This study addresses the issue of William Butler Yeats' use of Upanishad philosophy in his poetry. Although many analyses of Yeats' art vis-a-vis Eastern religion exist, none offer the thesis that the poet transformed certain religious concepts for his own purpose, thereby removing those concepts from the purview of Eastern religion. Quite the contrary, many of the analyses argue a parallel between Yeats' poetry and the religious concepts.In Chapter 1 this study gives a brief overview of the problem and proposes the thesis that instead of paralleling Eastern religious concepts, Yeats transformed those concepts; such transformations result in ideas which run counter to the yogic goal as expounded in the Upanishads.Chapter 2 summarizes yogic sources which help elucidate the concepts of Upanishad thought. Also Chapter 2 introduces various the critical analyses which present inaccurate conclusions regarding Yeats' use of Eastern religion.Chapter 3 explains certain Eastern religious concepts such concepts as karma and reincarnation and asserts that the goal of the discipline of yoga is self-realization.Chapter 4 discusses the poems of Yeats' canon which have been analyzed critically in terms of Eastern religious concepts and have erroneously been considered to parallel certain Eastern concepts. This chapter argues that Yeats' transformations resulted in an art which is chiefly based on the physical level of being, whereas the goal of yogic discipline places its chief emphasis on the spiritual level of being. Also it is argued that Yeats cultivated imagination, whereas the Eastern religious devotee cultivates intuition.Chapter 5 details the critical analyses which have erroneously argued the Yeatsian parallel to Eastern religion, showing how these critics have sometimes failed to understand concepts adequately and thus have misapplied them to Yeats' art.Chapter 6 contrasts Yeats' poetry with that of Rabindranath Tagore. Yeats failed to realize Tagore's motivation when Tagore referred to God. Yeats claimed that all reference to Cod was vague and that he disliked Tagore's mysticism. This lack of understanding on Yeats' part, I suggest, further supports the thesis that Yeats' use of Eastern religion constitutes transformations which do not reflect Upanishad philosophy but instead reflect a Yeatsian version of those concepts--a version which many critics have not clearly elucidated. / Department of English

Rabindranath Tagore, Nobel Prize winning Bengali poet and polymath, is an eminent figure in the history and culture of modern India. As the Indian Independence Movement grew in the early twentieth century, Tagore used his renown to establish a university in the rural community of Santiniketan: Visva-Bharati, “where the world meets in a single nest.” All of Tagore’s efforts — artistic, educational, and social — were informed by a universalist philosophy that he developed based on the Upanishads. Tagore’s philosophy facilitated unity between all creation, including harmony between the peoples of humanity and between humanity and the natural world. The architecture of Santiniketan is a tangible manifestation of Tagore’s philosophy. Designed under his direction by his associates Nandalal Bose, Rathindranath Tagore, and Surendranath Kar, Tagore’s residences at Santiniketan, in particular the houses Udayan and Shyamali, illustrate Tagore’s universalism in two primary ways. The designs unify a diverse set of traditions within a Modernist framework, and provide for maximum interaction between indoor and outdoor spaces. Udayan is a synthesis of Indian, Japanese, Javanese, and European designs, finding commonalities in the traditions through abstraction and modern materials. Shyamali also draws from a variety of influences and, in service to a connection between man and nature, the design blurs the boundaries between indoors and outdoors by using the natural material of mud. The architecture of Santiniketan, because it is a product of Tagore’s unique values, does not fit easily within the major trends of Modernist architecture in India or beyond. It is best evaluated as a single thread in the contrapuntal nature of Modernism.

Note:

Rabindranath Tagore (1861-1941) is often considered the most important literary figure in modern Bengali history. He lived through the transformation of Bengali culture and society from colonial to anticolonial to post-colonial times. Tagore was a playwright, novelist, philosopher, and songwriter. He wrote and composed nearly 2,500 songs, called Rabindrasangeet. My interlocutors ascribe Tagore’s songs with a particular affective strength that has become a medium for the construction of diasporic identity. In this dissertation, I explore the lives of three generations of women – from precolonial Bengal, post-independence Bengal, and the modern diaspora – and the types of movement they have experienced. I identify a rupture between the familiar and the immediate that accompanies their movement, and characterize this rupture as creating space for multiple identities, reflections, and intimacies, and the continuous building, dismantling, and rebuilding of culture. I argue that the genre of Rabindrasangeet forms and reforms in the diaspora through embodied processes of micro-level performance. Through friendships, kinships, inter-generational relationships, and technologically mediated connections, Rabindrasangeet remains present. It is a tool for self-making, and used to convey unspoken feelings in a gendered world.

In the wake of the First World War, reformers across the Western world questioned laissez-faire liberalism, the self-oriented and market-driven ruling doctrine of the nineteenth century. This philosophy was blamed, variously, for the war, for industrialisation and for urbanisation; for a way of life shorn of any meaning beyond getting and keeping; for the too great faith in materialism and in science; and for the loss of a higher, transcendent meaning that gave a unifying altruistic or spiritual purpose to individual existence and to society as a whole. For many, the cure to these ills lay in reforming the liberal social framework in ways that made it more fulfilling to the whole person and that strengthened ties between individuals. Dartington Hall was an outstanding practical example of this impulse to promote holistic, integrated living. It was a well-financed, internationally-minded social and cultural experiment set up on an estate in South Devon in 1925 by American heiress Dorothy Elmhirst (née Whitney) and her second husband, Leonard, son of a Yorkshire squire-parson. The Elmhirsts' project for redressing the effects of laissez-faire liberalism had two components. Instead of being treated as atomised individuals in the capitalist market, participants at Dartington were to achieve full self-realisation through a 'life in its completeness' that incorporated the arts, education and spirituality. In addition, through their active participation in running the community, they were to demonstrate how integrated democracy could bring about the perfection of individuals and the progress of society as a whole. The Elmhirsts hoped that Dartington would provide a globally applicable model for a better way of life. This thesis is a close study of Dartington's interlinked constellation of experiments in education, the arts, agriculture and social organisation - experiments that can only be understood by tracing them back to their shared roots in the idea of 'life in its completeness'. At the same time, it explores how Dartington's philosophy and trajectory illuminate the wider reform landscape. The Elmhirsts' community echoed and cross-pollinated with other schemes for social improvement in Britain, Europe, America and India, as well as feeding into the broad social democratic project in Britain. Dartington's evolution from an independent, elite-led reform project to one split between state-led and communitarian reform matched the trajectory of other such enterprises begun in interwar Britain, making it a bellwether of changes in reformist thinking across the century.

Notre thèse a pour objectif de comprendre comment se sont effectuées l’appropriation et l’utilisation du gandhisme par des nationalistes modernistes dans le contexte colonial vietnamien entre 1919 et 1948. Plus précisément, cette étude examine quelles idées les nationalistes ont retenues du gandhisme et dans quels contextes elles furent discutées. Qu'elles furent les idées et les méthodes du gandhisme qu’ils ont privilégié. Comment ces idées et ces méthodes furent-elles appropriées? Comment les éléments retenus furent-ils ensuite diffusés et utilisés par ces nationalistes? Comment les enseignements du gandhisme inspirèrent-ils les solutions proposées par les modernistes? Nous arguons que, validés par la force et la puissance du mouvement nationaliste indien, les concepts et méthodes politiques proposées par le gandhisme devinrent, pour ces colonisés, des outils pouvant les aider à réformer leur propre société pour qu’elle retrouve son autonomie politique. Notre travail est divisé en deux sections. La première section qui comporte le chapitre 1 est une présentation du contexte matériel et humain dans lequel les textes ont été écrits et lus. Le but est de nous aider à mieux comprendre les éléments qui influencèrent l'appropriation du gandhisme au Việt Nam. Le chapitre analyse le monde de l’imprimé au Việt Nam, ses aspects matériels (technologiques) et économiques de même que les aspects humains comme les producteurs et les consommateurs d’information. Le chapitre 1 discute également de l’environnement politique du monde de l’information; les conditions dans lesquelles les journalistes et les écrivains vietnamiens travaillèrent comme les différentes lois régissant la publication de livres, revues ou journaux et les différentes formes de censures étatiques. Pour finir, le chapitre décortique différentes réceptions du gandhisme à l'étranger et dans la diaspora indienne ayant influencé l'appropriation du gandhisme au Việt Nam. La seconde section de notre travail porte sur les représentations du gandhisme par les Vietnamiens entre 1919 et 1948. Nous présentons dans quatre chapitres les différents thèmes abordés dans les textes portant sur le gandhisme. Ces quatre chapitres discutent de différentes formes de nationalismes inspirées par le gandhisme et proposées pour aider les Vietnamiens à retrouver leur autonomie politique. Le chapitre deux discute du nationalisme culturel pour lequel les réformes allaient régénérer la société vietnamienne par l’éducation et rendre la société vietnamienne apte à diriger sa destinée. Le chapitre trois continue la discussion sur le nationalisme culturel de ces modernistes en démontrant comment les débats entourant le pan-asianisme et l'universalisme humaniste défendu par Rabindranath Tagore purent leur représenter une affirmation identitaire et une légitimité morale. Le chapitre quatre se penche sur le nationalisme économique chez qui le gandhisme fut un exemple d’affirmation nationale basée sur le développement de leviers économiques et le contrôle sur les ressources. Le chapitre cinq discute de la représentation du gandhisme principalement sous un angle politique en présentant les débats sur la violence entourant les satyagrahas gandhiens comme un miroir tendu au Français et proposer des solutions pour éviter les mêmes problèmes au Việt Nam. À travers ses différentes solutions culturelles, économiques et politiques proposées par ces modernistes, le récit sur le nationalisme vietnamien tente de répondre aux préoccupations des acteurs du moment et représenter une conception du nationalisme vietnamien durant la période coloniale.

This thesis concentrates on literature during India's battle for independence from the British Empire. These publications look at the outcomes of Europe's intent to colonize and its impact on the marginalized, colonial subjects down to the personal level. Delving into the tragic reality of colonialism and investigating its impact as portrayed in the novels selected, this thesis argues that the selected texts operate as resistance literature subverting the colonial discourse in retrieving South Asian culture and history. This project explores specific forms of resistance within the tropes of memory, history, and gender to pose a larger question of decolonial futures in the postcolonial aftermath. The explorations of Ahmed Ali's Twilight in Delhi, Rabindranath Tagore's The Home and the World, and R.K. Narayan's Waiting for the Mahatma all represent multiple ways of studying the independence movement in their resistance frame. Analyzing these works through a postcolonial perspective unveils underrepresented voices and the intricacies of the Independence landscape. Ahmed Ali incorporates nostalgia as an argument for abolition and articulates Muslim identity in India's rapidly transforming environment. Tagore writes from his real experiences, recounting the confusion and disarray that plagued the Independence movement as disputes erupted on how to fight for India's sovereignty. R.K. Narayan embraces the ‘Quit India' protest and Gandhi's pacifist ideals while worrying about the future after the Mahatma's death. These writers decolonize readers' minds, and campaign for India's independence against the Empire Such literature gives the colonized a voice as they actively resist the British colonization in every aspect of existence.

Kabīr stands as one of the most, if not the most, influential nirguṇbhakti poet of the so-called Sant movement in northern India during the 15th century. Even though his fame is far and widely spread, there is no extensive historical evidence regarding his own life. The understanding one might have surrounding Kabīr is mostly inspired by his poems, or following the information which is available through the rich traditions regarding Kabīr, mostly authored by his followers in the Kabīr Panth. His critical view on high caste society, and rough rhetoric regarding the institutionalized religious traditions of his era, made him a victim of hate and violence during his lifetime. After his death, this rough rhetoric and critical view, ignited a full on dispute between Hindus and Muslims on the subject of which group he belonged to. The teachings of Kabīr has not only sparked an interest in the field of academia but also in movies, literature and theater alike. The latter is the main subject of interest for this paper. The renowned Indian writer Bhisham Sahni has during his life been recognized as one of the most influential writers in the so-called Nayī Kahānī movement, which sprung from a new found vision of the future after Indian independence 1947. Sahnis is mostly famous for his novels and short stories, with such titles as Tamas and Amṛtsar ā gayā hai. But in this paper we shall instead take a closer look into his play Kabirā khaḍā bazār meṃ and how Kabīr is portrayed and understood by Sahni, as well as, if and how Sahni’s Kabīr can be understood within a comparative analysis with how he is portrayed in the introduction to Rabindranath Tagore’s One hundred poems of Kabir by Evelyn Underhill and in Linda Hess’s The Bījak of Kabīr.

Thesis advisors: Kevin Kopelson, Priya Kumar. Includes bibliographic references (p. 182-188).

BEZERRA, Emília Passos de Oliveira. A liberdade nomeada: leituras de Cecília Meireles para Cânticos. 2007. 136 f. Dissertação (Mestrado em Letras) – Universidade Federal do Ceará, Departamento de Literatura, Programa de Pós-Graduação em Letras, Fortaleza-CE, 2007. / Submitted by Liliane oliveira (morena.liliane@hotmail.com) on 2012-06-26T11:59:05Z No. of bitstreams: 1 2007_DIS_EPOBEZERRA.pdf: 1222968 bytes, checksum: e2bd1e14a06127ffddc8459750084249 (MD5) / Approved for entry into archive by Maria Josineide Góis(josineide@ufc.br) on 2012-06-27T15:06:16Z (GMT) No. of bitstreams: 1 2007_DIS_EPOBEZERRA.pdf: 1222968 bytes, checksum: e2bd1e14a06127ffddc8459750084249 (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2012-06-27T15:06:16Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 2007_DIS_EPOBEZERRA.pdf: 1222968 bytes, checksum: e2bd1e14a06127ffddc8459750084249 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2007 / The dissertation examines the work Songs, Cecilia Meireles, highlighting the historical context-cultural, ideological and artistic of the twentieth century, from the close relationship of literature produced by the poet with the mysticism of the philosophies of the East, in particular, Buddhism, with the mystical poetry of the Indian poet Rabindranath Tagore and the speeches of peace Mahatma Gandhi and Vinoba Bhave. The work of the poetic corpus, still uses to support the writer Complete Poetry, the critical study conducted by Amy Zagury, "Cecília Meireles: news biographical, critical study, anthology, literature, discography, the score," and in the testimony of letters, interviews, books and chronic prefaciados as princiapal refuge. Using the methods descriptive, analytical, interpretive-comparison, the search is divided into five stages, where: "Initial considerations", "The twentieth century", "Songs - named Freedom," "The Bilbioteca way" and, finally, as a conclusion, "The uniqueness of mystical corner." / A dissertação analisa a obra Cânticos, de Cecilia Meireles, destacando o contexto histórico-cultural, ideológico e artístico do século XX, a partir do estreito relacionamento da literatura produzida pelo poeta com o misticismo das filosofias do Oriente, em específico, o Budismo, com a poesia mística do poeta indiano Rabindranath Tagore e os discursos pacifistas de Mahatma Gandhi e Vinoba Bhave. O trabalho parte do corpus poético, utiliza ainda como apoio a Poesia Completa da escritora, o estudo crítico realizado por Eliane Zagury, em "Cecília Meireles: notícia biográfica, estudo crítico, antologia, bibliografia, discografia, partitura", e os depoimentos constantes de cartas, entrevistas, livros prefaciados e crônicas como amparo princiapal. Utilizando os métodos descritivo, analítico, interpretativo-comparativo, a pesquisa divide-se em cinco momentos, sendo: "Considerações iniciais", "O século XX", "Cânticos - A Liberdade nomeada", " A Bilbioteca via" e, finalmente, como conclusão, "A singularidade do canto místico".