Iqbal's poetry has such great variety that several anthologies of it could be compiled, each quite different from the others. The poems of this volume, while a personal selection, are representative of Iqbal's poetry, and their thematic arrangement reflects the diversity of subjects dealt with by Iqbal. Most of the poems are short (an anthology of Iqbal's longer poems is planned). The volume aims at introducing Iqbal's poetry to the English-speaking world in more than a perfunctory manner. While scholars and students will especially benefit from the detailed commentaries and notes, it is hoped that general readers in both Muslim and Western.
countries will find the work useful and interesting. Many of the translations published here first appeared in the International Islamic University of Malaysia's Research and Information Bulletin (1993-5). A few of these were reprinted else- where, but without my approval. All published poems have been revised; others, freshly translated, have been included; and much new introductory and commentarial material has been added. In its present form and arrangement this is a new work.
Many people have encouraged me in this undertaking, and thanks are due to all of them, although I would like to single out three names: Dr Shabbir Akhtar, Dr Suheyl Umar, and Dr Mumtaz Ahmad. A fellowship at the Centre for Islamic Studies, Oxford, in 1995-6 enabled me to revise the work, and I am grateful for it. I thank Hurst & Co., the British publishers, for their superb editing. Finally, I am deeply grateful to Dr Ralph Russell, a foremost authority on Urdu language and literature, not only for his recommendation of the work but also for many valuable suggestions, from which I have benefited in making the final revision.
Muhammad Iqbal (1877-1938) is one of the pre-eminent writers of the Indian subcontinent, and the attention he has received from numerous writers, translators and critics in Western as well as Islamic countries testifies to his stature as a world literary figure. While his reputation is primarity as a poet, Iqbal has not lacked admirers for other reasons: he has been called 'the most serious Muslim philosophical thinker of modern times',' and the appellation 'poet-philosopher' has often been used. Here the hyphen is all- important: Iqbal's poetry and philosophy do not exist in isolation from each other, but are integrally related, his poetry serving as a vehicle for his thought. Iqbal wrote poetry in Urdu and Persian, and several volumes in each language exist. In the following pages a biographical sketch of Iqbal is followed by a brief treatment of some of the major themes and literary features of his poetry.
Iqbal was born in 1877 at Sialkot, a city in the present-day province of the Punjab in Pakistan. He received his early education in that city, where one of his teachers was Mir Hasan, an accomplished scholar with a knowledge of several Islamic languages. Mir Hasan gave Iqbal a thorough training in the rich Islamic literary tradition and influenced him deeply. Many years later (1922), when the British governor of the Punjab proposed to the British Crown that Iqbal be knighted in recognition of his literary achievements, Iqbal asked that Mir Hasan too should be awarded a title. When the governor remarked that Mir Hasan had not written any books, Iqbal replied that he, Iqbal, was the book Mir Hasan had produced. Mir Hasan received the title of Shams al-'Ulama' (sun of scholars). For higher education Iqbal went to Lahore (1895), where he enrolled in Government College, obtaining his MA in philosophy in 1899. In Lahore, which was a major centre of academic and literary activity, Iqbal soon established his reputation as a poet. Among Iqbal's most admired teachers at Government College was Sir Thomas Arnold, and he in turn had great affection for Iqbal. Arnold helped Iqbal in his career as a teacher and encouraged him to undertake several research projects. When Arnold returned to England in 1904, Iqbal wrote a touching poem in which he expressed his resolve to follow him to England. Indeed Iqbal left to study at Cambridge the very next year. His choice of Cambridge was probably dictated by its reputation as a centre for the study not only of European philosophy but also of Arabic and Persian. During his three years' stay abroad, Iqbal obtained a BA from Cambridge (1906), qualified as a barrister at Lincoln's Inn in London (1906), and earned a PhD from Munich University (1908).
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