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Saturday, March 11, 2006

The story so far ...

Nazm karnay ko qaum kee taareekh
Müjh say kahtaa thha ayk din koee;
Baa adab maeñ nay arz kee keh müjhay
Naheeñ aatee hae marsiah-goee!

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7 Comments:

Blogger Destitute Rebel said...

Bohat Mushkil Urdu hai aap ki.

12 March, 2006 02:58

 
Blogger Zakintosh said...

Dear 'destitute rebel'

Your comment underscores only part of the tragedy that is this nation's lot. There seems to be hardly a word in that quatrain (I dare not call the form by its Urdu name in a message to you) that a 25-year old Pakistani should not be able to follow. Rebelliousness does not lie in shunning your language and, thus, becoming a destitute.

Goyam - müshkil, vagar nah goyam -mushkil! (Now this, I grant, may take deciphering --- although I wish it did not.)

12 March, 2006 08:10

 
Blogger the olive ream said...

How profoundly political without being political. Atleast, that is my interpretation. To politely refuse to sing the praises of a nation's history. Although, I have to ask ZAK, how would you address it if the first line changed to:

"Nazm karnay ko qaum kee taareef"

12 March, 2006 12:27

 
Anonymous Original-Anon said...

yes, this Urdu is difficult for today's semi-literate youth. I wonder what will become of a nation where the people cannot speak, read or write even one language properly. My ears hurt when I hear the people in Lahore speaking a strange blend of English, Urdu and Punjabi in a painful accent. There are some who refuse to speak Urdu altogether and all conversation turn into me trying hard to speak in Urdu and they responding in Angrezi.
It positively makes my blood boil when I read the blogs written by Pakistanis. Very few can spell, punctuate or know grammar anymore. Just go the Karachi Metblog and see how the supposed cream of the blogger crop butchers the language. I am all for freedom of expression, but for this reason, it almost gives me perverse pleaseure to see the blogger blcked.

16 March, 2006 21:40

 
Blogger Zakintosh said...

Perverse IS the right word!

Ek meray aashiaañ sé zidd thhi tümhayñ;
Sooni kar dee chaman ki har daali?
Mayree dunyaa tabaah karnay ko
Saaree dunya tabaah kar daali!


Your Blood-Type is obviously not B+
:-)

17 March, 2006 05:01

 
Blogger sabizak said...

Languages develop by an interaction with other cultures and other languages. Both culture and language are not static entities. Punjab (and Lahore) has done a lot for the development of Urdu, a language that you consider your own but one that was so large-heartedly adopted by the Punjabis even at the expense of relegating their own to the back burner. If you want to know more about how non-native speakers who are supposedly at one point in time considered to be 'butchering' a language actually end up contributing to it and how they can give their own identity to a language that is not their own, please refer to the theoretical as well as the fictional writing of Ngugi Wa Thiongo, Chinua Achebe and Derek Walcott.

19 March, 2006 20:17

 
Blogger Zakintosh said...

Just a clarification: 'Sabizak' is responding to the comment by 'Original-Anon' above and not to my post.

20 March, 2006 08:18

 

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