ABSTRACT
In this essay, Sharib Rudaulvi, a prominent academic and critic in Urdu, begins by positioning the Urdu short story within its traditional antecedents, as also the traditions of Qissagoi or Dastangoi, bringing it up to more contemporary practices of fiction writing which have included the use of ambiguity and symbolism, where the ‘picture’ usually found in a short story seems to have disappeared and instead the canvas seems desolate. Dismissing these different ideas as inadequate, he goes on to speak of what really makes a good short story, placing Joginder Paul amongst those artists who are skilled at writing stories in which the absorption of feeling and sensitivity into emotion and expression to acquire the form of an actual incident is clearly to be seen. Paul, according to this critic, is not just the writer of these stories, he is indeed a character along with all others who populate his fiction. Rudaulvi goes on then to analyse in great detail many of Paul’s short stories such as “Ifreet,” “Muqamaat,” “Back Lane,” “Granthi,” “Fakhtayein,” and others.
