In a 1953 letter, Salinger mentions that he made the title character in his short story "Teddy" slightly cross-eyed because Sri Ramakrishna considered the condition to be an unfavorable spiritual sign. William James invited him to speak at Harvard Gertrude Stein and Leo Tolstoy were fans, with the latter calling him “the most brilliant wise man” and arguing that “it is doubtful in this age that another man has ever risen above this selfless, spiritual meditation.” In later decades, everyone from Carl Jung to Joseph Campbell to Nikola Tesla to Henry Miller to Christopher Isherwood to Aldous Huxley were enthusiasts of the teachings of Vivekananda. Vivekananda became a sensation in Western literary circles. A devotee of the Indian Hindu spiritual leader Sri Ramakrishna, Swami Vivekananda gave many Americans their introduction to Hinduism and some of its practices (including yoga), and historians often mark his speeches in Chicago as the beginning of American interest in that faith tradition long before immigration from India and East Asia made it more common in the United States. A symposium late last week sponsored by the Free Library of Philadelphia marked the occasion of the 130th anniversary of the arrival in the United States of Swami Vivekananda, a young Hindu monk from Kolkata who toured the country and spoke at the 1893 Parliament of World Religions in Chicago, Ill.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |