Dareechah-e-Nigaarish

Munir Niazi (1928-2006) wrote Urdu ghazals that turned out to be an amazingly successful attempt by this innovative artist to carve a modern path that is distinct from everyone else writing Urdu ghazals.

The uniqueness of Munir's ghazals is rooted in three main attributes:

Firstly, Munir Niazi is a maestro of narrative poetry and his ghazals, many individual couplets, are mini-stories. He loves to tell these stories and sketches just the right amount of detail in them to make them strike a chord with the reader. He shows his eagerness for telling his mini-stories again and again !

Secondly, Munir Niazi is a master word craftsman. His choice of Urdu words is very diverse. Like all great poets, he exhausts his era's Urdu diction. Here I am quoting Wichaar Webcast's Dr. Manzur Ejaz, a critic with a revealing analysis of Munir Niazi's poetry . . . see this link to my YouTube channel Goonj's uploaded video of Dr. Manzur Ejaz's critique of Munir Niazi's poetry.

Thirdly, Munir Niazi championed the art of imagistic poetry. Here I am quoting Dr. Anis Nagi ... see my YouTube channel Goonj's video where Dr. Nagi expresses his views on Munir Niazi's poetry. Munir excels in painting mesmerizing images of the colorful universe he is surrounded by and with which he communicates in an awed child's innocence and directness !

 Just like his poems, the world of Munir Niazi's ghazals is also a cosmos of sleeping, moonlit cities, abandoned ancient ruins, young girls on rooftops and lovers wandering city roads at night and mourning their unrequited love.  This magical realism (similar to the world of Gabriel Garcia Marquez's novels) sets him apart from everyone else writing Urdu ghazals in the modern era.

 Bravo,  Munir Niazi  !!

 Dareechah has uploaded two videos of rare interviews with

Munir Niazi in a new web page "Munir Niazi: Interview Videos" in the Urdu Poems section)