Sri Aurobindo

Letters of Sri Aurobindo

SABCL 26

Fragment ID: 7920

Literature and art are or can be a first introduction to the inner being – the inner mind, vital; for it is from there that they come. And if one writes poems of bhakti, poems of divine seeking, etc., or creates music of that kind, it means that there is a bhakta or seeker inside who is supporting himself by that self-expression. There is also the point of view behind Lele’s answer to me when I told him that I wanted to do Yoga but for work, for action, not for Sannyasa and Nirvana,– but after years of spiritual effort I had failed to find the way and it was for that I had asked to meet him. His first answer was, “It would be easy for you as you are a poet.” But it was not from any point of view like that that X put his question and it was not from that point of view that I gave my answer. It was about some especial character-making virtue that he seemed to attribute to literature.

18-11-1936