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Dr. Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan’s letter to Dilip Kumar Roy

posted Sep 3, 2011, 9:49 PM by Sarat Kumar Sarvepalli   [ updated Sep 3, 2011, 9:58 PM ]

My dear Mr. Dilip Kumar Roy,

Your letter of the 9th instant. I realise that Sri Aurobindo will be very much pre-occupied with other things. But, may I impose on you the real importance of a specific contribution from him for the purposes of this volume. You are possibly aware that for the volume on Contemporary British Philosophy, men like Bossanquet, Bertrand Russell, Haldane and McTaggart, among others, made their contributions. The volume on Contemporary Indian Philosophy will not be worth the name without a statement from Sri Aurobindo. I feel that he will realise the enormous importance of a special contribution for this volume, not for my sake or for his sake, but for the sake of our country. If you do not have a copy of the Contemporary British Philosophy there, on hearing from you, I will send you a volume from which you will get a general idea.

Interesting as this letter to Mr. Chadwick is, I am afraid it will not do as a statement of Sri Aurobindo’s convictions on the central problems of God, Man and his Destiny. If he sets down his thoughts on these problems, we will be able to put it in. You may put a series of questions asking him to state in a summary form his views on God, the nature of the Human Soul, its Destiny, and if you get rounded answers to them, we may possibly use that as his contribution.

I hope you at least realise my anxiety in this whole matter.

I am returning the paper and shall be delighted to see the other thing on the Avatarhood of Rama.

Yours sincerely,

S. Radhakrishnan’
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