Sri Aurobindo

Letters on Poetry and Art

SABCL - Volume 27

Part 2. On His Own and Others’ Poetry
Section 1. On His Poetry and Poetic Method
On Poems Published in Ahana and Other Poems

James Cousins on In the Moonlight and The Rishi [1]

I hear that James Cousins said about your poem The Rishi that it was only spiritual philosophy, not poetry.

I never heard that. If I had I would have noted that Cousins had no capacity for appreciating intellectual poetry. But that I knew already — just as he had no liking for epic poetry either, only for poetic “jewellery”. His criticism was of In the Moonlight which he condemned as brain-stuff only except the early stanzas for which he had high praise. That criticism was of great use to me — though I did not agree with it. But the positive part of it helped me to develop towards a supra-intellectual style. As Love and Death was poetry of the vital, so Ahana [Ahana and other Poems] is mostly work of the poetic intelligence. Cousins’ criticism helped me to go a stage farther.

11 November 1936