Jan 12 is actually the birth anniversary of Swami Vivekananda as well. Hence this small little attempt to understand him a little more.
Most all people know him as a monk, dedicated to ancient Hinduism. That opinion, rather a misconception, as he was actually a very modern, contemporary, progressive, liberal, democratic thinker, would require a proper book to demolish it.
Let me hence present here a side of Vivekananda very few think about. In my opinion, he was an interesting poet. Undoubtedly, he is a great communicator. Remember the very emotive, and hence highly appealing, beginning of the famous Chicago speech? Believe me, that speech about religion, is quite poetic, too. Swamiji uses so many poetic devices, alliteration to allusion, that is, sound to semantics, that reading it is enriching yourself as a reader/author. His rhetoric is anecdotal, too, which gives it a very personalised effect.
Last year, when the G3 paper was not absolutely "career oriented", I taught Swamiji's poem entitled " Peace" that made brilliant use of all the poetic aspects, but especially of a figure of speech called paradox. It was fun explicating it and students enjoyed it, too. Well, I was to write a chapter on Swamiji's poetics as a means of his vision. The project did not come through due to many a reasons. Here is hoping I would soon get a chance to thus explicate and celebrate Swamiji!
Pratima @be a reader to be a poet!
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