Of Truth, Beauty, Bullying & Washing Dishes
Inspired once to win a Hindi poetry-writing competition in school, I wrote about 25 lines in monorhymed verse. Titled Soorat (face), the poem talked about the buzzing of bees, the chirping of birds and such things that seem beautiful to us. It then pointed out things like the cry of a beggar that are associated with the ugly (or bad). In the ultimate stanza, the poem chided humans for always judging what is good-bad or ugly-pretty, thereby appointing a soorat to everything in this world. Sadly, I won no prizes, but I must admit that I still am very proud of that little creation and it is my inspiration for this piece.
One of my favorite poems by Keats ends with two of the most popular and discussed lines in all of his works. The poem is ‘An Ode to the on a Grecian Urn’ and the lines are:
Beauty is truth, truth beauty,–that is all
Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know
In this article, I intend to add my two cents to the analysis of these lines.
Recently, I had the privilege of sharing an apartment with two wonderful ladies, separately. Let’s name them V and W. While living with W, it so happened that I once decided to wash all the dirty dishes. When W attempted to stop me, I produced a wonderful philosophy which, I would like to believe, baffled her and put her protests to rest. I said, “It’s a sin to deny me the kaarya (work) I have chosen for myself. Resultantly, you are almost calling me bekaar (useless).” However, as fate would have it, once while living with V, she started washing all the dishes. Now just as I was about to stop her from doing so, I realized what I had gotten myself into. On the one hand was chivalry - a societal norm and a cultural inbred - while on the other hand was philosophical hypocrisy. I decided to let V go ahead and wash all the dishes down to the last tablespoon.
Again recently, a few friends and I began talking about ragging in schools and colleges. There were 2 ladies – Y and Z; and 4 guys – B, C, D and me. Lady Y was adamant that ragging is uncivilized and that no one in this world has the right to force his or her view on another person, apart from that person’s parents. Lady Z echoed Y’s feelings and added that ragging is a more common phenomenon among men/boys due to a hunger for power and instinctive aggression. Y agreed, and stated that there was no point where a line can be drawn beyond which ragging can’t be justified; such is human nature if let free. B, D and I have attended boarding schools while C and D have been freshmen in Indian colleges. Lady Y, admittedly, had gone through ragging herself – but I think you would agree that ragging in a day school hardly measures up to a hostel’s standards. B’s stand was clearly in favor of ragging; he brought out the fact that ragging straightens out irregularities and prepares one to face the outside world. C agreed but added that there is a limit to ragging and as soon as it gets down to physical abuse/routine, it was avoidable. D was the quietest amongst us all but kept asserting his long-held and oft-expressed belief that a boarding school is the best place to send your kids and that it makes them finer people who command greater respect.
However, what is more important to this article is my stand in that whole argument (of course!). Contrary to what I have always believed and practiced in 6 years of life in Doon, I stood with the guys. Most of you who have had long discussions (as a group) with me involved, know that I almost always seek to even things out by taking up the weaker side irrespective of what I believe – be it about abortion, nationalism or Narendra Modi. However, here, where both sides were evenly matched (yes, the ladies were vehement enough to cancel out the numerical disadvantage) I agreed whole-heartedly with B while bringing in dimensions that I myself used to refute back in high school. I showed a slight disrespect for rights and individuality and slowly brought the whole argument to a compromise that there exists a system and all need to follow this system in order to get accustomed to life in the big, bad world - a system that can, however, be done away with.
Keats’ Urn declares that truth and beauty are the same - Satyam Shivam Sundaram1. To humans caught in the passion of living this saying often comes across as too philosophical or too abstract.
What is my truth?
As in the second case, is it what I believe or what I should believe in? My disposition to often argue contrary to self-held views is something that has become a habit since high school debating. Are my views my truth or that tendency to do the unconventional? Or as in the first case (washing dishes), does it depend on what I think I should do or what is expected of me? I am not devoid of chivalry - I would hold the door open for a lady, or drop her back to her doorstep in the dead of the night. Is this gallantry my truth or my perspective that any and every type of work is worship? Or indeed, in this case, avoiding indulgence in hypocrisy?
What is (more) beautiful?
Chivalry or honesty towards myself? Intellectual equilibrium in a discussion, or honesty to others?
The answer to these questions is not only relative, but also a very personal issue. However, it is in these dilemmas and these questions that one sees how closely related beauty and truth can get – in the form of one’s inner truth, the choices made and the lesson learned. One may take this abrupt ending to be an ‘open to interpretation’ kind of let off that I am pampering myself with; however, truth is, I consider one’s faculty to be one’s inner truth and the finest example of how truth is the same as beauty. After all, my Math major friends and all calculus patrons will agree that two things can be proven to be equal if the difference between them can be shown to be arbitrarily small.
Footnote:
1Popular adage that says that each of the three – truth, virtue & beauty – are characterized and explained by the other two
Photo Courtesy: rei-san, mezzoblue
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haha your article is like you! confusing but fun and always thought-provoking. Although I think the examples will confuse people not directly involved in the incident.
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@ Simrat
Well, I hope you aren’t proved right.
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“One may take this abrupt ending to be an ‘open to interpretation’ kind of let off that I am pampering myself with; however, truth is, I consider one’s faculty to be one’s inner truth and the finest example of how truth is the same as beauty. “
I’m lost.
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Finding the subtle connections between paragraphs proved to be hard. nevertheless an interesting account of everyday things and questions one asks himself but is too lazy to answer.
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@ neon
Through the two incidents I have shown that there often arise a bunch of conflicts and in seeking to answer these questions when one turns to his/her Inner Self/Truth - that there is the finest exhibition of beauty being the same as truth. What seems to be impractical when said by Keat’s Urn to a person caught in the rat race of the 21st century is actually present in every question she/he answers.
@ Augustine
I made no attempt to synthesize the different paragraphs till the very end - you are right. There was purpose to it and infact it is what makes me, all the more, appreciate the picture (fork) we chose for the article. It is perfect! Thanks for the kind words.
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Truth is necessarily not beautiful. Imagine a child kneeling in front of an armed guerrilla soldier, a gun pressed to his forehead. Now watch as the child closes his eyes expecting to be shot. Then you hear a sharp bang. The child is on the ground. Dead. The truth is sometimes ugly. Denying the ugliness of the earth serves nothing but to propagate the ugliness. When good men do nothing, evil wins. Truth is objective. Beauty is not. While beauty can sometimes be found in truth, truth cannot always be found in beauty.
My vivid description serves only along with your cry of poverty to contrast with signs of happiness. Claiming the cry of poverty is beautiful feels wrong to such an extent for me because saying something beautiful is akin to recognizing and approving its existence. And in that, I find a pressing danger.
In lumen , verum
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Raving Reply:
April 23rd, 2009 at 1:34 pm
There is a morbid beauty in what you call ugly things too. But it is beautiful nonetheless. Your child execution can have all the aesthetic beauty of a rose if it is framed properly. Many middle class americans hang sepia pictures of slums in their halls and this to them moves them more then famous pieces of art. Also out of immense suffering comes many great works of art, literature and music and what after all is a tragedy?
You said: “Claiming the cry of poverty is beautiful feels wrong to such an extent for me because saying something beautiful is akin to recognizing and approving its existence. And in that, I find a pressing danger.”
Your claim that the beauty in a cry of poverty is wrong reveals much of your character. The poet who sings about chirping of birds and the buzzing of the bees is shallow as demonstrated by Vaibhav, and you are only identifying with this lack of intellectual depth, while not proving anything and furthermore trying to drag your ethics kicking and screaming into a conversation about asthetics.
Also, to discuss this morality of yours, you say that the recognition of poverty is a pressing danger? you do not acknowledge the existance of poverty? surely that is not what you meant to say, but it is clearly what you have said.
I apologize to everybody on this board for my attitude and my lack of consideration for Ravi’s feelings.
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Vaibhav (author) Reply:
April 23rd, 2009 at 4:09 pm
@ Raving
Don’t ever apologize for having spoken your mind out.
I like the point that you have brought out. However, as you recognize yourself, your tone is unnecessarily harsh. For that, apology accepted.
I think Ravi’s focus was on the word “approving” wherein he was suggesting that, the poet, in leveling happiness and the crying beggar, is suggesting that nothing be done to help that poor man or to ease his pains. He is not saying that he doesn’t recognize poverty.
In a way, he is right, because the focus of the line is on the word ‘cry’. When I wrote that poem I was a teenager and I was questioning labels like “good-bad” “pleasant-disgusting” “smart-dumb” etcetera.
However, that is, as you have recognized, not all what the poet says in those lines. The poet (which, by the way, is me
) condemns the attitude/interaction of those who label these things as ugly and face away. The focus in the line should rightly be on the beggar and not poverty and that is what is being called beautiful.
Mother Teresa and her open arms is the what comes to my mind when I want you to picture the alternative.
Your point about the aesthetic beauty is well put.
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Swami Vivekanand, Jr. has done a good job. Kudos.
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@ Hari
“Truth is necessarily not beautiful. Imagine a child … truth cannot always be found in beauty.”
See when I say that these lines by Keats are popular and highly discussed, I understate or play down the amount these lines have been debated on. Saying, ‘To humans caught in the passion of living this saying often comes across as too philosophical or too abstract’, I attempt to trace that very end of the debate that you are on.
However, I will attempt to answer your vivid example by focusing on the soldier, saying that there still remains the question of whether or not he is indulging in mindless slaughter - whether his faculty is involved or not. If it is then, he has made a choice, with full capability, to eliminate the child and that is his truth. The child may or may not wish to die and that is his/her truth but in full possession of his/her faculties, he can still make decisions (fight back, play dead, prepare for death etc.) and that there is beauty. Remember, beauty isn’t just aesthetic, it can be natural and/or poetic.
“My vivid description … And in that, I find a pressing danger.”
That poem laments the power of ‘I’ and ‘me’ that we humans have become subservient to and that dictate what we feel about things. Admit it, it’s a sweet poem
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@ Aditya
Thanks … for the title and the kind words, I guess
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I didn’t understand the last 2 paragraphs at all
But thanks for introducing me to those lines by Keats, and connecting them up with Satyam Shivam Sundaram. I’d never thought to ask what it meant.
Recent studies show that the faces we consider beautiful are also the least memorable, the most easily forgotten. Moreover, the faces we consider beautiful are easily influenced. Live in africa for six months, and you are more likely to find large lips beautiful. It seems our brains maintain a continual average of the faces we’ve seen in the last 6-12 months, and ‘beauty’ is merely the delta wrt that average.
I’m not sure that’s a propos of anything you wrote
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@ Kartik
“I didn’t understand … I’d never thought to ask what it meant.”
Based on the two incidents I have tried to show that there often arise a bunch of conflicts and in seeking to answer these questions when one turns to his/her Inner Self/Truth - that there is the finest exhibition of beauty being the same as truth. What seems to be impractical when said by Keat’s Urn to a person caught in the rat race of the 21st century is actually present in every question she/he attempts to answer. That is what I’m trying to say towards the end.
“Recent studies show that the faces … anything you wrote ”
HAHA … probably not
That study make a lot of sense’ though.
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i remember you writing that poem in school….
I believe that as soon as the word MY truth comes, for me it would be what i believe in, which may differ from the Universal truth or what others believe in. Although some may argue that there is a small line between Strongly believing in yourself and being arrogant, i think believing in what i do rather than what others expect gives me a greater possibility of thinking abstract and doing something off the page.
and as for beauty,… i guess it lies in the eye of the beholder….
And i guess for me, the beauty of these things is the possibility of so many different interpretations by each individual..
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you don’t always seek the truth, but you still think it’s beautiful. I think I actually get it!!
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This article raises a beautiful (forgive the word choice) question, and I applaud you, Vaibhav, for it.
I have a younger brother in 11th grade, and I am so often tempted to exact terms of protection and shelter I would never have tolerated had they been laid on me. In this, I find a noble objective: the well-being of my younger sibling, and then a, like you said, hypocritical one: that I wouldn’t have accepted that attention even if we’re labeled protection and “for your own good”.
I greatly enjoyed this article, and it by no means was confusing; rather artistic and spontaneous, lacking organization while preserving interest.
Thanks for the read,
Anand
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@ Varun
haha .. yeah dude. I remember it got published in Prayas though
What you have said is a very proactive way of living it out. It’s tolerant, yet not lacking of self-esteem. Kudos, buddy !
@ Vaishnavi
But like always, I have trouble getting you !
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@ Anand
Thank You ! But I do hope you agree that this article does better without transitions or organization.
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This is what I like about philosophy. It could be so objective, yet so imaginatively subjective, and it continues to challenge us. =)
I like how you ended it btw….
I am impressed!
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Kisi shaayar ne Kiya khub kaha hey
“Khaar bhi hote hein gulshan mein shareek,
sirf guloon se gulistaan hua nahin karte.”
As for the thought process of the article is concerned, the persona is fine but the permutation can vary from one person to the other according to ones upbringing.
The perspective part of ones thought process should be more versatile than monotonous as in todays world life is not as cool and easy as the boarding.
Truth & Beauty are the right and left hands of nature. To be a visionary, think more deeply about the different facets of life is what is refining all about. Perceptions keep on variating according to age process but fundamentals remain the same. The mix and match of both has been done justice with to an extent.
Keep it up…..good work. I rate it 4.25.
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@ Gunjan
What you have said is very profound indeed. Thank you for the encouragement.
@ Rajan
For the benefit of some of this readership, the above couplet roughly translates to:
“Thorns too are very much a part of a blossom
Petals alone don’t make up the blooming gardens”
I accept your criticism, dad.
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Hey Vaibhav
I read this yesterday and it’s a very interesting perspective. I especially like the use of Keats to illustrate a point I would not have associated with the poem. As far as rating goes, It’s a great thought-provoking which is perhaps written a little confusingly (for me personally, maybe not for everyone else).
Great work
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@ MZ
Keats’ lines - the ones referred to - have been debated over for many years by analysts; subject being whether these lines were meant to be said by the urn/vase to humanity or the speaker to the urn. In turn, most analysts either argue that:
1. Passions keep humans from always being beautiful, or from always being true. So, the speaker laments about human limitations
2. The urn teaches us a lesson and sets out an ideal visible only to those who are beyond all complications of human life.
I have exemplified one’s faculty and attempted to argue that in the small choices one makes and in every referral made to one’s inner self/truth, truth and beauty are found intertwined.
Interesting, btw, is my pet word
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I think you need to work on paragraph transitions and a slightly smoother tail off, but otherwise a good peice of reading!
Maybe the mr x and mr y is throwing people off but apart from that no complaints, bro.
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I guess being a former Literature student; I was more occupied in trying to weave Keats’ lines into the illustrations you’ve provided in this piece. From my understanding, the poem basically seeks to show us that there are human limitations when it comes to grasping and appreciating the ‘truth’ of the ways and days of the past. (Hence, the poem begins with questions about the pictures of figures on the urn, the persona is trying to seek answers but to no avail as the urn is just an artwork which gives us the pleasure of knowing its beauty but not its truth. The figures are stagnant, their beauty preserved but the truth of their existence, their lives, their ways remain vague)
And so, the final lines ‘Beauty is truth, truth beauty….’ consolidate the Romantic notion of art as being timeless and as long we appreciate the aesthetic that is all that matters. This is my interpretation of the lines and your article has definitely provided me with a different perspective. I enjoyed reading it, felt more like leafing through fragments of paper!
I did have trouble understanding a few of the underlying elements – inner truth/beauty/one’s faculty/connecting factors because they seem too abstract to me (too caught up in the passion of living, I must say!).
But then again, sometimes, truth is abstract and so is beauty
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@ AK
I accept your criticism. Thanks for the comment.
@ Divya
“I enjoyed reading it, felt more like leafing through fragments of paper!”
That brings a smile to my face. So ….
I agree that a lot of things dealt with in this article are abstract and may not even, necessarily, fit one’s philosophical dictionary. However, I did try and use words like inner self ( to suggest ’soul’) for those more comfortable with that. At the end it should come down to the clarity of my article and the perspective of the reader.
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Nice article.
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Thanks !
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I too think it’s a neat new perspective on things we usually tend to take for granted - that’s always nice. Putting it in a new context - that’s great. Of course, I love the ending - killer! Structure is a bit unconventional - that’s a plus in my book.
Interesting questions to ask - A completely different ball game to actually attempt answering them! Thanks for setting us off on a meandering walk in the realms of.. err whatever, you get it. Waters are bound to be murky, but that goes with the territory eh
Forgive half-hearted attempts at metaphorical allusions.
So, One’s faculty is one’s inner truth? Let’s save that conversation for somewhere else shall we?!
PS I was wondering: Ode to the Grecian Urn sounds better but it’s actually Ode ON A Grecian Urn isn’t it?
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@ Div
Yes, It is. Thanks for bringing the typo to my notice.
And yes, for an existentialist like me, that equation works
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hey really sorry for late reply
i like it a lot it was realy unique and different ,as it took time 4r me 2 understand it completely…
goodwork i grade u 4
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Don’t feel the need to reply to me on here–that’s why we have GChat, Vaibs.
Firstly, I hate Keats. I do. I’m sorry.
And I guess really the overarching thing I have to say about this piece is that I now know why you’re always playing devil’s advocate with me.
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@ Nidhi
Thanks !
Never too late
@ Muneezeh
I guess you mean you hate Keats’ poetry.
Are they too abstract? Does he whine too much? I’m sure you have better reasons.
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I hope next time I have to do the household some man is around me who will share the same views and take the job off my hands!
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Vaibhav (author) Reply:
April 6th, 2009 at 1:31 pm
@ Vanita
Haha. So long as you know your truth, the world is in equilibrium. Which by the way, isn’t necessary the most perfect state, but that’ll make for another article/conversation.
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Why am I reading this again?
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Vaibhav (author) Reply:
May 5th, 2009 at 2:50 am
It’s philosophy. I encourage you to read it every time you need it or are reminded of it. If you found it vague, then trust that it will grow on you. If neither happens, then it is a failure on the writer’s part.
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