- Sri Aurobindo
Sri Aurobindo is one of the supreme masters in Indian English
Literature. His poetry may be divided into two broad groups, i.e., poetry of
action and poetry of meditation. He is not only a poet but also a philosopher,
short story writer and dramatist. He gives charming descriptions of nature in
his writings. Savitri is the epic written by Aurobindo. It marks the
culmination of his poetic career.
Aurobindo's short poem 'The Tiger and the Deer' is a didactic
poem. It is a contrast between good and evil, innocence and experience, and
life and death.
The poem begins with a description of the tiger. The tiger
crouches and slouches brilliantly though the green forest. It has gleaming
eyes, mighty chest and soft soundless paws.
"Brilliant, crouching, slouching, what crept
through the green heart of
the forest,
Gleaming eyes and mighty
chest and soft
soundless paws of
grandeur or murder?"
Generally, people are afraid of
the tiger. They hate it because it is rough and dangerous. In the poem, the
world of tiger stands for death, darkness and arrogance.
The innocent deer drinks water from the great pool in the forest.
It is unaware of the tiger's plan of attack. The tiger crouches slowly to
attack the deer:
“...... the great beast crouched and crept, and crept
and crouched a last time, noiseless, fatal".
Then the fierce tiger has
leaped up over the deer and torn it to pieces. The deer died pathetically
thinking about its mate.
"Destroyed, the mild
harmless beauty by
the strong cruel
beauty in Nature"
The deer in the poem suggests innocence, softness and love. The
killing of the deer by the tiger suggests the death and destruction of healthy
values of life by the cruelty of modern civilization.
The poet closes the poem with a note of optimism. He says that in
spite of the various blows of death and darkness, life is a thing to be
enjoyed. Sufferings are not eternal. He teaches the lesson that those who harm
others will be destroyed like the mammoth. The mammoth shook the plains of Asia
once upon a time. But it is extinct now. Since the tiger kills and harms other
animals, the same fate of mammoth would come to it. But then the deer would
drink without any fear in the cool ponds of the forest. The poet beautifully
tells,
"The mighty perish in their might The slam survive
the slayer".
Thus, the poem expresses the poet's longing for a peaceful and
harmless world.
