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The two school theory of Urdu literature

University of British Columbia

The Two School theory, perhaps the most prevalent in Urdu literary criticism, holds that the Delhi School and the Lucknow School comprise the bulk of classical poetry. The two schools are named after the cities of Delhi and Lucknow, Muslim India's two greatest centers of Urdu culture. Dihlavi poetry (the poetry written in Delhi), considered by critics to be truer to the Persian literary tradition than the poetry of Lucknow, is described as emphasizing mystical concerns, Persian styles of composition, and a straightforward, melancholy poetic diction. Lakhnavi poetry (that written in Lucknow) by contrast, is characterized as sensual, frivolous, abstruse, flashy, even decadent. Reasons posited for Lakhnavi poetry's decadence are the deleterious effects of the city's prosperous, even opulent, economic and social climate during the late eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. Delhi's ravaged condition during the same period is likewise considered the cause of Dihlavi poetry's allegedly contrasting, melancholic outlook. The present study challenges the Two School theory on several counts, arguing that it is more an expression of cultural values than the supportable results of rigorous textual analysis. In the first place this study does not recognize the literary distinctions between Dihlavi and Lakhnavi poetry which are claimed by "Two School" critics. Secondly, it places the Two School theory in the context of cultural and political events of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries which touched the two cities of Delhi and Lucknow, including their literary spokespeople. This study's challenge is two-fold: it first traces the development of the Two School theory's articulation in Urdu critical literature. It follows the theory's transition from usually unspecific, subjective statements about Lakhnavi poetry by Urdu's earliest critics, Maulana Azad and Altaf Husain Hali—who were Dihlavi poets themselves—into a full-blown, formal classification of literary distinctions between a "Delhi School" and a "Lucknow School." This later classification was formalized by such twentieth century critics as Abdus Salam Nadvi, Andalib Shadani, Nurul Hasan Hashmi and Abul Lais Siddiqi. The next section challenges both Nadvi*s and Shadani's literary distinctions and their methods of argumentation as well. A comparative study of Dihlavi and Lakhnavi poetry, based on a structurally-controlled sample of verses composed in the same zamin (meter and end-rhyme), suggests that the poetic choices made by any Urdu poet—regardless of his or her domicile—is influenced at least as much by the structural demands of the ghazal form as by societal influences. Following the comparison between Dihlavi and Lakhnavi poetry comes a comparison of the two most important Lakhnavi ghazal poets, Nasikh and Atish. Though named by critics as co-founders of the Lucknow School, their styles are also characterized by the same critics as fundamentally different—some have even called Atish a "Delhi-style" Lucknow poet. This study concurs with the claim that Nasikh and Atish often write in two characteristically different styles, showing various differences in choice which the two exercise. These characteristic differences can be seen in ghazals composed by both poets in a single zamin. as well as in Nasikh's and Atish’s individual address of conventional ghazal themes (mazamin). The differences between the two foremost Lakhnavi poets further challenge the claim that Nasikh and Atish both developed and manifest the characteristic "Lakhnavi" style which forms the basis of a "school" distinction between Dihlavi and Lakhnavi poetry. The concluding chapter argues that despite its literary questionability, the Two School theory endures because it satisfies fundamental elements of Indo-Muslim cultural identification. The theory's origins are tied in with the birth of literary criticism in Urdu, which occurred during a time when political circumstances had caused Indian Muslims to question established perceptions, both of themselves and of their role in Indian society as a whole. The symbolism attached to "Lucknowness" and "Delhiness" seems to reflect these socio-political dynamics better than they reflect text-based analyses of Delhi and Lucknow poetry.

Text

2010-08-07

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http://hdl.handle.net/2429/27184

Asian Studies

University of British Columbia

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