RMIM Archive Article "247".

From the RMIM Article Archive maintained by Satish Subramanian
#
# RMIM/C Archives..
#  Subject: Tagore and Einstein - a conversation
#
# Posted by: 	parrikar@rococo.Colorado.EDU (Rajan P. Parrikar)
# Source:  	Einstein Lived Here
# Author: 	Prof. A Pais
#


Namashkar.

An occasional peek into soc.culture.bengali reveals that there exist
some bongs whose day job it is to shower praise upon praise upon praise
on Tagore while simultaneously running down Gandhi. In the Augean stables
of their minds Tagore's greatness is somehow a one-to-one function of 
Gandhi's 'non-greatness.` It is suggested that these bongs constitute an 
insignificant number among the total bong population (but unless and until 
a reference is found we have to maintain our skepticism). Be that as it
may, the positive fallout of these cyclical threads is to motivate moi 
into reading or re-reading portions of works of or about both Rabby and 
Gandhi. Recently I pulled out my copy of a delightful book, "Einstein Lived 
Here", authored by Professor Abraham Pais that has a chapter "The Indian 
connection: Tagore and Gandhi" which dwells on Einstein's interaction
with them. E admired both T and G and G in particular had made a deep
impression on him (although E was not always uncritical of G's ideas). 
E and T met thrice; E and G never and their contact was only epistolary.
Professor Pais reproduces some of the conversations of E and T but what
is germane to this newsgroup is their conversation about music. I remember
the delight with which I first read the mutual ruminations between these
two great sages and I hope you can share some of it too. Here it 
is:

T=Rabby Tagore; E=Einstein (year 1930)

-------------------------------------------------------------------------

pp 105-107

"The second Einstein-Tagore dialogue, the one held in Caputh, 'was
taken down by a friend who was present'. This time they began with a
discussion of the nature of causality. On this subject the two men
talked past each other without any understanding as to what the other
was driving at. I do not consider it worthwhile reproducing here any
of this. On the other hand, their next theme, on music is quite
appealing." 


T:  The musical system in India...is not so rigidly fixed as is the
    western music. Our composers give a certain definite outline,
    a system of melody and rhythmic arrangement, and within a certain
    limit the player can improvise upon it. He must be one with the
    law of that particular melody, and then he can give spontaneous
    expression to his musical feeling with the prescribed regulation.
    We praise the composer for his genius in creating a foundation
    along with a superstructure of melodies, but we expect from
    the player his own skill in the creation of variations of melodic
    flourish and ornamentation. In creation we follow the central
    law of existence, but, if we do not cut ourselves adrift from it,
    we can have sufficient freedom within the limits of our personality
    for the fullest self-expression.

E:  That is only possible where there is a strong artistic tradition
    in music to guide the people's mind. In Europe, music has come
    too far away from popular art annd popular feeling and has become
    something like a secret art with conventions and traditions of
    its own.

T:  So you have to be absolutely obedient to this too complicated
    music. In India the measure of a singer's freedom is in his own
    creative personality. He can sing the composer's song as his own,
    if he has the power creatively to assert himself in his inter-
    pretation of the general law of melody which he is given to
    interpret.

E:  It requires a very high standard of art fully to realize the
    great idea in the original music, so that one can make variations
    upon it. In our country the variations are often prescribed.
    
T:  If in our conduct we can follow the law of goodness, we can have
    real liberty of self-expression. The principle of conduct is
    there, but the character which makes it true and individual is
    our own creation. In our music there is a duality of freedom
    and prescribed order.

E:  Are the words of a song also free? I mean to say, is the singer
    at liberty to add his own words to the song which he is singing?

T:  In Bengal we have a kind of song -  Kirtan, we call it - which
    gives freedom to the singer to introduce parenthetical comments,
    phrases not in the original song. This occasions great enthusiasm,
    since the audience is constantly thrilled by some beautiful,
    spontaneous sentiment freshly added by the singer.

E:  Is the metrical form quite severe?

T:  Yes, quite. You cannot exceed the limits of versification; the
    singer in all his variations must keep the rhythm and the time,
    which is fixed. In European music you have a comparative liberty
    about time, but not about melody. But in India we have freedom
    of melody with no freedom of time.

E:  Can the Indian music be sing without words? Can one understand
    a song without words?

T:  Yes, we have songs with unmeaning words, sounds which just help
    to act as carriers of the notes. In North India music is an
    independent art, not the interpretation of words and thoughts,
    as in Bengal. The music is very intricate and subtle and is a
    complete world of melody by itself.

E:  It is not polyphonic?

T:  Instruments are used, not for harmony, but for keeping time and
    for adding to the volume and depth. Has melody suffered in your
    music by the imposition of harmony?

E:  Sometimes it does suffer very much. Sometimes the harmony swallows
    up the melody altogether.

T:  Melody and harmony are like lines and colors in pictures. A simple
    linear picture may be completely beautiful; the introduction of
    color may make it vague and insignificant. Yet color may, by
    combination with lines, create great pictures, so long as it does
    not smother and destroy their value.

E:  It is a beautiful comparison; line is also much older than color.
    It seems that your melody is much richer in structure than ours.
    Japanese music seems to be so.

T:  It is difficult to analyze the effect of eastern and western
    music on our minds. I am deeply moved by the western music - 
    I feel that it is great, that it is vast in its structure and
    grand in its composition. Our own music touches me more deeply
    by its fundamental lyrical appeal. European music is epic in
    character; it has a broad background and is Gothic in its
    structure.

E:  Yes, yes, that is very true. When did you first hear European music?

T:  At seventeen, when I first came to Europe. I came to know it
    intimately, but even before that time I had heard European music
    in our own household. I had heard the music of Chopin and others
    at an early age.

E:  There is a question we Europeans cannot properly answer, we are
    so used to our own music. We want to know whether our own music
    is a conventional or a fundamental human feeling, whether to feel
    consonance and dissonance is natural or a convention which we accept.

T:  Somehow the piano confounds me. The violin pleases me much more.

E:  It would be interesting to study the effects of European music
    on an Indian who had never heard it when he was young.

T:  Once I asked an English musician to analyze for me some classical
    music and explain to me what are the elements that make for the
    beauty of a piece.

E:  The difficulty is that really good music, whether of the East
    or of the West, cannot be analyzed.

T:  Yes, and what deeply affects the hearer is beyond himself.

E:  The same uncertainty will always be there about everything
    fundamental in our experience, in our reaction to art, whether in
    Europe or Asia. Even the red flower I see before me on your table
    may not be the same to you and me.

T:  And yet there is always going on the process of reconciliation
    between them, the individual taste conforming to the universal
    standard.

*****

Also, from the same chapter:

Tagore on Einstein:

"Einstein has often been called a lonely man. Insofar as the realm of
the mathematical vision helps to liberate the mind from the crowded
trivialities of daily life, I suppose he is a lonely man. His is what
might be called transcendental materialism, which reaches the
frontiers of metaphysics, where there can be utter detachment from the
entangling world of self. To me both science and art are expressions
of our spiritual nature, above our biological necessities and
possessed of an ultimate value.

Einstein is an excellent interrogator. We talked long and earnestly
about my 'religion of man.` He punctuated my thoughts with terse
remarks of his own, and by his questions I could measure the trend of
his own thinking."

*****

Einstein to Tagore:

"You are aware of the struggle of creatures that spring forth out of
need and dark desires. You seek salvation in quiet contemplation and
in the workings of beauty. Nursing these you have served mankind by a
long fruitful life, spreading a mild spirit, as has been proclaimed by
the wise men of your people."

Einstein on Tagore, co-written with Gandhi and Rolland:

"He has been for us the living symbol of the Spirit, of Light, and of
Harmony - the great free bird which soars in the midst of tempests -
the song of Eternity which Ariel strikes on his golden harp, rising
above the sea of unloosened passions. But his art never remained
indifferent to human misery and struggles. He is the 'Great Sentinel.'
For all that we are and we have created have their roots and their
branches in that Great Ganges of Poetry and Love."  *****


Regards, and all glories to Bishnu and his bhipe Lokkhi,


r
-------------------------------------------------------------------------





From the RMIM Article Archive maintained by Satish Subramanian