The Tension Between External Reality and Inner Experience in Urdu Nazm: A Comparative Study of the Progressive Writers’ Movement and Halqa-e-Arbab-e-Zauq

اردو نظم میں خارجی حقیقت اور داخلی تجربے کی کشمکش: ترقی پسند تحریک اور حلقۂ اربابِ ذوق کا تقابلی مطالعہ

Abstract

In twentieth-century Urdu nazm, the Progressive Writers’ Movement and Halqa-e-Arbab-e-Zauq developed two influential modes of poetic expression, commonly associated with external reality and inner experience, respectively. Progressive poetry foregrounded class inequality, colonial oppression, social injustice, and the aspiration for collective transformation, whereas poets associated with Halqa-e-Arbab-e-Zauq explored subjective consciousness, psychological complexity, symbolism, formal experimentation, and the artistic autonomy of poetry. In the poetry of Faiz Ahmed Faiz, romantic sensibility frequently acquires a collective and political resonance, while the inward-looking poetic worlds of N. M. Rashed and Meeraji remain connected to wider historical and cultural contexts. Employing a qualitative, historical, and comparative approach informed by close reading, the study examines the thematic priorities, linguistic strategies, and aesthetic possibilities of these poetic tendencies. It concludes that the richness of modern Urdu nazm emerges not simply from their differences but from the productive dialogue between social experience and individual consciousness.