... vision, the ideas, as we may say, of the higher and wider soul in him. Making them real to our life-soul as well as present to our intellect, it opens to us by the word the doors of the Spirit. Prose style carries speech to a much higher power than its ordinary use, but it differs from poetry in not making this yet greater attempt. For it takes its stand firmly on the intellectual value of the word... are only minor deities. If it goes beyond these limits, approaches in its measures a more striking rhythmic balance, uses images for sheer vision, opens itself to a mightier breath of speech, prose style passes beyond its normal province and approaches or even enters the confines of poetry. It becomes poetical prose or even poetry Page 16 itself using the apparent forms of prose as a... to the mere mind, we arrive outside the true domain of poetry; we approach the confines of prose or get prose itself masking in the apparent forms of poetry, and the work is distinguished from prose style only or mainly by its mechanical elements, a good verse form and perhaps a more compact, catching or energetic Page 17 expression than the prose writer will ordinarily permit to the easier ...
... the rich content and the revolutionary message of the Arya has been already discussed in the earlier sections and chapters, it may be appropriate to say a word or two here about Sri Aurobindo's prose style, - more particularly about the Arya style. He was forty-two when the first issue of the journal came out on 15 August 1914, and already he was a master of many languages - classical and modern.... classical prose to serve as the hand-maid of the spirit. 72 Another 'foreigner', Raymond F. Piper, has spoken with equal enthusiasm about the quality of Sri Aurobindo's philosophic thought and prose style: I could pick a thousand sentences from his writings and say of any one of them: trace its implications, and you will be led into the deep wonderlands of philosophic wisdom. I have never... 77ffand 87ff, for other sentences similarly analysed. Page 517 and symbolism, and Sri Aurobindo is seen to be poet no less than the wielder of an animated and effective English prose style. Some of Sri Aurobindo's characteristically epigrammatic or aphoristic molecules of prose are included in Thoughts and Glimpses and Thoughts and Aphorisms, and are also scattered in ...
... Page 1158 writings". He also noted, in an essay written some years before the start of the Bande Mataram , that it is difficult if not impossible to distinguish a given prose style from a good imitation of it: In an English literary periodical it was recently observed that a certain Oxford professor who had studied Stevenson like a classic, attempted to apportion... their respective work in the Wrecker, but his apportionment turned out [to] be hopelessly erroneous. To this the obvious answer is that the Wrecker is a prose work and not poetry. There was no prose style ever written that a skilful hand could not reproduce as accurately as a practised forger reproduces a signature. The editors have made every effort to distinguish pieces actually written ...
... Osbourne their respective work in the Wrecker, but his apportionment turned out [to] be hopelessly erroneous. To this the obvious answer is that the Wrecker is a prose work and not poetry. There was no prose style ever written that a skilful hand could not reproduce as accurately as a practised forger reproduces a signature. But poetry, at any rate original poetry of the first class is a different matter. ...
... classes and at the I.C.S. examinations and we never exchanged two words together. If any extra legal consideration came in subconsciously in the acquittal, it must have been his admiration for my prose style to which he gave fervent expression in his judgment. Don't drag him in like this,—let him rest in peace in his grave.) March 1930? I cannot fully answer just now as it is nearly six ...
... I think, nearer to the original. "Filth" is rather violent; I have substituted a milder phrase. Expressions like "your peak it is that" "your clarion it is that" are a little awkward in a poetic prose style: "he will seek" "he will look" etc. sounds stiff, the directness of the present tense gives a better effect. Your "Aurora" can hardly be said and is besides too classic and academic for present-day ...
... mystic poet- He blends with great effect the cryptograms and the epigrams, the natural and the supernatural, the mundane and the celestial. His poetic style has very little relation with his prose style. Even when Sethna extends his details in a poem, the style bears no relation with the expository technique of his prose. He passes from one dream image to another instead of concentrating on ...
... region of half-poetry, Page 25 because its principle of expression has not got far enough away from the principle of prose expression. It seems to forget that while the first aim of prose style is to define and fix an object, fact, feeling, thought before the appreciating intelligence with whatever clearness, power, richness or other beauty of presentation may be added to that essential ...
... classes and at the I.C.S examinations and we never exchanged two words together. If any extralegal consideration came in subconsciously in the acquittal, it must have been his admiration for my prose style to which he gave fervent expression in his judgment. Don't drag him in like this—let him rest in peace in his grave.) 27 June 1930 Page 13 ...
... controversies has obscured the silver bow of poetic power which he brought in his multifarious armoury; the too frequent thunder of his excursions on a ponderous-bodied though nimble-footed charger of prose style has led us to forget that on occasion he rides out on a more Pegasus-like hoof-stroke. In short, we fail to recognise that he has fought his way, though with many falls, into the kingdom of poetry ...
... Shankara. PURANI: Yes, Vaishnavas, Ramanuja, Madhava, etc. After this Nirodbaran referred to Professor Amarnath Jha's lecture in the Hindu on Indian English where he has mentioned Gandhi's prose style as simple, sincere, almost Biblical. DR. MANILAL: I must say Gandhi has improved Gujarati literature remarkably. On this topic Manilal had an argument with Purani. All the recent stylists of ...
... work 537, 799, 807 'belongs to the future' 606, 799 'is the Future...'754 the 'Golden Purusha' 617, 694 significance of his birth 635-6, 712, 831-2, 829 what he expects of us 636 his prose style 653-4, 656-7 what he came to tell us 669, 802 her understanding him anew 768 laying down Auroville's future 772 messages on his centenary 799-802 3. Others on Sri Aurobindo Amal Kiran 86-7 ...
... — and the threefold reiteration of each of the three significant letters makes us feel as if three colours were gleaming. A skilful line, this, but its deft representation of things differs from prose-style by a charm of rhythm more than by a special word-magic. Marvell's line has a more exquisite art which stirs us to sight on a deeper level of consciousness. His alliteration is not so open: the v ...
... nature to Chaucer: it is the new element Spenser brought into play and it is the element which constitutes the vital differentia of great poetry, transfiguring the substance beyond the reach of prose style. Spenser is not uniformly Page 10 successful, all his charm cannot persuade us that his narrative does not need pruning nor that, even after its being pruned, long stretches of ...
... briefly indicates that the book is a search for Sri Aurobindo's credo, which still remains unclarified for the literary audience. Since it is an "expanded version" of Sethna's earlier prose, the later prose style has coloured the book. The last paragraph of Sethna's "Foreword" to Classical and Romantic is the first lesson for our PhD. students, who seldom know that the "Preface" to a book should ...
... sorts of styles can each make authentic literature and be in a fundamental sense sincere, whereas over-emphasis and over-statement always bring in falsity. Who would think of censuring out of hand a prose style like Sir Thomas Browne's, Jeremy Taylor's, Donne's, Gibbon's, De Quincy's, Landor's, Car-lyle's, Ruskin's, Meredith's, Henry James's, Chesterton's, Charles Morgan's, Sir Winston Churchill's? ...
... twenty kandas and five thousand eight hundred forty nine verses. About one thousand two hundred of these verses are common with those of the Rig Veda. One sixth part of the Atherva Veda is in the prose style while the rest is poetry. 3 According to one of the Indian historians, Shri Avinash Chandra Das, Vedas could have been composed any time between 250 th and 750 th Century B.C. According ...
... Samhitā of Atharvaveda has 20 Kāndas which have 34 prapāthakas, 111 Anuvaks, 739 Sūktas and 5849 mantras. About 1200 mantras are common with those of Rigveda. 1/6 part of the Atharvaveda is in the prose style while the rest is poetic. Patanjali has indicated that Atharvaveda has 9 Shākhās but today we have only 2 Shākhās, namely, Paippalāda and Shaunaka. Apart from four Vedas and their numerous ...
... Collective Man, Mankind, 471; The Human Cycle, 472ff; The Ideal of Human Unity, 480ff; War & Self-Determination, 487ff; Foundations of Indian Culture, 490ff; Heraclitus, 511; "global*' prose style, 514; Mistral and Piper on the style, 514-5; structural quality, 515; the prose of The Life Divine, 516ff; flashes of p. etry in the prose, 517ff; offer of editorship by Baptista, 521-2; reasons ...
... the Congress." Sri Aurobindo,, Vol. 26, p. 13.) Page 57 the personality and achievement of Bankim Chandra are among the earliest exhibits that we have of Sri Aurobindo's English prose style. Excepting in their boldness of thought and energy of expression, they do no betray the age of the author (he was barely 22 then). Already we notice in them the sinuosity and balance, the imagery ...
... follow it. One must have a very clear memory for ideas to really understand what he says. 14 Here is a defence, as picturesque as it is vigorous and compellingly persuasive, of Sri Aurobindo's prose style, the Arya style, which at its evocative best is seen in the vast spaces of The Life Divine. The last of the Playground classes for 1957 was held on 18 December. After reading a paragraph ...
... inspiration was there too. Shyamsundar was a witty parodist and could write with much humour and he could be tellingly rhetorical as well; he had caught up some imitation of Sri Aurobindo's prose style and many could not at once distinguish between their writings. Whenever Sri Aurobindo was away from Calcutta, Shyamsundar had to do much of the editorial work and write the leading articles, ...
... best prose styles in the world's literature.... There are great writers in prose and great prose-writers and the two are by no means the same thing. Dickens and Balzac are great novelists, but their style or their frequent absence of style had better not be described; Scott attempts a style, but it is neither blameless nor is it his distinguishing merit. Other novelists have an adequate style and a... many more, especially in French which is the greatest store-house of fine prose among the world's languages—there is no other to match it.... All prose of other languages seems beside its perfection, lucidity, measure almost clumsy... The great prose-writers in English seem to seize you by the personality they express in their style rather than by its perfection as an instrument.... (To Dilip Kumar... a scholastic exercise. (2) Write modem English. Avoid frequent inversions or turns of language that belong to the past poetic styles. Modern English poetry uses a straightforward order and a natural style, not different in vocabulary, syntax, etc., from that of prose. An inversion can be used sometimes, but it must be done deliberately and for a distinct and particular effect. (3) For poetic ...
... of Bankim is absurd; he is and will always rank as one of the great creators and his prose stands among the ten or twelve best prose-styles in the world's literature. December 1932 Great Prose Stylists I stand rather aghast at your summons to stand and deliver the names of the ten or twelve best prose styles in the world's literature. I had no names in mind and I used the incautious phrase only... are by no means the same thing. Dickens and Balzac are great novelists, but their style or their frequent absence of style had better not be described; Scott attempts a style, but it is neither blameless nor has distinguishing merit. Other novelists have an adequate style and a good one but their prose is not quoted as a model and they are remembered not for that but as creators. You speak of Meredith... perfection, lucidity, measure almost clumsy." There are many remarkable prose-writers in English, but that perfection which is almost like a second nature to the French writers is not so common. The great prose-writers in English seem to seize by the personality they express in their styles, rather than by its perfection as an instrument—it is true at least of the earliest and I think too of the ...
... like; but rhetoric of one kind or another has been always a great part of the world's best literature; Demosthenes, Cicero, Bossuet and Burke are rhetoricians, but their work ranks with the greatest prose styles that have been left to us. In poetry the accusation of rhetoric might be brought against such lines as Keats' Thou wast not born for death, immortal Bird! No hungry generations tread thee... taste" are of the same kind, but can we say that they are merely prose epithets, good descriptive adjectives and have no other merit? If you take the lines about Nature's worship in Savitri , I do not see how they can be described as prose epithets; at any rate I would never have dreamt of using in prose unless I wanted to write poetic prose such expressions as "wide-winged hymn" or "a great priestly wind"... a serious limitation in his poetic perception and temperamental sympathies. Shakespeare's later terse and packed style with its more powerful dramatic effects can surely be admired without disparaging the beauty and opulence of his earlier style; if he had never written in that style, it would have been an unspeakable loss to the sum of the world's aesthetic possessions. The lines I have quoted are ...
... grace of rhythmic expression: he does not play upon his metrical base with skill enough to provide a sustained justification for choosing blank verse instead of prose. Shakespeare's style leads us to feel that the turn and rhythm of prose would entirely rob his language of its living faithfulness, its onomatopoeic response to the meaning he Page 91 has in mind. What writer of his... never, never! Pray you, undo this button — where the audacity of "sprung rhythm" and dramatic anticlimax has not a streak of crudeness or bathos and is a change the unpatterned movement of prose can never emphasise? Or take the mad Lear on the heath: Spit, fire! spout, rain! Nor rain, wind, thunder, fire are my daughters: I tax not you, you elements, with unkindness; ... on occasion like a book-worm, a lawyer, a commander-in-chief, a courtier, a politician; what he could never do was to introduce the genuine philosophical accent. The whole cast and vibration of his style is determined by a vital gusto, impetuousness or ingenuity and not intellectual contemplation; while, if Bacon was anything, he was an intellectual. Shakespeare dragged into his plays all that he was ...
... are by no means the same thing. Dickens and Balzac are great novelists, but their style or their frequent absence of style had better not be described; Scott has a style I suppose, but it is neither blameless nor has distinguishing merit. Other novelists have a style and a good one but their prose is not quoted as a model and they are remembered not for that but as creators. You speak of Meredith... perfection, lucidity, measure, almost clumsy." There are many remarkable prose-writers in English, but that essential or fundamental perfection which is almost like a second nature to the French writers is not so common. The great prose-writers in English seem to seize you by the personality they express in their styles rather than by its perfection as an instrument—it is true at least of the earliest... Sylhet letter you sent me, so I keep it and will send after reading. September 15, 1933 I stand rather aghast at your summons to stand and deliver the names of the ten or twelve best prose styles in the world's literature. I had no names in mind and I used the incautious phrase only to indicate the high place I thought Bankim held among the great masters of language. To rank the poets on ...
... but rhetoric of one kind or another has been always a great part of the world's best literature; Demosthenes, Cicero, Bossuet and Burke are rhetoricians, but their work ranks with the greatest prose styles that have been left to us. In poetry the accusation of rhetoric might be brought against such lines as Keats's Thou wast not bom for death, immortal Bird! No hungry generations tread... and "mortal taste" are of the same kind, but can we say that they are merely prose epithets, good descriptive adjectives and have no other merit? If you take the lines about Nature's worship in Savitri, I do not see how they can be described as prose epithets; at any rate I would never have dreamt of using in prose unless I wanted 7 The high boughs prayed in a revealing sky. — Ibid.... a serious limitation in his poetic perception and temperamental sympathies. Shakespeare's later terse and packed style with its more powerful dramatic effects can surely be admired without disparaging the beauty and opulence of his earlier style; if he had never written in that style, it would have been an unspeakable loss to the sum of the world's aesthetic possessions. The lines I have quoted ...
... and wide and full movement, with an organic harmony which is admirable. Depreciation of Bankim is absurd; he is and will always rank as one of the great creators and his prose stands among the ten or twelve best prose-styles in the world's literature. December 2 , 1932 The difficulty of getting the inner being out on the surface is no doubt very strong as is usually the case with... to the inclusion of your poems in the Patna anthology of Bengali poets—or even to your being tortured in Hindi prose, if you do not find it objectionable. Who knows, the supramental might even work a premature miracle and your poetry transform the Hindi prose instead of the Hindi prose deforming your poetry! The photographs you sent at first were rather bewildering, not to say startling. The... have recently seen indications about him from many quarters; the impression Page 210 given was that of a man of gifts who failed for want of vital balance—like so many others. The prose you have turned into verse—very well, as usual—has certainly quality, though there is not enough to form a definite judgment. A seeker who missed the issue, I should imagine—misled by the vitalistic ...
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