Nirodbaran's Correspondence with Sri Aurobindo

February 1936

By the way, you spoke of my friend J.B. as receiving the Mother's Force.

[Sri Aurobindo underlined "Mother's Force".]

"In contact with" the Divine Force which is the force of the Mother—that was what I wrote, I believe.

But which Mother? Ours or some universal Mother as people say? Perhaps an ignorant and foolish question, but Can't help it.

How many Mothers are there? Who is this some universal Mother? How many of these some universal Mothers are there?

I ask because I do not understand how without invoking the Mother, he gets her Force.

Have you not put him by the photograph and his letter in connection with us? Has he not turned in this direction? Has he not met Prithwisingh and been impressed by him—a third channel of contact. That is quite sufficient to help him to a contact if he has the faith and the Yogic stress in him.

And I do not understand either, how a married man—married not like Ramakrishna I mean,—gets all these experiences so easily.

Why not? A married man can get experiences, especially if he is not gross or over-sexy by nature. But if he follows this Yoga, he will have to drop copulation or he will get upsettings.

You have heard of Monoranjan Guha Thakurtha and his wife who, leading a married life, having children, were making a lot of progress in sadhana—especially his wife, it seems, had no sex-desire at all. She used to submit to these procreative acts with detachment. Possible?

That is possible but how many can do it?

I thought any sex-act, with or without desire, is a great hindrance to Yoga, and Mother has said, I hear, that every sex-act is a step towards death.

Well, did your Mrs. Guha live?

Well, but in spite of all these, she did progress in sadhana, as far as a layman can judge. Can you enlighten?

To a certain extent yes—but if she had been sexy, it would have been more difficult for her.

February 2, 1936

Regarding "how many Mothers are there?" K says that all Power, Force, Light in the universe belong to you and emanate from you. In that case, I asked him—"Does Raman Maharshi who is an aspirant of the Impersonal Brahman get a response from Mother and Sri Aurobindo?"

Who is the Mother and who is Sri Aurobindo? And who is this fellow you call the Impersonal Brahman?

K says, "Yes, because they are identified with the Supreme and the Supreme is static and dynamic at the same time." I answered—maybe—especially when Krishna is supposed to have contained the whole universe in his mouth or when he says that whoever takes the name of the Divine, or offers a flower, etc., comes to his feet. Then why is it said again that he is an Overmind god? Doesn't it mean that there is a greater godhead than Krishna?

What was said was that Krishna as a manifestation on earth opened the possibility of the Overmind consciousness here to men and stood for that, as Rama was the incarnation in mental Man. If Krishna was an overmind "God", that means he was not an Incarnation, not the Divine, but somebody else who claimed to be the Divine—i.e. he was a god who somehow thought he was God.

Somehow I can't accept that people following other paths of sadhana are calling Mother and Sri Aurobindo and getting their help and Force. In that case wouldn't all of them, except the worshippers of the Impersonal, be their disciples?

The Divine is neither personal nor impersonal, formless nor formed. He is the Divine. You talk of these distinctions as if they separated the Divine into so many separate Divines which have nothing to do with each other.

I continued, "My friend J.B. was having experiences which, Sri Aurobindo says, were coming from Mother, even before he was put in contact with them."

If so, why were you so much flabbergasted when he wrote about them? What was the date on which they began in this vividness—not as a mental impression but as a concrete contact with the Divine Presence or the Force?

I have no objection to your being the Supreme, only it stupefies one to think of you as such!

But there was no question about my being the Supreme; the question was whether there was one Divine Mother or 20,000 Divine Mothers. At the same time I don't see why it should stupefy one (you?), in spite of your absence of personal objections to think of me as such (the Supreme). Why, you are yourself the Supreme, aren't you? Soaham, tattwam asi Nirada, ঈশ্বর কোন বেটা, আমিই ঈশ্বর (Vivekananda)¹⁵¹ আমি in this formula means not V but anyone, that is to say Nirod. Also vide Krishna Prem. So what's this stupefaction about, I should like to know? When everybody is the Supreme and of everybody it can be said that he is God, why should I alone as such stupefy you?

Leave aside the question of Divine or undivine, no spiritual man who acts dynamically is limited to physical contact—the idea that physical contact through writing, speech, meeting is indispensable to the action of the spiritual force is self-contradictory, for then it would not be a spiritual force. The spirit is not limited by physical things or by the body. If you have the spiritual force, it can act on people thousands of miles away who do not know and never will know that you are acting on them or that they are being acted upon—they only feel that there is a force enabling them to do things and may very well suppose it is their own great energy and genius.

Mulshankar has a headache now and then, which he says is due to exertion in shouting for the servant etc.

So why not give him a small bell from here?

Coconuts are rather hard to get in the hospital. Shall I ask Dyuman to supply two a day?

If he can find—in some seasons it is hardly possible to find them—

I find that workmen—carpenters—go to see him on their way home. Shall I ask Chandulal to forbid them?

Yes, of course. That should be strictly forbidden.

February 3, 1936

You can send your Force to whomever you like—Lenin, Kemal, Gandhi, but how people calling Shiva or Krishna for their Ishta Devata¹⁵² get responses from you, I don't understand.

Again who is Shiva? and who is Krishna? and what is an Ishta Devata? There is only one Divine, not a thousand Divines.

It would mean that wherever a sincere heart is aspiring for the Divine, his aspiration reaches your ears.

Why my ears? Ears are not necessary for the purpose. You might just as well say, reaches me by the post.

And you send your responses, because you want to manifest the Divine rule on earth.

That has nothing to do with it. Besides it is not the Divine Rule on earth that I am after, but the supramental rule. This however has nothing to do with any supramental or Divine Rule on earth. It is only a general question of the response of the Divine and to the Divine.

Why should you stupefy me? Good Lord! Have you forgotten how Arjuna was stupefied, horrified, flabbergasted by seeing the Vishwarup¹⁵³ of Krishna whom he had thought of as his friend, guru, playmate? Could I, for a moment, play all these pranks on you if I saw your Vishwarup?

But that was because the Vishwarup was enjoying a rather catastrophic dinner, with all the friends and relations of Arjuna stuck between his danshtrani karahni.¹⁵⁴ But my viswarupa has no tusks, Sir, none at all. It is a pacifist vishwarup.

Already people say that I have no respect for you because I write anything and everything! "Sri Aurobindo is the Lord Supreme and with Him he plays all these pranks!"

And I return the compliment—I mean reply without restraint, decorum or the right grave rhythm. That is one reason why I indulge so freely in brackets.¹⁵⁵

No, Sir, I am satisfied with you as Sri Aurobindo pure and simple.

No objection, I only suggested that I don't know who this Sri Aurobindo pure and simple is. If you do, I congratulate you.

I am wrong about J.B., I discover. I forgot that he was put in contact with you by his photograph long ago. Who knew that you have been acting on him since then?

You must not imagine I have been thinking solely about J all the time. When a fellow contacts, a Force goes out to him and acts according to his capacity of response, that's all.

I have sent P's photograph also, but apparently there was no contact.

Plenty of people have sent their photographs—some mad, some sane, some good, some bad, some indifferent. You don't expect all to get the contact, do you? That would be too too even for a viswarupa.

Mulshankar is much better today, Sir, and the doctor has asked him to eat macaroni and potatoes. But the fellow can't bear the name of potato! Very queer, all of us are mad over it in the Asram!

Quite queer—for he has surely eaten plenty of potatoes in the Asram.

... The surgeon says he suspects a contusion in the abdomen—can't localise it... He seems to have said that it is or was a very serious case. But no serious symptoms are visible. What did you find in the occult, Sir? Had to work a lot?

Yes, still have to.

What should be done with the letters written to him from outside?

I suppose the letters can be sent to him or is it medically inadvisable?

February 5, 1936

A funny dream, Sir: On the Darshan day when I went up, I heard you say to the Mother, "Caress the boy a little". Mother did so and you in turn looked at me with wide open eyes and as you were taking them away, the Mother said, "No, no, look at him a little more". (Please do, Sir, do!) Mother was rather advanced in age and dark, while you were younger—these things make me doubt the dream.

These dreams are in the vital and their appearance is not fixed as it is in the physical body. It can change to express various things, some vital condition, some psychological symbolism, something in the mind of the man who sees, etc., etc., etc. So nothing funny, sir,—all quite normal and natural.

You were not at all like what we see. Then what we see is an illusion?

Obviously—even science knows that. You see only what your eyes show you.

Mulshankar had disturbed sleep because of the pain in the leg... Temperature 36.8˚ —all O.K. except for that blessed pain.

It is a contusion?

February 7, 1936

Mulshankar's doctor insists on his taking meat and fish and coaxed Rajangam to his view. I don't see any necessity for it provided we can give him sufficient nourishment.

We quite agree with your view. But Rajangam seems to have lectured Mulshankar into consent. Therefore Mother leaves it to the patient and the doctors to settle—

February 8, 1936

I wrote some time back that behind any difficult endeavour of an individual there is the seeking for Ananda which acts as a motive power. I got a rebuff from you: "Not that I know of!" The curt reply didn't satisfy me, as my little brain couldn't agree with your mighty one.

That is an easily made psychological proposition which can exist only by ignoring facts. If you say that it is the Ananda behind the veil which makes one act, as a moving power, not as a "motive",—that may be so, but this is a metaphysical, not a psychological generalisation. When a Communist faces torture in a Nazi concentration camp, he is not doing it for the sake of Ananda or happiness, but for something else which makes him indifferent to Ananda or happiness or else compels him to face the loss of these things and even their very reverse, however painful it may be.

I have always seriously thought that all men are after happiness which is a deformation of Ananda. Their acts of desires, sin, lust, striving after power,—in one word, all their activities, are guided by that one principle: seeking for Ananda, or happiness, if you like...

[Sri Aurobindo drew an arrow indicating "happiness".]

A mistake; many men are not after happiness and do not believe it is the true aim of life. It is the physical vital that seeks after happiness, the bigger vital is ready to sacrifice it in order to satisfy its passions, search for power, ambition, fame or any other motive. If you say it is because of the happiness power, fame etc. gives, that again is not universally true. Power may give anything else, but it does not usually give happiness; it is something in its very nature arduous and full of difficulty to get, to keep or to use—I speak of course of power in the ordinary sense. A man may know he can never have fame in this life, but yet work in the hope of posthumous fame or on the chance of it. He may know that the satisfaction of his passion will bring him everything rather than happiness—suffering, torture, destruction—yet he will follow his impulse. So also the mind as well as the larger vital is not bound by the pursuit of happiness. It can seek Truth rather or the victory of a cause. To reduce all to a single hedonistic strain seems to me very poor psychology. Neither Nature nor the vast Spirit in things are so limited and one-tracked as that.

I shall quote the following remarks of Raman Maharshi, recorded by Paul Brunton: "All human beings are ever wanting happiness, untainted with sorrow. They want to grasp a happiness which will not come to an end. The instinct is a true one..."¹⁵⁶

All? It is far too sweeping a generalisation. If he had said that it is one very strong strain in human nature—it could be accepted. But mark that it is in human physical consciousness only. The human vital tends rather to reject a happiness untainted by sorrow and to find it a monotonous, boring condition. Even if it accepts it, after a time it kicks over the traces and goes to some new painful or risky adventure.

... Man's real nature is happiness. Happiness is inborn in the true self His search for happiness is an unconscious search for his true self The true self is imperishable; therefore, when a man finds it, he finds a happiness which does not come to an end."¹⁵⁷

The true Self is quite a different proposition. But what it has is not happiness but something more.

... Even they [the wicked and the criminal] sin because they are trying to find the sells happiness in every sin they commit. This striving is instinctive in man, but they do not know that they are really seeking their true selves, and so they try these wicked ways first as a means to happiness..."¹⁵⁸

Who is this "they"? I fear it is a very summary and misleading criminal psychology. To say that a Paris crook or apache steals, swindles, murders for the happiness of stealing, swindling, murdering is a little startling. He does it for quite other reasons. He does it as his metier just as you do your doctor's work. Do you really do your doctor's work because of the happiness you find in it?

People will not seek a sorrowless, untainted, everlasting happiness, even if shown the way—because they will consider it beyond their power to attain, or so it seems to me.

It is also with many because they prefer the joy mixed with sorrow, মানুষের হাসিকান্না,¹⁵⁹ and and consider your everlasting happiness an everlasting bore.

About the criminals, I don't obviously include those types who are born with a criminal instinct: idiots and imbeciles.

Why not? If your generalisation is good for all, it must be good for them also.

Raman Maharshi says that if one meditates for an hour or two every day, then the current of mind induced will continue to flow even in work. Of course he speaks of meditation "in the right manner".

A very important qualification

"It is as though there are two ways of expressing the same idea; the same line which you take in meditation will be expressed in your activities"¹⁶⁰ And its result will be the gradual change of attitude towards people, events and objects. Your actions will tend to follow your meditation of their own accord.

If the meditation brings poise, peace, a concentrated condition or even a pressure or influence, that can go on in the work, provided one does not throw it away by a relaxed or dispersed state of consciousness. That was why the Mother wanted people not only to be concentrated at pranam or meditation but to remain silent and absorb or assimilate afterwards and also insisted on avoiding things that relax or disperse or dissipate too much—precisely for this reason that so the effects of what she put in them might continue and the change of attitude the Maharshi speaks of will take place. But I am afraid most of the sadhaks have never understood or practised anything of the kind—they could not appreciate or understand her directions.

Of course, he adds that setting apart time for meditation is for spiritual novices... You too wrote to me to meditate at least half an hour a day, if only to bring a greater concentration in the work.

It does bring the effects of meditation into work if one gives it a chance.

You know that meditations are not always successful.

You forget that with numbers of people they are successful.

Even if they were, how does this affect the whole day's work?

It doesn't, if one does not take care that it should do so—if one takes care, it can.

Is it something like charging a battery which goes on inducing an automatic current?

It is not exactly automatic. It can be easily spoilt or left to sink into the subconscient or otherwise wasted. But with simple and steady practice and persistence it has the effect the Maharshi speaks of—he assumes, I suppose, such a practice. I am afraid your meditation is hardly simple or steady—too much kasrat[76] and fighting with yourself.

Raman Maharshi seems a real Maharshi

He is more of a Yogi than a Rishi, it seems to me. The happiness theory does not impress me,—it is as old as the mountains but not so solid. But he knows a lot about Yoga.

February 9, 1936

You have hit me well by asking me whether I do my doctoring for the sake of happiness. But it was forced on me, Sir!

Most people do things because they have to, not out of the happiness they find in the things. It is only its hobbies and penchants that the nature finds some happiness in, not usually in work—unless of course the work itself is one's hobby or penchant and can be indulged in or dropped as one likes.

We are puzzled over this word "Rishi". Dilipda and myself agree that a Rishi is something more than a Yogi.

Why always this less and greater?

Kanai places a Yogi higher than a Rishi. He says, "But then Sri Aurobindo has called Bankim a Rishi"...

A Rishi is one who sees or discovers an inner truth and puts it into self-effective language—the mantra. Either new truth or old truth made new by expression and realisation.

Raman Maharshi has seen the Truth, can he be called a Rishi?

He has experienced certain eternal truths by process of Yoga—I don't think it is by Rishilike intuition or illumination, nor has he the mantra.

February 10, 1936

From your definition of a Rishi am I to understand that a Rishi may not necessarily be a Yogi because a truth may not always be the Ultimate Truth?

A Rishi may be a Yogi, but also he may not ; a Yogi too may be a Rishi, but also he may not. Just as a philosopher may or may not be a poet and a poet may or may not be a philosopher.

A Rishi will have 2 things: 1) Seeing or discovering a truth—new or old, 2) putting it in mantra. These two things are quite possible in a man not doing Yoga at all, because intuition and sudden illumination can come to poets, literary people, artists, etc... can't they?

Yes, but poetic intuition and illumination is not the same thing as Rishi intuition and illumination.

You have called Bankim a Rishi. Do you think his "Bande Mataram" is a real mantra?

Well, the Bande Mataram acted as a mantra and so I suppose I gave him the credit of Rishihood.

Did he actually see the country as the Mother?...

Can't say whether he saw. Must ask him.

When you wrote that you look upon India not as an inert, dead mass of matter, but as the very Mother, the living Mother in bones and flesh, I believe you saw that Truth—or was it just the expression of a poetic or patriotic sentiment?

My dear sir, I am not a materialist. If I had seen India as only a geographical area with a number of more or less interesting or uninteresting people in it, I would hardly have gone out of my way to do all that for the said area.

Merely a poetic or patriotic sentiment—just as in yourself only your flesh, skin, bones and other things of which the senses give their evidence are real, but what you call your mind and soul do not self-exist being merely psychological impressions created by the food you eat and the activity of the glands. Poetry and patriotism have of course the same origin and the things they speak of are quite unreal. Amen.

Mulshankar had no sleep last night due to pain in the leg. But it stopped in the morning. Temperature normal. Otherwise too all right. Is it necessary to visit him once in the morning at 7?

Why not?

There is a chronic difficulty with Benjamin's phimosis.

My dear sir, if you clap a word like that on an illness, do you think it is easy for the patient to recover?

A complains of nausea. Worms? Liver? Liver pain better.

She says you spoke wrathfully to Becharlal and Becharlal spoke wrathfully to her and accused her of high crimes and misdemeanours (like irregularity in eating) of which she was not guilty. So she is very wounded and won't go to Doctors any more!! Fact? or liver?

February 11, 1936

Spoke wrathfully? I thought I am a very calm and peaceful man. But I'll tell you what happened. Dr. Becharlal and I were breaking our heads over the budget when A entered. I was a bit troubled about the budget and I asked Dr. B what A's complaint was and he asked her in Gujerati: "Have you done some indiscretion in the diet?" That's all. Now you can judge for yourself.

Well, I don't know why, but you have the reputation of being a fierce and firebrand doctor who consider it a crime for patients to have an illness. You may be right, but—Tradition demands that a doctor should be soft like butter, soothing like treacle, sweet like sugar and jolly like jam. So!

I hear K is crying with pain and for my neglect of her condition. She is afraid of coming to the dispensary lest I should be displeased!

That's the thing. General complaint, sir.

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?

So 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 in abstract or surrealist poetry, but as I had no models to imitate, I may have blundered.

February 12, 1936

I had to show that doggerel to Amal as I couldn't decipher. Amal suggests that your "perfectly private" is a joke after all.

No, sir. Quite serious. Can't afford to play jokes like that in public.

Is it "Coo in their sacred legions"?

Yes, the cooing is the supramental zenith of the softness and the surrealistic transformation of the cough.

You have made me very happy by your comment on my poem I had sent you. But I doubt if the same sustained level will be maintained. Amal says that he too is not able to do it.

Very few poets can. The best poetry doesn't come by streams, except in periods of extraordinary inspiration. It usually comes by intermittent drops, though sometimes three or four drops at a time. Of course there are exceptions—Shakespeare etc.—but that kind of spear doesn't shake everywhere.

Bengali people say that they like my English verses better than my Bengali ones, for they find there something new.

Isn't that because "people" are less accustomed to English poetry than to Bengali? You have written two good poems in English, and certainly it is early to have done that. But the circumstances are exceptional.

This brings me to Nishikanta's poem. I wonder how, with such poor knowledge of English, he can write such beautiful poems with striking images and expressions.

A very fine poem.

Images and expressions come to him in English because they are there pressing behind; but his imperfect knowledge prevents their getting the right form and arrangement.

Is it something like a wide opening into these planes?

Yes, of course. It is the same thing. One opens to or into a plane of creative expression. Everything is that; it is only the transcription that has to be réussi.

Comparing Nishikanta with Dilip, I find that though Dilip writes very well, his expressions do not fuse with the thoughts and feelings. They are something like bright gems standing out strikingly from the rest of the flowers in a garland.

Do you mean the expression as a whole is not so beautiful as the thought and feeling? I don't quite catch the metaphor of the gems and the flowers. Please clarify. Is it particular expressions you refer to or the expression as a whole?

It strikes me as if he has not yet found that alchemy by which a miraculous harmony can be created out of whatever one touches, while Nishikanta has and knows.

Well I suppose Housman's theory comes in there. D's poetry is more mental. N's comes straight from the vital vision and knocks you in the pit of the stomach.

He does not repeat his images so much as D—and they are exceedingly striking and forceful. They are of one type, but that I suppose is the case with most poets.

From all this I conclude that a born poet and genius combined, is something quite different from one made by yoga. And there will be always a difference between the two.

Can't say I understand. N himself had done nothing worth doing in poetry when he came here—all the signs were that he would be at the best only a Tagorean poetling like so many others. He got a touch here which brought out in him some powerful force of vital vision and word that certainly had not shown any signs of existing before. It may have been there latent, but so was the poet in D. What then exactly is meant by a combination of born poet and genius? A born poet is usually a genius, poetry with any power or beauty in it implies genius.

You wrote to Harin that richness of image comes from an openness to occult planes, which Hann and Nishikanta have. Dilip does not have it yet, it seems to me.

Richness of image is not the whole of poetry. There are many "born poets" who avoid too much richness of image. There are certain fields of consciousness which express themselves naturally through image most—there are others that do it more through idea and feeling.

What do you think of my criticism—right or wrong?

It will have to be more clear, precise and specific before I can assess its value.

What about Nishikanta's big poem? No remark?

Read it. Very good—no remark needed.

And what about his note-book, then? Have you made it a point of reading one poem every day as a mantra?!

Very little chance of his getting it back before the February non-correspondence vacation.

Another poem by Nishikanta: "The Rat and the Cat".

Very strong and original.

I don't write to my mother at all because it doesn't do any good except opening a channel for more wallowings in depression and for moans.

Evidently. If people accepted the inevitable, it would be easier to do something for them.

If the tradition demands, we shall try to be softer than butter, but we may be too tempting and evoke a response from the patient's palate for making delicious toast. Who will save us then?

Of course, if you are too too sweet. You must draw the line somewhere.

A doctor says that one has to be firm, stern and hard with women. They may not like it superficially, but they enjoy it and stick to the doctor who gives them hard knocks. Caveman spirit?

He must have been a he-man. She-women enjoy it from he-men.

But all women are not she-women and all men are not he-men. Moreover there is an art as well as a nature in that kind of thing which you lack.

Dr. R seems no less a firebrand than myself, but women seem to like him.

He's a he-man. Even so, the women here have ended by saying No more of R!

February 13, 1936

You said "circumstances are exceptional" as regards my early success in English versification. It must be so, otherwise how could I write these poems so fast and beautifully? But please

Let me know
How 'tis so
A dullard like me
Bursting like a sea
With the heart of the Muse
Makes his rhythm fuse?

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.

N.B. Surrealist poetry.

K says that last two days she has not taken much and is not hungry either.

[Sri Aurobindo drew an arrow indicating the word "much".]

?!!

Ambu's weakness seems to be nervous. I wanted to prescribe Drakshasava (general tonic + appetiser), but our stock is exhausted. Amal said he has a bottle of it, sent to him by his family, which he could share with Ambu. What do you say?

Yes

Though I don't see why Amal requires any medicine at all.

It is the family which forces medicines on him, I hear.

February 14, 1936

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

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

After the day's hard work, you can understand my disappointment when with all froth and bubble of joy I opened the letter to find that not a line of your hand was there! I had to sigh and say:

(Tagore) "For this have I kept awake all night and done sadhana," or (Nishikanta) "I have endured mosquito-bites all over my body for this and it has come back without receiving your gracious look," or (Nirod) "Now I am bursting into tears of despair. I'll send it again at your door. You will kill me, 0 Guru, if you forget it this time!"¹⁶¹

(শ্রী অরবিন্দ)¹⁶² 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?

N.B. Abstract poetry, very abstract.

By the way, today is the date of my arrival, if you remember. I had forgotten it myself until Sanjiban reminded me. When you read this the day will be a past date, but the blessings won't!

Blessings and plenty of them

For Is eczema I suppose a stimulating ointment should be given.

Umph! If it is necessary.

February 15, 1936

[Image 6]

A wide/ inexpres/sible Peace/ seizes/ my soul,
Pervad/ing the spac/es a/profound/ Presence/ I feel
Inscru/table, vas/ter than/the sea,/ sky-still.¹⁶³

That, except in the second line, is the orthodox method of scansion, but even so the two lines are not iambic pentameters. The first is anapaestic-trochaic with an iamb at the beginning and another at the end. In the second line the orthodox scansion would make it a line of six feet.

You scanned: Illumined / by thousand / resplendent / suns.
I did: Illum/ined by / thousand/ resplen/dent suns.

That is a mathematical scansion, not rhythmic. If you scan like that, there is no prose that cannot become verse. I have scanned in that way your prose. "Mother, one more poem" etc.

The stress in "thousand" is on the first syllable, not the second. The natural stresses are "Illú/mined by thoú/sand resplen/dent suns." If you stress the unstressed "by" and the unstressed "sand" and destress the strongly stressed "thou" in "thousand", then no law of accent remains, you land yourself in pure license and there is no reason why you should not scan "Īllu/mīned by/ thoūsănd/ rēsplĕn/dēnt suns"/ and make a trochaic line of it. You cannot ignore stresses in the English language.

I really cannot see how you find iambic rhythm in "Pervading the spaces a profound Presence I feel". If there is any rhythm, it is the rhythm of free verse not of any fixed metre.

You have to train your ear to recognise (1) the difference between the various basic rhythms, iambic, trochaic, anapaestic and the various lengths pentameter etc. (2) the extent to which other feet can be admitted without upsetting the basic rhythm. These two things are indispensable.

Nishikanta thinks that it is easier for you to send Force for English verse than for Bengali. He has felt it, he says. Even D the sceptic, thinks that for English you have an easy work comparatively—words, expressions, even the technique you can direct through your Force.

Why the deuce should I do that? If I had to compose the whole poem myself, why go on and pump it into some other person's mind? Haven't I a fountain-pen and couldn't I write it and isn't there Nolini to type it?

Whereas in Bengali it is more of a general sort. True? Since Bengali code you don't know, or shy to admit, you can't do that?

Weird

"Benighted traveller sore, why do you moan
Because a transient darkness entwines your way?"

What is this "sore"? It sounds like a bear with a sore head. Benighted also sounds like an abuse.

"When the Divine like a loving friend has poured
His luscious grace on thee..."

"luscious" is too palatal or sensual to be an adjective of "grace".

Mulshankar is quite well, no pain. He wants to come out, but it would be better not to do so till the 20th.

Not till the 20th. Till he is able to walk and look after himself. What is the use of his coming on the 20th if he is not able to walk to the Pranam? However, you need not say that to him till the time comes.

February 16, 1936

Mulshankar is all right. He is trying to walk a little. Found a swelling in his right foot. Shall I ask Prasanna to tidy his bed?

But what is all this? You are all determined to have him here on the 20th whether he is fit or not? What is the idea behind all this haste? Has not the Mother said he should come only if he can walk and do the most necessary things for himself?

Here is my attempt at the use of anapaests in the iambic metre :

"The dismal clouds which haunted my days and night
Dissolve into a transparently wide
Calmness, by the ascent on the black height,
Of thy moon increasing in a swelling tide..."

It is stressed transpárent, not tránsparent. What a howler! It makes me "drop into poetry"—thus

Sir, you seem ápparéntly ignorant
That párent is the trick and not parént.
And yet the stress transpires transpárently
And is appárent to both ear and eye.
So you compáre and do not cómpare things;
Your soul prepáres, not prépares heavenly wings.

[A separate note:]

Please have a look at the poem and give some comments.

Noted with comments (poetic and prosaic) on the poem itself.

February 17, 1936

About that "tránsparent", well, I thought, Sir, it is transparent, but consulted the Ox. pocket dictionary and found transparent, though I did not understand how two accents can come one after the other.

Two accents can come together if the first syllable takes long to pronounce; but the accent then is minor, the other major—The main stress is on the 2nd syllable.

I am not an Englishman like you, Sir, to contradict or question the authority. I am only a Bengali and almost a hill-tribal at that!

Oxford Dictionary does not put the accents on the 1st and 3rd syllables as you do—so it does not contradict me.

You may say that they have divided the syllables like that, but other words also they accent in that way, e.g. transpiré. There is the rub.

I don't understand. Of course transpire is stressed on the second syllable, that was my whole point that transpire, transparent, compare, prepare, apparent are stressed on the second syllable, not on the first. Transparent also follows the same rule—the stress falls on the second syllable, it cannot fall on the first and third.

If O.D. puts a stress also on the first, that must be a minor stress due to the length of the syllable—but it cannot cancel the massive accent on the second or bestow an accent on the third where it does not exist.

Can you tell me why my poems tend to be so simple and bare? No images at all and whatever there is, is only common and almost hackneyed.

Poetry depends on power of thought, feeling, language—not on abundance of images. Some poets are rich in images, all need not be.

It seems I am not very rich in the faculty of imagination. And without that hardly any creation worth the name is possible.

What is this superstition? At that rate Sophocles, Chaucer, Milton, Wordsworth are not good poets, because their poetry is not full of images? Is Kalidasa a greater poet than Vyas or Valmiki because he is fuller of images?

After what you have seen of my English poetry, is there any chance for me?

Certainly

I have looked at the Ox. Dictionary here and I find it clearly puts the accent on the 2nd syllable, with none on the first, thus [Image 7], the ˚ marking the accent. In their system they put the sign of the stress after the stressed vowel e.g. rely ˚—but where there is an r after the r, as in [Image 8]. In their signs they make no difference between minor and major stresses. No English Dictionary, however eccentric, would justify your tránsparéntly wide—But perhaps you are writing for the 21st century?

February 18, 1936

Mulshankar proposes to come at 10 a.m. through Nolini's gate and finish the pranam on his way home. It may be too much as he is still limping.

He should reserve his energy for the darshan—this would be too much for the first day's outing.

February 19, 1936

What about the Darshan? Any good news for us?

Very queer darshan—too early to say anything.

The Americans, it seems, were much impressed. And the one who took the longest time, had a vision, I hear, of the whole of America bowing at your feet! What a wonderful thing it will be, by Jove!

That was what he was calling for and he believed he got the answer.

So if that vision were to come true, it would be marvellous. Somehow I feel that America would be the first to accept your message and through it your work will be spread all over the West. True?

Possibly. Mother has always expected something special from America.

You will find something in my famous bag, which may startle you! Well, the pen is a present from Arindam Bose. The size and everything will suit you best though the nib may not. And I send it to you that your writing may flow in rivers from the pen, in my book, not in a few stingy lines!

Good Lord! what a Falstaff of a fountain-pen.

But it is not the pen that is responsible for the stinginess; the criminal is Time and with a fat pen he can be as niggardly as with a lean one.

Amal says that to follow strictly the sonnet-principle, the rhyme-scheme in the second quatrain should be the same as in the first, i.e. ab ob.

Yes, certainly ; if you want to follow one of the strict sonnet forms.

The two regular sonnet rhyme-sequences are (1) the Shakespearean ab ab cd cd ef ef gg—that is three quatrains with alternate rhymes with a closing couplet and (2) the Miltonic with an octet abba abba (as in your second and third quatrains) and a sestet of three rhymes arranged according to choice. The Shn. is closer to the natural lyric rhythm, the Miltonic to the ode movement—i.e. something large and grave. The Miltonic is very difficult for it needs either a strong armoured structure of the thought or a carefully developed unity of the building which all poets can't manage. However there have been attempts at an irregular sonnet rhyme-sequence. Keats tried his hand at one a century ago and I vaguely believe (but that may be only an illusion of Maya) that modern poets have played loose fantastic tricks of their own invention; but I don't have much first-hand knowledge of modern (contemporary) poetry. Anyhow I have myself written a series of sonnets with the most heterodox rhyme arrangements, so I couldn't very well go for you when you did the same. One who has committed many murders can't very well rate another for having done a few. All the same, this sequence is rather—a Miltonic octet with a Shakespearean close would be more possible. I think I have done something of the kind with not too bad an effect, but I have no time to consult my poetry file and am not sure. In the sonnet too it might be well for you to do the regular thing first, soberly and well, and afterwards when you are sure of your steps, frisk and dance.

February 22, 1936

I thought Darshan is over and whatever has to be seen, done, given, has been done! We are expecting a great Victory, and "very queer darshan" you say, Sir?

You arrange things in your own way! Things don't work like that.

You spoke of some unpublished sonnets lying idle in your file? Can you not send a few, at least 2 or 3?

Not for circulation or publication just now.

Since I am writing sonnets, they would certainly help me.

Don't think so—they are too irregular.

As there is no correspondence now, please send one or two poems from your old or new ones, if possible. Will you, Sir? Asking for the file would be too much, I suppose!

[Sri Aurobindo underlined "no correspondence".]

What a rash statement

February 23, 1936

"Exceptional circumstances"! Whatever they might have been, have disappeared.

Make them reappear.

Expected many things or at least something from Darshan, but don't see anywhere any sign of it!

Many Americans at least, which was not expected! It is always the unexpected that happens, you see.

February 25, 1936

You are fine, you are wonderful, Sir! How the dickens am I to make the exceptional circumstances reappear when I don't knoW what they are? I asked you what the "exceptional circumstances" were, and the only reply I extracted from you was "You are widening, scopening"—a most vague, misty reply too.

Well, but that's just it. Widen, widen, scopen, scopen and the poetry may come in a torrent roaring and cascading through and enlarged fissure in yours and the world's subtle cranium.

Now I don't find poetry anywhere on the horizon.

How do you know? It may be hiding behind a cloud.

Maybe this disappearance of poetry is the unexpected that has happened as a result of Darshan! But the result of Darshan in some other quarters leaves me staggered and staggered! I can't imagine such an incident taking place in the Asram—I mean, of course, N's gripping M's throat. It makes me rather aghast. Coupled with that the incident of R rushing to shoe-beat P. Good Lord! but I suppose they are all in the game!

You seem to be the most candid and ignorant baby going. We shall have to publish an "Asram News and Titbits" for your benefit. Have you never heard of N's going for K's head with a powerfully-brandished hammer? Or of his howling challenges to C to come out and face him, till Mother herself had to interfere and stop him? Or of his yelling and hammering in a rage at C's door till Dyuman came and dragged him away? These things happened within a short distance of your poetic ears and yet you know nothing??? N is subject to these fits and has always been so. The Darshan is not responsible. And he is not the only howler. What about M herself? and half a dozen others? Hunger strikes? Threats of suicide? not to mention rushes to leave the Asram etc., etc. All from the same source, sir, and apparently part of the game.

Difficulties of individual nature rushing up?

Individual and general. The subconscient, sir, the subconscient. Brilliant irruptions of the subterranean Brahman into the dullness of ordinary life. অবচেতনায় ব্রহ্মনে নমো নমঃ¹⁶⁴

R writes that there is a spare pestle and mortar in the Dispensary lying in the cupboard and not being used—he needs one for his work. If this is not in use, it can be given to him.

February 26, 1936

Yes, we have a big mortar, but not exactly lying uselessly; we need it at times. But if he requires it more often we can spare it and get it from him whenever needed. Dr. Satyendra also uses it, though rarely. So as you please or as R pleases!

We will inform R of the situation of the mortar and ascertain his notions.

February 27, 1936

If by "widening" you mean that I have made a mighty or even a fractional conscious personal effort, well, that's just not it.

No, I did not mean that.

And with all my widening, I can't get even a glimpse of the Presence?

But you don't widen! If you did (I suppose you are too lazy to do so) you would get a glimpse and more.

The laws of its coming and going are as unknown as Einstein's law of Relativity. It comes of its own sweet will, at its own sweet hour. I feel Peace, Bliss and I write—"A Peace has taken my soul", and you say I have widened.

Of course. If you hadn't widened, how could the blessed thing get in? Of course, whether you widened yourself or it widened you and forced its way, is another matter.

It goes as it comes.

It always does, you know. But it comes back too, if you allow it.

The tragedy is that I know nothing of its reason of arrival and departure...

No reason. Only unreason or superreason. Keep your end up and it will arrive again, and some day perhaps after jack-in-the-boxing like that sufficiently, one day it will sit down and say "Here I am for good. Send for the priest and let us be married." With these things that is the law and the rule and the reason and rhyme of it and everything.

At times I think why the devil do I bother my head with poetry? Poetry, poetry, poetry! Have I come here for blessed poetry?

You haven't. But the poetry has come for you. So why shout?

I know that success in English poetry is as far away as the stars in heaven in spite of your remark to the contrary, though I must confess to having some contentment in writing.

Rubbish! the stars in heaven don't stroll in and pay a visit—not do they stroll out again.

Now let me tell you how an Englishman named Thompson visiting our Asram, looks at our versification in his tongue which has thrown cold water on it.

I am not interested in the looks of your Englishman.

Thompson's tongue has thrown cold water on it—or what? This sentence is almost as unintelligible as Thompson's own English.

He had a heated discussion with Dilip and said he could not understand at all why we Easterners should write poetry in English, deserting our own tongue.

Is his understanding of such immense importance? I might just as reasonably ask him why Westerners like him should go to practise an Eastern thing like spirituality or Yoga leaving their own parliaments, factories and what not. But not being Thompson in intelligence, I don't ask such absurd questions.

He seems to know definitely that we shan't be able to handle English as an Englishman would—its tradition, its expressions, etc.

A Thompson, like his father Tom, also his uncles Dick and Harry must of course be omniscient.

He asks: "Suppose an Englishman were to write a poem in Bengali, what would you say?"

It would depend on the Englishman and how he did it.

Dilip argued: "The Gitanjali of Tagore was appreciated and highly praised by many English poets. Conrad's prose ranks as high as any great English writer's. Sarojini Naidu and some others were praised by Gosse, Binyon and De la Mare."

Add Santayana whose prose is better than most Englishmen's

Thompson rejoined: "Well, the merits of the latter people you mention were extra-literary. Show the works of the Indians to people like Eliot and see." God knows what he means.

I don't think God knows.

What the blazes does all this nonsense mean? The latter people like Binyon and De la Mare have no literary merit or literary perception and Eliot has? Eliot is a theorist, a man who builds his poetry according to rule. God save us from such fellows and their opinions.¹⁶⁵

As for Tagore, his work is said to have been appreciated because it was "derivative", (though what exactly he means by "derivative", I don't know. I suppose he means a translation).

What difference does that make? The English Bible is a translation but it ranks among the finest pieces of literature in the world.

As for Conrad, according to Thompson, he is a Westerner, and surely there is a greater difference in tradition, expression, feeling between an Easterner and an Englishman than between an Englishman and another European.

In other words, any Western tradition, expression, feeling—even Polish or Russian—can be legitimately expressed in English, however unEnglish it may be, but an Eastern spirit, tradition or temper cannot? He differs from Gosse who told Sarojini Naidu that she must write Indian poems in English—poems with an Indian tradition, feeling, way of expression, not reproduce the English mind and turn, if she wanted to do something great and original as a poet in the English tongue.

He objects to our making even an experiment in English versification.

How terrible! Then of course everybody must stop at once. I too must not presume to write in English—for I have an Indian mind and spirit and am that dreadful Indian thing, a Yogi!

I can't say that he is absolutely wrong except in disfavouring even an experiment.

Nobody ever is absolutely wrong. There is an infinitesimal atom of truth even in the most imbecile or lunatic proposition ever made.

I think that however much we may try, we shan't be able to enter into the subtleties of a foreign tongue; so we run the risk of writing un-English English.

[Sri Aurobindo underlined "we".]

Who is this we?

Many Indians write better English than many educated Englishmen.

I believe he would waive his objection in your case.

How graciously kind of him! After all perhaps I can continue to write in English. Only poor Amal will have to stop. He can't write a line after the cold water of Thompson's tongue.

I don't know that any Englishman could write pucca Bengali. It would sound and "sense" un-Bengali Bengali.

It would if he had not thoroughly mastered the Bengali tongue. It is true that few Englishmen have the Indian's linguistic turn, plasticity and ability.

Of course if you say that our aim is not success or Shelleyan heights, but only to give voice to our spiritual experiences in a tongue so widely spoken, nothing remains to be said.

Shelleyan heights are regarded, I believe, by Eliot as very low things or at least a very bad eminence.

But even for expressing spirituality or whatever may be the object, we must try to make the vehicle as perfect as possible.

Who said not except the unparalleled T?

Now, is there any chance for it? T (an Englishman, mind you) says "None." And you?

How can my opinion have any value against that of an Englishman—especially when that Englishman calls himself T?

As I said at the beginning I have no interest in T's opinions and set no value by them. Even the awful fact of his being an Englishman does not terrify me. Strange, isn't it? I have seen some lucubrations of his meant to be spiritual or Yogic and they are the most horrible pretentious inflated circumlocutionary bombastic wouldbe-abysmally-profound language that I have seen. For a man who talks of English style, tradition, expression, feeling, idiom, it was the worst production and most unEnglish possible. Few Indians could have beaten it. And the meaning nil. Also he is the gentleman who finds that there is "very little spirituality" in India. So hats off to T (even though we have no hats), and for the rest silence.

As for the question itself, I put forward four reasons why the experiment could be made: (1) The expression of spirituality in the English tongue is needed and no one can give the real stuff., like Easterners and especially Indians. (2) We are entering an age when the stiff barriers of insular and national mentality are breaking down (Hitler notwithstanding), the nations are being drawn into a common universality with whatever differences, and in the new age there is no reason why the English should not admit the expression of other minds than the English in their tongue. (3) For ordinary minds it may be difficult to get over the barrier of a foreign tongue, but extraordinary minds (Conrad etc.) can do it. (4) In this case the experiment is to see whether what extraordinary minds can do, cannot be done by Yoga. Sufticit—or as Ramchandra eloquently puts it "'Nuff said!"

I don't know what so do about N's polyuria. There is no apparent reason to account for it. We can make a laboratory examination of his urine, without his knowledge.

How to do that? My objection to his knowing the results, if bad, is that his physical consciousness accepts all suggestions of illness, instead of reacting sinks down under the illness and prolongs it interminably. If the results are good, it is another matter. There is also something in his underconsciousness that likes to be ill so that it may be complaining and supine.

February 28, 1936

Today I attended a very tedious operation tending to go bad. I wonder if the Mother and you heard my call for help. I heard from R that whenever he called you, you promised him your force and help.

R gets the Force, first, because he has the dynamic faith in it, and, secondly, because he knows (instinctively, I suppose) how to draw it when he needs it. But even without that knack a sufficiently strong call will bring it. It is not even necessary that I should know the case or anything about it. The Force can use your knowledge and apply itself at the necessary point. It is not even necessary that my physical mind should know you have called. The call, if it is of the right kind, is self-effective.

February 29, 1936