Javed Akhtar conferred Lifetime Achievement award
Mumbai, Mar 13 (UNI) Bollywood script writer, poet and lyricist Javed Akhtar was conferred the ''Lifetime Achievement'' award at the ongoing MAMI festival here.
In an informal chat with reporters after receiving the award, Akhtar lamented the declining standard of songs. ''Today there is speed in life, at the cost of depth,'' he rued. Vocabulary is sinking in society and there has been a moral and aesthetic decline all around and we should be concerned about it, he added.
''If you want to be a lyricist, there should be 'riyaz'. You have to learn writing by reading. You should have enough vocabulary of words at your disposal. Words have weightage and a phonetic effect,'' he says.
Akhtar
rues
the
declining
quality
of
poets
today.
He
says,
''1950s
and
1960s
have
been
the
golden
decades
of
poetry.
We
had
a
galaxy
of
lyricists
like
Sahir,
Kaifi,
Janisar,
Majrooh
and
Shailandra.
These
people
were
ready.
Today
'riyaz'
is
going
out
of
fashion.''
Asked
what
was
his
idea
of
a
perfect
screenplay,
Akhtar
says,
''It
is
very
difficult
to
answer.
It
is
like
looking
for
the
perfect
person
or
house.
But
I
think
a
story
well
told,
a
good
narrative,
good
characterisations,
an
X
factor
which
the
screenplay
captures,
and
between-the-line
dialogues,
make
good
screenplay.''
UNI