SOME SEGMENTS OF A RIVER

A writer examines Western poetry through the lens of an Eastern mystic.

After spending over a decade studying the philosophy and ashrams of Abhinavagupta, an influential Indian mystic affiliated with the nondualist tradition of Trika Shaivism, Franklin was struck by “surprising analogies between the metaphysics and aesthetics” of the mystic and the works of English Romantic and American Neo-Romantic poets. Despite contrived narratives of East versus West and the West’s intellectual proclivity to put even the most abstract spiritual ideas into “categorical niches,” the author believes all great works of art, including Western poetry, are “preceded by a kind of powerful, preconscious, synoptic intuition” that connects the poets to a greater spiritual consciousness beyond themselves. The book begins with a lengthy introduction to Abhinavagupta’s metaphysical philosophies, which Franklin believes are too often ignored both in the West and India in favor of his more well-known writings on aesthetics. The volume’s largest chapter is devoted to the work of Pulitzer Prize–winning poet Wallace Stevens. In detailed, stanza-by-stanza analyses of a myriad of Stevens’ poems, the author makes compelling analogies between Abhinavagupta’s centuries-old philosophies and the 20th-century works of the American poet. Though it is clear Franklin has a preference for, and perhaps even a spiritual connection to, Stevens, other chapter-length comparisons are made between Abhinavagupta and the English Romantic poets John Keats, Percy Shelley, and William Blake. Particular emphasis is placed on Blake’s notion of “the Poetic Genius,” which does not suggest that a poet acts as a “passive medium or channeler taking dictation from heavenly voices.” Blake’s views correspond with the author’s own brand of metaphysics that believes that Eastern mystics like Abhinavagupta and Western poets “tap into this power of the ongoing act of Consciousness as pure, self-knowing awareness” and that their “acts of imagination” are “energized by this ineffable power.”

Similar intriguing connections between East and West are made beyond the realm of poetry. For example, both the Christian saint Teresa of Avila and the Indian saint Ramakrishna share ecstatic visions of a spiritual plane and energy beyond themselves, be it with the Christians’ Jesus or the Hindus’ Divine Mother. Though Franklin deliberately sets himself apart from scholars (whom he disparages as “academic high priests”), he studied verse at Harvard, obtained an MFA in creative writing from Brown University, earned an MA in English literature from Columbia University, and has published two books of poetry. Indeed, his analysis of 19th- and 20th-century poetry is as learned and sophisticated as one would find in an academic publication, just without the footnotes to other scholars. His in-depth examination of the works of Stevens is particularly erudite and may even contain valuable revelations of interest to the academic scholars Franklin dismisses. But those without a strong background in Hinduism and Eastern mysticism may get lost in a sea of obscure references and esoteric philosophies. The book also needs more historical context, both of the Indian and Hindu period in which Abhinavagupta was active and the 19th-century social upheaval that gave rise to Romantic poetry. Though full of fresh insights made between the unlikely pairing of Abhinavagupta and Western poetry, the volume is at times repetitive, particularly in the author’s coy declarations that he is not a scholar.

A flawed but original and striking comparison of an Eastern mystic with Western poets.