Note on the Texts
THE FUTURE POETRY was first published serially in the monthly
reviewAryabetween December 1917 and July 1920 in thirty-two
instalments. The starting-point for these chapters was a book by James
H. Cousins,New Ways in English Literature(Ganesh & Co., Madras,
preface dated November 1917). A copy of this book was sent to Sri
Aurobindo shortly after its publication for review in theArya.He
began a review (see Appendix I) but soon abandoned it in favour of
a larger work drawn, as he wrote later, from his “own ideas and his
already conceived view of art and life”.
Revision ofThe Future Poetry.The Future Poetrywas not published
as a book during Sri Aurobindo’s lifetime. He wished to revise the
Aryachapters before republishing them and twice undertook this task,
first in the late 1920s or early 1930s, and then in the last years of his
life, apparently in 1950. During the first period he revised seventeen
chapters: 2 – 14, 16, 25, 27 and 32. The work done ranges from very
light retouching to the rewriting of entire chapters. During the second
period he dictated to his amanuensis changes and additions to twenty
chapters, thirteen of which had been revised during the earlier period.
This later revision is mostly light — in some chapters only a word or
two was added or changed — but it does include two considerable
additions to Chapter 19 and an incomplete opening for a planned new
first chapter (see Appendix III). Sri Aurobindo had plans for much
more extensive additions. In particular he wished to write a chapter or
chapters on contemporary poetry, and was considering a treatment of
the metaphysical poets of the seventeenth century.
All told twenty-four of the book’s thirty-two chapters received
some revision at one time or another. A table outlining the nature and
extent of the revision of each chapter appears in the reference volume
(volume 35).