Thursday, November 3, 2011

Rabindranath and Urbana,USA (contd-2)

Rabindranath came Urbana with an aim to pass a peaceful life leaving the busy days in England. First few days he had no problem. On 8th Nov he wrote to Ajit kumar ;
"The place where we are at present is like our Bengal. The sky is almost same as that of Bengal. The sky is bright, clear and blue. The people here does not speak in a loud voice, less congested and pin of silence all around. There is little contradiction between the nature and human beings. I am passing here a peaceful life  which I long for.I have come again to myself after passing many busy days."
 But this was only for two or three days. He again entangled in the crowd of human beings. Arrangements had been done previously.    In the local paper, Courier Herald, this was announced on 9th Nov which he wrote with detail description to Ajit Kumar;
" Mr. (Albert R.) Vail, a Unitarian missionary, lives here. he is a member of a club here known as Unity Club. On every Sunday lectures, discussions are arranged on different religions and on different religion guides.He asked me to deliver a talk on Upanishad.I did not give my consent at first. But I came to learn  that some Bengalee titled Shaw  was preparing himself to deliver the lecture who had no knowledge and was not even eligible to say on Upanishad. So I had to agree at the last moment to do my duty in the name of the saints of Upanished. I had one advantage . Satish Babu (Satish Chandra Roy I.E.S., 1880-1960) had translated my essay, "World Realisation" in English which I had edited and and kept after typing. Adding an introduction in that essay I read that in the evening in gthe church room. Almost all the Professors of the University were present. It was my luck that  all of them liked it. As a result, they invited me to deliver a talk on Sunday. This time I wrote an essay on the subject, 'Self Realisation'".
The essay Rabindranath read in Unity Club was titled, "World Realisation" which after many changes took the shape, "The relation of the Imdividual to the Universe". This essay was published in Sadhana : in the name-" The realisation of Life (1913)."
The subject  of the next lecture delivered by Rabindranath  in the Unity Club was "Self Realisation" which was published in Sadhna, titled "Soul Consciousness".
He wrote Ajit Kumar on 23rd Nov;
"I have also entangled here. In London I was involved in the flood of verse but here I am absorbed in the flood of  prose. In the latter case I had to construct all my lectures. After all it yielded a good result. His subject was "Self Realisation". There were some Germans in the auditorium who encouraged me much. There is a Professor of Physics here who is also a German, named Dr. Jacob Kunz. He is famous in his wonderful research work. I had long discussion with him after my lecture. I do not know when and where this will end. I think, I am encircled in a new wave of storm."