Our Light and Delight (Recollections of Life with The Mother)

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K. D. Sethna, otherwise known as Amal Kiran- a name given to him by Sri Aurobindo, is a radiant multifaceted genius living unassumingly in the Sri Aurobindo Ashram, born in 1940 he joined the Ashram in 1927 and is one of the foremost disciples of Sri Aurobindo and The Mother, fortunately still amongst us today. He is a distinguished poet, a literary critic, an artist and a seer. (kavi). Apart from his own poems he is a great prose writer on a wide variety of subjects – poetry, literature, history, Christianity, philosophy and of course Sri Aurobindo and The Mother. He has been the editor of Mother of India, the monthly periodical from Pondicherry, since1949.

This book took shape originally in response to the Mother’s birth-centenary. The first article appeared in the special issue of Mother India dated 21 February 1978. The last was expected to coincide with the issue if January 1979 completing the twelve months of commemoration. But there was so much to tell and the public appreciation so warm that the idea of asset period was put aside and the flood o recollection allowed to go on until it came to a natural stop in July of the same year. Occasionally, side by side with the regular series other articles were written, bearing on the Mother and her work: they have been brought together in a Supplement.

The most concrete sign welcome to the series came when my friend Harshad V. Mehta spontaneously expressed his wish to bring it out in book-form. This was the Mother’s Grace indeed. But the loan available could be only a bright start, not a full covering of the course. Harshad happened to speak to his friend Maganbhai V. Patel. To his surprise his inspiration found an amplified echo in that old yet still visionary and adventurous heart. At once a plan was made to take up the major share of the expenses. Half of it was even offered as a gift, but I insisted on everything being a generous loan.

Thus the book was launched and the business of printing entrusted to the economical Andhra Bhavan Press at Pondicherry, which has carried out the project with constant good will and care.

My grateful acknowledgment are due to the Sri Aurobindo Ashram trust for permission t quote from the writings of Sri Aurobindo and the Mother.

The deepest thanks go to the Mother and the Master themselves for fostering through the years all my stumbling efforts to be their child and for filling my life sufficiently with their wonderful ways to enable me to remember and try conveying something of the varied interchange between the divine consenting to be human and the human toiling to be divine.