Ghazal 218, Verse 2

Nazm:

There's no pleasure in the verse, but from this conditional utterance the information also here emerges that the King has gone to see the garden, and from his going there such glory/magnificence [raunaq] has occurred that people have become surprised. (249)

== Nazm page 249

Bekhud Dihlavi:

In the spring, the King used often to betake himself to stroll in the tulip-garden. (306)

Bekhud Mohani:

[Disagreeing with Nazm:] The pleasure of the verse is clear from this: that a new category of praise for the tulip-garden has emerged.

People were not surprised to see the increase in glory/magnificence of the garden. Rather, the tulip-garden where the King went to stroll must have begun to be talked about: 'My God, my God, this is a place such that the King goes to stroll in it!'. (449)

FWP:

SETS

Like its predecessor {218,1}, this is a verse of flattery to the king, so we shouldn't expect too much from it. Nazm says flatly that it has 'no pleasure' in it, but that's too harsh. Like its predecessor, it does have a certain small amount of relish.

This relish lies in the clever use of namuud , which is not only multivalent in itself (see the definition above), but is so framed that its multivalence is maximized. (The grammar forces it to be a noun; if it had been used as an adjective, its multivalence would have been much reduced, for the tulip-garden would have lost the possibility of agency.) For its meanings include a kind of activity shared between observer and observed. Here are some of the ways it can be read:

=People come to know about the garden.
=People consider the garden to be a 'celebrity' and a 'show'.
=People 'honor' and admire the garden.
=The garden displays itself with 'pomp' and makes a 'show' of itself.
=The garden shows 'affectation' and vanity over its new fame.

Any or all of these reactions can be the result of the royal stroll in the tulip-garden.