According to Sri Aurobindo, There are three great poets in the history of Poetry of the 1st rank in the world, - Valmiki, Homer and Shakespeare. He puts others like Vyas, Kalidas, Milton in the 2nd rank.

Thus when it comes to Shakespeare and esp. ' The Winter's Tale', one has got to be very cautious in our approach to understanding it. This probably is the last drama that he wrote. His maturity understandably is at its acme.

Because it s a comedy one must not take it lightly. In fact this piece is totally different in its substance than the other comedies that he has written.

Bearing this in the back of our mind we read once more this drama we will discover new vistas. This passage is no exception.

I would hasten to add, to the above comment that the song above is from the comedy, ' As You like It', Act. II , Sc. 7.
Sakespeare be it in tragedy like in 'King Lear' or the present one in 'As you Like It', is a Keen observer of life and its charecteristics. Here how beatifully he weaves in the theme of ingratitude of man.

Sri Aurobindo had put the following poets in three rows as the world’s greatest poets. In 1932 young Amal Kiran had persisted in asking him to rank the poets according to several criteria of poetic excellence including the quantity of poetic output. Amal himself had submitted a list for consideration. Here’s the final classification according to Sri Aurobindo:

First row—Homer; Shakespeare, Valmiki, Vyasa
Second row—Dante, Kalidasa, Aeschylus, Sophocles, Virgil, Milton
Third row—Goethe

And here’s more of Winter Wind.

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