Read in Kishwar Naheed’s book that there was a tussle between famous poets of Pakistan ‘Parveen Shakir’ and Iftikhar Arif.
Parveen was in Customs / Income Tax Department after passing Civil services exams and iftikhar Arif was famous due to his presence on TV in programs liek ‘Kasauti’.
Then came the lobbies. Parveen was ladli of Ahmed nadeem Qasmi and used to call him ‘Ammoo’. Her first book ‘Khushboo’ was dedicated to Qasmi saheb ’ Ammoo jaan ke naam’. She had made many poets as her brothers including Amjad Islam Amjad.
When Iftikhar Arif launched his first book, no one from Parveen’s group attended the ceremony.
After Parveen’s death, Iftikhar Arif paid her tribute in good words:
Re: Professional Jealousy, tussles and lobbies in Literary circles
Her poetry was a breath of fresh air in Urdu poetry. She used the *first-person feminine pronoun, which is ***rarely used in Urdu poetry even by female poets, he said.
Re: Professional Jealousy, tussles and lobbies in Literary circles
This may be a bit irrelevant, but why is that?
In sub-continent, female writers always faced opposition and most of them attracted allegation that someone wrote for them.
This was done to Zehra Nigah, when she read her poetry in first musha'ira, people said that her uncle wrote the poetry (who was a poet). Though Zehra aapa belongs to family where writing is in roots. Her grandfather was a poet in pre-partition India. Her sister Fatima Suraya Bajiya and brother Anwar Maqsood are well know names in literary circles.
Parveen Shakir herself faced same kind of allegations. This even continued with drama writers like when Farzana Nadeem Syed (late) wrote Hawa'ein, everyone said that its by her husband 'Asghar Nadeem Syed'.
Considering these rivalries, female writers / poets either wrote with fake male names or wrote in a way which could hide their gender. This with the passage of time became norm in Urdu poetry, even after female writers stopped hiding their identity.
Before Parveen Shakir, we don't find lines referring to ladies in first person, but Parveen came with lines like:
Kaanp uthti hoon main soch ke tanhai main
mere chehre pe tera naam na paRh le koi
Before her, this 'kaanp uthti hoon' would have been 'kaanp uthta hoon' even if written by a female poet to hide gender.
Re: Professional Jealousy, tussles and lobbies in Literary circles
[QUOTE] Parveen Shakir has added a new dimension to the traditional theme of love by giving expression to her emotions in a simple style and she used variety of words to convey different thoughts with varying intensities using imaginative insight, Iftikhar Arif said.
[/QUOTE]
Re: Professional Jealousy, tussles and lobbies in Literary circles
I have no knowledge about who's going against who in present day literary world, but there had been some famous rivalries in the past. Lord Byron bitterly mocked and openly disliked poor John Keats. Charlotte Bronte didn't like Jane Austen, and I'm sure some famous literati opposed Shakespeare but I can't remember their names (it'll come back to me hopefully). There are quite a few famous rivalries in literary world.
Re: Professional Jealousy, tussles and lobbies in Literary circles
^I've read that the playwright Ben Johnson had a rivalry with Shakespeare and that the two were known to denigrate each other’s works. Christopher Marlowe is also thought to have been a rival of Shakespeare but there is no record of any animosity between them.
Re: Professional Jealousy, tussles and lobbies in Literary circles
Well that's true to some extent. Shakespeare did not go to University, consequently he received no formal education in writing and didn't travel a lot, but he was certainly very very well read. A lot of ideas are heavily borrowed from other writers (European and English), histories and Greek mythology. As the saying goes in Urdu 'naqal ke liye bhi aqal chahiye' and Shakespeare is one famous example who proves this idea right.
