Sri Aurobindo
Letters on Poetry and Art
SABCL - Volume 27
Part 2. On His Own and Others Poetry
Section 2. On Poets and Poetry
Indian Poetry in English
Indo-English Poetry [3]
The doctrine that no one who is not a born and bred
Englishman, especially no Oriental, should try to write or can really write
English poetry because the traditions, sentiments, expressions of the English
language or of any language are so different from others and so peculiar to
itself that a foreigner cannot acquire them, is no new discovery; it is a
statement that has been often made. But it fails at one point birth does not
matter. A pure Italian by blood like Rossetti or his sister Christina, a Pole
like Conrad, a Spaniard like Santayana (I am speaking of prose 
also, however,) can do as well in English as born English writers. It
is said however that this applies only to Europeans, for their native
tradition, sentiments, expressions are not entirely alien to those of the
English tongue and by education or adaptation they can acquire, but the Indian
mind is of too alien a character, too far off and cut away by a gulf from the
English to be able to write in that language. It may be said also that an Indian
may succeed in writing correct English, but can never write great English prose,
still less perfect or enduring poetry. I doubt whether this is true I remember
having read some extracts from letters by Sarojini Naidu in her youth that
seemed to be very perfect and beautiful English prose. But let us keep to poetry
which has no doubt a special language or a special spirit and turn in its
language and it is true of it that no one who cannot acquire that spirit and
turn can succeed in writing English poetry. But in the first place I do not see
why an Indian bred in England or an Indian to whom English has become his
natural tongue should be any more disqualified {{0}}[incomplete][[Sri
Aurobindo wrote this passage on the back of a typed copy of the letter of 28
February 1936 printed above. It appears to be the draft of a letter that was not
completed or sent. Ed.]]
28 February 1936