The Neoclassicists

Abstract

By the early twentieth century, Urdu literature had grown in variety and richness—it consisted of not only divans of ghazals but novels, dramas, historical accounts, biographies, and even books on medicine and astronomy. However, the ghazal as a genre had suffered a reversal, first by a movement by some British educationists aimed at promoting poems, and then by the loss of master poets like Dagh, Hali, and Shibli, without any replacement by the poets of the same caliber. Under such circumstances, it was left to poets like Hasrat Mohani, Akbar Allahabadi, Allama Iqbal, Chakbast, and Yagana to take up the ghazal’s banner. All of them helped in its vigorous restoration and revival with a captivating lyrical touch.