Harindranath Chattopadhyay Harin : (1898-1990), playwright, poet, actor, & musician, he used English as if it were his mother tongue.
... radiant personality, flawless sincerity and unalterable purity of character." (D.K.Roy & Indira Devi, Pilgrims of the Stars) 17. Sri Aurobindo's own experience in Alipore jail. 18. Harindranath Chattopadhyay (1897 -1990), a poet and cinema actor, brother of Mrinalini Chattopadhyay and Sarojini Naidu. Husband of Kamala Devi Chattopadhyay. 19. aksaravrtta: system of versification in which... version published in the Centenary Edition (1972). 148. "With the Guru's grace all difficulties can disappear in a flash even as agelong darkness does the moment you strike a match." 149 Harin's poem: "His ways are such As you shall never guess though you may try A myriad lifetimes long. God is as much A hostage to the law as you or I." 150. UtsTdeyur ime loka na kuryam ...
... case Dilip has not the mystic mind and vision—Harin also. In quite different ways they receive and express their vision or experience through the poetic mind and imagination—even so, because it expressed something unusual, Dilip's poetry has had a difficulty in getting recognised except by people who were able to give the right response. Harin's poetry deals very skilfully with spiritual ideas... My work is not surrealist: I put meaning into everything, not intellectualism but a coherent vision worked out suggestively in various detail. Why then the difficulty? Everybody feels at home in Harin Chattopadhyaya's poetry though I dare say that if I catechised them I might find the deepest felicities missed. All the same, there was something in his work which made his sense more accessible.... that my work passes a little over his head—Arjava's, of course, he finds still more difficult. Perhaps I tend to pack too much stuff into my words and to render my links a little less explicit than Harin did or Dilip himself does in Bengali. But would people have the same trouble with vernacular poetry, however like my own it might be ?) "It is precisely because what you put in is not in ...
... Vakil's poem. The same difficulty. Mrs. Naidu wrote something fine at times and she had a power of expression but her range was small. Harin and Amal have been thinking and speaking in English since childhood. So for them writing in it is comparatively easy. Harin has from the very beginning always been original. There are several reasons why he is not appreciated in England. Firstly, he is an Indian... successfully, such as Byron, Matthew Arnold in Sohrab and Rustom and some others. But there are only three who have written great blank verse: Milton, Shakespeare and Keats. NIRODBARAN: What about Harin? SRI AUROBINDO: I don't think he has written anything wonderfull in blank verse. NIRODBARAN: And Amal? SRI AUROBINDO: The trouble with him is that he has a strain of what may be called pos... better to publish it first and then the poems may go down with the public." It is no wonder that people don't read poetry these days: the Modernists are responsible for it, I suppose. NIRODBARAN: Harin's poems were sent to Masefield?. SRI AUROBINDO: Why to Masefield? NIRODBARAN: Perhaps because he is the poet-laureate. SRI AUROBINDO: Poet-laureate! Anybody can be a poet laureate. The only ...
... has not the mystic mind and vision—Harin also. In quite different ways they receive and express their vision or experience through the poetic mind and imagination—even so because it expressed something not usual, Dilip's poetry has had a difficulty in getting itself recognised except by people who were able to give the right Page 463 response. Harin's poetry deals very skilfully with spiritual... suppressed power in him, Nishikanta whose full flow came only here, Arjava, Punjalal whose recent poems in Gujarati seem to me to have an extraordinary beauty—though I admit that I am no expert there. Harin wrote beautifully before but the sovereign excellence of his recent poetry is new. There are others who are developing a power of writing they had not before. All that does not show that Yoga has no... hope so—Bengali a little), there were four here whose work seemed to me to contain already in a fairly ample way the ripe possibility of the thing I wanted—yourself [ Dilip Kumar Roy ], Arjava, Amal, Harin. (I do not speak of Nishikanta and others because they are new or emergent only). There are some Gujarati poets but I do not know the poetic language and technique in that tongue well enough to form ...
... vision and express it, without the outer having the least awareness of it. NIRODBARAN: Can one who is not a mystic write mystic poems? Tagore —or Harin before he came here? SRI AUROBINDO: Tagore had a tradition of religious tendencies in his family. Harin had a mystic part in him. Unfortunately, he had many other parts also. Reading his earlier poems I predicted that he could be a spiritual poet. ...
... rightly the terse and pregnant force that is supposed, and surely with justice, to be the essential quality of the poetic style of the Kurral: a dialogue in poetic prose, "The Vision", by Harindranath Chattopadhyay, in which we get imagination, beauty and colour of phrase and a moving sentiment,—but not yet, I think, all the originality and sureness of touch of the poet when he uses his own already ...
... 12.5.37 There is an idea that Harin is a reincarnation of Shelley. It is supposed to be based on your own intuition or at least a practical certainty on your part. The character of Harin poetry seems to add colour to the idea. "I have never had any practical certainty or any certainty that Harin was Shelley. The question was often raised... raised - I remember to have replied in the negative. No doubt there was a strong Shelleyan vein in Harin's poetry, but if everybody who has that is to be accounted a reincarnation of Shelley, we get into chaotic waters. In that case, Tagore must be a reincarnation of Shelley, and Harin, logically, must be a reincarnation of Tagore — who couldn't wait till Tagore walked off to Paradise or Shelley ...
... 1 October 1932 Harin's new poems are a little difficult to follow sometimes because they render a special form of experience—but they are very powerful and genuine. He has the eye of one who can see in the occult sense. 3 September 1933 Do poets like Harin feel more than others or is it rather that they simply express themselves better? It depends on the poet. Harin expresses what he... beings of a higher plane and Harin simply wrote it down? Yes—that is, Harin was a medium, the poetry came in to him from a plane which he did not possess; also whatever visions or experiences he had were poured into him by the Mother. But his personal being remained without any radical uplifting or alteration. 29 October 1936 The Sources of Inspiration of Harin and of Arjava We were wondering... 23 January 1950 Harindranath Chattopadhyaya I can understand very well what Suhrawardy objects to in Harin's poetry, though his expression of it is absurdly exaggerated ("trash"), and he may be right in thinking it an exotic in English literature; but I am under the impression that Harin will stand in spite of that, though he has still to write something so sovereign in its own kind as to put ...
... British logician-poet J.A. Chadwick by Sri Aurobindo), Harindranath Chattopadhyaya, Dilip Kumar Roy, Nishikanto, Nirodbaran, Jyotirmayi - just to name a few. Reflecting on a joint photo of Amal and Harin belonging to this period, this is what Amal says: "Harindranath Chattopadhyaya, already famous, and Amal-kiran still in the world's background but with Sri Aurobindo's grand certificate in his pocket... companion rather lanky and somewhat taller, with a tiny moustache and a close-cut fringe of beard, appears to strain his gaze towards a future" which, to quote Meredith, "lends a yonder to all ends." Harin, "overburdened with the favours of the goddess," was already famous with his Feast of Youth which was reviewed by Sri Aurobindo himself in the November 1918 issue of the Arya . In the early time... squandered and only the tinsel gave joy to the emotional-vital. The roots were not deep enough. About his best mystical creations during the three years of stay in the Ashram, Sri Aurobindo says that Harin's "poems came from the inner mind centre, some from the Higher Mind - other planes may have sent their message to his mind to put in poetic speech, but the main worker was the poetic intelligence which ...
... 25 January 1935 You write in your note to Harin [of 24 January 1935] about Toru Dutt and "Romesh of the same ilk" and Sarojini Naidu that you know of no other Indian than Sarojini to have published in English anything that is really alive and strong and original. I can understand your forgetting your own work, but how is it that you have omitted Harin himself? Surely he has published things that... nothing that could touch Sarojini's level, though in another way? I did not speak of Harin because that was a separate question altogether—besides, whether in criticising or in paying compliments, present company is always supposed to be excepted unless they are specially mentioned, and for this purpose Harin and myself are present company. About Manmohan I said that I knew very little of his later... think it first-class in its own kind; of course he was educated at an English public school, but I suppose he Page 442 was not born to the language. Some of Toru Dutt's poems, Sarojini's, Harin's have been highly placed by good English critics, and I don't think we need be more queasy than Englishmen themselves. Of course there were special circumstances, but in your case also there are special ...
... the sestet are so fine that anything ordinary in the last line sounds like a sinking or even an anticlimax. The real line that was intended to be there has not yet been found." (I have got Harin to put his head together with mine. He has come up with: "lambency of dawn." A good phrase, no doubt—but I wonder if it suits the style and atmosphere and suggestion in my sonnet. After over a fortnight ...
... education. More members of the family, including Suhasini's elder brother, Harindranath (Harin), gravitated there. Harin, poet, playwright and actor, was handsome and vivacious and it was a matter of time before Kamaladevi and Harin fell in love. By the time Kamaladevi was twenty, she had married Harin. They had shared interests in the arts, especially theatre and music, and the two also c... collaborated to produce plays and skits. Their only son, Ramu, was born in the following year. Whether due to the envy of the gods or cupidity of human nature the Harin- Kamaladevi marriage did not endure. After independence while some nationalist leaders assumed the responsibility of running the administration; others, notably the Socialists, opted for an Opposition role to strive for a two-party system ...
... SRI AUROBINDO: I wonder which poems of mine he has taken. Does he not mention Harin or my brother? NIRODBARAN: No. SRI AUROBINDO: Then I don't understand the rationale of the selection. Sarojini is alright. But, except for a few things, Toru Dutt does not come to much. And, if Toru can be included, surely Harin and Manmohan ought to be. They are better writers than she. If Romesh Dutt was still ...
... Shailen's, it does not mean that it is on a par with Harin's or Arjava's or yours. It means that it is very good Shailen, but not that it is very good Harin or very good Arjava.... I may write 'good' or 'very good' on the work of a novice if I see that it has succeeded in being poetry and not mere verse however correct or well rhymed - but if Harin or Arjava or you were to produce work like that, I would ...
... any case Dilip has not the mystic mind and vision—Harin also. In quite different ways they receive and express their vision or experience through the poetic mind and imagination—even so, because it expressed something unusual, Dilip's poetry has had a difficulty in getting recognised except by people who were able to give the right response. Harin's poetry deals very skilfully with spiritual ideas or... . My work is not surrealist: I put meaning into everything, not intellectualism but a coherent vision worked out suggestively in various detail. Why then the difficulty? Everybody feel: at home in Harin Chattopadhyaya's poetry though I dare say that if I catechised them I might find the deepest felicities missed. AU the same, there was something in his work which made his sense more accessible. Even... that my work passes a little over his head—Arjava's, of course, he finds still more difficult. Perhaps I tend to pack too much stuff into my words and to render my links a little less explicit than Harin did or Dilip himself does in 1 J. A. Chadwick, who received from Sri Aurobindo the name "Arjavananda —"Arjava" for short. (K.D.S.) Page 90 Bengali. But would people ...
... than Harin's—the inspiration that makes you write strong and original things. Under H's influence you seem to become secondhand and reminiscent of past poetry. There is however a lyric vein of another kind which came out in your dream-poems—it is that that sometimes tries to come out in your lyrics—but it is not like Harin's. July 7, 1937 Do you think then I should stop reading Harin and... to cure him. If he does, send him a telephone! I am almost sure you will howl this time, seeing my poem. But I can't help it. I won't howl, but only sigh. By the way, I am reading Harin's lyrics. But I find that his influence does not suit me. My poems become, according to you, sentimental, romantic; while when I read Amal's poems, there come in unconsciously some lines high and lofty ...
... concentrating on the first Book and working on it over and over again with the hope that every line may be of a perfect perfection—but I have hardly any time now for such work. 31 October 1934 Harin used to write ten or twelve poems in a day or any number more. It takes me usually a day or two days to write and perfect one or three days even, or if very inspired, I get two short ones out, and have... them into shape. The time does not matter, getting it done and the quality alone matter. So forge ahead and don't be discouraged by the prodigious rapidity of Nishikanta. 8 December 1935 If Harin could receive his inspiration without any necessity for rewriting, why not you? So could I if I wrote every day and had nothing else to do and did not care what the level of inspiration was so long ...
... Of course, especially as our wheat is detained at Madras. If we had our own wheat we could go on millennium. NIRODBARAN: Then instead of wheat we shall have rice. ( After awhile ) Have you read Harin's poems? SRI AUROBINDO: Yes, they are good but nothing wonderful. I have read part of Anilbaran's conversations 1 too. I don't see that all of them are worth publishing. There are plenty of trivial ...
... original makes no difference to his method—he brings the same temperamental attitude to both. Of course there are artists whose temperament is so buoyant that they keep the flow at command almost (like Harin with his poems), painting or working every day for hours together. Others cannot—they work sometimes more, sometimes less—sometimes after long intervals etc. 27 September 1934 Uncreative Periods ...
... SRI AUROBINDO: In the Hymns I have clearly held the gods to be realities and I have marked two or three passages saying so. PURANI: Going back to Armando Menezes and his work, do you know that Harin told Armando that his poetry has a mystic element? Armando replied that he wasn't aware of it. SRI AUROBINDO: What is meant by "mystic"? If you mean something beyond the external material existence ...
... itself can go on in the sleep-state and not only in the waking condition. During a recent night I thought there were no dreams. But today I remember to have had a dream that night about Harin and another about a rose. This proves that dreams were playing on and I was unconscious of their existence! There are perhaps only a few minutes of sleep in the night without dreams. ...
... nor Sanskrit. That won't do in Bengali poetry. Of course Nishikanto is excluded. PURANI: He wants everybody to follow him. He can't like Dilip since he published Harin's letter in Anami. SRI AUROBINDO: What letter? PURANI: Harin wrote to Dilip that if they want something new in Bengali they must get rid of Tagore's influence. Tagore is dominating too much. SRI AUROBINDO (smiling) : That ...
... "Sky-rims" which he appreciated very much except for its last line which seemed insufficiently shot with the revelatory rum of sight and sound. To fill the lacuna I invoked the Muse day after day. Harin Chattopadhyaya was a close friend at the time and he too sportingly took up the challenge for me. Actually the fault of the non-revelatory line was that it ran: To yet another revelatory dawn... Page 73 sounds tike a sinking or even an anticlimax. The real line that was intended to be there has not yet been found." I made one more attempt and wrote to Sri Aurobindo: "I have got Harin to put his head together with mine. He has come up with: 'lambency of dawn'. A good phrase, no doubt - but I wonder if it suits the style and atmosphere and suggestion in my sonnet. After over a fortnight ...
... different writers and also with different kinds of writings. If I put 'very good' on a poem of Shailen's it does not mean that it is on a par with Harin's or Arjava's or yours. It means that it is very good Shailen, but not that it is very good Harin or very good Arjava. 'If very good were won by them all', you write! But, good heavens, you write that as if I were a master giving marks in a class... current speech -can it? On your own showing, "treason" and "poison" which are monosyllables in prose or current speech can be scanned as dissyllables in verse; Shelley makes "evening" three syllables and Harin has used even "realm" as a dissyllable... All the same, current speech, if your favourite Chambers' Dictionary and as well as my dear Oxford Concise is to be believed, insists on "evening", "precious"... class. I may write 'good' or 'very good' on the work Page 197 of a novice if I see that it has succeeded in being poetry and not mere verse however correct or well rhymed - but if Harin or Arjava or you were to produce work like that, I would not say 'very good' at all.... If I write 'very good' or 'excellent' on some verses of Dara about his chair, I am not giving it a certificate of equality ...
... while she was in Japan. Also in this room is a stunning standing brass oil lamp with sixty-five wick lamps. On the top sits an ornate brass peacock. It was given by the poet and Film star, Harindranath Chattopadhyay. This room also holds chairs used by the Mother and Sri Aurobindo before 1926. The second room has eleven cabinets Filled with offerings to Mother and Sri Aurobindo by disciples and the ...
... These things are obvious, but probably Rabindranath meant good and beauty in their higher aspects or their essence. 9 September 1937 Page 703 Experience of Beauty In a recent poem, Harin makes the following observation on Beauty: Beauty is not an attitude of sense Nor an inherent something everywhere, But keen reality of experience Of which even beauty is all unaware, Adding ...
... Excuse me, they can. ন তত্র ভাতি চন্দ্রতারকাং । 200 May 14, 1938 You say "ন তত্র ভাতি চন্দ্রতারকাং", that may be a spiritual experience, but to express it in poetry is rather difficult. Harin has sun and moon in plenty. Amal has "stars" coming in almost every one of his poems, said his friend Saranagata. That was Amal's own preference, not the spiritual poems' necessity. I read the other... variety? He then becomes a mere litterateur. Of course if a man simply writes to get poetic fame and a lot of readers, if he is only a poet, Tagore's advice may be good for him. Nishikanta and Harin have more variety, perhaps. But on the whole don't you think we are likely to be lacking in this rasa and variety? It is not a necessity of spiritual poetry; but if it so happens, I don't see that... damn cheap, that's your idea, I suppose. I don't "make" anything cheap or dear. They are so by nature. These, sir, are the usual vicissitudes of the poetic career and unless you are a Dilip or a Harin writing away for dear life every day with an inexhaustible satisfaction and producing tons of poetic matter' you can't escape the said vicissitudes. How far does this poem go in the hooking business ...
... question was often raised, often by Harin himself because he was anxious to have it confirmed - I remember to have replied in the negative. No doubt there was a strong Shelleyan vein in Harin's poetry, but if everybody who has that is to be accounted a reincarnation of Shelley, we get into chaotic waters. In that case, Tagore must be a reincarnation of Shelley, and Harin, logically, must be a reincarnation... (1)Amal Kiran : There is an idea that Harin is a reincarnation of Shelley. It is supposed to be based on your own intuition and the Mother's or least a practical certainty on your part as well as on here. The character of H's poetry seems to add colour to the idea. . Sri Aurobindo: I have never had any practical certainty or any certainty that Harin was Shelley - what by the way is this practical ...
... 9eneral and melancholy get inside again and sit down at your table. There is no other reason for your troubles than this readiness to listen to their knock and open the door. You speak of Harin,18 but that is why Harin gets on because when they knock, he turns them out at once. If you resolutely do Page 51 that, you will arrive also at security and perfect ease—for there are only two things... becoming more and more experiences, realities in the deeper being—it is a very good sign of progress in the inner consciousness. I thought it best to write myself to Harin—I have done so tonight. I have no doubt there will be no difficulty—for Harin has repeatedly written that his feelings towards others have entirely changed and he no longer feels any reaction of anger or resentment when criticisms or mockeries... I don't think you need mind others knowing if there is a reconciliation. Venkataraman has long desired an understanding between you and Harin, Ambu hardly counts and Dara is not likely to be interested. But although there is not now any formal retirement, Harin is much absorbed now a days in his sadhana and not seeing many who ask to o him, so I don't know whether a visit or visits will be Page ...
... The Divine does the sadhana first for the world and then in others. Sometimes a sadhak feels as if not only he but also the Mother goes through a certain experience in us. The poet Harin often speaks of such a happening as "I am thrilled by Thee and Thou art thrilled by me. I am happy by Thee and so Thou art by me", etc. I cannot understand how such experiences take place. ...
... there. That's all. When the subconscient change has to come about, many will find it difficult. There will be some who will drop out because they do not fulfil the demands made on them. For instance Harin. At the beginning he was swimming in poetry and kept some old movements going. But as soon as the Mother decided that the sort of thing couldn't go on and his vital must change, he could not bear it ...
... have never demurred: I used it over a year ago in Pointers: From the sea rise up Fingers of foam Trying to pierce through Page 645 The veil of gloam And I remember Harin's use of it: In me, the timeless, time forgets to roam, Drunk with my poise, grown sudden unaware, Offering up its noontide and its gloam Withdrawn in a lost attitude of prayer. If it... remark about the necessity of my justifying it I conjecture some solid principle behind your diffidence. Why should one hesitate to enrich the language? It did not strike me in your poem. As for Harin, I never object to what he may invent in language or in grammar, because so much mastery of language carries with it a right to take liberties with it. But I am more severe with myself and others. However ...
... are repeated. Hang it all, sir, let them repeat to their heart's content. Do you think this recent sentimentality could be due to Harin's influence? No. I am reading his lyrics at present, so an unconscious imitation of his style? I don't know. Harin's sentimentality is of a different kind. June 18, 1937 A has again pain in the joints, and fever. Shall we then call Valle ...
... writers and also with different kinds of writing. If I put "very good" on a poem of Shailen's, it does not mean that it is on a par with Harin's or Arjava's or yours. It means that it is very good Shailen, but Page 620 not that it is very good Harin or very good Arjava. "If 'very good' was won by them all," you write! But, good heavens, you write that as if I were a master giving marks... writes a few lines in no time and the rest perhaps at no time! This is too cryptic for me. I may say however that inspiration for poetry is always an uncertain thing (except for a phenomenon like Harin). Sometimes it comes in a rush, sometimes one has to labour for days to get a poem right, sometimes it does not come at all. Besides each poet is treated by the Muse in a different way. 24 August... taking any beautiful expressions used by others. Page 593 As a rule it is better to avoid taking over special expressions used by others. 15 February 1937 Sameness and Variety Harin has suns and moons in plenty in his poetry. A friend of Amal's has remarked that stars come in almost every one of his poems. This seems to be one point against spiritual poetry. Another is that spiritual ...
... Many English critics think it first-class in its own kind; of course he was educated at an English public school, but I suppose he was not born to the language? Some of Toru Datt's poems, Sarojini's, Harin's have been highly placed by good English critics, and I don't think that we need be more queasy than Englishmen themselves. Of course there were special circumstances; I don't find that you handle the ...
... prospect—for my motives in dealing with people are not those of the ego. Besides, from the first I knew that Harin would either rise very high or fall very low or do both—and I took the risk, as it seemed worth taking. I My cryptic utterances were not in the least meant as a defence of Harin. I did the defending business in days when Page 301 I was still trying to "harmonise" the people... peaceful like Raman Maharshi. (...) You have written a very fine poem. But Harin's bidroha [revolt] is of another character—there is something behind low and dark which he does not want to get out of himself. So— P.S. Of course it was not my intention in writing the last letter that you should cut or throw off Harin. I only wanted you to know our position and the difficulties and this letter... your Supramental vision. But do you seriously want me to swallow this mountainous absurdity that any man can be made a Krishna or a Sri Aurobindo, any woman a Mother, any Venkataraman a Tyagaraj, any Harin a Tansen, any Manodhar a Shakespeare, any Sita91 a Raphael, any Radhananda 92 a Vyas or Valmiki. You really want me to swallow this [even?] if I suffocate? If you do I will try to but then you mustn't ...
... steamer. You wrote the other day: "The subconscient is there, so long as it is not enlightened these dreams are bound to come." I had asked you the question from the viewpoint of Harin's lines: Even in sleep-depths I am wide awake. Thy sweet presence is always there. That does happen, but usually only when the ...
... in your translation. With that, it seems to me as literal as it can be. I enclose the Mother's chit for the pillow-cases. By the way, I forgot to say anything about the Conversations for Harin,—Mother will send a copy... [ incomplete ]. 1933? Khitish Sen's translation of the opening lines of the Vedantin's Prayer is magnificently done. He has quite caught the tone of the... Khirode, 2 for a feeling of rancorous aversion that has come between you and Sahana—and you express an apprehension that the same development may come on your still existing friendship with Subhash and Harin and others, evidently as the result of my yogic influence or my demand upon you. And finally you expect me to turn upon you and reject and hate you because in spite of all I find you unworthy of the... and the others ? I consented to your sending my blessing to Subhash and the extracts or letters, not for his sake—for I never met him—but for yours and because of your friendship with him; I welcomed Harin as much for your sake as his. I have admitted Bindu, Pratap and others because of your love or friendship or appreciation of them; in all cases, I believe I can say, I have given my blessings to your ...
... current speech—can it? On your own showing, "treason" and "poison" which are monosyllables in prose or current speech are scanned as dissyllables in verse; Shelley makes "evening" three syllables and Harin has used even "realm" as a dissyllable, while the practice of taking "precious" and "conscious" to be three syllables is not even noticeable, I believe. All the same, current speech, if your favourite ...
... transformations. I send a poem as an offering—the result of the Darshan. By the way very much pleased with your offering. Even if he is slow in delivery and his Muse not অনন্তপ্রসবা 103 like Harin's or Dilip's or—the poet is undeniable. August 16, 1935 You say, "I have become superior to it and am travelling forward fast," but you have been always superior and been always travelling ...
... he found fault with Harin for using rhymes which Shelley uses freely in his best poems. You must remember also that Harin's poetry has been appreciated by some of the finest English writers like Binyon and De la Mare. But anyway all growing writers (unless they are very lucky) meet with, depreciation and criticism at first until people get accustomed to it. Perhaps if Harin had published his poems ...
... Errant Life ] which I sent you back the other day, though the tone is different — that other was more subtly perfect, this reaches another kind of summit through sustained height and grandeur.” Harin and Amal Amal and Minna – Ashram Nursing Home Dec. 1999 Go within your little person and you will find the key which opens all the doors. The Mother ...
... the sestet are so fine that anything ordinary in the last line sounds like a sinking or even an anticlimax. The real line that was intended to be there has not yet been found." (I have got Harin Chattopadhyaya to put his head together with mine. He has come up with: 'lambency of dawn." A good phrase, r,o doubt—but I wonder if it suits the style and atmosphere and suggestion in my sonnet. After ...
... but this is what impresses me at present. I can understand very well what Suhrawardy objects to in Harin's poetry, though his expression of it is absurdly exaggerated ("trash"), and he may be right in thinking it an exotic [?] in English literature; but I am under the impression that Harin will stand in spite of that, though he has still to write something so sovereign in its own kind as to put... my beginner's poems are so appreciated (for I would not think he was insincere here—Englishmen are very chary of praise in such matters) how would he respond to the magnificent mature poems of Harin ? By the way please send us a version of your Thomsonian letter to Nirod so that we may ponder over and grow wiser at leisure. I really need some polite version thereof. Also did you note Saratchandra's... Byng doesn't know English ______________________ 1. Heddy Miller, Dilip's friend from Vienna, a famous opera-singer. Page 135 either! That would explain everything. Harin's metres (1) "Drowse Deeps" This metre could be taken as iambic with occasional [?] lines such as the first or trochaic with an occasional excess syllable at the beginning. But the first seems ...
... competent, if a little academic) disregarding all the mystic suggestions and even the Plain statement of the closing couplet, actually described the ________________________________ 1- Harindranath Chattopadhyay, a poet and cinema actor, brother of Mrinalini Chattopadhyay and Sarojini Naidu. Husband of Kamala Devi Chattopadhyay. Page 57 poem as the poet's memory of a girl running past... ample harmony of expression and rhythm which mark a new and remarkable advance in your poetic development. Here at least there is no lack of progress—and a very rapid progress. Page 56 Harin's 1 poem ["The Cycle"], though beautiful in expression and good in rhythm, is, as often, fanciful in parts and I do not like the tag about God and clod—it sounds almost silly, but the last two lines ...
... both the most elevated and the most down-to-earth subjects in a way never done before. Nirodbaran, however, wanted also to become ‘a literary gent’ and looked up to poets like Sethna, Roy, Sahana, Harin and Nishikanto. Unfortunately, he lacked even the most elementary literary talent. But Sri Aurobindo started working on him, and Nirod blossomed into a fine surrealist poet, yet without being aware ...
... precisely I want. All I can say is that the writing should have greater beauty, depth, etc. That is rather too vague. ... I fondly cherish a hope that one day we shall be able to write like Harin. Better, I hope. Perhaps we may not have his fluency. So much fluency is not necessary. He had perhaps too much. Nowdays I am having more difficulty in writing. The "abundance" of i ...
... earth had been dug out for planting trees. With Nirmal-da's permission we got into that excavated portion and started our wrestling bout there! He taught me a lot of holds in wrestling: saukhini tang, harin fansh, tabak faad, machhi gota and many others. After the bout he washed himself under our house-tap and said that he was very happy to see my wrestling. If I wished to learn wrestling well he could ...
... 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 ...
... afterwards she stopped them. You drew from the prohibition to Harin and the stopping of the concerts that Mother did not like music or did not like Indian music or considered music bad for sadhana and all sorts of strange mental reasons like that. Mother prohibited Harin because while music was good for you, it was spiritually poison to Harin—the moment he began to think of it and of audiences, all the... 22,1936 But why allow these houses still to weigh heavily upon you ? In essence you are relieved of them and they or their weight should be now only the impression of a past Maya ? As for Harin and his names—well that was to be expected. It is his usual method and tune when one fails to please him. But the final effect with most people is likely to be the same as with Arindam. I hope... That won't do at all! Cough must go off. Page 79 May 13, 1936 Another beautiful song of Nishikanta d'aprés my father. (This song was one of the greatest favourites of Harin, who used to say that it is one of the masterpieces among songs.) I really can't help marvelling. To imitate such masterpieces is no joke—but this is no mere imitation, I feel. It is simply exquisite ...
... other side. Krishnaprem I mention, because his judgment forms a curious and violent contrast to Mendonҫa's: the latter finds no overtones¸ in my poetry while Krishnaprem who similarly discourages Harin's poetry on the ground of a lack of overtones finds them abundant in mine. One begins to wonder what overtones really are, or are we to conclude that they have no objective existence but are only a term ...
... poems and have a new element in them. But I don't advise their publication. If the writer has written anything in prose it is better to publish it first and then the poems may go." Disciple : Harin's poems were sent to Masefield but got only lukewarm praise from him. He said they were "interesting". Sri Aurobindo : Why were they sent to Masefield? Disciple : Perhaps, because he ...
... One has to offer his free self to the Divine; afterwards the Divine will chose the action in you." 7 March. Talk on Hindu-Muslim unity and Khilafat. Discussion about the poetry of Tagore and of Harin Chattopadhyaya and about a letter of Mahatma Gandhi to Mahomed Ali. 8 March. A letter from Kesarlal Dixit about coming to the Ashram; another from Rajani Kanta Palit about the illness of his wife... Talk about publishing The Future Poetry . Mr. Thakur Dutt, an Indian settled in America, sent Rs.1000 as a token of his regard. His wife Maud Sharma sent her poems for Sri Aurobindo to see. Talk on Harin Chattopadhyaya's poetry. A letter of G. V. Subbarao to Sri Aurobindo about the visit of Devdas-Gandhi, Mahatma Gandhi's son, to Pondicherry. 17 June. Talk on passive resistance. Letter from Suren ...
... other side. Krishnaprem I mention, because his judgement forms a curious and violent contrast to Mendonca's: the latter finds no overtones in my poetry while Krishnaprem who similarly discourages Harin's [Harindranath Chattopadhyaya] poetry on the ground of a lack of overtones finds them abundant in mine. One begins to wonder what overtones really are, or are we to conclude that they have no objective ...
... critics think it first-class in its own kind; of course he was educated at an English public school, but I suppose he was not born to the language. Some of Toru Dutt’s 13 poems, Sarojini’s, 14 Harin’s have been highly praised by good English critics, and I don’t think we need be more queasy than Englishmen themselves. Of course there were special circumstances, but in your case also there are ...
... English and was doing well. Besides Nolini, Dilip, Nirod and Anilbaran were writing in both English and Bengali. Nishikanta brought out a book of English poems — Nolini was writing in French also. Harin came, as a great genius, and went on writing in huge quantity. He composed directly on the typewriter. He was already known as a fine poet. Sri Aurobindo had written a glorious review of his first book ...
... Thakur Dutt Sharma. It was a poem on a "chair". Sri Aurobindo : Some of the phrases she used are rather remarkable. There is some poetic capacity in her. Disciple : Did you read Harin Chattopadhyaya's "Saints Series" recently published? Sri Aurobindo : I read his Pundalik and Mira Bai. The form of drama does not suit him. It is most undramatic. He should not go in for it ...
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