اردو شاعری میں عشق کا تصور: کلاسیکی و جدید تناظر کا تقابلی مطالعہ

THE CONCEPT OF LOVE IN URDU POETRY: A COMPARATIVE STUDY OF CLASSICAL AND MODERN PERSPECTIVES

Abstract

The concept of love has been a central theme in Urdu poetry for centuries, serving as a medium of spiritual, aesthetic, and intellectual expression. This study presents a comparative analysis of classical and modern Urdu poetry, examining how the meaning, symbols, metaphors, and intellectual context of love have evolved. In classical poetry, love was primarily spiritual, Sufi-oriented, and romantic, with symbols like the beloved, flowers, candles, and gardens representing the heart, soul, and emotions. Poets such as Mir, Ghalib, and Sufi writers portrayed love as a means of inner purification, aesthetic pleasure, and spiritual ecstasy. In modern Urdu poetry, love has acquired complex existential, psychological, and philosophical dimensions, linking individual selfhood, creative energy, social awareness, and human freedom. Iqbal presents love as a stimulus for selfhood and creativity, while Faiz Ahmed Faiz associates it with resistance, revolution, and social consciousness. N. M. Rashid and Meeraji explore its existential and psychological aspects. The study highlights the evolutionary transformation of love’s symbols and metaphors, from classical romantic and Sufi-inspired imagery to modern existential, philosophical, and social representations. It also underscores the shift in love’s socio-intellectual role from individual spiritual experience in classical poetry to broader human, social, and intellectual engagement in modern works. This analysis demonstrates that love in Urdu poetry is not only a literary and aesthetic phenomenon but also an existential, philosophical, and social theme.