Sri Aurobindo

Letters of Sri Aurobindo

Volume 1

Letter ID: 281

Sri Aurobindo — Roy, Dilip Kumar

October 20, 1932

I am glad you have made a (partial) conquest of Buddhadev. If you can establish laghu-guru as a recognised metrical principle in Bengali, you will fulfil one of my two previsions for the future with regard to the language. When I was first introduced to Bengali prosody, I was told that Madhusudan’s blank verse was one of fourteen syllables, but to my astonishment found that sometimes ten syllables even counted as fourteen, e.g.

Rāvan swashur mama Meghnād swami

[Ravan is my father-in-law, Meghnad is my husband.]

Of course, it was afterwards explained to me that the syllables were counted in the Sanskrit system, and I got the real run of rhythmic movement; but I always thought, why not have an alternative system with a true sonant syllabic basis – and, finally, I saw the birth (I mean as a recognised serious metre) of the svara-vṛtta. Afterwards I came across Hemchandra’s experiments in bringing in a quantitative element – and fell in love with the idea and hoped somebody would try it on a larger scale. But up till now this attempt to influence the future did not materialise. Now perhaps in your hands it will – even apart from songs.

Sorry about your nose. But after all a nose cannot be like Tennyson’s brook – “Gods may come and Gods may go but I run on for ever.” A running nose is essentially a temporary phenomenon, its run [?] is brief – while Shiva is supposed to be immortal.