Chapter 18Undated 1956

(Letter to Mother from Satprem)

Pondicherry Mother, I invoke the Presence of Mahakali to break all my RESISTANCES, my INERTIA, my discouragement. Rather painful shocks than this tepidness! Or else, why am I here?

O Mother, may the PRESENCE of Mahakali be with me, may She force my whole being towards the Truth, the Light. Burn me, Mother, if I do not know how to love you!

Signed: Bernard

(Letter to Mother from Satprem)

Pondicherry All artistic creation is born of a question, a conflict, a discord with oneself, mankind or the cosmos. What painter, what poet, what writer has not wrenched from this conflict the best of his art, from Michelangelo to Goya, from Van Gogh to Rodin, from Villon to Rimbaud, Baudelaire or Dostoevski? And the work of art – the painting, novel or poem – is a harmony torn from this disharmony, a conquest over some chaos, a response to a question posed by man – a metamorphosis.

Artistic creation relies upon that which is most unique in man, most singular with respect to others, and it is through this singular uniqueness that the artist achieves his metamorphosis, his recreation of the world; it is through this that he seeks to commune with others, himself and the world.

Now, Yoga seeks to eliminate conflict, problems or questions. Man has to forget all this, to cease being a question.

So when an answer has been given to every question, what place remains for the work of art? When all is metamorphosized through Transcendence, what place remains for artistic metamorphosis? When all is supreme harmony, can this harmony be expressed otherwise than through silence, a smile, a radiance or ‘inspired’ poetry – of which Sri Aurobindo is the sole example; even so, his poetry is not drawn from the human level, it surpasses the human, it issues from elsewhere.