Mirza Asadullah Beg Khan (27 December 1797 – 15 February 1869), commonly known as Mirza Ghalib, was an Indian poet and letter writer of the Mughal Empire. Writing in Persian and Urdu during the final years of the Mughal Empire and the rise of British colonial rule, his poetry often addressed themes of love, loss, philosophy, the human condition, and socio-political disturbances with a depth and complexity that influenced the literary traditions of his time. His ghazals, noted for their intricate imagery and layered meanings, form a significant part of Urdu literature. He spent most of his life in poverty.
He wrote in both Urdu and Persian. Although his Persian Divan (body of work) is at least five times longer than his Urdu Divan, his fame rests on his poetry in Urdu. Today, Ghalib remains popular not only in South Asia, but also among the South Asian diaspora.
Mirza Ghalib was born on 27 December 1797 in Kala Mahal, Agra into a family of Mughals who moved to Samarkand (in modern-day Uzbekistan) after the downfall of the Seljuk kings. His paternal grandfather, Mirza Qoqan Baig, was a Seljuq Turk, and a descendant of Sultan Berkyaruq who had immigrated to India from Samarkand during the reign of Ahmad Shah (1748–54). He worked in Lahore, Delhi and Jaipur, was awarded the sub-district of Pahasu (Bulandshahr) and finally settled in Agra. He had four sons and three daughters.
Mirza Abdullah Baig (Ghalib's father) married Izzat-ut-Nisa Begum, an ethnic Kashmiri, and then lived at the house of his father-in-law. He was employed first by the Nawab of Lucknow and then the Nizam of Hyderabad. He died in a battle in 1803 in Alwar and was buried at Rajgarh, Alwar, when Ghalib was a little over 5 years old. He was then raised by his Uncle Mirza Nasrullah Baig Khan, but in 1806, Nasrullah fell off an elephant and died from related injuries.
In 1810, at the age of thirteen, Ghalib married Umrao Begum, daughter of Nawab Ilahi Bakhsh (brother of Ahmad Baksh Khan, the Nawab of Ferozepur Jhirka and Loharu and nephew of Qasim Jan). He soon moved to Delhi, along with his younger brother, Mirza Yousuf, who had developed schizophrenia at a young age and later died in Delhi during the chaos of 1857.
None of his seven children survived beyond infancy. In one of his letters, he describes his marriage as the second imprisonment after the initial confinement that was life itself. The idea that life is one continuous painful struggle that can end only when life itself ends, is a recurring theme in his poetry. One of his couplets puts it in a nutshell:
There are conflicting reports regarding his relationship with his wife. She was considered to be pious, conservative, and God-fearing.
In 1850, Emperor Bahadur Shah Zafar bestowed upon Mirza Ghalib the title of Dabir-ul-Mulk (Persian: دبیر الملک, lit. 'secretary of state'). The Emperor also added to it the additional title of Najm-ud-daula (Persian: نجم الدولہ, lit. 'star of the state'). The conferment of these titles was symbolic of Mirza Ghalib's incorporation into the nobility of Delhi. He also received the title of Mirza Nosha (Persian: مرزا نوشہ) from the Emperor, thus enabling him to add Mirza to his name. He was also an important courtier of the royal court of the Emperor. As the Emperor was himself a poet, Mirza Ghalib was appointed as his poet tutor in 1854. He was also appointed as a tutor of Prince Fakhr-ud Din Mirza, eldest son of Bahadur Shah II, (d. 10 July 1856). He was also appointed by the Emperor as the royal historian of the Mughal Court.
Being a member of declining Mughal nobility and old landed aristocracy, he never worked for a livelihood, lived on either royal patronage of Mughal Emperors, credit, or the generosity of his friends. His fame came to him posthumously. He had himself remarked during his lifetime that he would be recognized by later generations. After the decline of the Mughal Empire and the rise of the British Raj, despite his many attempts, Ghalib could never get the full pension restored.
Ghalib started composing poetry at the age of 11. His first language was Urdu, but Persian and Turkish were also spoken at home. He received an education in Persian and Arabic at a young age. During Ghalib's period, the words "Hindi" and Urdu" were synonyms (see Hindi–Urdu controversy). Ghalib wrote in Perso-Arabic script which is used to write modern Urdu, but often called his language "Hindi"; one of his works was titled Ode-e-Hindi (Urdu: عود هندی, lit. 'Perfume of Hindi').
When Ghalib was 14 years old a newly converted Muslim tourist from Iran (Abdus Samad, originally named Hormuzd, a Zoroastrian) came to Agra. He stayed at Ghalib's home for two years and taught him Persian, Arabic, philosophy, and logic.
Although Ghalib valued Persian over Urdu, his fame rests on his writings in Urdu. Numerous commentaries on Ghalib's ghazal compilations have been written by Urdu scholars. The first such elucidation or Sharh was written by Ali Haider Nazm Tabatabai of Hyderabad during the rule of the last Nizam of Hyderabad. Before Ghalib, the ghazal was primarily an expression of anguished love; but Ghalib expressed philosophy, the travails, and mysteries of life and wrote ghazals on many other subjects, vastly expanding the scope of the ghazal.
In keeping with the conventions of the classical ghazal, in most of Ghalib's verses, the identity and the gender of the beloved are indeterminate. The critic/poet/writer Shamsur Rahman Faruqui explains that the convention of having the "idea" of a lover or beloved instead of an actual lover/beloved freed the poet-protagonist-lover from the demands of realism. Love poetry in Urdu from the last quarter of the seventeenth century onwards consists mostly of "poems about love" and not "love poems" in the Western sense of the term.
The first complete English translation of Ghalib's ghazals was Love Sonnets of Ghalib, written by Sarfaraz K. Niazi and published by Rupa & Co in India and Ferozsons in Pakistan. It contains complete Roman transliteration, explication, and an extensive lexicon.
Ghalib has been described as having been concerned about receiving pensions more so than building an estate or engaging in commerce. Ghalib was paid a monthly salary of 52 rupees and 8 annas from his uncle's government pension until 1827. He travelled to Calcutta and presented a petition to the Governor-General to keep receiving money from this pension.
One of Ghalib's ambitions in life was to become the highest-ranking Ustaad for the royal Mughal Court. This position not only would prove his artistic mastership but also provide a salary of 400 rupees a month. Before becoming the official poet laureate of the court, Ghalib was paid a salary of 50 rupees a month to write histories on the history of the House of Taimur.
Mirza Ghalib was a gifted letter writer. Not only Urdu poetry but prose is indebted to Mirza Ghalib. His letters gave foundation to easy and popular Urdu. Before Ghalib, letter writing in Urdu was highly ornamental. He made his letters "talk" by using words and sentences as if he were conversing with the reader. According to Ghalib:
His letters were very informal; sometimes he would just write the name of the person and start the letter. He was very humorous and wrote very interesting letters. In a letter he wrote, "Main koshish karta hoon ke koi aisi baat likhoon jo padhe khush ho jaaye'" (I want to write lines such that whoever reads them would enjoy them). Some scholars say that Ghalib would have the same place in Urdu literature based on his letters only. They have been translated into English by Ralph Russell in The Oxford Ghalib.