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The Obscene and the
Ugly – OBSCENITY has its place in art, but
not ugliness. Obscenity and ugliness are
not the same, nor are decency and beauty. To maintain and hide the brute in man is a characteristic feature of
the civilised world, and this is what is called decency. And to expose this
brute nature to daylight is obscenity. Is there any necessity or
usefulness at all in exhibiting the brute nature in any sphere of a civilised
society? Brute truth may be admitted in the world of scientific research. But
the question arises whether an artist also has the same privilege. From the
standpoint of the creation of beauty what purpose can obscenity serve? Is it not mere idle talk to speak of exposing the brute nature to
public view? For there have been different opinions in different times and
climes as to what constitutes exposing the brute nature. Decency is that which conforms to social rules and customs, and
that means decorum in conduct. And it is natural that there should be
difference in social usages in different societies and in different ages.
Decency and indecency are but relative terms, they have no absolute value. An artist may be charged with obscenity when he violates the
prevalent standard of good taste in a society. But that
Page – 143 need not detract in the least from
the value of the beauty he creates. A decent thing may be civil and correct, but not necessarily
beautiful. The puritans lay great stress on civility, decency and good conduct.
But, on that account, it cannot be said that they are endowed with a great
sense of beauty as well. History testifies otherwise. Puritan England is a
glaring proof how even decency can be an embodiment of ugliness. And the pen of Kalidasa gloriously proves that obscene things are
not always bound to be ugly. When does the obscene happen to become
ugly? On coming down to a particular stage of nakedness? It does not seem to be
so. The obscene may have an inseparable relation with nakedness, but surely not
with ugliness. Even extreme nakedness may turn out to be supremely beautiful,
owing to the attitude of the observer, by virtue of the delicate touch of the
artist's brush. On the other hand, the decent appears ugly when one identifies
it with untouchability; that is to say, it is so to an acute moral sense, to a
profession of good taste, to prudishness; in other words, when we do not give
a thing its innate, its soul value, when we fail to appreciate its proper
nature and function in the universal play, but sever it from its setting in the
whole and assign a false value to it, sometimes too much, sometimes too
little. A thing begins, on the contrary, to grow beautiful when it imbibes a
universal rhythm, wears the supremely blissful smile of creation. In the bosom
of Nature everything is beautiful. The ugly is only that which is artificial
and perverse. The decent is ugly when it is merely
Page – 144 an outward show of purity without
reflecting any inner truth. Indeed often in an inordinate attempt to protect
the body from exposure, decency amounts almost to indecency. Ugliness comes into being only when we endeavour to exhibit
something, be it decent or indecent, as a truth which is not realised as such
in the conscious bliss of the heart. O artist, have you realised the bliss with which the Divine has
filled the ugly and the filthy to the brim? If so, then you have acquired the
philosopher's stone which transforms even the ugly into the beautiful. When Duhshasana, the second Kaurava, unrobed Draupadi, it must have
been something indecent to look at. But when Sri Krishna robbed the bathing
gopi girls of their clothes, it was supremely beautiful. The poet says, "Add the Divine to what is ugly and you will
find the supremely beautiful. When you tied God to the gallows, the gallows
became the Cross." ¹ There are two varieties of beauty: beauty of essence – the sap of truth – and beauty of form. Youth is beautiful, for it is handsome. Old age too has a beauty of its own, because it is the expression of a ripe and mellow experience, a long view and a large detachment. The beauty of the heavens consists in the beauty of form. The Rig Veda says: "The supreme Poet used his poetic genius and created the beautiful forms in heaven." But the earth has another delight to give – delight itself. "Of all elements the earth is essentially full of delight," so says the Brihadaranyaka Upanishad. A smile radiates the beauty of form. A deeper emotion makes tears more beautiful. Happiness is limned ¹"Attachez Dieu au gibet,
vous avez la croix." – Victor Hugo
Page – 145 by the beauty of form, while sorrow
is carved by the depth of the feeling. We appreciate a comedy through the play of
a formal beauty and a tragedy through the poignancy of an emotional substance.
Ariel was handsome, hence beautiful. Caliban was high-serious, vibrant with an
essential sap of Truth. Sakuntala appeals to our heart, for she was an
embodiment of beauty. We can appreciate Lady Macbeth for the intensity of her
sombre soul. Kalidasa has excelled in depicting the beauties of form. Shakespeare
sought not beauty but the wide surge of vital truths. Petrarch abounds in the
beauty of form. He created more and yet more beauty of form. But Dante is to be
appreciated rather through the poetic truths that stood out as unmoving rocks,
the tremendous energy petrified as it were in the form. Our Indian poet
Vidyapati was mad after the beauty of form. He expressed the pangs of his heart
thus: "Since my birth I have been seeing beauty after beauty, yet my
eyes are not satiated." Chandidas seeks the quintessential substance (rasa). His
heart is dipped in this soul-sap. The form given to beauty is therefore
somewhat less impressive in him – he evokes more the being and less the becoming
(speaking metaphysically). Rasa and rupa are however in the end the two wings of poetic
beauty, and the perfect poetic beauty marries the two in an indivisible unity –
although actually that is a rare phenomenon.
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