{"id":1287,"date":"2013-07-13T01:33:52","date_gmt":"2013-07-13T08:33:52","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/localhost\/?p=1287"},"modified":"2013-11-28T15:14:36","modified_gmt":"2013-11-28T23:14:36","slug":"34-the-process-form-and-substance-of-poetry-vol-09-the-future-poetry-volume-09","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/01-works-of-sri-aurobindo\/01-sabcl\/09-the-future-poetry-volume-09\/34-the-process-form-and-substance-of-poetry-vol-09-the-future-poetry-volume-09","title":{"rendered":"-34_The Process, Form and Substance of Poetry\u00a0.htm"},"content":{"rendered":"\n\n
\n

\nSECTION ONE<\/font><\/b><\/p>\n

\n 
\n<\/font><\/p>\n

The Process, Form and Substance of Poetry <\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\n

\nTHREE ELEMENTS OF POETIC CREATION<\/font><\/b><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

                P<\/font>oetry, or at any rate a truly poetic poetry,
\ncomes always from some subtle plane through the creative vital and uses the outer
\nmind and other external instruments for transmission only. There are three
\nelements in the production of poetry; there is the original source of
\ninspiration, there is the vital force of creative beauty which contributes its
\nown substance and impetus and often determines the form, except when that also
\ncomes ready made from the original source; there is finally the transmitting
\nouter consciousness of the poet. The most genuine and perfect poetry is written
\nwhen the original source is able to throw its inspiration pure and undiminished
\ninto the vital and there takes its true native form and power of speech exactly
\nreproducing the inspiration, while the outer consciousness is entirely passive
\nand transmits without alteration what it receives from the godheads of the
\ninner or the superior spaces. When the vital mind and emotion are too active
\nand give too much of their own initiation or a translation into more or less
\nturbid vital stuff, the poetry remains powerful but is inferior in quality and
\nless authentic. Finally, if the outer consciousness is too lethargic and blocks
\nthe transmission or too active and makes its own version, then you have the
\npoetry that fails or is at best a creditable mental manufacture. It is the
\ninterference of these two parts either by obstruction or by too great an
\nactivity of their own or by both together that causes the difficulty and labour
\nof writing. There would be no difficulty if the inspiration came through
\nwithout obstruction or interference in a pure trans\u00adcript \u2014 that is what
\nhappens in a poet’s highest or freest mo\u00adments when he writes not at all out of
\nhis own external human mind but by inspiration, as the mouthpiece of the Gods.<\/p>\n

The originating source may
\nbe anywhere; the poetry may arise or descend from the subtle physical plane,
\nfrom the higher or lower vital itself, from the dynamic or creative
\nintelligence, from the plane of dynamic vision, from the psychic, from the
\nillumined mind or Intuition, \u2014 even, though this is the rarest, from the
\nOvermind widenesses. To get the Overmind inspiration <\/p>\n

Page – 291<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n
\n

<\/span><\/i><\/b><\/div>\n

is so rare that there are only a few lines or
\nshort passages in all poetic literature that give at least some appearance or
\nreflec\u00adtion of it. When the source of inspiration is in the heart or the
\npsychic there is more easily a good will in the vital channel, the flow is
\nspontaneous; the inspiration takes at once its true form and speech and is
\ntransmitted without any interference or only a minimum of interference by the
\nbrain-mind, that great spoiler of the higher or deeper splendours. It is the
\ncharacter of the lyrical inspiration, to flow in a jet out of the being \u2014
\nwhether it comes from the vital or the psychic, it is usually spontaneous, for
\nthese are the two most powerfully impelling and compelling parts of the nature.
\nWhen on the contrary the source of inspiration is in the creative poetic
\nintelligence or even the higher mind or the illumined mind, the poetry which
\ncomes from this quarter is always apt to be arrested by the outer intellect,
\nour habitual thought-production engine. This intellect is an absurdly
\nover-active part of the nature; it always thinks that nothing can be well done
\nunless it puts its finger into the pie and therefore it ins\u00adtinctively
\ninterferes with the inspiration, blocks half or more than half of it and
\nlabours to substitute its own inferior and toilsome productions for the true
\nspeech and rhythm that ought to have come. The poet labours in anguish to get
\nthe one true word, the authentic rhythm, the real divine substance of what he
\nhas to say, while all the time it is waiting complete and ready behind; but it
\nis denied free transmission by some part of the transmitting agency which
\nprefers to translate and is not willing merely to receive and transcribe. When
\none gets something through from the illumined mind, then there is likely to
\ncome to birth work that is really fine and great. When there comes with labour
\nor without it something reasonably like what the poetic intelligence wanted to
\nsay, then there is something fine or ade\u00adquate, though it may not be great
\nunless there is an intervention from the higher levels. But when the outer
\nbrain is at work trying to fashion out of itself or to give its own version of
\nwhat the higher sources are trying to pour down, then there results a manu- i facture
\nor something quite inadequate or faulty or, at the best, "good on the
\nwhole", but not the thing that ought to have come.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/span>2.6.1931 <\/p>\n

\nPage – 292<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n
\n

<\/span><\/i><\/b><\/div>\n

THE CREATIVE POWER OF INSPIRATION
\nAND THE HUMAN INSTRUMENT<\/font><\/b><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

A poem may pre-exist in the timeless as all
\ncreation pre-exists there or else in some plane where the past, present and
\nfuture exist together. But it is not necessary to presuppose anything of the
\nkind to explain the phenomena of inspiration. All is here a matter of formation
\nor creation. By the contact with the source of inspiration the creative Power
\nat one level or another and the human instrument, receptacle or channel get
\ninto con\u00adtact. That is the essential point, all the rest depends upon the
\nindividual case. If the substance, rhythm, form, words come down all together
\nready-formed from the plane of poetic crea\u00adtion, that is the perfect type of
\ninspiration; it may give its own spontaneous gift or it may give something
\nwhich corresponds to the idea or the aspiration of the poet, but in either case
\nthe human being is only a channel or receptacle, although he feels the joy of
\nthe creation and the joy of the āveśa, enthousiasmos,<\/i> elation
\nof the inrush and the passage. On the other hand it may be that the creative
\nsource sends down the substance or stuff, the force and the idea, but the
\nlanguage, rhythm etc. are found somewhere in the instrument; he has to find the
\nhuman transcription of some\u00adthing that is there in diviner essence above; then
\nthere is an illumination or excitement, a conscious labour of creation swift or
\nslow, hampered or facile. Something of the language may be supplied by the mind
\nor vital, something may break through from somewhere behind the veil, from
\nwhatever source gets into touch with the transcribing mind in the liberating or
\nstimulating excitement or uplifting of the consciousness. Or a line or lines
\nmay come through from some plane and the poet excited to crea\u00adtion may build
\naround them constructing his material or getting it from any source he can tap.
\nThere are many possibilities of this nature. There is also the possibility of
\nan inspiration not from above, but from somewhere within on the ordinary
\nlevels, some inner mind, emotional, vital etc. which the mind practised in
\npoetical technique works out according to its habitual faculty. Here again in a
\ndifferent way similar phenomena, similar varia\u00adtions may arise.<\/p>\n

\nPage – 293<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n
\n

<\/span><\/i><\/b><\/div>\n

As for the language, the tongue in
\nwhich the poem comes or the whole lines from above, that offers no real
\ndifficulty. It all depends on the contact between the creative Power and the
\ninstrument or channel, the Power will naturally choose the language of the
\ninstrument or channel, that to which it is accus\u00adtomed and can therefore
\nreadily hear and receive. The Power itself is not limited and can use any
\nlanguage, but although it is possible for things to come through in a language
\nunknown or ill-known \u2014 I have seen several instances of the fbrmer \u2014 it is not
\na usual case, since the samskāras <\/i>of<\/span> the mind, its habits of action and conception would normally
\nobstruct any such unprepared receptiveness; only a strong mediumistic faculty
\nmight be unaffected by this difficulty. These things, however, are obviously
\nexceptional, abnormal or supernormal pheno\u00admena.<\/p>\n

If the parts of a poem come from different planes,
\nit is be\u00adcause one starts from some high plane but the connecting con\u00adsciousness
\ncannot receive uninterruptedly from there and as soon as it flickers or wavers
\nit comes down to a lower, perhaps with\u00adout noticing it, or the lower comes in
\nto supply the continuation of the flow or on the contrary the consciousness
\nstarts from a lower plane and is lifted in the dvesa<\/i> perhaps
\noccasionally, perhaps more continuously higher for a time or else the higher
\nforce attracted by the creative will breaks through or touches or catches up
\nthe less excited inspiration towards or into itself. I am speaking here
\nespecially of the Overhead planes where this is quite natural; for the
\nOvermind, for instance, is the ulti\u00admate source of intuition, illumination or
\nheightened power of the planes immediately below it. It can lift them up into
\nits own greater intensity or give out of its intensity to them or touch or combine
\ntheir powers together with something of its own greater power \u2014 or they can
\nreceive or draw something from it or from each other. <\/b>On<\/span> the lower planes beginning from the
\nmental downwards there can also be such variations, but the working is not the
\nsame, for the different powers here stand more on a foot\u00ading of equality
\nwhether they stand apart from each other, each working in its own right, or
\nco-operate.<\/p>\n

29.4.1937<\/p>\n

\nPage – 294<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n
\n

<\/span><\/i><\/b><\/div>\n

THREE ESSENTIALS FOR WRITING POETRY<\/font><\/b><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

I have gone through your poems. For poetry
\nthree things are necessary. First, there must be emotional sincerity and
\npoetical feeling and this your poems show that you possess. Next, a mastery
\nover language and a faculty of rhythm perfected by a knowledge of the technique
\nof poetic and rhythmic expression; here the technique is imperfect, true
\nfaculty is there but in the rough and there is not yet an original and native
\nstyle. Finally, there must be the power of inspiration, the creative energy,
\nand that makes the whole difference between the poet and the good verse-writer.
\nIn your poems this is still very uncertain\u00a0
\n<\/span>\u2014\u00a0 <\/span>in some passages it almost
\ncomes out, but in the rest it is not evident.<\/p>\n

I would suggest to you not to turn your
\nenergies in this direction at present. Allow your consciousness to grow. If
\nwhen the consciousness develops, a greater energy of inspiration comes, not out
\nof the ordinary but out of the Yogic conscious\u00adness, then you can write and, if
\nit is found that the energy not only comes from the true source but is able to
\nmould for itself the true transcription in rhythm and language, can continue.<\/p>\n

6.6.1932<\/p>\n

ESSENCE <\/b>
\n<\/font>OF INSPIRATION<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

There can be inspiration also without words \u2014
\na certain inten\u00adsity in the light and force and substance of the knowledge is
\nthe essence of inspiration.<\/p>\n

18.6.1933<\/p>\n

POETIC\u00a0 <\/span>FLUENCY<\/font><\/b><\/p>\n

It is precisely the people who are careful,
\nself-critical, anxious for perfection who have interrupted visits from the
\nMuse. Those who don’t mind what they write, trusting to their genius, vigour or
\nfluency to carry it off are usually the abundant writers. There are exceptions,
\nof course. "The poetic part caught in the<\/p>\n

\nPage – 295<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n
\n

<\/span><\/i><\/b><\/div>\n

mere mind" is an admirable explanation of the
\nphenomenon of interruption. Fluent poets are those who either do not mind if
\nthey do not always write their very best or whose minds are sufficiently poetic
\nto make even their "not best" verse pass muster or make a reasonably
\ngood show. Sometimes you write things that are good enough, but not your best,
\nbut both your insistence and mine \u2014 for I think it essential for you to write
\nyour best always, at least your "level best" \u2014 may have curbed the
\nfluency a good deal.<\/p>\n

The check and diminution forced on your prose
\nwas com\u00adpensated by the much higher and maturer quality to which it attained
\nafterwards. It would be so, I suppose, with the poetry; a new level of
\nconsciousness once attained, there might well be a new fluency. So there is not
\nmuch justification for the fear.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\nINSPIRATION
\nAND EFFORT<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

1<\/b><\/b><\/p>\n

Inspiration is always a very uncertain thing; it comes when it
\nchooses, stops suddenly before it has finished its work, refuses to descend
\nwhen it is called. This is a well-known affliction, per\u00adhaps of all artists,
\nbut certainly of poets. There are some who can command it at will; those who, I
\nthink, are more full of an abundant poetic energy than careful for perfection;
\nothers who oblige it to come whenever they put pen to paper but with these the
\ninspiration is either not of a high order or quite unequal in its levels. Again
\nthere are some who try to give it a habit of coming by always writing at the
\nsame time: Virgil with his nine lines first written, then perfected every
\nmorning, Milton with his fifty epic lines a day, are said to have succeeded in
\nregularising their inspiration. It is, I suppose, the same principle which
\nmakes Gurus in India prescribe for their disciples a meditation at the same
\nfixed hour every day. It succeeds partially of course, for some entirely, but
\nnot for everybody. For myself, when the inspiration did not come with a rush or
\nin a stream, \u2014 for then there is no difficulty, \u2014 I had only one way, to allow
\na certain<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Page – 296<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n
\n

<\/span><\/i><\/b><\/div>\n

kind of incubation in which a large form of the
\nthing to be done threw itself on the mind and then wait for the white heat in
\nwhich the entire transcription could rapidly take place. But I think each poet
\nhas his own way of working and finds his own issue out of inspiration’s
\nincertitudes.<\/p>\n

                2\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span><\/span><\/b>\u00a0\u00a0<\/span>.<\/span><\/p>\n

Few poets can keep for a very long time a sustained
\nlevel of the highest inspiration. The best poetry does not usually come by
\nstreams except in poets of a supreme greatness though there may be in others
\nthan the greatest long-continued wingings at a con\u00adsiderable height. The very
\nbest comes by intermittent drops, though sometimes three or four gleaming drops
\nat a time. Even in the greatest poets, even in those with the most opulent flow
\nof riches like Shakespeare the very best is comparatively rare.<\/p>\n

All statements are subject to qualification.
\nWhat Lawrence states1<\/sup> is true in principle, but in practice most
\npoets have to sustain the inspiration by industry. Milton in his later days
\nused to write every day fifty lines; Virgil nine which he corrected and
\nrecorrected till it was within half way of what he wanted. In other words he
\nused to write under any conditions and pull at his inspiration till it came.
\nUsually the best lines, passages, etc. come like that.<\/p>\n

3<\/b><\/p>\n

 <\/b>Merciful heavens, what a splashing and floundering! When you miss
\na verse or a poem, it is better to wait in an entire quietude about it (with
\nonly a silent expectation) until the true inspiration comes, and not to thrash
\nthe inner air vainly for possible variants \u2014 like that the true form is much
\nmore likely to come, as people go to sleep on a problem and find it solved when
\nthey awake. Otherwise, you are likely to have only a series of misses, the
\nhalf-gods of the semi-poetic mind continually intervening with their false
\nenthusiasms and misleading voices.<\/p>\n

11.7.1931<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/span>‘
\n"One can only write creative stuff when it comes – otherwise it is not
\nmuch good."<\/font> <\/font><\/p>\n

\nPage – 297<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n
\n

<\/span><\/i><\/b><\/div>\n

4<\/b><\/p>\n

Perhaps one reason why your mind is so
\nvariable is because it has learned too much and has too many influences stamped
\nupon it; it does not allow the real poet in you who is a little at the back to
\nbe himself \u2014 it wants to supply him with a form instead of allowing him to
\nbreathe into the instrument his own notes. It is, besides, too ingenious. What
\nyou have to learn is the art of allowing things to come through and recognising
\namong them the one right thing \u2014 which is very much what you have to do in Yoga
\nalso. It is really this recognition that is the one important need \u2014 once you
\nhave that, things become much easier.<\/p>\n

3.2.1932<\/p>\n

THE TRUE ARTISTIC TEMPER<\/font><\/b><\/p>\n

1<\/b><\/p>\n

It<\/span> is
\nno use being disgusted because there is a best you have not reached yet; every
\npoet should have that feeling of "a miraculous poetic creation existing on
\na plane" he has hot reached, but he should not despair of reaching it; but
\nrather he has to regard present achievement not as something final but as steps
\ntowards what he hopes some day to write. That is the true artistic temper.1.5.1934<\/b><\/p>\n

2<\/b><\/p>\n

You seem to suffer from a mania of
\nself-depreciatory criticism. Many artists and poets have that; as soon as they look
\nat their work they find it awfully poor and bad. ( I had that myself often
\nvaried with the opposite feeling,, A also has it ) ; but to have it while
\nwriting is its most excruciating degree of intensity. Better get rid of it if
\nyou want to write freely.<\/p>\n

14;12.<\/b><\/span>1936<\/p>\n

3<\/b><\/p>\n

Impatience does not help; intensity of
\naspiration does. The use<\/p>\n

\nPage – 298<\/span><\/i><\/b><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n
\n

<\/span><\/i><\/b><\/div>\n

of keeping the consciousness uplifted is that it
\nthen remains ready for the flow from above when that comes. To get as early as
\npossible to the highest range one must keep the consciousness steadily turned
\ntowards it and maintain the call. First one has to establish the permanent
\nopening \u2014 or get it to establish itself, then the ascension and frequent,
\nafterwards constant descent. It is only afterwards that one can have the ease.<\/p>\n

21.4.1937<\/p>\n

INSPIRATION AND<\/font><\/span> MENTAL UNDERSTANDING<\/font><\/b><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Yes, the mind is used as a medium. It might
\nbe an understanding transcribing agent or it may be only a passive channel. If
\nan agent, it transcribes what comes from above, understands but does not pass
\nits opinion \u2014 only transmits. If it is only a channel then it sees the words
\nand passes them but knows no more.<\/p>\n

Not to improve; for that would mean the mind
\ninterfering, refusing to be a medium and trying to do better on its own active
\naccount. But to understand is desirable. If the mind is watch\u00adful and awake to
\nthe symbols being used or the images it can acquire the habit or knack of
\nunderstanding.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

CORRECTION BY SECOND INSPIRATION<\/font><\/b><\/p>\n

1<\/b><\/p>\n

It is a
\nsecond inspiration which has come in improving on the first. When the improving
\nis done by the mind and not by a pure inspiration then the retouches spoil more
\noften’than they perfect.<\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>2<\/span><\/b><\/p>\n

How can "anything" be used in a
\npoem? A slight change makes all the difference between something forceful and a
\nmere literary expression that misses its mark.<\/p>\n

27.5.1936 <\/p>\n

\nPage – 299<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n
\n

<\/span><\/i><\/b><\/div>\n

JOY OF POETIC CREATION<\/font><\/b><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Poetry can start from any plane of
\nconsciousness although like all art \u2014 or, one might say, all creation \u2014 it must
\nalways come through the vital if it is to be alive. And as there is always a
\njoy in creation, that joy along with a certain enthousiasmos \u2014 <\/i>\u00a0<\/span>not enthusiasm, if you please, but ānandamaya
\nāveśa \u2014<\/i> must always be there whatever the source. But your poetry
\ndiffers from the lines you quote. Your inspiration comes from the linking of
\nthe vital creative instrument to a deeper psychic experience, and it is that
\nwhich makes the whole originality and peculiar individual power and subtle and
\ndelicate perfection of your poems. It was indeed because this linking-on took
\nplace that the true poetic faculty suddenly awoke in you; for it was not there
\nbefore, at least on the surface. The joy you feel, therefore, was no doubt
\npartly the simple joy of creation, but there comes also into it the joy of
\nexpression of the psychic being which was seeking for an outlet since your
\nboyhood. It is this that justifies your poetry-writing as a part of your
\nSadhana.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

PRESSURE OF CREATIVE FORMATION<\/font><\/b><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

I know very well this pressure of a creative
\nformation to express itself and be fulfilled. When it presses like that there
\nis nothing to do but to let it have its way, so as to leave the mind unoccu\u00adpied
\nand clear; otherwise it will be pushed two ways and would not be in the
\ncondition of ease necessary for concentration.<\/p>\n


\n\u00a0\u00a0
\n<\/font>
\n<\/span>FORM AND SUBSTANCE OF POETRY<\/font><\/b><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

On the general question the truth seems to me
\nto be very simple. It may be quite true that fine or telling rhythms without substance
\n(substance of idea, suggestion, feeling) are hardly poetry at all, even if they
\nmake good verse. But that is no ground for belittling beauty or excellence of
\nform or ignoring its supreme importance for poetic perfection. Poetry is after
\nall an art and a poet ought <\/p>\n

\nPage – 300<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n
\n

<\/span><\/i><\/b><\/div>\n

to be an artist of word and rhythm, even though
\nnecessarily, like other artists, he must also be something more than that, even
\nmuch more. I hold therefore that harshness and roughness are not merits, but serious
\nfaults to be avoided by anyone who wants his work to be true poetry and
\nsurvive. One can be strong and powerful, full of sincerity and substance
\nwithout being harsh, rough or aggressive to the ear. Swinburne’s later poetry
\nis a mere body of rhythmic sound without a soul, but what of Browning’s
\nconstant deliberate roughness or, let us say, excessive sturdiness which
\ndeprives much of his work of the claim to be poetry \u2014 it is already much
\ndiscredited and it is certain there is much in it that posterity will carefully
\nand with good reason forget to read. Energy enough there is and abundance of
\nmatter and these carry the day for a time and give fame, but it is only
\nperfection that endures. <\/b>Or<\/span>
\nif the cruder work lasts, it is only by association with the perfection of the
\nsame poet’s work at his best. I may say also that if mere rhythmic acrobacies
\nof the kind to which you very rightly object condemn a poet’s work to
\ninferiority and a literature deviating on to that line to decadence, the drive
\nto\u00adwards a harsh strength and rough energy of form and substance may easily
\nlead to another kind of undesirable acrobacy, an opposite road towards
\nindividual inferiority and general deca\u00addence. Why should not Bengali poetry go
\non to the straight way of its progress without running either upon the rocks of
\nrough\u00adness or into the shallows of mere melody? Austerity of course is another
\nmatter; rhythm can either be austere to bareness or sweet and subtle, and a
\nharmonious perfection can be attained in either of these extreme directions if
\nthe mastery is there.<\/p>\n

As for rules \u2014 rules are
\nnecessary but they are not absolute; one of the chief tendencies of genius is
\nto break old rules and make departures which create new ones. English poetry of
\nto\u00adday luxuriates in movements which to the mind of yesterday would have been
\ninsanity or chaotic license, yet it is evident that this freedom of
\nexperimentation has led to discoveries of new rhythmic beauty with a very real
\ncharm and power and opened out possible lines of growth, \u2014 however unfortunate
\nmany of its results may be. Not the formal mind, but the ear must be the judge.
\n <\/p>\n

\nPage – 301<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n
\n

<\/span><\/i><\/b><\/div>\n

Moreover the development of a new
\nnote \u2014 the expression of a deeper Yogic or mystic experience in poetry \u2014 may
\nvery well demand for its fulness new departures in technique, a new turn or
\nturns of rhythm, but these should be, I think, subtle in their difference
\nrather than aggressive.<\/p>\n

4.1.1932<\/p>\n

\nRHYTHM AND SIGNIFICANCE<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

You seem to suggest that significance does
\nnot matter and need not enter into the account in judging and feeling
\npoetry!… Rhythm and word-music are indispensable, but are not the whole of
\npoetry…. Certainly, the significance and feeling sug\u00adgested and borne home by
\nthe words and rhythm are a capital part of the value of poetry. Shakespeare’s
\nlines<\/p>\n

Absent thee from felicity awhile,<\/i><\/p>\n

And in this harsh world draw thy breath in
\npain,<\/i><\/p>\n

have a skilful and consummate rhythm and
\nword-combination, but this gets its full value as the perfect embodiment of a pro\u00adfound
\nand moving significance, the expression in a few lines of a whole range of
\nhuman world-experience.<\/p>\n

\nGRADES OF PERFECTION IN POETRY<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

To the two requisites you mention which are
\ntechnical \u2014 "the rightness of individual words and phrases, the rightness
\nof the general lingual reconstruction of the poetic vision, \u2014 that is, the
\nmanner, syntactical and psychological, of whole sentences and their
\nco-ordination", \u2014 two others have to be added, a cer\u00adtain smiling sureness
\nof touch and inner breath of perfect per\u00adfection, born not made, in the words
\nthemselves, and a certain absolute winging movement in the rhythm. Without an
\ninevit\u00adable rhythm there can be no inevitable wording. If you understand<\/p>\n

\nPage – 302<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n
\n

<\/span><\/i><\/b><\/div>\n

all that, you are lucky. But how to explain
\nthe inexplicable, something that is self-existent ? That simply means an
\nabsolute\u00adness, one might say, an inexplicably perfect and in-fitting thisness
\nand thereness and thatness and everythingelseness so satisfying in every way as
\nto be unalterable. All perfection is not neces\u00adsarily inevitability. I have
\ntried to explain in The Future Poetry \u2014<\/i> very unsuccessfully I am afraid
\n\u2014 that there are different grades of perfection in poetry: adequateness,
\nenectivity, illumi\u00adnation of language, inspiredness \u2014 finally, inevitability.
\nThese are things one has to learn to feel, one can’t analyse.<\/span><\/i><\/b><\/p>\n

All the styles, "adequate",
\n"effective", etc., can be raised to inevitability in their own line.<\/p>\n

The supreme inevitability is something more
\neven than that, a speech overwhelmingly sheer, pure and true a quintessential
\nessence of convincingly perfect utterance. That goes out of all classifications
\nand is unanalysable. Instances would include the most different kinds of style
\n\u2014 Keats’\u00a0 <\/span>"magic casements",
\nWordsworth’s Newton and his \u201cfields of sleep",\u00a0 <\/span>Shakespeare’s\u00a0
\n<\/span>"Macbeth has murdered sleep",\u00a0
\n<\/span>Homer\u2019s descent of Apollo from Olympus,\u00a0
\n<\/span>Virgil’s "Sunt lachrymae rerum" and his "O passi
\ngraviora".\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span><\/p>\n

Homer’s passage translated into English would
\nbe perfectly ordinary. He gets the best part of his effect from his rhythm.
\nTranslated it would run merely like this: "And he descended from the peaks
\nof Olympus, wroth at heart, bearing on his shoul\u00adders arrows and doubly pent-in
\nquiver, and there arose the clang of his silver bow as he moved, and he came
\nmade like unto the night." <\/b>His<\/span>
\nwords too are quite simple but the vowellation and the rhythm make the clang of
\nthe silver bow go smashing through the world into universes beyond while the
\nlast words give a most august and formidable impression of godhead.<\/p>\n

I don’t think there is any co-ordination
\nbetween the diffe\u00adrences of style and the different planes of inspiration \u2014
\nunless one can say that the effective style comes from the higher mind, the
\nillumined from the illumined mind, the inspired from the plane of intuition.
\nBut I don’t know whether that would stand at all times \u2014 especially when each
\nstyle reaches its inevitable power. <\/p>\n

\nPage – 303<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n
\n

<\/span><\/i><\/b><\/div>\n


\nPOETIC<\/font><\/span><\/b>
\nAUSTERITY AND<\/span> EXUBERANCE<\/b><\/font><\/p>\n

 1<\/b> <\/span><\/p>\n

It<\/span> is not easy to say
\nprecisely what is austerity in the poetic sense \u2014 for it is a quality that can
\nbe felt, a spirit in the writer and the writing, but if you put it in the
\nstrait-waistcoat of a definition or of a set technical method you are likely to
\nlose the spirit altoge\u00adther. In the spirit of the writing you can feel it as a
\nsomething constant, self-gathered, grave and severe; it is the quality that one
\nat once is aware of in Milton, Wordsworth, Aeschylus and which even their most
\nfervent admirers would hardly attribute to Shakespeare, Shelley, Keats,
\nTennyson, Euripides. But there is also an austerity in the poetic manner and
\nthat is more diffi\u00adcult to describe or to fix its borders. At most one can say
\nthat it consists in a will to express the thing of which you write, thought,
\nobject or feeling, in its just form and exact power without addi\u00adtion and
\nwithout exuberance. The austerer method of poetry avoids all lax superfluity,
\nall profusion of unnecessary words, excess of emotional outcry, self-indulgent
\ndaub of colour, over-brilliant scattering of images, all mere luxury of
\nexternal art or artifice. To use just the necessary words and no others, the
\nthought in its simplicity and bare power, the one expressive or revealing
\nimage, the precise colour and nothing more, just the exact impression,
\nreaction, simple feeling proper to the object, \u2014 nothing spun out, additional,
\nin excess. Any rioting in words, colour, images, emotions, sound, phrase for
\ntheir own sake, for their own beauty, attraction, luxury of abundant expression
\nwould, I suppose, be what your friend means by ucchvāsa.<\/i> Even, an
\nextreme contemporary tendency seems to condemn the use of image, epithet,
\ncolour, pitch or emphasis of any kind, except on the most sparing scale, as a
\nvice. Length in a poem is itself a sin, for length means padding \u2014 a long poem
\nis a bad poem, only brief work, intense, lyrical in spirit can be throughout
\npure poetry. Milton, for example, considered austere by the common run of
\nmortals, would be excluded from the list of the pure for his sprawling
\nlengthiness, his epic rhetoric, his swelling phrases, his cult of the
\ngrandiose. To be perfect you must be small, brief <\/p>\n

Page – 304<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n
\n

<\/span><\/i><\/b><\/div>\n

and restrained, meticulous in cut and style.<\/p>\n

This extremism in the avoidance of excess is
\nperhaps itself an excess. Much can be done by bareness in poetry \u2014 a poetic
\nnudism if accompanied by either beauty and grace or strength and power has its
\nexcellence. There can be a vivid or striking or forceful or a subtle, delicate
\nor lovely bareness which reaches to the highest values of poetic expression.
\nThere can be also a com\u00adpact or a stringent bareness \u2014 the kind of style
\ndeliberately aimed at by .Land or; but this can be very stiff and stilted as
\nLandor is inl<\/sup> his more ambitious attempts \u2014 although he did
\nmagnificent things sometimes, like his lines on Rose Aylmer, \u2014 you can see
\nthere how emotion itself can gain by a spare austerity in self-expression. But
\nit is doubtful whether all these kinds \u2014 Wordsworth’s lyrics, for example, the Daffodils,<\/i>
\nthe Cuckoo \u2014<\/i>can be classed as austere. On the other hand, there can be a
\nvery real spirit and power of underlying austerity behind a consider\u00adable
\nwealth and richness of expression. Arnold in one of his poems gives the image
\nof a girl beautiful, rich and sumptuous in apparel on whose body, killed in an
\naccident, was found be\u00adneath the sumptuousness, next to the skin, an under-robe
\nof sack\u00adcloth. If that is admitted, then Milton can keep his claim to austerity
\nin spite of his epic fullness and Aeschylus in spite of the exultant daring of
\nhis images and the rich colour of his language. Dante is, I think, the perfect
\ntype of austerity in poetry, standing between the two extremes and combining
\nthe most sustained severity of expression with a precise power and fullness in
\nthe language which gives the sense of packed riches -no mere bare\u00adness
\nanywhere.<\/p>\n

But, after all, exclusive
\nstandards are out of place in poetry; there is room for all kinds and all
\nmethods. Shakespeare was to the French classicists a drunken barbarian of
\ngenius; but his spontaneous exuberance has lifted him higher than their willed
\nseverity of classical perfection. All depends on the kind one aims at \u2014
\nexpressing what is in oneself \u2014 and an inspired faith\u00adfulness to the law of
\nperfection in that kind. That needs some explanation, perhaps; but I have here perforce to put a dash <\/i><\/span>and
\nfinish.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span><\/p>\n

8.10.1932<\/p>\n

Page – 305<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n
\n

<\/span><\/i><\/b><\/div>\n

2<\/span><\/b><\/p>\n

I<\/span>
\nsaid that Aeschylus like Milton was austere au fond \u2014<\/i> there is as in
\nDante a high serious restrained power behind all they write;but the outward form
\nin Milton is grandiose, copious, lavish of strength and sweep, in Aeschylus
\nbold, high-imaged, strong in colour, in Dante full of concise, packed and
\nsignificantly force\u00adful turn and phrase. These external riches might seem not
\nres\u00adtrained enough to the purists of austerity: they want the manner and not
\nthe fond<\/i> only to be impeccably austere. I did not mean that Dante
\nreached the summit of austerity in this sense; in fact I said he stood between
\nthe two extremes of bare austerity and sumptuosity of language. But even in his
\nlanguage there is a sense of tapasyā,<\/i> of concentrated restraint in
\nhis expressive force. A in his translation of Dante has let himself go in the
\ndirection of eloquence more than Dante who is too succinct for eloquence and he
\nhas used also a mystical turn of phrase which is not Dante’s \u2014 yet he has got
\nsomething of the spirit in the language, something of Dante’s concentrated
\nforce of expression into his lines. You have spread yourself out even more than
\nA, but still there is the Dantesque in your lines also, \u2014 very much so, I
\nshould say, \u2014 with only this difference that Dante would have put it into fewer
\nwords than you do. It is the Dantesque stretching itself out a little \u2014 more
\nlarge-limbed, permitting itself more space.<\/p>\n

Aeschylus’ manner cannot
\nbe described as ucchvasa,<\/i> at least in the sense given to it in my
\nletter. He is not carefully restrained and succinct in his language like Dante,
\nbut there is a certain royal measure even in his boldness of colour and image
\nwhich has in it the strength of tapasya<\/i> and cannot be called ucchvāsa.<\/i>
\nI suppose in Bengali this term is used a little indiscriminately for things
\nthat are not quite the same in spirit. If mere use of bold image and fullness
\nof expression, epithet, colour, splendour of phrase is ucchvasa,<\/i> apart
\nfrom the manner of their use, I would say that austerity and ucchvasa<\/i> of
\na certain kind are perfectly compatible. At any rate two-thirds of the poetry
\nhitherto recog\u00adnised as the best in different literatures comes of a
\ncombination of these two elements. If I find time I shall one day try to
\nexplain <\/p>\n

\nPage – 306<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n
\n

<\/span><\/i><\/b><\/div>\n

this point with texts to support it.<\/p>\n

I don’t know the Bengali for austerity. Gāmbhirya<\/i>
\nand other kindred things are or can be elements of austerityTbut are not
\nausterity itself. Anucchvāsa<\/i> is not accurate; one can be free from ucchvāsa<\/i>
\nwithout being austere. The soul of austerity in poetry as in Yoga is ātmasamyama;,<\/span><\/i>
\nall the rest is variable, the outward quality of the austerity itself may be
\nvariable.<\/p>\n

9.10.1932<\/p>\n

3<\/b><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

I am still at a loss what to answer about ucchvāsa,<\/i>
\nbecause I still don’t understand exactly what your correspondent is aiming at
\nin his criticism. There is not more ucchvāsa<\/i> in Bengali poetry than
\nin English if by the word is meant rhetoric, free resort to imagery, prolific
\nweaving of words and ideas and sentiments around what one has to say. Indian
\npoetry in the Sanskritic languages \u2014 there are exceptions of course \u2014 was for
\nthe most part more restrained and classic in taste or else more impression\u00adist
\nand incisive than most English poetry; the qualities or defects noted above
\ncame into Beifgali under the English influence. I don’t see therefore the point
\nof his remark that the English language cannot express the Indian temperament.
\nIt is true of course to a certain extent, first, because, no foreign language
\ncan express what is intimate and peculiar to a national temperament, it tends
\nat once to become falsified and seems exotic, and espe\u00adcially the imagery or
\nsentiment of one language does not go well with that of another; least of all
\ncan the temperament of an ori\u00adental tongue be readily transferred into a
\nEuropean tongue. What is perfectly simple and straightforward in one becomes
\nemphatic or over-coloured or strange in the other. But that has nothing to do
\nwith ucchvāsa<\/i> in itself. As to emotion \u2014 if that is what is meant \u2014
\nyour word effusiveness is rather unfortunate, for effusiveness is not
\npraiseworthy in poetry anywhere; but vividness of emotion is no more
\nreprehensible in English than in Bengali poetry. You give as examples of ucchvāsa<\/i>
\namong other things Madhusudan’s style, Tagore’s poem to me, a passage from
\nGovindadas. I don’t think there is anything in Madhuudan
\n <\/p>\n

Page – 307<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n
\n

<\/span><\/i><\/b><\/div>\n

which an English poet writing in Bengal
\nwould have hesitated to father. Tagore’s poem is written at a high pitch of
\nfeeling perfectly intelligibl to anyone who had passed through the exaltation
\nof the Swadeshi days, but not more high pitched than certain things in Milton,
\nShelley, Swinburne. In Govindadas\u2019s lines, \u2014 let us translate them into English
\n\u2014<\/p>\n

Am I merely thine? 0 Love, I am there
\nclinging<\/i><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/span>In
\nevery limb of thine \u2014 there ever in my creation and my dissolution \u2014<\/i><\/p>\n

the idea is one that would not so easily
\noccur to an English poet, it is an erotic mysticism, easily suggested to a mind
\nfamiliar with the experiences of Vedanta or Vaishnava.mystics; but this is not
\neffusiveness, it is intensity \u2014 and an English writer\u2014 e.g. Lawrence \u2014 could be
\nquite as intense, but would use a different idea or image.<\/p>\n

1.10.1932<\/p>\n

4<\/span><\/b><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

I am afraid the language of your appreciations or
\ncriticisms here is not apposite. There is nothing "bare and rugged"
\nin the two lines you quote \u2014<\/p>\n

A rhythmic fire that opens a secret door,<\/i><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/span>And
\nthe treasures of eternity are found;<\/i><\/p>\n

on the contrary they are rather violently figured
\n\u2014 the os\u00e9<\/i> image of a fire opening a door of a treasure-house would
\nprobably be objected to by Cousins or any other purist. The language of poetry
\nis called bare when it is confined rigorously to just the words necessary to
\nexpress the thought or feeling or to visualise what is described, without
\nsuperfluous epithets, without images, without any least rhetorical turn in it.
\nE.g. Cowper’s<\/p>\n

Toll for the brave \u2014<\/i><\/p>\n

The brave! who are no more\u2014<\/i><\/p>\n

\nP<\/span>age \u2013 308<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n
\n

<\/span><\/i><\/b><\/div>\n

is <\/i><\/b><\/span>bare Byron’s<\/span><\/p>\n

Jehovah’s vessels hold<\/i><\/p>\n

The godless heathens wine<\/i><\/p>\n

does not quite succeed because of a
\nrhetorical tinge that he is not able to keep out of the expression. When Baxter
\n( I think it was Baxter ) writes\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span><\/p>\n

I<\/i> spoke as one who ne’er would speak again1 <\/sup><\/i><\/p>\n

And as a dying man to
\ndying men,<\/i><\/p>\n

that might be taken as an example of strong and
\nbare poetic language. I have written of Savitri waking on the day of des\u00adtiny
\n\u2014\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>.<\/p>\n

Immobile in herself,
\nshe gathered force.<\/i><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/span>This was the day when Satyavan must die\u2014-<\/i><\/p>\n

that is designedly bare.<\/p>\n

But none of these lines or
\npassages can be called rugged; for ruggedness and austerity are not the same
\nthing; poetry is rugged when it is rough in language and rhythm or rough and
\nunpolished but sincere in feeling. Donne is often rugged, \u2014<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Yet
\ndare I almost be glad, I do not see<\/i><\/p>\n

That spectacle of too much weight for me. <\/i><\/p>\n

Who sees God’s face that is self-life must die,<\/i><\/p>\n

What a death were it then to
\nsee God die ?<\/i><\/p>\n

but it is only the first line that is at all
\nbare.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span><\/p>\n

On the other side you describe
\nthe line of your preference<\/p>\n

My moments pass with
\nmoon-imprinted sail<\/i><\/span><\/p>\n

by the epithets "real, wonderful,
\nflashing". Real or surreal? It is precisely its unreality that makes the
\nquality of the line; it is surreal, not in any depreciatory sense, but because
\nof its supra-<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

‘ The original line reads: I preach’d as never
\nsure to preach again,<\/font> <\/p>\n

\nPage – 309<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n
\n

<\/span><\/i><\/b><\/div>\n

physical imaginativeness, its vivid suggestion of
\noccult vision; one does not quite know what it means, but it suggests some\u00adthing
\nthat one can vividly see. It is not flashing \u2014 gleaming or glinting would be
\nnearer the mark \u2014 it penetrates the imagination and awakens sight and stirs or
\nthrills with a sense of beauty but it is not something that carries one away by
\nits sudden splendour.<\/p>\n

You say that it is more poetic than the other
\nquotation \u2014 perhaps, but not for the reason you give, rather because it is more
\nfelicitously complete in its image and more suggestive. But you seem to attach
\nthe word poetic to the idea of something remotely beautiful, deeply coloured or
\nstrangely imaged with a glitter in it or a magic glimmer. On the whole what you
\nseem to mean is that this line is "real" poetry, because it has this
\nquality and because it has melodious sweetness of rhythm, while the other is of
\na less attractive character. Your solar plexus refuses to thrill where these
\nqualities are absent \u2014 obviously that is a serious limitation in the plasticity
\nof your solar plexus, not that it is wrong in thrilling to these things but
\nthat it is sadly wrong in thrilling to them only. It means that your plexus
\nwill remain deaf and dead to most of the greater poetry of the world \u2014 to
\nHomer, Milton, Valmiki, Vyasa, a great part even of Shakespeare. That is surely
\na serious limitation of the appreciative faculty. What is strange and beautiful
\nhas its appeal, but one ought to be able also to stir to what is great and
\nbeautiful, or strong and noble, or simple and beautiful, or pure and exquisite.
\nNot to do so would be like being blind of one eye and seeing with the other
\nonly very vividly strange outlines and intensely bright colours.<\/p>\n

I may add that if really I appreciate any
\nlines for something which I see behind them but they do not actually suggest or
\nex\u00adpress, then I must be a very bad critic. The lines you quote not only say
\nnothing about the treasures except fhat they are found, but do not suggest
\nanything more. If then I see from some know\u00adledge that has nothing to do with
\nthe actual expression and sug\u00adgestion of the lines all the treasures of
\neternity and cry "How rich" \u2014 meaning the richness, not of the
\ntreasures, but of the poetry, then I am doing something quite illegitimate
\nwhich is the sign of a great unreality and confusion in my mind, very
\nundesirable
\n <\/p>\n

\nPage – 310<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n
\n

<\/span><\/i><\/b><\/div>\n

in a critic. It is not for any reason of that kind that I made a
\nmark indicating appreciation but because I find in the passage a just and striking
\nimage with a rhythm and expression which are a sufficient body for the
\nsignificance.<\/p>\n

3.11.1938 <\/p>\n

5<\/b><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

There is probably a defect in your solar plexus which makes it
\nrefuse to thrill unless it receives a strong punch from poetry \u2014 an ornamental,
\nromantic or pathetic punch. But there is also a poetry which expresses things
\nwith an absolute truth but without effort, simply and easily, without a word in
\nexcess or any laying on. of colour, only just the necessary. That kind of
\nachievement is considered as among the greatest things poetry can do.<\/p>\n

A phrase, word or line may be quite simple and
\nordinary and yet taken with another phrase, line or word become the perfect
\nthing.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u00a0 <\/span><\/p>\n

A line like "Life that is deep arid
\nwonder-vast" has what I have called the inevitable quality; with a perfect
\nsimplicity and straightforwardness it expresses something in a definite and per\u00adfect
\nway that cannot be surpassed; so does "lost in a breath of sound"
\nwith less simplicity but with the same inevitability. I do not mean that highly
\ncoloured poetry cannot be absolutely in\u00adevitable, it can, e.g. Shakespeare’s
\n"In cradle of the rude impe\u00adrious surge" and many others. But most
\noften highly coloured poetry attracts too much attention to the colour and its
\nbrilliance so that the thing in itself is less felt than the magnificence of
\nits dress. All kinds are legitimate in poetry; poetry can be great or perfect
\neven if it uses simple or ordinary expressions, e.g. Dante simply says "In
\nHis will is our peace" and in writing that in Italian produces one of the
\ngreatest lines in all poetic literature. <\/p>\n

1.4.1938 <\/p>\n

6<\/b><\/p>\n

 <\/b><\/p>\n

Simplicity<\/span> and
\nbeauty are not convertible terms. There can be a difficult beauty. What about
\nAeschylus then? or Blake? <\/p>\n

Page – 311<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n
\n

<\/span><\/i><\/b><\/div>\n

     7\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span><\/span><\/b><\/span><\/p>\n

Too violent condensations of language or too
\ncompressed thoughts always create a sense either of obscurity or, if not that,
\nthen of effort and artifice, even if a powerful and inspired artifice. Yet very
\ngreat poets and writers have used them, so great a poet as Aeschylus or so
\ngreat a prose stylist as Tacitus. Then there are the famous "knots"
\nin the Mahabharata. I think one can say that these condensations are justified
\nwhen they say something with more power and depth and full, if sometimes recondite,
\nsignificance than an easier speech would give, but to make it a constant
\nelement of the language (without a constant justifica\u00adtion of that kind) would
\nturn it into a mannerism or artifice.<\/p>\n

 8<\/b><\/p>\n

\u201cYoung heart", "thrilled
\ncompanionship", "warm hour", "lip to lip",
\n"passionate unease" are here poorly sensuous clich\u00e9s \u2014 <\/i>they or
\nany one or two of them might have been carried off in a more moved and inspired
\nstyle, gathering colour from their surround\u00adings or even a new and rich life;
\nbut here they stand out in a fashionable dressed-up insufficiency. This secret
\nof fusing all in such a white heat or colour heat of sincerity of inspiration
\nthat even the common or often-used phrases and ideas catch fire and burn
\nbrilliantly with the rest is one of the secrets of the true poetic afflatus.
\nBut if you stop short of that inspiration and begin to write efficient poetry,
\nthen you must be careful of your P\u2019s and Q\u2019s. <\/p>\n

19.3.1932<\/p>\n

9<\/span><\/b><\/span><\/p>\n

The line\u00b9 strikes at once the romantically
\nsentimental note of more than a hundred years ago which is dead and laughed out
\nof court nowadays. Especially in writing anything about vital love, avoid like
\nthe plague anything that descends into the sentimental or, worse, the
\nnamby-pamby.<\/p>\n

30.5.1932\u00a0 <\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u00b9"…so grief-hearted, strangely lone."<\/font> <\/p>\n

Page – 312<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n
\n

<\/span><\/i><\/b><\/div>\n

10<\/b><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

An expression of the lower vital lashed to
\nimaginative fury is likely to produce not poetry but simply "sound and
\nfury", \u2014 "tearing a passion to tatters" and in its full
\nfuriousness may even rise to rant and fustian. Erotic poetry more than any
\nother needs the restraint of beauty and form and measure, otherwise it risks
\nbeing no longer poetic but merely path-plogic.<\/p>\n

14.6.1932<\/p>\n

EPIC GREATNESS AND SUBLIMITY<\/font><\/b><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

I don’t know how I differentiate, between the
\nepic and the other kinds of poetic power. Victor Hugo in the Legende des
\nSi\u00e8cles <\/i>tries to be epic and often succeeds, perhaps even on the whole.
\nMarlowe is sometimes great or sublime, but I would not call him epic. There is
\na greatness or sublimity that is epic, there is another that is not epic, but
\nmore of a romantic type. Shakespeare’s line\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span><\/p>\n

In cradle of the rude imperious surge<\/i><\/p>\n

is as sublime as anything in Homer or
\nMilton,
\nbut it does not seem to me to have the epic ring, while a very simple line can
\nhave<\/p>\n

it, e.g. Homer’s<\/p>\n

Bē de kat oulumpoīo karēnōn
\nchō\u00f6menos kēr\u00a0 <\/span>(He went down
\nfrom the peaks of<\/i> Olympus wroth at heart)<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n

or Virgil’s<\/p>\n

Disce, puer, virtutem ex me verumque laborem,<\/i><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/span>Fortunam ex aliis
\n\u2014\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span><\/i><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

or Milton’s<\/p>\n

Fall’n Cherub, to be weak is miserable.<\/i><\/p>\n

\nPage – 313<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n
\n

<\/span><\/i><\/b><\/div>\n

What is there in these lines that is not in
\nShakespeare’s and makes them epic (Shakespeare’s of course has something else
\nas valu\u00adable)? For the moment at least, I can’t tell you, but it is there. A
\ntone of the inner spirit perhaps, expressing itself in the rhythm and the turn
\nof the language…. Dante has the epic spirit and tone, what he lacks is the
\nepic \u00e9lan and swiftness. The distinc\u00adtion you draw \u2014 "epic sublimity has a
\nmore natural turn of ima\u00adgination than the non-epic: it is powerfully wide or
\ndeep or high without being outstandingly bold, it also displays less
\ncolour" \u2014 applies, no doubt, but I do not know whether it is the essence
\nof the thing or only one result of a certain austerity in the epic Muse. I do
\nnot know whether one cannot be coloured provided one keeps that austerity
\nwhich, be it understood, is not incom\u00adpatible with a certain fineness and
\nsweetness.<\/p>\n

9.5.1937<\/p>\n

\nPage – 314<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/table>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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