Sri Aurobindo - The Smiling Master

Chapter 9

Sri Aurobindo's Humour in Verse

Once a budding poet sent up some of his poems to Sri Aurobindo for the latter's perusal and comment. Sri Aurobindo remarked that there were certain "funny" things in these poems but nevertheless they were "fine". The word "funny" somewhat hurt the feelings of the amateur poet and he complained to Sri Aurobindo: "You find 'funny' things in my poems? Then, Sir, you have only to ask me to stop writing." But Sri Aurobindo consoled him with these words:

"But why do you object to fun? Modern opinion is that a poet ought to be funny (humorous) and that the objection to funniness in poetry is a romantic superstition."

But the budding poet persisted: "How is it that you give remarks 'Fine', 'Very fine' etc.?"

Sri Aurobindo cryptically rejoined: "Well, it can be funnily fine or finely funny - can't it?"

The final shot of the young poet was like this: "If they are really funny, why should I spend my valuable time writing them when I could sleep comfortably for two hours?"

Sri Aurobindo's short and pithy reply: "For the joy of the world, of course."¹

For the joy of the world? - Yes, for the joy of the world! Indeed, the poetic form easily lends itself to the fun of the humorist and there is a wide domain where humour is better expressed in forms that belong to poetry and verse. The budding poet we have mentioned above finally wrote to Sri Aurobindo almost in a mood of self-adulation: "In spite of your decrying my poems, Sir, there are plenty of beautiful conceptions, you must admit!"

Sri Aurobindo's prompt reply was: "Who decries it? Some are funny - I beg pardon, extraordinary - but the beauty is all there."²

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Yes, the beauty of expression and the joy in its effect is all that is sought by the humorist when he takes to poetry as his chosen medium. And it has its marked advantages too. For, as Prof. Stephen Leacock has so aptly remarked:

"Poetry in the full and proper sense means the creation of things by the human imagination, making something out of nothing, or as children say, out of one's own head.... Poetry can say in a word what prose must say in a page; poetry can convey in a flash what prose loses in a fog. Poetry can breathe life and colour and pathos into the texture of words, where prose fails to animate."³

Says in a word and conveys in a flash? — Yes, this is so true; and as we are dealing with humour in verse, let us cite two or three examples which will adequately substantiate this point.

Ex. 1: E.C. Bentley made an "estimate of the mighty dead" in these four lines:

Sir Christopher Wren

Said, "I'm going to dine with some men.

If anybody calls,

Say I am designing St. Paul's."⁴

Readers will surely appreciate with pleasure how the real dig is here conveyed with surprising and ingenious brevity.

Ex. 2: Here is the epitaph of the poet Gay as inscribed on his tomb in the Westminster Abbey:

Life is a jest; and all things show it,

I thought so once; but now I know it.⁵

Ex. 3: Here is an epitaph composed by Dryden who allies humour with solemnity to convey with a telling effect the frustrations of a conjugal life:

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Here lies my wife: here let her lie!

Now she's at rest - and so am I.⁶

Humorous poetry has taken many forms in course of its evolution. Some of the more common forms are: parody; mock heroic poetry; burlesque; narrative light verse; epigrammatic verse; super-comic; pure comic verse; satirical light verse; tragic light verse; and finally poetic humour. Prof. Stephen Leacock has in his book Humour and Humanity described in detail with appropriate examples the main characteristics of these different forms of humorous poetry. In some of the forms merriment and amusement become the dominant element; in a few others a satirical or a didactic element may appear, although the fun-element continues to occupy the centre stage; at a still higher level, humour in verse is divested of mere comicity and becomes one with reflection on the incongruities of life itself. And when comic verse reaches its highest level of development, humour broadens in its outlook and becomes one with half-saddened and half-amused pathos in which tears and laughter join together. At this stage - to quote the words of Prof. Leacock -

"... under the light form there is a deeper shade of meaning: the laughter flickers on the surface like sunshine over rising waters.... It is obviously humour, yet it is sad, but not so terribly sad; full of reflection, yet expressed so easily, so lightly."⁷

This is so for the essence of the thing; but so far as is concerned the technique for the production of comic effect in poetry, the masters in this field have been found to have adopted many a varied device and principle. Following the analysis of Prof. Leacock we may briefly mention them as follows, as lack of space will not allow us to allude to them in greater detail:

(i) The pretence of terrific importance of things that don't really matter; (ii) the pretence of terrific dangers that are ludicrously small; (iii) the pretence of tremendous exploits that really amount to nothing; (iv) conveying the intended meaning with unexpected and ingenious brevity; (v) the ingenuity of

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unexpected rhymes; (vi) a delectable trickery of words; (vii) mixing two poems together in a 'funnily' original way; (viii) cutting off the head and tail of well-known poems and juxtaposing them with the middle left out; (ix) employing funny verbal forms; etc.

An example of (vi) above:

They played him a sonata - let me see -

'Medulla oblongata' key of G —"

An example of (vii) above:

"Under a spreading chestnut tree

the village smithy stands,

His breast is bare, his matted hair

lies buried in the sands."

Another example of the same device (vii):

"Lady Clara Vere de Vere,

I hardly know what I must say.

But I'm to be Queen of the May, Mother,

I'm to be Queen of the May."

An example of (viii) above:

"It was the schooner Hesperus

that sailed the wintry sea;

The skipper he blew a whiff from his pipe,

A frozen corpse was he."

(All the four examples cited above are from Prof. Leacock's collection.)

So far for the introduction. Let us now turn to Sri Aurobindo's works for examples of his own humour in verse. They are of different genres ranging from simple unadulterated

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fun to sublime humour passing through the satirical comicality.

I. From Sri Aurobindo's "Correspondence..."

(1)Surrealist poetry\

NB: You said 'circumstances are exceptional' as regards my early success in English versification.... Let me know how it is so...

Sri Aurobindo:

You are opening, opening, opening

Into a wider, wider scopening

That fills me with a sudden hopening

That I may carry you in spite of gropening

Your soul into the supramental ropening.⁸

(2)"O apples, apples,...A

NB: I hear that J [a patient] is now shedding tears of joy at the sight of apples, oranges and prunes. Tears of sorrow, tears of joy, oh dear"!

Sri Aurobindo: "fruity" tears of joy. They move me to poetry:

"O apples, apples, oranges and prunes,

You are God's bliss incarnate in a fruit!

Meeting you after many desolate moons

I sob and sniff and make a joyous bruit."

Admit that you yourself could not have done better as a poetic and mantric comment on this touching situation.⁹

(3)On the cricket field of Mindl

NB: I send you a new poem of mine:

"I gather from the fathomless depth of the Mind

Transparent thoughts that float through a crystal wind

To a spirit-sky and weave a memory

Around the starry flames (glimpse) of Infinity."

Sri Aurobindo: I read you varitaion (glimpase ) first as ''stumps'' .What a magnificent and original image image ! the starry stumps (or star- stumps ) of infinity! But I fear alas that it would

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be condemned as surrealistic...

NB: In yesterday's poem, I am much tempted to take the "stumps", even if it is surrealistic. Who cares what it is when you find it magnificent?

Sri Aurobindo: Don't do it, sir, or you will get stumped. The "star-stumps" are "magnificent" from the humorous-reckless-epic point of view, but they can't be taken seriously. Besides you would have to change all into the same key, e.g.

"I slog on the boundless cricket field of Mind

Transparent thoughts that cross like crystal wind

God's wicket-keeper's dance of mystery

Around the starry-stumps of infinity."¹⁰

(4)"Laugh and grow fat":

NB: ... By the way -

My boil has burst and as you see

From the depression I am free.

Thanks, Guru, thanks to Thee!

Wilt Thou now pour some poetry?

Sri Aurobindo:

Thank God for that!

Free from boil, At poems toil.

Laugh and grow fat.¹¹

(5)"O blessed blessed boil...":

NB: Again I have a blessed boil inside the left nostril -painful. I feel feverish. A dose of Force, please!

Sri Aurobindo: I hope the [following] stotra will propitiate the boil and make it disappear, satisfied.

O blessed blessed boil within the nostril,

How with pure pleasure dost thou make thy boss thrill!

He sings of thee with sobbing trill and cross trill,

O blessed, blessed boil within the nostril.¹²

(6)"Drop it, pleasel"

NB: I have a bad frontal headache, feeling feverish, hope no complication of left frontal sinus suppuration! Help, Guru!

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Sri Aurobindo: What's all this? Is this a time to start suppurating sinuses? Drop it, please.

Throw off the cold,

Damn the fever.

Be sprightly and bold

And live for ever.¹³

(7)"A bill from Smith or Jones":

NB: How is it, Sir, that my letter and the poem came away as they went? Because I was late or some Supramental forget -fulness?

Sri Aurobindo: Never had a glimpse of either of them. Must have been hiding scared in your bag.

NB: I'll send it again at your door. You will kill me, O Guru,

if you forget it this time!

Sri Aurobindo's Humour in Verse

O must I groan and moan and scarify my poor inspired

bones

To get my poem back as if it were a bill from Smith or

Jones'"

(8)NB:

What thinkest thou of this anapaest poem, Sir -

Written by my humble self? Pray, does it stir

Any soft feelings in thy deep within

Or touches not even thy Supramental skin?

Sri Aurobindo:

O soft, so soft, I almost coughed, then went aloft

To supramental regions,

where rainbow-breasted pigeons

Coo in their sacred legions.

N.B. This inspired doggerel is perfectly private. It is an effort at abstract or surrealist poetry, but as I had no models to imitate, I may have blundered!

NB: Is that "Coo in their sacred legions"?

Sri Aurobindo : Yes, the cooing is the superamental zenith of the softness and the surrealistic transformation of the cough! 15

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(9)"Noted with comments (poetic and prosaic)":

NB: Here is my attempt at the use of anapaests in the iambic metre. Please have a look at the poem and give some comments:

"The dismal clouds haunting my days and nights

Dissolve into a calm transparent wide

Horizon, when ascends on the black heights

Thy moon increasing in its luminous tide." Sri Aurobindo

Sri Aurobindo: Noted with comments 9poetic and prosaic )...

It is stressed transparent , not transparent. What a howler! It makes me ''drop into poetry''-thus

"Sir, you seem apparently ignorant

That parent is the trick and not parent.

And yet the stress transpires transparently

And is apparent to both ear and eye.

So you compare and do not compare things;

Your soul prepares, not prepares heavenly wings."¹⁶

(10)"Enough? Amenl"

NB: Please give a few examples of conceit in English poetry. Not very clear about it.

Sri Aurobindo: Conceit means a too obviously ingenious or far-fetched or extravagant idea or image which is evidently an invention of a clever brain, not a true and convincing flight of the imagination. E.g. Donne's (?) comparison of a child's smallpox eruptions to the stars of the milky way or something similar. I have forgotten the exact thing, but that will serve.

This hill turns up its nose at heaven's height,

Heaven looks back with a blue contemptuous eye -that's a conceit.

O cloud, thou wild black wig on heaven's bald head, would be another.

These are extravagant specimens. I haven't time to think out any ingenious ones, nor to discuss trochees adequately — have given one or two hints in the margin [of your notebook].

Some more conceits, ingenious all of them:

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Am I his tail and is he then my head?

But head by tail, I think, is often led.

Also

Like a long snake came wriggling out his laugh.

Also

How the big Gunner of the upper sphere

Is letting off his cannon in the sky!

Flash, bang bang bang! he has some gunpowder

With him, I think. Again! whose big bow-wow,

Goes barking through the hunting fields of Heaven?

What a magnificent row the gods can make!

And don't forget

The long slow scolopendra of the train.

Or if you think these are not dainty or poetic enough, here's another:

God made thy eyes sweet cups to hold blue wine;

By sipping at them rapture-drunk are mine.

Enough? Amen!¹⁷

II. From Sri Aurobindo's Collected Poems:

(1) A Dream of Surreal Science

One dreamed and saw a gland write Hamlet, drink

At the Mermaid, capture immortality;

A committee of hormones on the Aegean's brink

Composed the Iliad and the Odyssey.

A thyroid, meditating almost nude

Under the Bo-tree, saw the eternal Light

And, rising from its mighty solitude,

Spoke of the Wheel and eightfold Path all right.

A brain by a disordered stomach driven

Thundered through Europe, conquered, ruled and fell,

From St. Helena went, perhaps, to Heaven.

Thus wagged on the surreal world, until

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A scientist played with atoms and blew out

The universe before God had time to shout.¹⁸

(2)Self.

He said, "I am egoless, spiritual, free,"

Then swore because his dinner was not ready.

I asked him why. He said, "It is not me,

But the belly's hungry god who gets unsteady."

I asked him why. He said, "It is his play.

I am unmoved within, desireless, pure.

I care not what may happen day by day."

I questioned him, "Are you so very sure?"

He answered, "I can understand your doubt.

But to be free is all. It does not matter

How you may kick and howl and rage and shout,

Making a row about your daily platter.

"To be aware of self is liberty,

Self I have got and, having self, am free."¹'

(3)Despair on the Staircase:

Mute stands she, lonely on the topmost stair,

An image of magnificent despair;

The grandeur of a sorrowful surmise

Wakes in the largeness of her glorious eyes.

In her beauty's dumb significant pose I find

The tragedy of her mysterious mind.

Yet is she stately, grandiose, full of grace.

A musing mask is her immobile face.

Her tail is up like an unconquered flag,

Its dignity knows not the right to wag.

An animal creature wonderfully human,

A charm and miracle of fur-footed Brahman,

Whether she is spirit, woman or a cat,

Is now the problem I am wondering at.²⁰

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(4) Surrealist:

I have heard a foghorn shouting at a sheep,

And oh the sweet sound made me laugh and weep

But alas, the sheep was on the hither shore

Of the little less and the ever-never more.

I sprang on its back; it jumped into the sea.

I was near to the edges of eternity.

Then suddenly the foghorn blared again.

There was no sheep - it had perished of ear pain.

I took a boat and steered to the Afar

Hoping to colonise the polar star.

But in the boat there was a dangerous goose

Whom some eternal idiot had let loose.

To this wild animal I said not "Bo!"

But it was not because I did not know.

Full soon I was on shore with dreadful squeals

And the fierce biped cackling at my heels.

Alarmed I ran into a lion's den

And after me ran three thousand armoured men.

The lion bolted through his own backdoor

And set up a morose dissatisfied roar.

At this my courage rose; I grew quite brave

And shoved myself into a tiger's cave.

The tiger snarled; I thought it best instead

To don my pyjamas and go to bed.

But the tiger had a strained objecting face,

So I turned my eyes away from his grimace.

At night the beast began my back to claw

And growled out that I was his brother-in-law.

I rose and thought it best to go away

To a doctor's house: besides 'twas nearly day.

The doctor shook his head and cried, "For a back

Pepper and salt are the remedy, alack."

But I objected to his condiments

And thought the doctor had but little sense.

Then I returned to my own little cot

For really things were now extremely hot.

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Then fierily the world cracked Nazily down

And I looked about to find my dressing gown.

I was awake (I had tumbled on the floor).

A shark was hammering away at my front-door.²¹

Before we close this chapter we would like to make an additional observation. Comic poetry pleases us at times by its sheer lack of any significant meaning although there may be there plenty of rhythm and word music. Here are two examples. The first one is from Mr. Gillet Burgess:

I never knew a Purple Cow,

I never hope to see one.

But I can tell you anyhow

I'd rather see than be one.²²

Artemus Ward is the author of the second one:

Uncle Simon he

Clumb up a tree

To see

What he could see,

When presentlee

Uncle Jim

Clumb up beside of him

And squatted down by he.²³

Now a piece from the pen of Sri Aurobindo and with this we come to the end of this chapter on Sri Aurobindo's humour in

verse:

In the human heart of Heligoland

A hunger wakes for the silver sea;

For waving the might of his magical wand

God sits on his throne in eternity.²⁴

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REFERENCES

N.B. For what the abbreviations stand for please consult Bibliography on page 439.

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