The entire edifice and magnificent symbols and images went right above the critic’s head. Not only that an eminent English critic voiced the opinion that Savitriwas fit only for the waste paper basket.
Aurobindo is not another Tagore, or Iqbal or even Sarojini Naidu.” (Quoted in “The poetic genius of Sri Aurobindo”–K. His thoughts are profound, his technical devices commendable, but the music that enchants or disturbs is not there. This is what appeared in Times Literary Supplement, shortly after Savitriwas published: “It cannot be said that Aurobindo shows any organic adaptation to music and melody. We shall examine a few outstanding critics who have tried to understand or misunderstand this great opus. Hence Savitrineeds a new approach to estimate or judge it as a poem. It does not deal with heroic deeds as in Iliad or the Aeneid. Yet it is not an allegory like the Faerie Qyeene or epics like Vita Nouvova or The Paradise Lost. This is because Sri Aurobindo deals with facts of consciousness, the vast drama of subtle realities, powers and truths. Savitriis a work which has no parallel in English, perhaps in the world literature–for its whole turn, approach, its language, its imagery and symbolisms are of a radically different type we meet in the poets–past or present. But it is his Savitri, his greatest and most enduring work which, due to its extraordinary quality both in symbol and language, baffles the critic. His earlier poems or dramas do not offer any difficulties in comprehension both to the reader or to the critic. Of late Sri Aurobindo has been recognised and accepted as a poet of superlative quality, apart from his being a politician and a seer.
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