________________
106
A LOVER OF LIGHT AMONG LUMINARIES : Dilip Kumar Roy others. But Dilip Roy refuted the poet's charge by quoting a passage from Sri Aurobindo's Synthesis of Yoga in which he clarified his stand as a person who was not concerned with his individual salvation but also with:"the liberation and self-fulfilment of others."65 He asked Tagore to visit Sri Aurobindo and check his claim on his own. Tagore did so in 1928 and wrote of his conversation in Modern Review. A few lines of it are:
“Years ago I saw Aurobindo in the atmosphere of his earlier heroic youth and I sang to him: 'Aurobindo, accept the salutation of Rabindranath'. Today I saw him in a deeper atmosphere of reticent richness of wisdom and again sang to him in silence:
'Aurobindo, accept the salutation of Rabindranath."66
He also paid a beautiful tribute to Sri Aurobindo by writing a poem: “Rabindranath, 0 Aurobindo, bows to thee !"67 Roy, after reading tributes, was very much impressed by “the poet's deep humility which made him bow so readily to one who had been so grievously misunderstood in his lifetime”, then he adds: "only a Colossus can truly understand a Colossus."68 Roy was happy to find that he was instrumental in bringing these two great persons together and also in removing misunderstanding prevalent about his guru.
In the Future Poetry Sri Aurobindo, too, wrote about Tagore's art as a poet:
"And at the subtlest elevation of all that has yet been reached stands or rather wings and floats in a high intermediate region the poetry of Tagore...in a psycho-spiritual heaven of subtle and delicate soul-experience transmuting the earth-tones by the touch of its radiance. The wide success and appeal of his poetry is, indeed, one of the most significant signs of the tendency of the
mind of the age.”69
The author has dealt with various incidents of their tolerance, patience, and a fine sense of humour at different places in Sri Aurobindo Came to Me and Six Illuminates of Modern India. (B) Evaluation :
What is evident from Dilip Roy's sketch of Rabindranath Tagore, is that the latter has impressed the former both as an artist and as a man.
When he evaluates Tagore as a poet, one can easily see that he has spoken of the major themes of Tagore's poetry in detail, but has not uttered a word about the form of his poetry. Moreover, he has remained silent about the difference between his Bengali poetry and his English translations, though he has given the examples of both while talking of the themes. Dilip Roy has given his own translations of many of Tagore's poems which is a mark of his good command of
Jain Education International
For Private & Personal Use Only
www.jainelibrary.org
