An Anthology of Urdu verse in English, with the original poems in Devanagari

Urdu, one of the major languages of South Asia, cuts across political boundaries, has a wide and varied literature, and its poetry especially is known and loved even by many who do not speak it as their mother-tongue. This anthology presents a selection of Urdu verse in English translation, chosen from the work of poets who lived between the 16th and 20th centuries. The poems, accompanied by devangari (as the Indian script most widely used) transliteration of the original Urdu text on facing pages, are loosely grouped under a number of headings providing a fair representation of the subjects which have attracted Urdu poets over a period of four centuries. An introduction provides an account of the origin and nature of Urdu and the main period of its literature, together with the genres of Urdu poetry and a note on versification. An appendix provides short bibliographical notes on each of the poets, and a brief explanation of Urdu proper names which can often prove confusing to those unacquainted with the cultural background.