Sri Aurobindo was inspired by Dante

Marko Says: May 11th, 2007 at 10:10 am Hi Tusar,
I discovered that also a professor on comparative literature in California has written some chapters in two books comparing Dante and Aurobindo and stating that Aurobindo was inspired by Dante. If I remember well, Satprem writes in “the Adventure of Consciousness” that Aurobindo wanted to learn Italian to be able to read the Divine Comedy in its original, so she is probably right.

The professor’s name is Brenda Deen Schildgen and her books where she included these chapters on this subject are “Other Renaissances” and “Dante in India; Sri Aurobindo and Savriti”. It would be interesting to see if she shares your judgement. I have not read them and could not find the books on Amazon but if you are interested I include some links here:

www.palgrave.com/products/Catalogue.aspx?is=1403974462
www.brandeis.edu/programs/interdepartmental/italian/dante/adb2002.htm

Tusar N. Mohapatra Says: May 11th, 2007 at 8:25 pm I would wish that let the rest of your life be an endless series of discoveries along the footsteps of Sri Aurobindo, the poet. Here is a letter he wrote to one of his close disciples:

[There is probably a defect in your solar plexus which makes it refuse to thrill unless it receives a strong punch from poetry — an ornamental, romantic or pathetic punch. But there is also a poetry which expresses things with an absolute truth but without effort, simply and easily, without a word in excess or any laying on. of colour, only just the necessary. That kind of achievement is considered as among the greatest things poetry can do.

A phrase, word or line may be quite simple and ordinary and yet taken with another phrase, line or word become the perfect thing.

A line like “Life that is deep arid wonder-vast” has what I have called the inevitable quality; with a perfect simplicity and straightforwardness it expresses something in a definite and per­fect way that cannot be surpassed; so does “lost in a breath of sound” with less simplicity but with the same inevitability. I do not mean that highly coloured poetry cannot be absolutely in­evitable, it can, e.g. Shakespeare’s “In cradle of the rude impe­rious surge” and many others. But most often highly coloured poetry attracts too much attention to the colour and its brilliance so that the thing in itself is less felt than the magnificence of its dress. All kinds are legitimate in poetry; poetry can be great or perfect even if it uses simple or ordinary expressions, e.g. Dante simply says “In His will is our peace” and in writing that in Italian produces one of the greatest lines in all poetic literature. 1.4.1938] Document: Home > E-Library > Works Of Sri Aurobindo > Future Poetry Volume-09 > The Process, Form And Substance Of Poetry