Sri Aurobindo & the Literary Renaissance of India

— Pariksith Singh

		Price: Rs 995 Hard Cover Pages: 411 Dimensions (in cms): 14x22     Publisher: BluOne Ink LLP, Noida ISBN: 978-81-949547-8-1
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About Sri Aurobindo & the Literary Renaissance of India

This book about the impact of Sri Aurobindo’s life and work on the literary renaissance of India examines not only Sri Aurobindo the poet and playwright, the aphorist, translator, and prose writer, but also Sri Aurobindo the philosopher and visionary. In a series of short essays the author shows how Sri Aurobindo synthesised India’s ancient philosophy and spirituality, sciences, arts, culture, nationalism, dharma, languages, and linguistics by introducing new lines of development and thought that helped awaken India to her destiny. 

Divided into eight sections, each one dwelling on a different aspect of Sri Aurobindo’s contributions to India and Indian writing, the book covers his philosophy, poetry and drama, aphorisms, translations of texts from Indian languages to English, literary criticism, quantitative metre in his poetical works, the example set by his prose writing, and his influence on the Indian literary awakening.

REVIEW

In his new book Pariksith Singh takes the reader on a tour de force through Sri Aurobindo’s literature, by means of comparison with European philosophy and poetry and a consideration of Sri Aurobindo’s writings’ relevance in their historical and evolving cultural contexts, especially India’s.

The Mother suggested that Sri Aurobindo’s vision should be presented in relation to other schools of thought. Naturally, Dr Singh did not aim for exhaustive comparative explorations. Rather the author shares his love and appreciation for, of course, Sri Aurobindo’s thought and literary contributions, but also poetry and philosophy in general. By keeping most of these compact personal studies to only a few pages the book can appeal to long-time aficionados of these subject matters who would like to pick up on a detail or perspective they might not have contemplated yet themselves—or to simply join Singh in his contagiously enthusiastic and joyous revelling in a variety of expertly crafted wordsmithery and showcased peak performances of intellectual athleticism.

Equally, the book can serve as a first introduction to both various Western schools of ontology, epistemology, axiology, etc., as well as provide an entry into Sri Aurobindo’s approaches to these and, by extension, to Indian visions of being, reality and their purposes. Here also Singh doesn’t claim objectivity but transparently shares his subjective interpretations and experiences. Especially the intimate inner states that the author tries to convey, for example, when sharing inner experiences invoked by poems in the context of his own inner life, make for a uniquely engaging reading experience.

On Philosophy

In the first part of the book Singh focuses on European philosophy and begins his comparative exploration with the German philosopher Wittgenstein, who the author considers to have ended where Sri Aurobindo began. This presents a recurring perspective and theme in Singh’s reflections on Western philosophy. According to Singh, Wittgenstein heavily critiqued reliance on the rational mind, its systems of logic and language to attempt to solve their inherent problems. Instead, Wittgenstein asked his students to “see” rather than think, which Singh sees as a first incomplete step in the West towards the source of higher knowledge, vidya, long known in the East: Yogic Vision. Similarly, the German philosopher Husserl is considered as “one of the bridges” from West to East as he at least admitted the study of intentional awareness as useful for inquiry—yet he didn’t actually apply this insight thoroughly enough. Kant gets a corresponding treatment, as he acknowledged the limits of the mind but didn’t go beyond through the silence and emphasised rationalised duty without a higher guidance as posited in Karmayoga. This corresponds with Singh’s assessment of Sartre and other existentialist philosophers who caught on to the essential truth of consciousness and being but didn’t dare or lacked the systematic and disciplined approach Eastern traditions utilise in their deeper, wider and higher inner explorations.

In Singh’s book Schopenhauer’s saving grace from total entrapment within these Western blinders seems to have been that he had at least read the Upanishads. Reflecting on Nietzsche, Singh points out that Sri Aurobindo’s supramental evolution is all-encompassing and harmoniously unifying, thereby distinguishing it from the brute legacy of Nietzsche’s ideas of cyclic evolution towards his “vitalistic Superman”. Singh acknowledges Spinoza’s contribution to the cultural evolution of thought and society in the West, although to the author it was only Sri Aurobindo who finally brought about the supreme reconciliation to the apparent contradictions between monism, the absolute, matter and life, themes the Western philosopher struggled with. Hegel’s inspired ideas of a “world evolving in a dialectic of thesis and antithesis” left it to Sri Aurobindo to actually “complete the dialectic loop in practice and reality”, and in the conclusion to Singh’s analysis of Derrida’s ideas, Sri Aurobindo would have earned the Western philosopher’s highest title—“the truest incorruptible”. Heidegger, as well, failed to apply his deep intellectual ponderings on the nature of being and succumbed to Nazism, while Sri Aurobindo’s suprarational faculties allowed him to see through their falsehoods.

Maybe the most appreciative treatment by Singh of any modern Western thinker is received by Aldous Huxley, who he considers to have had genuine spiritual experiences. Here the means by which they were arrived at are critiqued by the author, albeit in a very measured and balanced way. Yet of course for Singh yoga comes out on top as the supreme and safest road towards higher knowledge.

The last modern Western philosopher Singh considers is Martin Buber. Here the deliberations on relationality, the ‘I-It’ and ‘I-Thou’ relationships within ourselves, with each other, in society and even with the divine, include a refreshingly critical take on the “clinical” state of clinical practice within what Singh calls “our allopathic military-industrial complex”.

Finally, the ancient Greeks, explored in their philosophies by Singh through what remains to history of Parmenides, Heraclitus and Plato, are considered to have come closest to Sri Aurobindo’s vision and Indian thought, be it by their almost Vedantic considerations of oneness, stillness and perfection, their contemplation of the cyclic nature of reality, of the soul, of worlds of perfect form or ideal societies. Yet again, of course, Sri Aurobindo’s integrality and his rediscovery of the Rishi’s secrets complete their intellectual endeavours and promises the eventual manifestation of a perfected collective and physical body.

On Poetry

In Pariksith Singh’s reappraisal of Sri Aurobindo’s poetry he reflects on three aspects in particular. According to the author, Sri Aurobindo the poet’s most important contributions to Indian English literature consist in his introduction of Indian symbolism into English – even more powerfully than others such as Rabindranath Tagore –, his attempt at writing in novel metres and, of course, Sri Aurobindo gifting us the first Indian epic originally written in English while retaining a mantric quality and achieving “something new”, a “new kind of word music”. The innovative way in which Singh balances an expert’s scholarly inquiry with intimate psychological reflection might be best exemplified with these short passages on page 189, following an exploration of the metres in “Rose of God”:

So much for the technique. The line I love the most is this:

Rose of Light, immaculate core of the ultimate seeing!”

[…] The next line which hits me in the solar plexus is this one:

Sun on the head of the Timeless, guest of the marvellous Hour.”

Singh further examines several of Sri Auro-bindo’s poems in the trademark personal and intimate style of his book, while reminding readers of his broad literary interests by associating the Master’s poems with history’s greats in English language poetry. To this effect Singh for example takes “A God’s Labour” and shares inner experiences he had while contemplating the poem, points out the autobiographical significance of certain lines, and presents a poem by Shelley for comparison in terms of the subtle vibrations experienced. Sri Aurobindo’s “Descent” gets a similar treatment.

The author takes another approach by analysing the structure of Sri Aurobindo’s “Nirvana” (he proceeds similarly with “Jivanmukta”) and the perceptions of its intended effects to convey the unconveyable, yet finally recommends the reader to just “return to the perfection of this sonnet and let its sounds reverberate through one’s inner worlds like a veritable mantra”.

Further, Sri Aurobindo’s “Despair on the Staircase” gets a mention as possibly the first Indian surrealist poem. As for the sonnet, his “The Self’s Infinity” is a welcome evolution of this poetic form. Since its inception 600 years ago in Italy it has been used primarily as a vehicle for mental-emotional expression, but Sri Aurobindo adapted the sonnet form to impart his experiences in the realm of the spirit.

The poems “Shiva”, “An Image” and Ilion present opportunities to comment on the relevance of Sri Aurobindo’s theory on quantitative metre while the “The Divine Hearing” gives Singh an opportunity to share his personal views on the universality of spirituality and the power of its expression in verse. Singh tracks Sri Aurobindo’s literary evolution by detecting a foreshadowing of Savitri in “In the Moonlight”, and finds evidence for his mastery over and innovative use of metre in the hendecasyllables of “Thought the Paraclete”. Sri Aurobindo’s poems Urvasie and “The Vigil of Thaliard” are commented on in the context of Romantic poetry and his development as a writer. Singh’s appreciation for Sri Aurobindo’s patriotic Indian poetry is made clear by comparing his “Baji Prabhou” with “Vande Mataram” and by stating that it “should have been one of the national poems of India”.

Singh dedicates deserved longer chapters to comparisons of Sri Aurobindo and such giants of literature as Shakespeare, Herbert, Yeats and Tagore, as well as Milton, with the latter one focusing mostly on Paradise Lost and Savitri as well as the question “if a new rhythm can be created”. In “Savitri as Play” Singh con-templates the staging of Savitri for audiences, which reminds this reviewer of his hope that he’ll get to one day see millions of dollars spent not on glitzy digital performance installations but on inspired line-by-line visualisations of Sri Aurobindo’s epic mantric poem. Singh closes his reflections on poetry by tracing a preliminary understanding of poetry as the consciousness-altering use of sculptured symbols in Western thought, presenting Sri Aurobindo’s definition of mantra and finally his personal hope for a collective resurgence of this conscious engagement with the beauty and power of language.

On Sri Aurobindo’s works and some thoughts on critical comparisons

The third part of the book comprises essays on selected writings of Sri Aurobindo, their relevance in historical, contemporary literary and (cross-)cultural discourse and their future implications. To this reviewer Singh sharing his joy of reading Sri Aurobindo’s Aphorisms while contextualising his ‘micro-models of empirical inquiry’ (as John Stuart Mill described aphorisms) in the lineages of sutras “from Confucius to Twitter”^[1] stood out.  Singh deems Sri Aurobindo’s Essays on the Gita “perhaps the best interpretation of this ancient scripture in modern times”. He adds that Swami Prabhupada called the essays “masterly”, and Swami Paramahansa Yogananda apparently considered Essays on the Gita the best exposition of the scripture in English. It’s good to know that, although the latter’s books seem to have been more in demand than Sri Aurobindo’s (at least in the West), he himself must have read at least that one.

The subject matter here is comparison and evaluation of success and popularity of scripture, literature, thought, poetry and their commentaries. Equanimous, detached, in-formed, discerning critique and discourse as well as expression of inner and vital movements and states associated with writings and their authors certainly have their right value and place. One might also consider the perspective that spirituality ideally goes beyond attitudes and mindsets of competition. Embodied, lived integral spirituality can do so without falling prey to one-sided oversimplifications that everything is always equal, there are no differences in quality of various kinds and authentic hierarchy shouldn’t or doesn’t actually exist.

—Matthias Pommerening

Matthias, who lives and works in Auroville, has an academic background related to research into consciousness and is fascinated with Sri Aurobindo’s and the Mother’s explorations in the field.

Reviewed in February 2022