In today’s My Poetic Side news round-up we bring you the story behind the doodle that appeared on Google yesterday. We also look at an article about the poem who penned the national anthem on Turkey on the 81st anniversary of his death.
Google Honours Urdu Poet
Yesterday Google created a doodle in honour of the iconic poet Mirza Ghalib in the occasion of the 220th anniversary of his birth.
Khan was born on 27th December 1797 in Agra, India. He is more commonly known by the name Mirza Ghalib, which, loosely translated, means conqueror, and is one person who is the most influential and iconic poets in literature in Urdu.
In the image the poet is depicted standing on the balcony of a period building, pen and paper in hand with the sun and a mosque in the background.
Ghalib was not only one of the most influential poets of the Urdu language but also Persian language, he wrote his poems when the British were taking over India and beginning its last days was the Mughal empire. His ghazals, a type of ode, have been sung and interpreted in several different performances over the years, and he is not just popular in India but also in Pakistan.
National Poet Commemorated by Turkish Parliament
On Tuesday this week the Parliament speaker in Turkey commemorated the life of the poet Mehmet Akif Ersoy. Ersoy is the author of the Turkish National Anthem.
Marking the 81st anniversary of the death of Ersoy, the speaker Ismail Kahraman hailed the poet as a man who was brave and held up the righteous whilst at the same time making a stand against the tyranny of the establishment. He claimed that Ersoy’s views and spirituality lead to him joining the ranks of immortal figures for the country.
The poet was a Turkish-Albanian, who came into the world in 1873, during the time known as the Ottoman era. It was in the wake of World War I, in 1921 amid the War of Independence the Turkey fought against occupation from foreign armies that he penned his poem that later became the National Anthem.
Istiklal Marsi, Independence March, was penned to help encourage the army and motivate the nation which was struggling. When the new republic was created in 1923, just two years later, the poem was elevated to the status of national anthem, earning Ersoy the title of “National Poet”.
Here we reproduce the first 8 lines of Istiklal Marsi, these are the only lines of the 41-line long poem which are performed at official ceremonies:
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