literary notes: Colonialism, Urdu criticism and Hali's three-dimensional literary career.

Byline: Rauf Parekh

SOMETIMES literary success in a realm becomes an impediment in the sense that it eclipses brilliance of an author in other literary domains.

The smashing success of Altaf Hussain Hali's Muqaddama-i-Shaer-o-Shaeri (1893), a treatise on critical theory, is a good case in point. It established Hali as a pioneering literary critic and critical theorist since his Muaqaddama was the maiden endeavour on critical theory in Urdu. Before Hali, Urdu criticism was limited to either 'tazkiras' - adulatory introduction to poets with sample verses - or mushaeras that also served as opportunity to critically review the poetry of contemporary poets, albeit informally.

The tradition of 'islaah', or correction, literally, wherein a junior poet asked a senior one for critical review and suggestions, was another way of getting one's work critically analysed. Aside from these informal and irregular forums of applied criticism, there was little, if at all, written on critical theory in Urdu. Hali formally founded literary criticism in Urdu and that is why he is often dubbed as Urdu's first literary critic.

But Hali's stature as a critic overshadowed his other contributions that were equally important and remarkable: Hali as a poet and a biographer. A new book, an anthology of articles written on all three dimensions of Hali's literary works, has been published and it is packed with important information as well as invaluable critical opinions on Hali's diverse literary acumen. These articles were written from time to time by some of our towering literary figures and have now been selected and compiled by Ishtiaq Ahmed in this book titled Hali: Naqqaad, Shaer, Savaneh Nigar. Ishtiaq Ahmed teaches Urdu at Government Islamia College, Kasur, and has compiled several anthologies on literary issues before the present one.

In his foreword, Ishtiaq Ahmed says that despite some lacunas in Hali's critical writings, the significance of his thought and work cannot be underestimated. In his foreword, Ishtiaq Ahmed has also pointed a finger towards some critics, especially Syed Muhammad Aqeel and Abul Kalam Qasmi, who 'try to prove that Hali and his contemporaries, such as Muhammad Hussain Azad and Moulvi Nazeer Ahmed Dehlvi, had been active in supporting the expansionist policies of the British colonialists' or were, at least, 'under some colonial pressures'. He then suggests that 'the critics supporting purely western critical notions such as...