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The Best of Faiz
With his death in 1984, his admirers all over the world felt as if a literary era had come to an end. Edward Said described Faiz Ahmed Faiz as “the greatest of contemporary Urdu poets.”
Being a liberal humanist, Faiz’s poetic vision recognised no national barriers. His musical poetry has lent itself readily to such renowned ghazal singers as Begum Akhtar, Mehdi Hasan, Iqbal Bano and Noor Jehan.
In The Best of Faiz, Shiv K. Kumar has presented an English translation of many of his poems, with the original in both Urdu script and Roman transliteration, to enable even non-Urdu readers to enjoy poetry that articulates the entire range of human emotions.
Here is a book for all lovers of poetry to read and preserve.
Being a liberal humanist, Faiz’s poetic vision recognised no national barriers. His musical poetry has lent itself readily to such renowned ghazal singers as Begum Akhtar, Mehdi Hasan, Iqbal Bano and Noor Jehan.
In The Best of Faiz, Shiv K. Kumar has presented an English translation of many of his poems, with the original in both Urdu script and Roman transliteration, to enable even non-Urdu readers to enjoy poetry that articulates the entire range of human emotions.
Here is a book for all lovers of poetry to read and preserve.
- GenresPoetry
200 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1995
12 people are currently reading
242 people want to read
About the author
Faiz Ahmad Faiz
59 books284 followersFaiz Ahmad Faiz [فيض ١حمد فيض] was born on February 13, 1911, in Sialkot, British India, which is now part of Pakistan. He had a privileged childhood as the son of wealthy landowners Sultan Fatima and Sultan Muhammad Khan, who passed away in 1913, shortly after his birth. His father was a prominent lawyer and a member of an elite literary circle which included Allama Iqbal, the national poet of Pakistan.
In 1916, Faiz entered Moulvi Ibrahim Sialkoti, a famous regional school, and was later admitted to the Skotch Mission High School where he studied Urdu, Persian, and Arabic. He received a Bachelor's degree in Arabic, followed by a master's degree in English, from the Government College in Lahore in 1932, and later received a second master's degree in Arabic from the Oriental College in Lahore.After graduating in 1935, Faiz began a teaching career at M.A.O. College in Amritsar and then at Hailey College of Commerce in Lahore.
Faiz's early poems had been conventional, light-hearted treatises on love and beauty, but while in Lahore he began to expand into politics, community, and the thematic interconnectedness he felt was fundamental in both life and poetry. It was also during this period that he married Alys George, a British expatriate, with whom he had two daughters. In 1942, he left teaching to join the British Indian Army, for which he received a British Empire Medal for his service during World War II. After the partition of India in 1947, Faiz resigned from the army and became the editor of The Pakistan Times, a socialist English-language newspaper.
On March 9, 1951, Faiz was arrested with a group of army officers under the Safety Act, and charged with the failed coup attempt that became known as the Rawalpindi Conspiracy Case. He was sentenced to death and spent four years in prison before being released. Two of his poetry collections, Dast-e Saba and Zindan Namah, focus on life in prison, which he considered an opportunity to see the world in a new way. While living in Pakistan after his release, Faiz was appointed to the National Council of the Arts by Zulfikar Ali Bhutto's government, and his poems, which had previously been translated into Russian, earned him the Lenin Peace Prize in 1963.
In 1964, Faiz settled in Karachi and was appointed principal of Abdullah Haroon College, while also working as an editor and writer for several distinguished magazines and newspapers. He worked in an honorary capacity for the Department of Information during the 1965 war between India and Pakistan, and wrote stark poems of outrage over the bloodshed between Pakistan, India, and what later became Bangladesh. However, when Bhutto was overthrown by Zia Ul-Haq, Faiz was forced into exile in Beirut, Lebanon. There he edited the magazine Lotus, and continued to write poems in Urdu. He remained in exile until 1982. He died in Lahore in 1984, shortly after receiving a nomination for the Nobel Prize.
Throughout his tumultuous life, Faiz continually wrote and published, becoming the best-selling modern Urdu poet in both India and Pakistan. While his work is written in fairly strict diction, his poems maintain a casual, conversational tone, creating tension between the elite and the common, somewhat in the tradition of Ghalib, the reknowned 19th century Urdu poet. Faiz is especially celebrated for his poems in traditional Urdu forms, such as the ghazal, and his remarkable ability to expand the conventional thematic expectations to include political and social issues.
In 1916, Faiz entered Moulvi Ibrahim Sialkoti, a famous regional school, and was later admitted to the Skotch Mission High School where he studied Urdu, Persian, and Arabic. He received a Bachelor's degree in Arabic, followed by a master's degree in English, from the Government College in Lahore in 1932, and later received a second master's degree in Arabic from the Oriental College in Lahore.After graduating in 1935, Faiz began a teaching career at M.A.O. College in Amritsar and then at Hailey College of Commerce in Lahore.
Faiz's early poems had been conventional, light-hearted treatises on love and beauty, but while in Lahore he began to expand into politics, community, and the thematic interconnectedness he felt was fundamental in both life and poetry. It was also during this period that he married Alys George, a British expatriate, with whom he had two daughters. In 1942, he left teaching to join the British Indian Army, for which he received a British Empire Medal for his service during World War II. After the partition of India in 1947, Faiz resigned from the army and became the editor of The Pakistan Times, a socialist English-language newspaper.
On March 9, 1951, Faiz was arrested with a group of army officers under the Safety Act, and charged with the failed coup attempt that became known as the Rawalpindi Conspiracy Case. He was sentenced to death and spent four years in prison before being released. Two of his poetry collections, Dast-e Saba and Zindan Namah, focus on life in prison, which he considered an opportunity to see the world in a new way. While living in Pakistan after his release, Faiz was appointed to the National Council of the Arts by Zulfikar Ali Bhutto's government, and his poems, which had previously been translated into Russian, earned him the Lenin Peace Prize in 1963.
In 1964, Faiz settled in Karachi and was appointed principal of Abdullah Haroon College, while also working as an editor and writer for several distinguished magazines and newspapers. He worked in an honorary capacity for the Department of Information during the 1965 war between India and Pakistan, and wrote stark poems of outrage over the bloodshed between Pakistan, India, and what later became Bangladesh. However, when Bhutto was overthrown by Zia Ul-Haq, Faiz was forced into exile in Beirut, Lebanon. There he edited the magazine Lotus, and continued to write poems in Urdu. He remained in exile until 1982. He died in Lahore in 1984, shortly after receiving a nomination for the Nobel Prize.
Throughout his tumultuous life, Faiz continually wrote and published, becoming the best-selling modern Urdu poet in both India and Pakistan. While his work is written in fairly strict diction, his poems maintain a casual, conversational tone, creating tension between the elite and the common, somewhat in the tradition of Ghalib, the reknowned 19th century Urdu poet. Faiz is especially celebrated for his poems in traditional Urdu forms, such as the ghazal, and his remarkable ability to expand the conventional thematic expectations to include political and social issues.
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Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews
February 10, 2018
I think it's my first ever poetry book and first Urdu book I ever managed to finish. The translation seemed a bit off at points but did help me a lot to grasp the connotations of the poems. However, toughest Urdu I have ever come across. Had to remove all clamorous distractions from the room and turned on really good lighting, even then, had trouble at a lot of moments during the reading. Also, had to read aloud at times to understand which I absolutely anathematise when someone else does the same. Couldn't help but notice the stark contrast between English and Urdu. A single line that seemed so bland and tepid in English was so exuberantly vibrant in Urdu. This exhibit was a patron to my notion of Urdu being the prettiest language out there. Thinking of reading it again when I'd have a really good command over Urdu's vocab. Absolutely loved "Kuttay" and "Bol". Low rating cuz poetry isn't my cup of tea.
"Humne mana jung khari hai
Sar phooteinge, Khoon bahay ga
Khoon mein gham bhi beh jayega
Hum na rahe, gham bhi na rahe ga"
"Saari duniya se duur hojaye
Jo zara tere sath ho bethe"
May 16, 2023
Reflections
Why is my heart so disconsolate?
Why am I always sunk in silence?
Leave me to my tale of woe
I’m happy as I am.
What if my heart is sorrowful,
Sorrow looms over the entire world.
This pain is neither yours nor mine,
it’s every human’s inheritance, O love.
Even if you were mine, O love,
the world’s sorrows will remain—
embroilment in sin and tyranny’s hold—
could we just wish them all away?
Sorrow is lethal in every form,
be it mine or somebody else’s.
Tears only singe the heart—
this way or that, pain will always remain.
Why not own up the world’s suffering
and later ponder over the way out?
There’ll then be time for dreaming
and unraveling the riddle of dreams.
Carefree are all the affluent—
why are they always cheerful?
Let’s share their joy and happiness,
for aren’t they also like us?
Indeed, the struggle would be relentless,
heads will be bashed and blood will flow:
Blood will wash away all pain—
and as we perish so will end our suffering.
---
Humility I’ve learnt, sympathy for the poor,
learnt the meaning of despair, suffering and pain;
learnt to comprehend the miseries of the oppressed,
the meaning of cold sighs, of pallid faces.
Whenever those hapless creatures sit together to cry,
in whose eyes tears, bitterly shed, fall asleep,
and those destitute upon whose morsels swoop down
the vultures hovering above, poised on their wing—
whenever is traded in the market place the flesh of the
labourer,
and on the highways flows the blood of the poor,
a sort of fire upsurges in my bosom
and I lose all hold over my heart.
---
Pen and Paper
Forever will I nurture pen and paper,
forever express in words whatever my heart undergoes,
forever proffer ingredients of the sorrows of love
and quicken into life the wasteland of time.
Yes, the bitterness of time will keep on spawning,
just as the tyrants will persist in their cruelty.
Cheerfully, I’ll give into bitterness, this tyranny too
I’ll endure—
so long as there’s breath, I’ll seek ever new cures
for torments.
If the tavern still remains, I shall embellish every door
and balcony of the haram with the redness of wine.
If the heart is not drained of all blood, I’ll colour
every tear
with the redness of the beloved’s lips and cheeks.
This posture of indifference, let it be her prerogative—
for me it will always be my desire’s entreaty.
---
[...]
O Faiz, nobody compels you to endure the
heart’s ravage;
if she’s your heart’s enemy, why don’t you forget her?
---
A Wish
I have no faith in miracles
but this wish I do nurture
that when death carries me away from the world,
it should grant me this permission, just once
that I may return from the grave
and, knocking at your door, cry out
if you need a consoler
I’m here.
And if you don’t need one,
I may return again to the other world.
---
We Poets
We were there—in every age, in every clime,
drinking poison, singing songs;
we kept sacrificing ourselves for life’s sake—
for the moment of rapture at love’s union.
We kept squandering away our treasure of
spirit and matter,
holding on to our provision of deprivation and hunger.
Whatever path we chose, we stuck to it
even while the affluent kept staring at us disdainfully,
reproachfully, rubbing their palms.
On them we hurled the stone of the word of truth
whose dread kept the world reeling.
And for those who’d none to shed tears over,
our eyes rained tears for their sorrow.
At the ruler’s command, we went out of sight,
endured prisons, suffered flogging.
As people listened to the strains of our hearts’ cries,
our songs kept filtering through the prison bars.
We are the blood-stained mirrors of this
blood-stained world,
we are the sorrowful heart of anguished humankind.
A poet’s temper is to battle against injustice and
tyranny;
we are the arbiters of good and evil, right and wrong.
April 21, 2025
The sound of these color filled words moistens the soul..
July 4, 2020
The quality of Faiz's writing needs no comment. The Ghazals, Nazms and Shayaris are well chosen. The translation into English is additive, not reductive. The script is in Urdu as well as Hindi, so I could practice a bit of Urdu reading skills also :-)
January 8, 2022
Anything Faiz writes is poetry -
The translation aided in explaining words which were hard to decipher in Urdu. It helped me gain deeper appreciation and access to Faiz's poetry. Thoroughly enjoyed it.
The translation aided in explaining words which were hard to decipher in Urdu. It helped me gain deeper appreciation and access to Faiz's poetry. Thoroughly enjoyed it.
Want to read
November 17, 2021i have interest in poetry and this is first ever poetry book
May 30, 2022
A great selection of poetries. As the title says its the best. The translation helped me understand the words of urdu which I didn't knew. Enjoyed reading.
Read
September 21, 2022Ll l pp
September 15, 2011
Actually I read Faiz in English translated by Kamal but as I could not find it on goodreads I chose this book..The translations were shoddy but there were some real jewels in there...
July 17, 2015
"Read" will not rightfully describe my reading status for this book.. It is endless. The book that feels like spring cannot help coming back to it over and over and over again..
Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews