The Progressive Urdu Afsana: Toward a New Aesthetic

Abstract

The Progressive Writers' Movement was an avant-garde movement that focused on marginalized communities. Progressive writers conceived of themselves as advocates of radical social change. Nevertheless, narratives of Progressive writers emphasize the primacy of the writers' creativity and fashion a literary aesthetic that involves the emancipatory. These self-conscious narratives engage the reader in a participatory process. This paper briefly estimates Urdu fiction as a composite conception of traditional literary genres harmonizing with western literary models. At length, it examines the Urdu Afsana as an experimental and experiential Progressive genre. Representative short stories, pre- and post-dating 1950, are analyzed.