اختر شیرانی اور جان کیٹس کے مشترک رومانوی زاویے: تلاش حسن A Comparative Study of Akhtar Shirani and John Keats: Quest for Beauty Section Urdu Literature

Abstract

similarities and dissimilarities between their thought patterns, literary beliefs/schools of thoughts, romantic characteristics, concerns and themes etc... John Keats is the most Romantic English poet ever; likewise, Akhtar Shirani is the most Romantic poet, Urdu has ever produced. Romantic movement in English literature reached its climax in the early nineteenth century; a century before it set forth in Urdu. Still the two Romantic poets have striking similarities in the romantic characteristics of their poetry, like fervent imagination, quest for beauty, escapism, sensuousness, medievalism, nostalgia, supernaturalism etc.This article aims at a comparative study of Keats's and Shirani's quest for beauty. Surprisingly, both Romantic poets yearn for feminine beauty, the beauty of Nature and then reach the ultimate ideal of Beauty of Truth.To Keats, beauty itself is the ultimate truth; likewise, Akhtar Shirani through branded as a drunkard by the Urdu critics, sees the ultimate beauty of truth when just like Keats, his Romantic Ideals are shattered to bits. Unlike Keats, Shirani is unable to blend his findings of reality in odes but his scattered verses confirm that just like Keats, he clearly sees the rejection of his Romantic Ideals and embrace the realistic beauty of truth in his later life.