List of Illustrations     1. Cave Cathedral, Ajanta 2  Kalahastishwara Temple, Andhra Pradesh 3 . Sinhachalam Temple, Andhra Pradesh 4. Kandarya Mahadeo Temple, Khajuraho 5. Humayun's Tomb, New Delhi 6 . Taj Mahal, Agra 7.Itimad-ud-Daulah's Tomb, Agra 8.Panch Mahal, Fatehpur Sikri 9.Dhyani Buddha, Ajanta 10.Maheshwara Murti, Elephanta Caves

XII   Indian Art   A GOOD deal of hostile or unsympathetic Western criticism of Indian civilisation has been directed in the past against its aesthetic side and taken the form of a disdainful or violent depreciation of its fine arts, architecture, sculpture and painting. Mr. Archer would not find much support in his wholesale and undiscriminating depreciation of a great literature, but here too there has been, if not positive attack, much failure of understanding; but in the attack on Indian art, his is the last and shrillest of many hostile voices. This aesthetic side of a people's culture is of the highest importance and demands almost as much scrutiny and carefuln

XVI   Indian Literature   THE ARTS which appeal to the soul through the eye are able to arrive at a peculiarly concentrated expression of the spirit, the aesthesis and the creative mind of a people, but it is in its literature that we must seek for its most flexible and many-sided self-expression, for it is the word used in all its power of clear figure or its threads of suggestion that carries to us most subtly and variably the shades and turns and teeming significances of the inner self in its manifestation. The greatness of a literature lies first in the greatness and worth of its substance, the value of its thought and the beauty of its forms, but also in the degree

The Renaissance in India     The Renaissance in India   THERE has been recently some talk of a Renaissance in India. A number of illuminating essays with that general title and subject have been given to us by a poet and subtle critic and thinker, Mr. James H. Cousins, and others have touched suggestively various sides of the growing movement towards a new life and a new thought that may well seem to justify the description. This Renaissance, this new birth in India, if it is a fact, must become a thing of immense importance both to herself and the world, to herself because of all that is meant for her in the recovery or the change

'The Renaissance in India and Other Essays on Indian Culture' by Sri Aurobindo - Page 1 of 34 Note on the Texts     Note on the Texts   The thirty-two essays that make up this volume were first published in the monthly journal Arya between August 1918 and January 1921. Each essay was written immediately before its publication.   The Renaissance in India. Four essays appeared in the Arya between August and November 1918 under the title The Renaissance in India. In September 1920 they were published under the same title by the Prabartak Publishing House, Chandernagore, after being revised lightly by Sri Aurobindo. The publisher's note to this edition stated: "The subject m

A Defence of Indian Culture         I   A Rationalistic Critic on Indian Culture   WHEN we try to appreciate a culture, and when that culture is the one in which we have grown up or from which we draw our governing ideals and are likely from overpartiality to minimise its deficiencies or from overfamiliarity to miss aspects or values of it which would strike an unaccustomed eye, it is always useful as well as interesting to know how others see it. It will not move us to change our view-point for theirs; but we can get fresh light from a study of this kind and help our self-introspection. But

XXI   Indian Polity   I HAVE spoken hitherto of the greatness of Indian civilisation in the things most important to human culture, those activities that raise man to his noblest potentialities as a mental, a spiritual, religious, intellectual, ethical, aesthetic being, and in all these matters the cavillings of the critics break down before the height and largeness and profundity revealed when we look at the whole and all its parts in the light of a true understanding of the spirit and intention and a close discerning regard on the actual achievement of the culture. There is revealed not only a great civilisation, but one of the half dozen greatest of which we have a s

  Fragment of a Play  Act I Mathura.   Scene 1   A street in Mathura. Ahuca's house. Sudaman, Ocroor.   SUDAMAN What art thou? OCROOR One that walks the Night. SUDAMAN No Ogre! Thou art Ocroor by thy voice.   OCROOR Whatever name The Lord has given his creature. Thou shouldst be Sudaman.   SUDAMAN If I am? OCROOR Walk not alone When the black-bellied Night has swallowed earth Lest all thou hast done to others should return Upon thee with a sword in the dumb Night   Page – 945 And no man know it. SUDAMAN Care not; I am shiel

  Act II   A room in Eric's house.   Scene 1 Hertha, Aslaug.   HERTHA See what a keen and fatal glint it has, Aslaug.   ASLAUG Hast thou been haunted by a look, O Hertha, has a touch bewildered thee, Compelling memory?   HERTHA Then the gods too work?   ASLAUG A marble statue gloriously designed Without that breath our cunning maker gives, One feels it pain to break. This statue breathes! Out of these eyes there looks an intellect That claims us all; this marble holds a heart, The heart holds love. To break it all, to lay This glory of God's making in the dust! Why

  Act II   Scene 1   A room in the palace at Cowsamby. Alurca, Vasuntha.   ALURCA He'll rule Cowsamby in the end, I think. VASUNTHA Artist, be an observer too. His eyes Pursue young Vuthsa like a hunted prey And seem to measure possibility, But not for rule or for Cowsamby care. To reign's his nature, not his will.   ALURCA This man Is like some high rock that was suddenly Transformed into a thinking creature.   VASUNTHA There's His charm for Vuthsa who is soft as Spring, Fair like a hunted moon in cloud-swept skies, Luxurious like a jasmine in its leaves.   ALURCA When will this Vuthsa grow to man? Hard-b