107818 SISTER NIVEDITA The Dedicated A BIOGRAPHY OF NIVEDITA by Uzelle Raymond an ASIA book THE JOHN DAY COMPANY NEW YORK. Copyright, 1953, by Lizelle Reymond All rights reserved. This book, or parts thereof, must not be reproduced in any form -without permission. Published by The John Day Company, 62 West 45th Street, New York 36, N.Y., and on the same day in Canada by Long- mans, Green & Company, Toronto. Translated from the French. The author acknowledges gratefully the aid of Katherine Woods in revising and pre- paring this book for American publication. library of Congress Catalog Card Number: 52-12681 Manufactured in the United States of America Preface SEVERAL YEARS ago, in a large city in India, I attended a theatri- cal performance by a remarkable traveling company, semi- professional, made up of some sixty children. At the end of the play the director of the company invited me to the religious service which was always celebrated by the young actors before they had their supper. On an improvised altar behind the scenes had been placed portraits of various gods, prophets, and great men: Gandhi was neighbor to Buddha, and Sri Rama- krishna's portrait stood dose to a Botticelli Madonna* Among all these serene faces, the one which most attracted my attention was that of a Western lady; and my hosts brought the picture to me so that I might look at it closely. It was an Irish* woman who had died a few years before, after devoting all her life to India: Sister Nivedita was the name she bore in India. Lizelle Raymond recounts this life, in pages that are moving in their simple sincerity; the only thing that is left for me to say is how well-known her name is to the people of Bengal, even among the humble and the illiterate. As a matter of fact, Nivedita spent only a few years in India; but her guru, Swami Vivekananda, had given her the key to the country and its people, and she had submitted herself to the austere and exact- ing discipline which enabled her to make use of this key. Her amazing vitality, both multiplied and channeled by that as- cetism and that consecration, was such that even today there is scarcely any field religion, pedagogy, science, art, politics, society in which she did not leave her mark. And all the leaders of India who made the epoch from 1895 to 1914 famous, Were her intimate friends. It is .indeed surprising that forty years after Nivedita's death no real biography of her should yet have been written, apart from some booklets in which Hindu children in their primary school, venerating her name as they study, are learning to read. I asked some friends in India about this, and they smiled. Nivedita's life was too dosely interwoven with the deep waves of spirituality and nationalism started by the under- ground struggle for liberty to be disclosed earlier. The bi- ographer who would relive the life of that history's heroine, in its most daring flights as well as in its deepest secrets, had not yet appeared. For an intimate understanding of this woman, who was both astonishingly multiple and profoundly one, a person was needed who would do the work with the same fire, the same absolute devotion, that Nivedita had felt for India: a person who would be able to enter into all the anguish, all the righteous anger, all the inner experiences, all the joys also, that she herself knew. One of Nivedita's greatest friends, the one whom Swami Wvekananda called "Yum-Yum," had a sudden intuitive feeling, a few years ago, as we sat in her XVIth century house at Strat- ford-on^Avon, that Nivedita's biographer was actually ready and waiting in the person of Lizelle Reymond. And this at once appeared so obvious to us all, that the decision was reached on the spot, and the documents immediately began to pour in from all sides. Archives, huge files of correspondence, the personal recollections of relatives, friends, disciples, and ad- mirersall this piled up quickly. The patient and punctiliously careful biographer spent several years in analyzing all these, verifying them, completing them, comparing them. She traveled all over India to get in personal touch with Nivedita's old friends amongst them many a spiritual and political leader who has now won national fame and to breathe the atmos- phere of the places in which her heroine had lived and worked, loved and suffered. Rich contributions to this vast store of material were made with alacrity by Nivedita's brother and VI sister, by all the monks of the Order of Ramakrishna who had known her and particularly by the late Abbot of the Order Maharaj Swami Vivajananda, by the present Revered head of the Monastery, Swami Shankarananda, who was in his youth her private secretary for several years, as well as Gonen Maharaj; by Hindus who were her intimate friends, such as Sri Auro- bindo, Barindra Ghose, Bhupendranath Dutt, Surendranath Tagore, Ramananda Chatterjee; Western friends like S. K. Rat- cliffe, Lady Margesson, Mr. Sturdy, Miss Josephine MacLeod; and many others too numerous to be named and personally thanked here. And some six hundred autograph signed letters of Nivedita's supplied all the details for the reconstruction of the events of her life. It may surprise some of the men and women who were closely connected with one aspect of her work to discover how manifold were the activities which rounded her life and of which each one only saw one particular facet. The author of this book has risen above any specialized point of view. She has tried to restore to us in its totality, in all its beauty and all its power, this intensely human personality that was Nive- dita. Let us be grateful to her for that. Her book is more than a biography. It is a page from the history of India; it is also a course of instruction, from which each reader will draw what he can understand. Some will find here lessons in energy, and in devotion. Others will discover in these pages the yogi's secret of a balanced life, of that mysterious spiritual treasure which India has carefully prescribed for thousands of years. Others may feel the breath of a still higher inspiration. And all will be true. JEAN HERBERT vn Contents Preface by Jean Herbert Part One: THE QUESTING SOUL 1. A Stranger Comes to India 3 2. An Irish Child 9 2. The Schoolgirl 15 4. Learning as a Teacher 21 5. Meeting 31 6. The Disciple 40 7. Toward the East 54 Part Two: THE GURU 8. Early Impressions 69 9. The First Steps 74 10. "She Who Had Been Dedicated" 84 21. First Fruits 90 12. The Path of Sacrifice 99 13. Uprooted 115 14. Disappointment and Discovery 123 15. lessons in an Interlude 133 16. At the Feet of Sarada Devi 136 17. Zenana 143 18. The Choice 151 19. The Vows for Life 158 20. The School for Girls 162 21. Brahmo-Samaj Friendships 170 22. The Worship of Kali 184 23. Westward 191 24. London Again 198 25. Sannyasa 203 26. Work in the United States 215 27. In France: Decision 220 28. New Points of View 229 29. The New Resolve 236 30. Reunion and Loss 241 Part Three: "MOTHER INDIA" 31. A Political Mission 255 32. Spreading the Swami's Message 266 33. The New Life 274 34. Young India 280 35. The Nivedita School 288 36. Dynamic Religion and United India 296 37. The Woman, at Home 303 38. Budh-Gaya 308 39. S-vadeshi 312 40. Interlude . 317 41. In the Limelight 320 42. "Deeds, Deeds, Deeds!" 324 43. From Art to Bombs 332 44. Exile 339 45. The Last Battle 345 46. Kedarnath 353 47. Final Tasks 361 48. The End of the Journey 368 x Part One The Questing Soul 1. A Stranger Comes to India FOR DAYS the Mombasa had glided in scorching heat over the placid sea. At the far mouth of the Ganges delta the speed of the steamship slackened and its powerful wake faded. Slowly it nosed its way between the unseen sandbanks that lurked be- neath the muddy waters. Porpoises leaped and played in the foam. Gulls and falcons circled the masts. Heavy fiat-bottomed fishing boats with curved bows rose up on the horizon, driven by square-cut sails that dipped down to touch the surface. On the deck of the Mombasa Margaret Noble was watching for her first sight of the shores of India. She was a young Irish- woman who, as a teacher in London, had won some success in writing and public speaking. When the famous Swam! Viveka- nanda had visited England she had become his disciple, and had resolved to give her life to work among his people. And now she was coming to the end of the long voyage. In the delta the sunlit banks merge so dosely into the lapping waters that the first contact with India is almost ethereal. of Suddenly land appeared-two narrow reed-covered spits golden sand stretching to right and left Flamingos, with sun- tinted wings, flew overhead. Then the land came to life; palms and coconut trees raised their outspread dusters toward the sky. Patches of green became low jungles. Here and there, trees covered with scarlet flowers sparkled like tongues of flame. Tiny villages could be seen, with thatched huts nestling one against the other. On the towpaths, in the fields, silhouettes of men and women made a moving fresco.