If some think that there can be no pleasure better than what thrills their senses, some other try to have it from what provokes their intellect and satisfies their aesthetic sense. Some such persons get pleasure from reading poetry: while others, by writing it. If at one moment their job is akin to the one which John Keats had when he first read Chapman's translation of homer, at another moment it is the all engrossing pleasure which Keats had when he wrote the Grecian Urn and thought that a thing of beauty is a joy for ever, In face when some of us prefer to read the Meghaduta to listening to pedestrian film songs it is a question of our taste and concept of pleasure.
Whether we are the pensive men of Milton's it penseroso or the cheerful man of L' Allegro, pleasure remains the sole purpose of our life. In that case we love to read War and peace instead of seeing the filmed version of the novel though distributors and exhibitors may lure us by tempting advertisements. Then we prefer a Satyajit Ray's film to the beat-film which is not so great a box-hit that it runs for fifty weeks. A question of taste, of course nothing else.
Whether we are the pensive men of Milton's it penseroso or the cheerful man of L' Allegro, pleasure remains the sole purpose of our life. In that case we love to read War and peace instead of seeing the filmed version of the novel though distributors and exhibitors may lure us by tempting advertisements. Then we prefer a Satyajit Ray's film to the beat-film which is not so great a box-hit that it runs for fifty weeks. A question of taste, of course nothing else.
And he who writes lyrics though living in penury does so because it instills in him a feeling of joy when words become liquid emotions at his command. The pursuit may not make him a Nobel Laureate or a national poet; but if we take away the muse from him and give him everything else which mostly people long for, he languishes like a young maiden parted from her lover.
No joy other than the one which such an impassioned soul gets by writing poetry can be a substitute. The purpose of his life is to enjoy it in the requested company of his Muse. Ghalib might have written letters to his patron friends complaining about his poverty, but we wonder if life would have been so pleasant to him if he had goblets of wine, but had been not writing ghazals.
No less is painters' passion for life. They might long for love as Van Gogh did, but the fountain head of their joy is their capacity to transform pigments into silent yet eloquent figures, calm yet whispering nature, triangle and squares yet symbols of human urges. Living in privation, spurning life of comfort like Paul Gauguin and living in self-imposed exile, they find the pursuit of their art the only thing that can make them have a sense of fulfillment and joy. We do not know whether Michelangelo's urge was joy that he got from his frescoes or anything else. Some psycho-analyst pr sociologist would throw better light on it.
Whatever people, who think that women and wine alone can make one's life joyful, might say about such musicians as Tavi Shanker and Bismillah khan (to nameonly a few). Abt Vogler's sole joy was music. So it was with Bach and Beethoven. Sehgal might have loved his bottle and money bag that his acting in films never let deplete. But it was vocal music which gave him the feeling of enjoying life. Had it not been so, he would have not cared to subject himself to rigid discipline of the voice and practice (riaz) but for which no classical singer can sing. Without a feeling he would have remained contented with his job as a clerk.
[ Part 1] [ Part 3]
No joy other than the one which such an impassioned soul gets by writing poetry can be a substitute. The purpose of his life is to enjoy it in the requested company of his Muse. Ghalib might have written letters to his patron friends complaining about his poverty, but we wonder if life would have been so pleasant to him if he had goblets of wine, but had been not writing ghazals.
No less is painters' passion for life. They might long for love as Van Gogh did, but the fountain head of their joy is their capacity to transform pigments into silent yet eloquent figures, calm yet whispering nature, triangle and squares yet symbols of human urges. Living in privation, spurning life of comfort like Paul Gauguin and living in self-imposed exile, they find the pursuit of their art the only thing that can make them have a sense of fulfillment and joy. We do not know whether Michelangelo's urge was joy that he got from his frescoes or anything else. Some psycho-analyst pr sociologist would throw better light on it.
Whatever people, who think that women and wine alone can make one's life joyful, might say about such musicians as Tavi Shanker and Bismillah khan (to nameonly a few). Abt Vogler's sole joy was music. So it was with Bach and Beethoven. Sehgal might have loved his bottle and money bag that his acting in films never let deplete. But it was vocal music which gave him the feeling of enjoying life. Had it not been so, he would have not cared to subject himself to rigid discipline of the voice and practice (riaz) but for which no classical singer can sing. Without a feeling he would have remained contented with his job as a clerk.
[ Part 1] [ Part 3]
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