary, not to mention the prosody and rhetoric.
His novel Kai chaand thei sar-i-aasmaan reflects Faruqi’s command over history, culture and language. It is perhaps one of the great Urdu novels ever written. But then there is a long list of his works and one can only nod with a knowing smile when his name is mentioned, lest one is considered uncultured.
You have to fear him because Faruqi does not mince his words and comes out as forcefully as he can when he disagrees with you. Straightforward and honest, Faruqi is equipped with a gift of articulation and incision. He rips through an opponent’s argument with a language suited to the issue, serious at times and becoming ironical at once. When Gianchand Jain’s book Aik bhasha do likhavat first appeared, it sent a tremor across the world of Urdu as it put forward a case against Urdu and Urdu-walas as well as Muslims. It was as unbelievable as shocking because of all the people Gianchand had penned it, the scholar of Urdu who had taught and served Urdu for over 50 years with some of his groundbreaking research works. But Urdu-walas were aghast and dumbfounded, looking for an apt reply. It was Shams-ur-Raman Faruqi who rose to the occasion and wrote the first detailed, crispy, satirical, scholarly and objective rejoinder to the book whose ghastly contents still reverberate in the memory. In fact, Faruqi is one of the frontline soldiers defending Urdu and Urdu-walas in India and elsewhere.
Though initially joining hands with Muhammad Hasan Askari against progressives, Faruqi is not a rightist in the strict sense of the word. His early education and upbringing had sown the seeds of religious leanings as his grandparents, both maternal and paternal, were very religious, but becoming a religious fellow was never his intention. Despite being thoroughly impressed by Muhammad Hasan Askari and his traditionalist school of thought earlier in his literary career, Faruqi soon drifted away and carved out what can be called a sort of his own cult. He is, if anything at all, a modernist. His literary magazine Shabkhoon too was a representative of modernism and it played a vital role in spreading the modernist views in the Indo-Pak subcontinent generally and in Urdu specifically.
On Shams-ur-Rahman Faruqi’s 82nd birthday, Anjuman Taraqqi-i-Urdu Hind’s research journal Urdu adab — published from Delhi under the editorship of Ather Farouqui — has published a special section on him. Though some sources, especially online writings that are usually full of all kinds of misinformation and inaccuracies, have mentioned January 15, 1935, as his birthday, Faruqi himself in one of his writings has expressly written that he was brought into this ‘manhoos’(inauspicious or ill-omened) world on September 30, 1935. So on his 82nd birthday, Faruqi is presented with a lovely gift — a special section in July-Sep, 2017, issue of Urdu adab — that pays him glowing tributes that he has earned well and deserved fully.
The articles included in the special section are written by well-known scholars of the Indo-Pak subcontinent, showering accolades on Faruqi’s works and personality. The contributors include Nayyar Masood, Ghazanfar, Siddiq-ur-Rahman Qidvai, Ather Farouqui, Khalid Javed and Noshad Kamran. The issue also includes a few of Faruqi’s articles.
Aside from reverence, wonder and fear, Faruqi evokes a feeling of love, too, for a great scholar and writer like him deserves the love of those who love literature.
Published in Dawn, September 11th, 2017
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