Author's Note: This is an expanded version of a paper presented at the seminar “The Urdu Ghazal and Prose Fiction: Materials for the Study of Muslim Society in South Asia” held under the auspices of the Center for South Asian Studies, University of Wisconsin, Madison, February 1978. Support for this study came from the Graduate School, University of Wisconsin, Madison, whom the author wishes to thank for their generous assistance. Urdu consonants tē, sē, čē, rāl, sē, suād, tō'ē, and zō'ē, have been transliterated in this study as t, s, č, z, r;, s, z, and z transliteration of other Urdu letters is self-explanatory.

¹ (Paris: Gallimard, 1919–1927), 1, 281.

² For a brief biographical sketch of Intiār Husain, see my “Partition Literature: A Study of Intiimg;ār Husain,” Modern Asian Studies, 14 (07 1980), 377–410.Google Scholar

³ Miguel, de Unamuno, Tragic Sense of Life, trans. Flitch, J. E. Crawford (London, 1921; rpt. New York: Dover Publications, 1954), p. 8.Google Scholar

⁴ On this movement see Carlo, Coppola, “Urdu Poetry, 1935–1970: The Progressive Episode,” Ph. D. diss., The University of Chicago, 1975;Google ScholarHafeez, Malik, “Marxist Literary Movement in India and Pakistan,” Journal of Asian Studies, 26 (1967), 649–664; and my essay referred to in n. 2 above.Google Scholar

⁵ See Intiār, Husain, “Hamārē 'ahd kā adab,” Savērā (Lahore, Pakistan), 31 (n.d.), 9.Google Scholar

⁶ Ibid.

⁷ A form of poetry dealing with the theme of love, whether human or divine. It can have any number of couplets, but no fewer than five. Each couplet is a separate entity in itself, not always semantically connected with the other couplets, all of which are held together by a common meter and rhyme. The rhyme scheme is invariably: aa, ba, ca, da, ea, fa, etc.

⁸ A form of poetry which may deal with any subject. It is ideally suited for describing whole episodes and longer sequences of thought. Traditional nazms show strict adherence to a chosen meter, but may use a different rhyme scheme within each couplet.

⁹ E.g.: his novel Čānd-gahan (Lunar Eclipse) (Lahore: Maktaba-e-Kārwān, 1953)Google Scholar and collections of short stories Galī kūčē (Alleys, and Byways, ) (Lahore: Maktaba-e-Kārwān, 1952)Google Scholar and kankarī (Pebble, ) (Lahore: Maktaba-e-Jadīd, 1955).Google Scholar

¹⁰ Shahr-e-afsōs (Lahore: Maktaba-e-Kārwān, 1973), pp. 62–83Google Scholar (all further references to this work appear in the text); English tr., “The Stairway,” by Muhammad, Umar Memon, Indian Literature, 19 (11–12 1976), 87–102.Google Scholar

¹¹ Shahr-e-afsōs, pp. 190–206. All further references to this work appear in the text.Google Scholar

¹² Ibid., pp. 9–28 (all further references to this work appear in the text); English tr., “The Lost Ones,” by Muhammad, Umar Memon, Edebiyāt, A Journal of Middle Eastern Literatures. 3, 2 (1978), 139–156.Google Scholar

¹³ Ākhrī ādmī (Lahore: Kitābiyāt, 1967), pp. 14–36Google Scholar (all further references to this work appear in the text); English tr., “The Yellow Dog,” by Faruq, Hassan, in Nothing but the Truth, Pakistani Short Stories, ed. Faruq, Hassan and Khalid, Hasan (Montreal: Dawson College, 1978), pp. 207–223.Google Scholar

¹⁴ Ākhrī ādmī, pp. 1–13Google Scholar (all further references to this work appear in the text); English tr., “The Last Man,” by Riaz, Hassan, in Nothing but the Truth, pp. 232–239.Google Scholar

¹⁵ Shahr-e-afsōs, pp. 249–270;Google Scholar English tr., “The City of Sorrows,” by Salim-ur-Rahman, M., in Modern Urdu Short Stories from Pakistan, ed. Azim, S. Viqar (Islamabad: Pakistan Branch, R. C. D. Cultural Institute, 1977), pp. 128–145. All further references to this work and its translation appear in the text.Google Scholar

¹⁶ Alam is the spear-headed black banner of Imām husain and Imām hasan which is carried in procession during the Muharram festival. Panja is literally an aggregate of five; here it refers to a hand with five fingers extended, attached to the staff of the 'alam, signifying the Prophet Muhhammad, his daughter Fātima, his cousin and son-in-law 'Alī b. Abī Sālib, and his grandsons Hasan and Husain. An imām (Arabic) is spiritual and religious leader. Bārah (Hindi) is an abode or enclosure, a building in which the Muharram festival is celebrated. Karbalā' is a place about 40 km north of Kūfa in Iraq, where, on 10 October 680, Husain was killed by the Umaiyads in a battle. For an excellent account of the celebration and observances of Muharram, see MrsMeer, Hassan Ali, Observations on the Mussulmanns of India, ed. Crooke, W. (1832; rpt. Karachi: Oxford University Press, 1974), pp. 17–54;Google Scholar see also Ja'far, Sharīf, Islam in India, or the Qānūn-i-Islām, ed. Crooke, W. (1921; rpt. New Delhi: Oriental Books Reprint Corporation, 1972), pp. 151–185Google ScholarAbdul, Halim Sharar, Lucknow: The Last Phase of an Oriental Culture, trans. and ed. Harcourt, E. S. and Fakhir, Hussain (London: Paul Elek, 1975), pp. 216–217, and p. 244 n. 129.Google Scholar

¹⁷ See his “Hamārē 'ahd kā adab,” Savérā, 31 (nd.), 16.

¹⁸ For example, see Sa'ādat, Sa'īd, “Mas'alē kā mas'alah,” Funūn (Lahore, Pakistan), 12 (12–01 1970–1971), 36.Google Scholar

¹⁹ “Ijtimā'ī tahzīb aur afsānah,” Nayā Daur (Karachi, Pakistan), 15–18 (n.d.), 64.Google Scholar

²⁰ 'Khushbū kī hijrat (Shaikh Salāhu 'd-Dīn, Intizār husain, Nāsir Kāzmī, aur hanīf Rāmē kē darmiyān ēk mukālimah), Savērā, 17–18 (n.d.), 221.Google Scholar

²¹ On Muharram see above, n. 16.

²² Intercession (shafā'a), although considered unlawful by the Sunnite Islam because of its potential for promoting moral polytheism, constitutes the very ethos of Shī'ite spirituality. I discuss it in my Ibn Taimīya's Struggle against Popular Religion (The Hague and Paris: Mouton, 1976), pp. 20, 23, and 77.Google Scholar

²³ See Jean, Lecerf, “The Dream in Popular Culture,” in The Dream and Human Societies, ed. von Grunebaum, G. E. and Roger, Caillois (Berkeley and Los Angeles, University of California Press, 1966), p. 377.Google Scholar

²⁴ As does Nannhī Ammān in the story “Andhī galī” (The Blind Alley), Shahr-e-afsōs, pp. 227–248.Google Scholar

²⁵ Alamdisappears also in the story “Murdah rākh” (Dead Ashes), Shahr-e-afsōs, p. 84.Google Scholar

²⁶ Art of Islam, Language and Meaning (London: World of Islam Festival Trust, 1976), p. 7 nn. 2 and 5.Google Scholar

²⁷ See Husain, , “Murdah rākh,” in Shahr-e-afsōs, p. 90.Google Scholar

²⁸ The mundus imaginalis('ālam al-mithāl), the “realm of images,” is not purely imaginary, nor does it have anything to do with Platonic ideas (see Henry, Corbin, “The Visionary Dream in Islamic Spirituality,” in The Dream and Human Societies, p. 406,Google Scholar and Fazlur Rahman, “Dream, Imagination and 'Ālam al-mithāl,” in ibid., p. 409. It became very important during the later Muslim Middle Ages, as it came to form an integral part of Sūfī spiritual culture (Rahman, , p. 419),Google Scholar and so took on a distinct ontological status (Corbin, , p. 407);Google Scholar only Sirhindī (d. 1625) reduced it to “experience,” and sought to strip it of its ontological status (see Rahman, , p. 419).Google Scholar

²⁹ Burckhardt, , p. 36.Google Scholar

³⁰ On the science of oneiromancy in Muslim culture, the method of classifying dreams, and the organization of oneirocritical materials and treatises thereon, see Toufy, Fahd, “The Dream in Medieval Islamic Society,” in The Dream and Human Societies, pp. 351–363.Google Scholar

³¹ A red powder with which the Hindus smear each other during the festival of Hōlī.

³² The fortieth day of mourning following the death of a relative; here, following the anniversary of the martyrdom of Imām Husain. This is observed especially among the Shī'ite Muslims. See references in n. 16 above.

³³ Alī b. 'Uthmān Jullābī, popularly known in Pakistan as Dātā Ganj Bakhsh, was an eleventh-century mystic and author of the earliest work on Sūfism, Kashf al-mahjūb (Uncovering of the Veiled), ably translated by Nicholson, R. A. (London: Luzac & Co., 1911).Google Scholar

³⁴ Galī kūčē, pp. 193–224.Google Scholar

³⁵ Shahr-e-afsōs, pp. 227–248.

³⁶ Also wisāl (union) in Persian and Urdu poetry.

³⁷ “Visionary Dream,” p. 384.

³⁸ “Nayā ism (Nāsir Kāmī aur Intiār Husain kē darmiyān ēk guftugū,” Nayā Daur, 7–8Google Scholar (n.d.), 88; and “Intiār Husain aur Mutammad 'Umar Maiman Kē darmiyān ēk bāt-čīt,” Shab-Khūn (Allahabad, India), 8 (07–09 1975), 35.Google Scholar

³⁹ “Visionary Dream,” p. 381.

⁴⁰ Ibid.

⁴¹ See the Qur'ān 89:27. I use Corbin's translation of nafs ammāra and nafs muma'inna (“Visionary Dream,” p. 387).

⁴² See the Qur'ān 89:27–28.

⁴³ A verse by Iqbāl perfectly embodies this perception: “Khudī kō kar buland itnā ke har taqdīr sē pahlē l Khudā bandē sē khud pūčhē batā tērī razā kyā hai,” Eullīyāt-e-lqbāl, Urdū (Lahore: Shaikh Ghulām 'Alī & Sons, 1973),Google Scholarghazal 33, p. 374,Google Scholar a rough translation of which would be: “Cultivate your ego 50, and make it so sublime that even God, before every act of predestination, voluntarily asks the servitor, ‘What is your pleasure?’ ” And despite its seeming lack of perception of individuality, Rūmī's, “Goftam ke rafīqī-kun bā-man ke manat khīsham / goftā ke be-nashanāsam man khīsh zē bī-gāneh”. Kullīyāt (Teheran: Amīr-e-Kabīr, 1351)Google Scholar, ghazal 2309, p. 864 represents a state of ecstatic realization of ego rather than its subjugation, or an instance of reckless arrogance.Google Scholar

⁴⁴ See Henry, Corbin, L'imaginazion créatrice dans le soufisme d'Ibn 'Arabī (Paris: Flammarion, 1958);Google Scholar and Rahman, , “Dream, Imagination,” pp. 409–419.Google Scholar

⁴⁵ Qur'ān 3: 104.

⁴⁶ But espcially in “Parčhā'īn, pp. 37–56 (English tr., “The Shadow,” by Muhammad, Umar Memon, Indian Literature, 22 (03–04 172–187);Google Scholar “Kāyā-kalap,” pp. 93–105 (English tr., “The Metamorphosis,” by Naim, C. M., Mahfil, 1, 1 (1963), 22–29); “Tāngēn” (The Legs), pp. 107–132; and “Shahadat” (The Witness), pp. 159–173.Google Scholar

⁴⁷ Cf. this with the vastly different fate of Bérenger in Eugène Ionesco's play Rhinocéros. Some useful remarks on the symbolic meaning of this fate are offered by Martin, Esslin in The Theatre of the Absurd (New York: Anchor Books, 1961), p. 127.Google Scholar

⁴⁸ See his preface to Ākhrī ādmī, p. h.

⁴⁹ See Esslin's, discussion of these writers in The Theatre of the Absurd, pp. 47–78 and 79–139; especially, pp. 49 and 79.Google Scholar

⁵⁰ See the Qur'ān 2: 31.

⁵¹ Two other stories by Husain, “Asīr” (The Prisoner[s]) and, more importantly, “Kačhuwē” (The Turtles) – again, without any direct reference to 1971 – subtly explore the meaning and moral implications of the fragmentation of Pakistan. “Asīr” appeared in Savērā, 48 (07 1974), 106–113,Google Scholar and “Kačhuwē” in Nayā Daur. 63–64 (n.d.), 88–103.Google Scholar

⁵² (Lahore: Maktaba-e-Shi'r-o-Adab, n. d.), pp. 89–99. English tr., “Cold Like Ice,” by Naim, C. M. and Schmidt, Ruth L., Mahfil, 1, 1 (1963), 14–19.Google Scholar