The Nationalist

- Hindol Sengupta

THE BIGGEST POLITICAL truth of Vivekananda’s life was that he came from a country which was under colonial rule. So what did he think of nationalism, which was sputtering to life all around him? What did he think of the idea of an independent India?

I think the answer to this, first, is given in a rather funny tale. It features in the writings of Marie Louise Burke, who, in turn, quotes from the notes of another prominent follower of Swami Vivekananda in America, Mary Tappan Wright, wife of Professor John Henry Wright of Harvard who facilitated Vivekananda”s participation at the Parliament of Religions. The incident takes place when Vivekananda is staying at Annisquam, a little New England village. The swami tells a tale after supper.

“It was just the other day,” he (Vivekananda) said, in his musical voice, “only just the other day—not more than four hundred years ago…Ah, the English, only just a little while ago they were savages…the vermin crawled on the ladies’ bodices...and they scented themselves to disguise the abominable odour of their persons...Most hor-r-ible! Even now, they are barely emerging from barbarism.”

This shocked some of his listeners. One of them said—that’s not true, this was almost 500 years ago!