Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol. 7

(I)

IN Rabindranath, in his life as well as in his art, especially in his poetry, the thing that has taken shape is what we call aspiration, an upward urge and longing of the inner soul. In common parlance it is a seeking for the Divine, in philosophical terms it is a spiritual quest. But Rabindranath is a poet, and he is a modern poet. He cannot be wholly included in the older category, fixed in a mould of clear definition. To be sure, the special characteristic of his consciousness is to keep as far as possible the aim, the ideal, the goal and the Deity of the worship indivisible and indefinable. To make' something definite and clear is to limit and make it gross and material. Therefore to name the Deity whom he loves, adores and worships he has used words that are expansive, general and vague – infinite, boundless, formless and non-manifest. If the Deity appears in a manifested form the worship of the worshipper ends. The Deity also will no longer be a Deity of the worship. But it does not mean that the Deity of Rabindranath is the One beyond sound, touch, form and change' of the Upanishad. His aspiration is for another realisation of the Upanishad:

"One who has taken this form, that form and all the forms."

Or

"He being bodiless dwells in the forms and non-forms as well."

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That supreme truth cannot be called formless simply because it has no special form. He is formless since His form has no limit. He is not exclusively bound by any special form. He is not merely infinite and boundless but also delightful and ambrosial. He is endearing and with His endearing form He dwells behind all forms. It cannot be said definitely whether He is seen or not through forms – in this way He attracts the soul of man perpetually towards Him.

Rabindranath has not seen his Beloved with his eyes open. He has not sensed Him with unblinking eyes, nor even has he wished to do so. His delight and achievement consist in making Him mysterious and nebulous by keeping Him aloof, and veiling Him in innumerable names, forms, colours, rhythms, hints, gestures, ways and means. That object is infinite and boundless; it is more so, because it is unknown and unfamiliar or almost so.

It is, as it were, a damsel unfamiliar, remote and fond of mirth and play. It is a constant separation from the Beloved – though it is an object of deep love – that has made this love intense, sweet and poignant, moving and overflowing. Such a longing for the far-off Beloved made Shelley restless. His 'Skylark' is the living idol of this longing. Shelley's object of love also is a Deity dwelling in a distant world:

The desire of the moth for the Star,

Of the night for the morrow,

The devotion to something afar –

From the sphere of our sorrow.

This is equally the quintessence of Tagore's message. For this reason people brought up in European culture used to call Rabindranath the Shelley of Bengal. There is a close kinship between the two in this upward urge.

This spiritual aspiration was called quest in the scriptures of the West. The quest .of the Knights for the Holy Grail

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inflamed the heart of Europe to a great extent for a time. Its art and literature bear abundant indication of this. I bring in the West here, for the poetic consciousness of Rabindranath is no less shaped by the West than by the Upanishads. In many cases we see that as the Vedanta is in his inner Being, in the marrow of his bones, so there is Europe in his poetic consciousness, in flesh and blood. Rabindranath is a unique blending of these two.

However, due to the unique quality of the aspiration, curiosity and seeking which we have mentioned as being in his heart, two qualities are perceptible in his poetical style. First, the Style, the speed, the swing of rhyme and rhythm and the cadence of tune. Starting from 'Nirjharer Swapna Bhanga', the awakening of the fountain, 'My heart dances to-day', and 'Lo, he comes, he comes with rapture', to 'the restless, irresistible flutterings of the wings', of 'Balaka', the same style shows itself in a fast and almost merry stepping. A restlessness for an uninterrupted forward march of the soul and the inner consciousness to proceed ever still more, still further, still higher is the nature of the divine flame residing in the heart. So the delight of journeying incessantly, without a halt anywhere in any shelter, journeying for the sake of journeying – this becomes the aim and ideal of man's life. The Vedic Mantra – 'caraiueti', 'move, move on' – was therefore so dear to Tagore. Is there such a thing as a definite and fixed ideal? We surpass the aim of today and another appears on the horizon. Today's high precipice is left behind as a foothill. A higher precipice looms ahead, and behind it rears one still higher, thus an unending range. There is no stopping, never say there is 'no further'.

The message of the poet's heart runs:

To every one Thou hast given a home,

Me only the road to press on.

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Or

O there is no home for you,

No bed of flowers,

Only two wings and the vast expanse

Of the sky.

O Soul, O Bird of my heart!

Close not, O blind one, your wings.

Further:

O Charioteer of my life's journey!

I am a pilgrim on the eternal road,

I bow to Thee on my wayfaring.

This sense of ever progressive movement is very evident in Rabindranath. Several critics have compared Bergson with him in this connection. There is much similarity between the two; but, I think, their difference also is vital and fundamental. The progression of Bergson is the final, ultimate, sole and primeval truth. It is mere progressiveness without any cause. It is doubtful if it has any other quality. A line of evolution may be noticed there but that is a secondary sign of this progression. There is no purpose behind it. If there be any, then this movement loses its natural, spontaneous rhythm. But Tagore is a child of the Orient. However enamoured he might be of progressiveness, there is somewhere behind him "the static poise in home" of the Upanishads. However great might be his advance for the sake of advance, he knows after all that there is:

Peace boundless where comes a mighty halt

Quiet, sublime, deep and silent Glory.

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The movement in Rabindranath is not for its own sake, neither aimless nor eyeless. It is open to the light, it is luminous.

Each star of the sky invites the human soul.

The invitation to him is from all the worlds,

To the horizon of the East in teeming light.

Again,

Let thy deathless flower bloom towards the light

In the world and the worlds beyond, ever anew.

We have said that this movement is fundamentally a spiritual aspiration, a longing for the Divine – this aspiration and this longing are sweet, deep and penetrating and at once refined and transparent. The élan vital of Bergson is mainly a movement of nature and the life-force, however he might have tried to put on it towards the end a veneer of spirituality, of Christian religiosity.

Indeed this dynamism has given a unique stamp to Tagore's mode of expression. The peace and silence about which he specks often dwell in the consciousness hidden at the core as a refuge or as a hope and anticipation, an intimation from beyond – even as there is a pause in the heart of rhythm or at the end of a bar of tune there is a stillness. Cadence in Tagore represents the movement of progression in life and consciousness. The natural echo of time-flow and sound and melody and motion we find in the following lines:

Whoever moves goes on singing

To the land of abundance.

Or,

Farther and farther

The road goes on ringing with a thin, poignant,

Lengthening note.

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Dance and music almost run abreast. From the viewpoint of spiritual realisation we find that aspiration and invocation have the same origin. The spontaneous utterance of the heart is but the. mounting self-revelation and self-declaration of the aspiration.

All that I have not attained,

All that I have not struck

Are vibrating on the chords

Of thy Lyre.

Let us recollect in this connection Shelley's

And singing still dost soar and soaring ever singest.

Tagore is known to us as music incarnate. The simple, natural form of his poetic soul has expressed itself through songs and lyrics.

Let us now deal with the second quality that derives from a free, unbarred movement and proceeds towards the indefinable at its best. According to many a critic it is a great flaw. To some it means nothing but ambiguity, while to others it is, to say the least, lack of objectivity. Let us examine it. Listen, for example,

The teeming clouds rumble

With heavy showers.

Alone I sit on the rim of the rill

Empty of hope.

Sheaves of sickled paddy are collected in heaps;

The fleeting current of the river, full to the brim,

Is chill to the touch.

Rains interrupt the harvest-work.

Our mind and heart are carried away by the seductive charm of beautiful language, fine rhythm and an enchanting

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picture. But our physical eyes fail to seize a meaningful substance or a direct and clear experience behind the words. No doubt, evidently there is an effort to formulate some realisation, but nothing solid has been achieved. Everything is fluid and thin and tenuous, about to vanish like vapour. That is why critics of the classical school accused Tagore of obscurity and enigmatic vagueness – all a play of whims, caprices and fancies – the clear, direct and positive certainty of the truth-seer is lacking there – Rabindranath cannot sing in unison with the Vedic sages, jyok ca Saryam drse" – "May we behold the Sun with open and undazed eyes."

To some extent, perhaps, it is true that if we compare Tagore with those who stand on the peaks in world literature, we find in their creation an utmost, flawless harmony and synthesis between speech and substance, while in Tagore we find on the whole speech carrying more weight than substance and this is why his poetic genius, as it were, somewhat falls short of perfect perfection – except in a few instances. But that, it may be answered, would be demanding something from Tagore which is not germane to his nature and genius; it would be, as it were, to measure him by a standard different from his own. To be sure, substance does not mean mere wealth of clear intellectual thoughts or solidity of subject-matter. Substance means the real essence, the very core, the thing in itself, a delight-truth gleaned in consciousness, made vibrant with life. And it may be said that even this is the law of a particular formula of creation – but Rabindranath has followed another law. We may take here an example. As a sculptor Michael Angelo had no parallel among the artists. One special trait of his carving was this that he hardly ever completed a figure to a final finish; he left it unfinished to a certain extent; the unfinished portion in its rawness was suggestive of things unsaid. Probably he would indicate in this way that the statue as a statue has not an independent value of its own

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but is part of nature's own beauty around a statue; it was not a model according to the Greek ideal – a creation flawless, exquisite and perfect in every feature, complete and sufficient in itself but quite separate from other creations. In our country the practice of carving out some portion of a whole hill and shaping out of it some idol or cave temple was in vogue. The inner sense of that practice was perhaps to prove the unity and indivisibility of art and nature and how they harmonise and commune with each other. A similar excuse may be put forward on behalf of Tagore. A lightness and sinuosity, turns and returns in the movement, weave out the essential theme, because of the pressure, the necessity, the very law of the consciousness. And that also has characterised the impetus of the upward drive of aspiration – a thirst for attaining a farther and farther progression – the ever burning and increasing flame of the psychic Being, the everspreading rays of the immortal light. This unending, ceaseless, free and absolute aspiration, this voyage to the Unknown finds expression in lines like

Behold

The boundless main in the West,

The flickering light like hope

Quivers in the water –

or,

Not here, elsewhere, elsewhere, in some other clime.

The poet did not put a limit to his quest – the uniqueness of his own nature implanted itself perceptible and living in his style and manner. Realisation signifies union; the poet was not after union – but the yearning for union:

Where is light, O where is light!

Kindle it with the fire of separation.

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Saint Augustine in one of his sayings describes the state in which he did not love but loved to love. The heart of Tagore was dyed with something of this holy Augustinian tint.

(2)

It is an interesting study how the upward urge of aspiration, the basic note of consciousness runs like a golden thread through all different modes and manners and reveals itself under various names and forms. To begin from the beginning with 'The Awakening of the Fountain':

I shall rush from peak to peak,

I shall sweep from mount to mount,

With peals of laughter and songs of murmur

I shall clap to tune and rhythm.

Here is the first awakening of aspiration – the poet is still in his early youth, full of fun and frolic, laughter and dance, and looking outward and given to outer things.

Let us next come to the 'Golden Boat'. It presents another mood, another state:

Who comes singing to the shore as he rows?

It seems to be an old familiar face.

He moves with full sail on,

Looks neither right nor left.

The helpless waves break on either side.

It seems to be an old familiar face.

Consciousness is turned inward; the first fervour of aspiration, at once sweet, intense, full of pathos, has struck the chords of life. No loud demonstrations, there is a profound and touching cadence, the sharp call of a one-stringed lyre – a condensed realisation, the gait easy and rhythmic in

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its simple sincerity. Side by side there woke up a curiosity and an enquiry that made the mystery of life more mysterious, more delightful.

Further on we hear in 'The Philosopher's Stone':

The long way of the past lies lifeless behind.

How far from here the end cannot be measured.

From horizon to horizon

It is all the glistening sands of the desert.

The whole region is dimmed by the oncoming night.

According to the Christian saints this state is the 'dark night of the soul'. They say, the familiar past has been left behind, the new life has not been achieved, the foretaste of it has slipped away; there is no return to the past, the path to the new life is not known – a helpless anxiety surges up. But the night of our poet is by no means as dark as that of the Christian saints. The journey towards the unknown destination has almost the same aspect as a description of the dark night usually gives us, but in the midst of this darkness glitters the noiseless laughter of that 'feminine absconder'; the poet is able to say even when engulfed in that night:

Only the sweet scent of thy body is wafted by the wind,

Thy hair driven by the wind is scattered on my bare body...

Rabindranath's pain did never become extreme or tragic, the note of union is there hidden in his pang of separation: "O Death, thou art an equivalent to my Lord Krishna." Death is not death pure and simple; immortality lies hidden therein. The poet had always a glimpse of the One whom he pursued in a ceaseless quest. In his 'Urvasi' this urge has reached its acme. It is there that his insight has fully opened up. The poet has attuned all the strings of his

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life-energy to the highest note of his inner consciousness. The realisation is as profound as the language is gathered and condensed, the metre and rhythm too are of the finest and richest quality. Here at least once the glory of a real Epic has shown itself in his poetry. The full-throated Epic tune is sounded in the voice of the poet:

O Urvasi swaying soft and sweet,

When thou dancest before the assembly of the gods,

Thrills of delight course through thy limbs,

Waves upon waves swirl rhythmically in the bosom of the ocean,

The undulating tips of the shivering corn

Appear like the fluttering skirt of mother earth.

From the necklace hung upon thy breast

Drop down the stars on the floor of the sky.

And all at once man loses his heart in sheer rapture.

The blood flows leaping and gurgling,

In the twinkling of an eye thy girdle gives way

At the far horizon, O naked Beauty!

In the next phase, in his middle age when the poet arrived at a mature consciousness, when he wrote his 'Ferry Boat', he seems to have come down to a more normal, ordinary and homely tune in his expression, suited to the movements of every-day life. Superabundance of robes and ornaments has fallen away; what is normal, common, commonplace – not the pomp of vernal lush but merely the sobriety of autumn – is now enough; the aspiration of these mellow days resembles the sweet, pastoral tune of the religious mendicant's one-stringed lyre.

From the golden beach of the other shore

Imbedded in darkness

What enchantment came with a song upsetting my work?

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