Meeraji
Encyclopedia
Meeraji (May 25, 1912 – November 4, 1949) was an eminent Urdu
poet. He lived the life of a bohemian and worked only intermittently.
and named Mohammed Sanaullah Dar, he passed his childhood days in Kucha Sardar Shah, Mozang, Lahore
. His father Munshi Mohammad Mahtabuddin was a railway engineer, so his family had to move from one place to another. He lived in Kathiawar
, Bostan (Baluchistan), Sanghar
and Jacobabad
.
Meeraji began composing poetry, under the pseudonym of Sasri, when he was at school. It was from his later encounter with a Bengali
girl, Meera Sen, who was a daughter of an accounts officer serving in Lahore
, that he fell deeply in love. This left a permanent trace in his life that he adopted his pen name on her name. Though brought up in affluent surroundings, Meeraji left his home and family and chose to lead the life of a homeless wanderer mostly staying with his friends and made a living by selling his songs.
) and later worked for All India Radio
, Delhi
. He wrote literary columns for the monthly Saqi (Delhi
) and for a short period helped editing Khayal (Bombay). After partition
, he settled permanently in Bombay.
From his teenage days Meeraji felt attracted towards Hindu mythology
. Hindi
vocabulary often came across in his poetry, prose and letters. He acknowledged his debt to the Sanskrit
poet Amaru
and the French
poet Baudelaire. He also translated certain works of the Sanskrit
poet, Damodar Gupta and of the Persian
poet, Omar Khayyam
.
Meeraji is considered to be one of the pioneers of symbolism in Urdu poetry, and especially introducing Free Verse
. Along with N. M. Rashid, he was a leading poet of the group Halqa-e-Arbab-e-Zauq, the supporters of the progressive movement
in Urdu poetry, which broke away from the classic convention of radeef and qafia, explored the rich resources of blank verse
and Free Verse
, rejected the confines of the socially "acceptable" and "respectable" themes, rejected the stranglehold of Persianised diction, and explored with sensitivity and skill, the hitherto forbidden territories of sexual and psychological states. He also wrote illuminating criticism of poetry and yearned to alter the expression of his age.
, in his writeup "Meera Sen's forgoten lover", records that during Meeraji's lifetime four collections of Meeraji's works were published by Shahid Ahmed Dehlavi, and one by Maktaba-e-Urdu, Lahore
. His complete works Kulliyat-e-Meeraji appeared only in 1988 edited by Dr. Jameel Jalibi
. Another collection titled Baqiyat-e-Meeraji was edited by Sheema Majeed in 1990. A book titled "Iss Nazm Mein" containing Essays of Meeraji was published during his lifetime.
The list of the works of Meeraji:
, his poet friend and former class fellow, recalled that the only time Meeraji trimmed his long hair, was when he joined All India Radio, New Delhi.
, his poet friend, who was himself influenced by Meeraji and Noon Meem Rashid
, and with whom Meeraji had spent the last days of his life in Poona and Bombay, reported that his excessive drinking, cigarette-smoking, and sexual dissipation had drained away his strength and damaged his liver. Then, there came the additional agony of his psychic ailment, for which he had to be admitted to the hospital where he was given electric shocks to cure him of his insanity - a treatment which he dreaded. The end came at 4 p.m. on November 4, 1949 in King Edward Memorial Hospital in Bombay.
Urdu
Urdu is a register of the Hindustani language that is identified with Muslims in South Asia. It belongs to the Indo-European family. Urdu is the national language and lingua franca of Pakistan. It is also widely spoken in some regions of India, where it is one of the 22 scheduled languages and an...
poet. He lived the life of a bohemian and worked only intermittently.
Early life
Born into a Kashmiri family of GujranwalaGujranwala
Gujranwala is a industrial city in the north-east of the Punjab province. It is the sixth largest city in Pakistan with a population of approximately 2,661,360 as on 24 June 2011...
and named Mohammed Sanaullah Dar, he passed his childhood days in Kucha Sardar Shah, Mozang, Lahore
Lahore
Lahore is the capital of the Pakistani province of Punjab and the second largest city in the country. With a rich and fabulous history dating back to over a thousand years ago, Lahore is no doubt Pakistan's cultural capital. One of the most densely populated cities in the world, Lahore remains a...
. His father Munshi Mohammad Mahtabuddin was a railway engineer, so his family had to move from one place to another. He lived in Kathiawar
Kathiawar
Kathiawar or Kathiawad is a peninsula in western India, which is part of the Saurashtra region on the Arabian Sea coast of Gujarat state. It is bounded on the north by the great wetland of the Rann of Kutch, on the northwest by the Gulf of Kutch, on the west and south by the Arabian Sea, and on...
, Bostan (Baluchistan), Sanghar
Sanghar
Sanghar is a city in Sanghar District, Sindh, Pakistan. Sanghar is the headquarters of Sanghar District and Sanghar Taluka . It is one of the agriculture town situated approximately 265 km from Karachi city...
and Jacobabad
Jacobabad
Jacobabad or Yaqubabad is the capital city of Jacobabad District, Sindh, Pakistan. The city is also the administrative centre of Jacobabad Taluka, an administrative subdivision of the district, the city is subdivided into 8 Union Councils...
.
Meeraji began composing poetry, under the pseudonym of Sasri, when he was at school. It was from his later encounter with a Bengali
Bengali people
The Bengali people are an ethnic community native to the historic region of Bengal in South Asia. They speak Bengali , which is an Indo-Aryan language of the eastern Indian subcontinent, evolved from the Magadhi Prakrit and Sanskrit languages. In their native language, they are referred to as বাঙালী...
girl, Meera Sen, who was a daughter of an accounts officer serving in Lahore
Lahore
Lahore is the capital of the Pakistani province of Punjab and the second largest city in the country. With a rich and fabulous history dating back to over a thousand years ago, Lahore is no doubt Pakistan's cultural capital. One of the most densely populated cities in the world, Lahore remains a...
, that he fell deeply in love. This left a permanent trace in his life that he adopted his pen name on her name. Though brought up in affluent surroundings, Meeraji left his home and family and chose to lead the life of a homeless wanderer mostly staying with his friends and made a living by selling his songs.
Literary life
Meeraji was associated with Adabi Duniya (LahoreLahore
Lahore is the capital of the Pakistani province of Punjab and the second largest city in the country. With a rich and fabulous history dating back to over a thousand years ago, Lahore is no doubt Pakistan's cultural capital. One of the most densely populated cities in the world, Lahore remains a...
) and later worked for All India Radio
All India Radio
All India Radio , officially known since 1956 as Akashvani , is the radio broadcaster of India and a division of Prasar Bharati. Established in 1936, it is the sister service of Prasar Bharati's Doordarshan, the national television broadcaster. All India Radio is one of the largest radio networks...
, Delhi
Delhi
Delhi , officially National Capital Territory of Delhi , is the largest metropolis by area and the second-largest by population in India, next to Mumbai. It is the eighth largest metropolis in the world by population with 16,753,265 inhabitants in the Territory at the 2011 Census...
. He wrote literary columns for the monthly Saqi (Delhi
Delhi
Delhi , officially National Capital Territory of Delhi , is the largest metropolis by area and the second-largest by population in India, next to Mumbai. It is the eighth largest metropolis in the world by population with 16,753,265 inhabitants in the Territory at the 2011 Census...
) and for a short period helped editing Khayal (Bombay). After partition
Partition of India
The Partition of India was the partition of British India on the basis of religious demographics that led to the creation of the sovereign states of the Dominion of Pakistan and the Union of India on 14 and 15...
, he settled permanently in Bombay.
From his teenage days Meeraji felt attracted towards Hindu mythology
Hindu mythology
Hindu religious literature is the large body of traditional narratives related to Hinduism, notably as contained in Sanskrit literature, such as the Sanskrit epics and the Puranas. As such, it is a subset of Nepali and Indian culture...
. Hindi
Hindi
Standard Hindi, or more precisely Modern Standard Hindi, also known as Manak Hindi , High Hindi, Nagari Hindi, and Literary Hindi, is a standardized and sanskritized register of the Hindustani language derived from the Khariboli dialect of Delhi...
vocabulary often came across in his poetry, prose and letters. He acknowledged his debt to the Sanskrit
Sanskrit
Sanskrit , is a historical Indo-Aryan language and the primary liturgical language of Hinduism, Jainism and Buddhism.Buddhism: besides Pali, see Buddhist Hybrid Sanskrit Today, it is listed as one of the 22 scheduled languages of India and is an official language of the state of Uttarakhand...
poet Amaru
Amaru Shataka
The Amaruśataka or Amarukaśataka , authored by Amaru , is a collection of poems dated to about the 7th or 8th century....
and the French
French people
The French are a nation that share a common French culture and speak the French language as a mother tongue. Historically, the French population are descended from peoples of Celtic, Latin and Germanic origin, and are today a mixture of several ethnic groups...
poet Baudelaire. He also translated certain works of the Sanskrit
Sanskrit
Sanskrit , is a historical Indo-Aryan language and the primary liturgical language of Hinduism, Jainism and Buddhism.Buddhism: besides Pali, see Buddhist Hybrid Sanskrit Today, it is listed as one of the 22 scheduled languages of India and is an official language of the state of Uttarakhand...
poet, Damodar Gupta and of the Persian
Persian people
The Persian people are part of the Iranian peoples who speak the modern Persian language and closely akin Iranian dialects and languages. The origin of the ethnic Iranian/Persian peoples are traced to the Ancient Iranian peoples, who were part of the ancient Indo-Iranians and themselves part of...
poet, Omar Khayyam
Omar Khayyám
Omar Khayyám was aPersian polymath: philosopher, mathematician, astronomer and poet. He also wrote treatises on mechanics, geography, mineralogy, music, climatology and theology....
.
Meeraji is considered to be one of the pioneers of symbolism in Urdu poetry, and especially introducing Free Verse
Free verse
Free verse is a form of poetry that refrains from consistent meter patterns, rhyme, or any other musical pattern.Poets have explained that free verse, despite its freedom, is not free. Free Verse displays some elements of form...
. Along with N. M. Rashid, he was a leading poet of the group Halqa-e-Arbab-e-Zauq, the supporters of the progressive movement
Progressive Writers' Movement
The Anjuman Tarraqi Pasand Mussanafin-e-Hind or Progressive Writers' Movement was a progressive literary movement in the pre-partition British India, consisting of a few different writers groups around the world....
in Urdu poetry, which broke away from the classic convention of radeef and qafia, explored the rich resources of blank verse
Blank verse
Blank verse is poetry written in unrhymed iambic pentameter. It has been described as "probably the most common and influential form that English poetry has taken since the sixteenth century" and Paul Fussell has claimed that "about three-quarters of all English poetry is in blank verse."The first...
and Free Verse
Free verse
Free verse is a form of poetry that refrains from consistent meter patterns, rhyme, or any other musical pattern.Poets have explained that free verse, despite its freedom, is not free. Free Verse displays some elements of form...
, rejected the confines of the socially "acceptable" and "respectable" themes, rejected the stranglehold of Persianised diction, and explored with sensitivity and skill, the hitherto forbidden territories of sexual and psychological states. He also wrote illuminating criticism of poetry and yearned to alter the expression of his age.
Works
Meeraji's literary output was immense but he is said to have published very little of his poetry during his lifetime. However, Khalid HasanKhalid Hasan
Khalid Hasan was a senior Pakistani journalist and writer. He was born in Srinagar, Kashmir.He was the brother in law of first elected president of Azad Jammu & Kashmir Mr K.H.Khurshid private secretary to Mohammed Ali Jinnah,the founder of Pakistan...
, in his writeup "Meera Sen's forgoten lover", records that during Meeraji's lifetime four collections of Meeraji's works were published by Shahid Ahmed Dehlavi, and one by Maktaba-e-Urdu, Lahore
Lahore
Lahore is the capital of the Pakistani province of Punjab and the second largest city in the country. With a rich and fabulous history dating back to over a thousand years ago, Lahore is no doubt Pakistan's cultural capital. One of the most densely populated cities in the world, Lahore remains a...
. His complete works Kulliyat-e-Meeraji appeared only in 1988 edited by Dr. Jameel Jalibi
Jameel Jalibi
Muhammad Jameel Khan commonly known as Prof. Dr. Jameel Jalibi Ph.D., D.Litt, SI, HI, is a noted linguist, critic, writer, researcher, educationist and scholar of Urdu literature and linguistics from Pakistan...
. Another collection titled Baqiyat-e-Meeraji was edited by Sheema Majeed in 1990. A book titled "Iss Nazm Mein" containing Essays of Meeraji was published during his lifetime.
The list of the works of Meeraji:
- "Meeraji ke Geet" (Poems)
- "Meeraji ki Nazmen"(Poems)
- "Teen Rang" (Poems)
- "Iss Nazm Mein" (Criticism - Essays of Meeraji)
- "Kulliyat-e-Meeraji" (Poems) compiled by Altaf Gauhar and published by Dr. Jameel Jalibi, Urdu Markaz U.K.
- "Baqiyat-e-Meeraji" (Poems) edited by Sheema Majeed and published by Pakistan Books and Literary Sounds, Lahore.
- "Intikhab-e-kalaam"
- "Pratinidhi Shairy"
Personality
Meeraji had adopted a deliberately outlandish style in his dress. Supporting long, floating hair, a dagger-like mustache, over-size earrings, a colorful headgear, an amulet and a string of beads around his neck, he fits into Coleridge's description of a poet - an inspired being with "flashing eyes and floating hair", who "on honey - dew hath fed/ And drunk the milk of Paradise ". Mehr Lal Soni Zia FatehabadiMehr Lal Soni Zia Fatehabadi
Zia Fatehabadi , born Mehr Lal Soni , was a renowned Urdu ghazal and nazm writer. He was a disciple of Syed Aashiq Hussain Siddiqui Seemab Akbarabadi who was a disciple of Nawab Mirza Khan Daagh Dehlawi...
, his poet friend and former class fellow, recalled that the only time Meeraji trimmed his long hair, was when he joined All India Radio, New Delhi.
Death
Akhtar ul ImanAkhtar ul Iman
Akhtar ul Iman was a noted Urdu poet and screenwriter in Hindi cinema, who had major influence on modern Urdu nazm.He won the Filmfare Award for Best Dialogue in 1963 for Dharmputra and 1966 for Waqt...
, his poet friend, who was himself influenced by Meeraji and Noon Meem Rashid
Noon Meem Rashid
Nazar Mohammed Rashed commonly known as Noon Meem Rashed or N.M. Rashed, was born as Raja Nazar Muhmmad Janjua...
, and with whom Meeraji had spent the last days of his life in Poona and Bombay, reported that his excessive drinking, cigarette-smoking, and sexual dissipation had drained away his strength and damaged his liver. Then, there came the additional agony of his psychic ailment, for which he had to be admitted to the hospital where he was given electric shocks to cure him of his insanity - a treatment which he dreaded. The end came at 4 p.m. on November 4, 1949 in King Edward Memorial Hospital in Bombay.
Theses
- "Meeraji" a monograph on the Urdu poet written by Shafey Kidwai.
- "Meeraji : Shakhsiyat aur Funn" - Doctoral dissertation of Dr. Rashid Amjad.
- "Meeraji aur Amli Tanqeed" published by Mah-e-Nau, LahoreLahoreLahore is the capital of the Pakistani province of Punjab and the second largest city in the country. With a rich and fabulous history dating back to over a thousand years ago, Lahore is no doubt Pakistan's cultural capital. One of the most densely populated cities in the world, Lahore remains a...
in May, 1979. A study of Meeraji's methods of literary criticism.