Habib Khan, Quetta: Some say that a translation is like the underside of a carpet, but I have been fortunate in my translators. Taking the word for word translations of my poetry – my broken jar of the mountains – they have put the pieces together again so firmly that if any water leaks from the jar it is not their fault but mine.” –Rasul Hamzatov
I can at least confirm Hamzatov’s sayings as the Urdu translations were done by none other than the esteemed Faiz Ahmad Faiz.
Rasul Hamzatov wrote in his native Avar language and Faiz Sahib’s translations are so skillfully done that it is almost impossible to decipher the translations from Faiz sahib’s own poetry.
A couple of examples:
“He did not talk in babyhood
Yet understand him well I could
Now he can talk and write as well
But what he means I cannot tell “
اس نے جب بولنا نہ سیکھا تھا
اس کی ہر بات میں سمجھتی تھی
اب وہ شاعر بنا ہے نام خدا
لیکن افسوس کوئی بات اس کی
میرے پلے ذرا نہیں پڑتی
And
“My elder brother died twelve years ago
Upon the battlefield of Stalingrad
My aged mother nurses still her woe
And goes about in the house in mourning clad.
And there is pain and bitterness for me
In knowing I am older now than he”
آج سے بارہ برس پہلے بڑا بھائی میرا
ستالن گراد کی جنگاہ میں کام آیا تھا
میری ماں اب بھی لیئے پھرتی ہے پہلو میں یہ غم
جب سے اب تک ہے وہی تن پہ رداء ماتم
اور اس دکھ سے مری آنکھ کا گوشہ تر ہے
اب مری عمر بڑے بھائی سے کچھ بڑھ کر ہے
Rasul Hamzatov had traveled to Pakistan in the mid-1960s and attended a gathering of progressive writers at Karachi’s Jabees Hotel, where the Balochi poet Mir Gul Khan Nasir read a poem about the recently concluded elections between Mohtarma Fatima Jinnah and President Ayub Khan. The poem greatly impressed Rasul Hamzatov, initiating a friendship between the two poets. Upon his return to Moscow, Rasul Hamzatov invited Mir Gul Khan Nasir and his family to visit the Soviet Union, but unfortunately, President Ayub Khan’s government did not permit Mir Gul Khan Nasir to make the trip.
When I learned of Rasul Hamzatov’s death in 2003, I made a plan to visit his village and grave in Dagestan, but I have failed to obtain a visa for Dagestan, although I could have obtained one for Moscow, which was not my intended destination in Russia. The war in Ukraine has made matters worse, yet my intention and desire to visit Makhachkala remains.
I end with my favorite poem by Rasul Hamzatov:
“If in this world a thousand men
With love for you are smarting
Know that among those thousand men
Am I, Rasul Hamzatov
If to your love one hundred men
Enroll as willing martyrs
Among them seek the mountaineer
By name Rasul Hamzatov
If ten fine fellows you entrance
Among those glad to barter
Their fortune for a loving glance
Am I Rasul Hamzatov
Should but one lover seek your hand
With fearless, peerless ardour
Be sure the man is none other than
The mountaineer Hamzatov
Should no one for your favours plead
And sit you broken hearted
Go, upon a graveyard stone read
Here lies Rasul Hamzatov “
Rasul Hamzatov: Born Sept. 8, 1923.
