Chandidas : (14th-15th cent.), Bengali poet & singer whose songs about washerwoman Rami was/is a source of inspiration to Bengal’s Vaishnava & Sahajiya religious movements based on the identity between human & divine love.
... once to perfect birth from the genius of... Vidyapati, a consummate artist of word and line, and the inspired singer Chandidas in whose name stand some of the sweetest and most poignant and exquisite love-lyrics in any tongue. 10 Two of Sri Aurobindo's renderings from Chandidas are included in Songs to Myrtilla and one more in a later collection. These three, along with selections from Nidhu... Bengali and Sanskrit poetry, he was also seized with the desire to translate some of it, whether lyric, didactic, narrative or dramatic, into English verse.* The mediaeval lyrics of Vidyapati, Chandidas and others were an immediate irresistible temptation. In this rich vein of poetry, the divine and human aspects are so tantalisingly jumbled together that, at one and the same time, a lyric may be... The renderings are the effusion of an exuberant youthful sensibility that for the first time felt the power and fascination of a rich native poetic tradition. The primary inspiration may have been Chandidas or Vidyapati, but what matters to us is that the lyrics have the authentic swing and taste of poetry: O heart, my heart, merry thy sweet youth ran In fields where no love was; thy breath ...
... literary virtue? In our Bengali literature Vidyapati and Chandidas are the pioneer poets who made an attempt at creating genuine poetry surpassing all plebeian poetry. They had infused the popular literature with a new spirit, and thus formed a basis for real poetic utterance. The joy we derive from the songs of Vidyapati and Chandidas can be called the real poetic pleasure. For example, Hearken... shall store up my Beloved in my soul. To none shall I disclose The perfect union of two hearts. ( Chandidas) It is said that Valmiki is the pioneer poet in Sanskrit literature. In our Bengali literature it is Vidyapati, nay, to be more precise and accurate, it is Chandidas who is the father of poetry. He raised the natural vital experiences to the level of the psychic. He has transformed... the era of the Vaishnava Page 49 poets, coming down to the time of Bharat Chandra the same line of sadhana, of spiritual practice, continued. The Bengali poets who flourished after Chandidas have hardly made any new contribution, they have not unveiled another layer of the soul of the poetic genius of Bengali literature. What they have done amounts to an external refinement and orderliness ...
... can make the impulses of the heart intense and one-pointed to such a high degree. Chandidas was a typical Bengali poet. Judging from this point of view, Vidyapati does not seem to be a Bengali poet at all. In him we find a play of intellect and reasoning, an attitude of casting side glances, and an alertness. But Chandidas was self-oblivious and beside himself with poetic imagination. The Bengalis... the Bengalis want only simplicity and decency. No other race prefers the white colour for their clothing as the Bengalis do. We find this tendency toward simplicity and purity in the pioneer poet Chandidas of Bengal. Another touchstone of beauty is woman. Women of beauty abound more in other parts of India, but Bengal owns graceful women. Some unknown versifier, while describing the special qualities... ideal of Mahatma Gandhi. Rabindranath is the model of a Bengali. The Deccan has produced Shankara; Nanak and Surdas appeared in the North; but in the fertile soil of Bengal were born Sri Chaitanya, Chandidas and Ramprasad. The cult of devotion exists, no doubt, in other parts of India; but the cult of looking upon God as the Lover of the beloved devotee has blossomed only in Bengal. The worship of Kartikeya ...
... cannot be considered totally unsympathetic to poetry of a spiritual order. "I can read," he says, "the Divine Comedy with pleasure, St. John of the Cross is a marvellous poet, poems of Kabir and Chandidas are exquisite. T.S. Eliot's Ash-Wednesday is an excellent poem of spiritual tension, confusion and resolution which I can read with great enjoyment and recall with surprising accuracy and detail... You actually try to prove that you are quite competent to pass judgment on spiritual poetry: you list your qualifications by commenting favourably on Dante, Eliot, St. John of the Cross, Kabir and Chandidas. The suggestion is unmistakable: Sri Aurobindo is a poetic failure and not merely a poet to whom you are allergic. It is this suggestion that drew my fire. I do not for a moment deny what you ...
... of it! The Two dwell upon two: Some may guess something of it: Upon these dwells the Love Thus speaks the twice born Chandidas! CHANDIDAS Page 158 ...
... early spiritual experiences, 64-5, 385-7; beginnings of Yoga, 64, 68,273-4,282,384; marriage, 65ff; on Translations, 68; use of Hexameter, 71, 626-7; on bhakti poetry, 72-3, 505-6; translations from Chandidas, 72; from Vidyapati, 74; from Nidhu Babu, 74; from Horu Thakur, 76; from Jnanadas, 76; on Bande Mataram, 76; translation from Dwijendralal, 77; Sagar, Sangit, tr. of, 77ff, 411; on Vyasa & Valmiki... Prafulla, 289 Chakravarti, Shyamsundar, 222, 225, 242, 273,306, 324 Chakravarti, Suresh (Mom), 367,375ff, 377, 379ff, 405 Champaklal, 693, 739 Chanakya, 498 Chandidas, 72 Chandradip, 579 Chandrasekharam, Veluri, 411, 427, 440, 536,540 Chatterji, Amarendranath, 285-6 Chatterji, Baidyanath, 317 Chatterji, Bejoy, 222,324 ...
... cannot be considered totally unsympathetic to poetry of a spiritual order. "I can read," he says, "the Divine Comedy with pleasure, St. John of the Cross is a marvellous poet, poems of Kabir and Chandidas are exquisite. T. S. Eliot's Ash-Wednesday is an excellent poem of spiritual tension, confusion and resolution which I can read with great enjoyment and recall with surprising accuracy and detail... not charged with the powerful amplitude of vision and vibration such as we find in the verses of the Upanishads, verses which seem to be the Infinite's own large and luminous language. Kabir and Chandidas are somewhat in the same category, though with a difference of tone and temper. They are indeed, as Mr. Lai says, exquisite and they are authentically spiritual, but again more intense than immense... actually try to prove that you are quite competent to pass judgment on spiritual poetry: you list your qualifications by commencing favourably on Dante, Eliot, St. John of the Cross, Kabir and Chandidas. The suggestion is unmistakable: Sri Aurobindo is a poetic failure and not merely a poet to whom you are allergic. It is this suggestion that drew my fire. I do not for a moment deny what ...
... greater India of the future. Sri Aurobindo translated some portions of the Ramayana and the Mahabharata, some dramas of Kalidasa, the Nitishataka of Bhartrihari, some poems of Vidyapati and Chandidas etc. into English. Once, when R. C. Dutt, the well-known civilian, came to Baroda at the invitation of the Maharaja, he somehow came to know about Sri Aurobindo's translations and expressed his... and highly acclaimed. 20. These five were: One on Madhusudan Dutt, one on Bankim Chandra Chatterji, a sonnet on his maternal grandfather, Rajnarayana Bose, and two English adaptations from Chandidas, the reputed Bengali mystic poet whom he read along with Vidyapati and others at Baroda. Page 28 Baroda. Urvasi, a long poem, was also written at Baroda and published for private... had belonged to Sri Aurobindo have been sent to Sri Aurobindo Ashram from Baroda. They include the Complete Works of Ishwar Gupta, Sekal O Ekal by Rajnarayan Bose, Chaitanya Charitamrita, Chandidas, Jnanadas, the Dramatical Works of Amritalal Bose, the Poetical Works of Govindadas, a collection of poems by Dinabandhu Mitra, Bengali Sonnets by Michael Madhusudan Dutt, Ananda Math by Bankim ...
... 68 . POEMS FROM BENGALI Sri Aurobindo Ashram, Pondicherry, 1956 Translations from Nidhu Babu, Horn Thakur, Jnanadas and Chandidas, done in the early years of the author's stay at Baroda. The first of the translations from Chandidas first appeared in Ahana and Other Poems (See 3) , the second and third Page 400 in Songs to Myrtilla ( See 81) . All... Collected Poems and Plays (See 13). In SABCL the four translations noted above are included in Volume 8: the first two appear without title as numbers I and II of the "Selected Poems of Chandidas" on pages 302 to 304; the last two, translations from Plato and Meleager respectively, appear on page 411. SABCL: Collected Poems, Vol. 5 Translations, Vol. 8 82 . SPEECHES ...
... cannot be considered totally unsympathetic to poetry of a spiritual order. "I can read", he says, "the Divine Comedy with pleasure , St. John of the Cross is a marvellous poet, poems of Kabir and Chandidas are exquisite, T. S. Eliot 's Ash- Wednesday is an excellent poem of spiritual tension, confusion and resolution which I can read with great enjoyment and recall with surprising accuracy and detail... yet not charged with the powerful amplitude of vision and vibration such as we find in verses of the Upanishads, verses which seem to be the Infinite's own large and luminous language. Kabir and Chandidas are somewhat in the same category, though with a difference of tone and temper. They are indeed, as Mr. Lal says, exquisite and they are authentically spiritual, but again more intense than immense ...
... Therefore it is not that we do not find glimpses of pure intuition here and there among the Bengalees. Chandidas, the pioneer poet of Bengal, represents an unalloyed, pure inspiration and Vidyapati reflects glimpses of intuition. When a feeling of emotion tingled through the blood of Chandidas he turned deep within and sang to himself with his eyes closed, in trance as it were: Sister, who has ...
... life was quite impossible without Krishna (I wish this feeling lasted all the time till His relief came!) as I sang the last couplet, ankhira nimishe jadi nahi dekhi tabe je parane mari. chandidas kahe? – parasha ratan galay bandhiya pari? 5 The sorrow I felt was a qualified sorrow: it was full of sweetness of appeal to Krishna to accept me though with the knowledge (there was ...
... blank-verse 102,215 Brahma-muhurta 253 Brihadaranyaka Upanishad 302 brhat 302 Browning, Elizabeth 60,161 C Celtic fire and ether 197 ChadwickJohnA. 266 Chandidas 126 Chapman 189 Chattopadhyaya, Harindranath 36,42 Chit-Tapas 247 Coleridge 42,197,234 consciousness depths of 99 developing through Savitri 286 Divine 167 ...
... springs at once to perfect birth from the genius of the first Page 154 two poets who used the Bengali tongue, Bidyapati, a consummate artist of word and line, and the inspired singer Chandidas in whose name stand some of the sweetest and most poignant and exquisite love-lyrics in any tongue. The symbol here is sustained in its most external figure of human passion and so consistently that ...
... of a Racine amongst us. There is a special quality, a music and rhythm, a fine sensibility of the inner soul of Bengal. Its uniqueness is in its heart; a sweet ecstasy, an intoxicating magic which Chandidas was the first to bring out in its poignant purity and which has been nourished by Bankim, has attained the full manifestation of maturity, variety, intensity and perfection in Rabindranath. Here too ...
... Indian poet Vidyapati was mad after the beauty of form. He expressed the pangs of his heart thus: "Since my birth I have been seeing beauty after beauty, yet my eyes are not satiated." Chandidas seeks the quintessential substance (rasa). His heart is dipped in this soul-sap. The form given to beauty is therefore somewhat less impressive in him – he evokes more the being and less the becoming ...
... bee, take in with every breath of yours the honeyed fragrance. This is mysticism in excelsis and beautiful mysticism. We dive down the centuries and when we come up we find Chandidas thus greeting us: There is a shore poised on a shore, Upon that a wave, Waves dwell upon waves— But a few only know. or again It is the lover that knows ...
... 159 Brahmanas, the, 152 Britain , 11 Buddha, the, 148, 208, 223,234, 236, 245,247-8,265,268 Burma , 12 CALCUTTA , 57 Capella, 297 Chandidas, 158 Chakrabarty, Nabendra, 178 Chakrabarty, Nirendralal, 173-4 Chakrabarty, Parimal, 169 Chatila, 258 Chattopadhyaya, Ramakrishnaprasad, 170 Chinmoy, ...
... accomplished lyrical form springs at once to perfect birth from the genius of the first two poets who used the Bengali tongue, Vidyapati, a consummate artist of word and line, and the inspired singer Chandidas in whose name stand some of the sweetest and most poignant and exquisite love-lyrics in any tongue. The symbol here is sustained in its most external figure of human passion and so consistently that ...
... and Bhavabhuti and Bhartrihari and Jayadeva and the other rich creations of classical Indian drama and poetry and romance, the Dhammapada and the Jatakas, the Panchatantra, Tulsidas, Vidyapati and Chandidas and Ramprasad, Ramdas and Tukaram, Tiruvalluvar and Kamban and the songs of Nanak and Kabir and Mirabai and the southern Shaiva saints and the Alwars,—to name only the best-known writers and most ...
... And from my heart went fear and shame And maiden pride; panting I lay; He was around me like a flame.* * And felt him round me like a flame. Page 191 Chandidas Love, but my words are vain as air! In my sweet joyous youth, a heart untried, Thou took'st me in Love's sudden snare, Thou wouldst not let me in my home abide ...
... touched. My body almost swooned away And from my heart went fear and shame And maiden pride; panting I lay; He was around me like a flame.8 Page 179 Selected Poems of Chandidas 9 Love, but my words are vain as air! In my sweet joyous youth, a heart untried, Thou took'st me in Love's sudden snare, Thou wouldst not let me in my home abide. And now ...
... Another poem, again, from Jnanadas which describes the human soul, in a moment of rapt excitement when robe of sense has fallen from it, is surprised and seized by the vision of the Eternal. A poem of Chandidas describes ocean-deep yearning of the soul for the Divine. All the poems presented in this Appendix are translations from the original in Tamil or Bengali by Sri Aurobindo. Page 51 ...
... Elysian garden of bloom, the abode of immortality – to shine in my eternal youth there, like the Gods. Limitless is my beauty there. Rabindranath did not enjoy love for its own sake as did Chandidas. Beauty has found its highest revelation and acme in love. So he had to become a lover. The ultramodern experience has separated love from beauty, rather it is trying to bring about a union with ugliness ...
... honeyed essence that he has lavished in unstinted measure has no parallel in literature. It is this quality of sweetness that has made the fame of Bengali language and literature, from Vidyapati and Chandidas right down to Rabindranath. But the possibilities of this language and literature, not only for sweetness or grace but also for strength and nobility have been brought out by Madhusudan. He has not ...
... Camus, Albert 267,272 Canon Overton 305 Carpenter, Edward 438 Cassirer, Ernest 267 Chadwick,J.A.32 Chandidas 45 Chatterjec, Bankim Chandra 9 Chaucer, Geoffrey 9 Chetty, Shanker 14 Chitrangada 363,458 Clark, A.B. 9 Clemens, Prudentius ...
... for Agni or for Surya. Disciple : Can you give an instance of psychic poetry? Is there a psychic element in Vidyapati? Sri Aurobindo : I think there is some, though it is rare even in Chandidas. As for psychic poetry, take Shelley's lines : 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. ...
... simple girl breathes sweeter than you all. 101 At Baroda naturally his interests first hovered round Sanskrit and Bengali poetry Renderings from the Ramayana and the Mahabharata, from Chandidas, Vidyapati, Horu Thakur, Nidhu Babu and others, from Bhartrihari, from the Sagar-Sangit of C.R. Das, from the Vedas and the Upanishads, from Bankim Chandra and Dwijendralal Roy— all these make for ...
... abusing him. He wrote those poems called Bhanu Sinha's Songs and as soon as they came out people were enthusiastic. They were made to think that Bhanu Sinha was some unrecognised Bengali poet of Chandidas's time. SRI AUROBINDO: They are fine poems. I hear he has stopped publishing them. ...
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