If I observe very carefully, I have the impression that the mind of Matter Sri Aurobindo refers to, [the body-mind], the thought of Matter, isn't yet pure, it's still mixed; so it only takes one wrong movement for everything to come undone. And in people, that material mind lives in its wrong movement constantly—except a flash once in a while: a reversal.

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To say that transmission errors have dulled the force of Sri Aurobindo’s Savitri is to tell the dull-witted that he was not yogically sensitive to the lines when read out to him. He might not have written a particular word himself, but in his creative fire, in the Fire of his Yoga, yogāgni, he can certainly give to it a new fiery life.

To our rational mind, therefore, might appear differences between the several drafts of Savitri and what came out in 1950-51. Therefore it should be appealing to the rational mind to sit down quietly and dispassionately, without making any fuss of the matter, without becoming tawdry, without showing uncalled for concern in the nature of dullness and things of the sort, and prepare a good scientific table of differences which should become a part of Open Resources for anyone to look into the details. When that is done the question whether the Revised Edition has made Savitri defect-free, whether it has made it more mantric would not arise. What can be more mantric than what the author himself has given to us what had to be given to us?

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She walks in beauty, like the night
Of cloudless climes and starry skies;
And all that's best of dark and bright
Meet in her aspect and her eyes:
Thus mellowed to that tender light
Which heaven to gaudy day denies.

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When I made my Leh plans, after hours of research on internet and travel guides, Turtuk easily found its way into my itinerary. Very close to the Pakistan border Turtuk, was captured by Indian army in the year 1971. A craggy little border village, opened by the Indian government in late 2009 after relaxing the Protected Area Permit Regime (PAPR), Turtuk's credentials are cogent to arouse my curiosity. Mainly, I wanted to visit someplace that is not as touristy as the rest of Leh. I realised during the first few days of my trip that even the far-reaching places, like Hunder, are teeming with tourists—desi and foreign alike. The much-less popular Turtuk would be a singular experience. I set out after a hearty breakfast of Timok—steamed dumpling served with cooked vegetables. Mussa, my driver, turned out to be a brilliant raconteur. Part of the fun in travelling through Leh is having a good driver. If he is as amusing as Mussa, your bone-rattling rides would not be half as bad.

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A little more than two decades ago Jugal Kishore Mukherjee wrote two letters to the Ashram trustees concerned expressing his unhappiness regarding Archives and Research, the Ashram’s half-yearly journal. Controversial statements were made in it pertaining to the biographical and literary works of Sri Aurobindo. This also gets connected with the manner in which the manuscripts of Savitri were handled to bring out the Revised Edition in 1993. Jugal Mukherjee’s first letter written on 22 June 1986 drew a rebuttal from Jayantilal Parekh almost a year after its receipt; this was effectively answered by Jugal Kishore Mukherjee when he wrote his second letter on 14 June 1987.To get some idea about their contents these are freely excerpted here.

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The crux of the matter is this: You have the book gifted to you by the author; you have all the related manuscripts and drafts and proofs spread out in front of you; you have prepared tables and tables of differences between these two. The rest is editorial. If this has to be got out as a printed book after the original left behind by the author, it must be with the mention of the name(s) of the editor(s). The editors must take the responsibility of their printed version instead of hiding themselves behind the name of the author which will, in fact, be doing injustice to him. The situation in which things are locked at this stage can be summarised as follows. Ashram cannot bring out the 1950-51 or any of the earlier editions having committed itself solely to the Revised Edition. This is a terrible fix: Ashram cannot print them because of undertaking for the Revised Edition; other publishers cannot enter in because of the copyright held by the Ashram. This needs to be resolved. In the meanwhile we keep on talking about “the Mother has approved this and that”, “Nolini Kanta Gupta has approved this and that”, “Amal Kiran has approved this and that”, “Nirodbaran has approved this and that”, “Nirodbaran and Amal Kiran have approved this and that”. But we never speak of what was approved by Sri Aurobindo himself. The Mother speaks of Savitri as the supreme revelation Sri Aurobindo. So the poser is, if Sri Aurobindo has left his consciousness behind in Savitri, did he leave it with defects, full of mistakes? The answer to the question “Was not the 1950-1951 edition of Savitri approved by Sri Aurobindo?” should indeed settle the issue. The rest is logomachy of smaller souls.

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But this fire was pressed under the hooves of the horses,
And this fire jumped like a thunder from cloud to cloud,
And sprang up from temple-bells like a hymn of loud ascent,
And climbed up from a valley like the voice of immortality.
O worship this fire and offer it flowers and rich honey.

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There is an inevitable phrase-pattern, there is an unimpeachable rhythm-design—in short a form of perfect beauty inwardly created, not built up by mere outward skill. Through such form, poetry, whatever its subject, comes with the face and gait of a godhead. How even materialism and atheism could come like this is well hit off by a paradoxical turn of Elizabeth Browning's about Lucretius: she writes in a poem that he "denied divinely the Divine". It is the intrinsic divineness of the intuition-packed creative style of poetry that is the soul's note in it. And it is because the soul finds tongue through the poet that we have a light in poetry, a delight in poetry. Light and delight are the soul's very stuff, we might say, and by virtue of them the soul's "inner seeing and sense" is not just a fanciful entertainment but a kind of revelation. Of course, it is not directly a spiritual, a mystic gesture and movement: it is only indirectly so and even when its subject is spiritual or mystic the poet does not necessarily become a Yogi or a Rishi. In most instances he is no more than an "inspired" medium. But the soul-quality ensures that the genuine poetic utterance is "a great formative and illuminative power."

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I had that experience when the body was again moaning—I say "moaning," but it's not that, it's a kind of aspiration so strong that it becomes like an anguish; and also that sense of incapacity. And the same Response: all at once the body is seized by a formidable power, so great that the body itself feels it could break anything! It comes like a mass. And I recalled a sentence of Sri Aurobindo in which he said, "Before you can be the Lord's lion, you should first be the Lord's lamb,'' and it was as though I were told, "Enough of being the lamb! (laughing) Now become the lion." But it doesn't last. And I can easily see why it doesn't last! Oh, it's ... You feel as if you're going to tear everything down!

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I see what is true in things from the supramental point of view. And it's extremely interesting. I hear sounds that people don't usually hear, because these sounds have a supramental reality. I can see.... When people talk to me, I see at the same time not only what they think (that's old hat), but what's true from the supramental point of view. All the time it is like that. Both together. Because my body has no longer the same ... (what's the word?) ... I am strong, but the old type of energy is gone; and the one that replaces it is far more powerful—but I don't like to talk about it. When I do, I appear to be boasting. So I don't say anything. I tell you now so you'll understand.

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When my love swears that she is made of truth
I do believe her, though I know she lies,
That she might think me some untutor'd youth,
Unlearned in the world's false subtleties.

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Should India's traditional handcrafters occupy an elevated space in people's minds or should they remain on the pavements, bazaars, haats, and perhaps marginally in malls, to be looked at as poor street cousins of India's other cultural practitioners? Sixty years after three important Akademis were set up to promote cultural arts that come under the heading of dance, music, drama, literature and the fine arts, it may be time to take note of the huge reservoir of cultural heritage passing from generation to generation through the hands of craftspeople towards establishing a body that nurtures this heritage and builds respect beyond “marketing products” or subsidising “welfare”. A Hast Kala Akademi could be created as a more compact, private-public autonomous institution promoting all non-commercial explorations of the craft sector, while indirectly benefiting its economic prospects as well.

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In 1999 Sri Aurobindo Ashram brought out for private circulation a booklet entitled On the New Edition of Savitri. Publisher’s Note says the following:

A new edition of Savitri was brought out in 1993 by the Sri Aurobindo Ashram Trust. This edition was the result of many years of intensive work. Sri Aurobindo’s manuscripts were carefully compared with all copies, typescripts and printed texts. Wherever it was found that his lines had been copied, typed or printed differently from what he wrote or dictated, the lines were restored to their authentic form.

As there has been some misunderstanding regarding this edition, we publish here five statements by members of the Ashram. Readers having questions or seeking further clarification may write to the Copyright Department, Sri Aurobindo Ashram, Pondicherry 605002.

The booklet contains five entries which are reproduced here.

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Thanjavur has always been lucky in its rulers, for all of them fostered the fine arts and enriched the cultural life of Thanjavur. Among the Maratha contributions must be mentioned the art of Harikatha. Harikatha has its roots in the kirtan tradition of Maharashtra. Saint Samartha Ramadas, who was born in 1608, gave a theoretical foundation to this art through his work ‘Dasabodha.' Samartha was the spiritual guru of Chatrapathi Sivaji.

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Therefore indeed is this earth nourished by his splendid radiances,
And the Waters, and the Breath, and the triple Flame grow ever in him,
And the limitless ether, without hue, containing all forms creates forms.
It is by his fire that this Night exists, even as the stars in it shine,
It is in his ocean of Space that the Word arrives on soundless tracks,
This the Sun of superconscient Force gleaming with the Truth-Idea;
Therefore assuredly the wise pass through the wide gates of the Sun,
And the strong of limbs, and the bright of souls, ever dwell in him.
No wonder in the Sun they established foundation of the All-Bliss.
And the Seasons came and the Quarters awoke and Speech burst forth,
And the Eternal took birth to grow in the mystery of endless Time.
This the Sun the Devourer, and the Fosterer, and the tireless Increaser,
Eater of the Food, he is the one who is the Eating, and he the Food.

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To master the sex-impulse,—to become so much master of the sex-centre that the sexual energy would be drawn upwards, not thrown outwards and wasted—it is so indeed that the force in the seed can be turned into a primal physical energy supporting all the others, retas into ojas. But no error can be more perilous than to accept the immixture of the sexual desire and some kind of subtle satisfaction of it and look on this as a part of the sadhana. It would be the most effective way to head straight towards spiritual downfall and throw into the atmosphere forces that would block the supramental descent, bringing instead the descent of adverse vital powers to disseminate disturbance and disaster. This deviation must be absolutely thrown away, should it try to occur and expunged from the consciousness, if the Truth is to be brought down and the work is to be done.

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We can very well conceive (it's something easy to conceive) that beings may be born in another manner, through a power of concentration, and that those beings may materialize without any of the miseries that beset us—that's all very well, but it's for later. We are in between, that's where the difficulty is.

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A false impression has been promoted by the Archives Team by stating that 99.75% of Savitri is unaltered. To the scientifically and statistically minded people it would mean that 0.25% change is negligible and for practical purposes we may consider it to be zero. But the devil is in the false perspective of taking poetry as a linear form with words as the linear unit. It would be here exposed as just another branch of editorial arrogance of the Archival Team in the space of Statistics.

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One day, I went as usual to relate to Sri Aurobindo what had been happening—we had come to something really very interesting, and perhaps I showed a little enthusiasm in my account of what had taken place—then Sri Aurobindo looked at me…and said: “Yes, this is an Overmind creation. It is very interesting, very well done. You will perform miracles which will make you famous throughout the world, you will be able to turn all events on earth topsy-turvy, indeed...” and then he smiled and said: “It will be a great success. But it is an Overmind creation. And it is not success that we want; we want to establish the Supermind on earth. One must know how to renounce immediate success in order to create the new world, the supramental world in its integrality.”

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And if, as autumn deepens and darkens
I feel the pain of falling leaves, and stems that break in storms
and trouble and dissolution and distress
and then the softness of deep shadows folding,
folding around my soul and spirit, around my lips
so sweet, like a swoon, or more like the drowse of a low, sad song
singing darker than the nightingale, on, on to the solstice
and the silence of short days, the silence of the year, the shadow,
then I shall know that my life is moving still
with the dark earth, and drenched
with the deep oblivion of earth’s lapse and renewal.

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