Universal thought Tagore, Neruda, Cesaire. Poetry in the service of a new humanism

Poetry in the service of a new humanism

Published on 23 June 2011

Author(s): The UNESCO Courier

Type:  Feature April-June 2011

“Poetry is always like an act of peace. The poem is born just as bread is born of the flour” Pablo Neruda

“Even though they moved in very different cultural circles, and almost never came across each other in the course of their lives, the vision of these three giants of philosophy and poetry converged,” says Irina Bokova, Director General of UNESCO, about Rabindranath Tagore, Pablo Neruda and Aimé Césaire.

The work of these three global giants of poetry, born, respectively, in India, Chile and France (Martinique), underpins a new UNESCO project, entitled “Tagore, Neruda, Césaire: for a reconciled universal.” It was launched in June 2011 with the objective of inspiring reflection, in both academic and artistic milieus, on the universal values of human society.

“The idea was put forward in 2008 by Olabiyi Babalola Joseph Yaï, Permanent Delegate of Benin to UNESCO and Chairman of the Organization’s Executive Board,” explains Françoise Rivière, who, at the time, was Assistant Director-General for Culture at UNESCO. “He received the backing of the permanent delegations of Chile, France and India,” she adds, then sums
up the gist of the project. “The main objective was to establish a link between these writers who have marked their era and the current global context, and to observe contemporary problems in the light of their work.”

One of the most acute issues arising today, which is of particular interest to the project, is otherness, explains Annick Thébia-Melsan, one of the project’s creators. “Our relationship with the other is no longer a theoretical question,” says this Aimé Césaire specialist, who published an interview with the father of Negritude in the May 1997 issue of the UNESCO Courier. “We have never regarded our specificity as the opposite or antithesis of universality […]. Our concern has always been a humanist concern and we wanted it to have roots,” said the poet from Martinique, adding “the universal is reached by a deeper exploration of the particular.”

Rabindranath Tagore had said much the same thing, in his own words, in a letter to a friend in 1921, “…but by nature all men are dwija or twiceborn…. first they are born to their home, and then, for their fulfilment, they have to be born to the larger world” (UNESCO Courier, December 1961). In a letter to another friend in 1934 he added “Individuality is precious, because only through it can we realize the universal.” (UNESCO Courier, January 1994).

And Pablo Neruda, in a lecture given at UNESCO in 1972, when he was Permanent Delegate of Chile, said “I am far from being an individualist – I believe that man is only free to the extent that he is a collectivist.” This idea had appeared in his 1945 poem Song to the Red Army on Its Arrival at the Gates of Prussia: “I wanted to sing for you all, for the whole of the earth, this song of obscure words, to make us worthy of the light that is coming.”

Other areas of convergence have been identified within the “Tagore, Neruda, Césaire: for a reconciled universal” project, which aims to stimulate thinking on five subjects in particular: – poetry as mediator between man and the world; a new pact between humanity and nature; emancipation versus all forms of oppression; a certain vision of the relationships between science, knowledge and ethics; and the educational heritage of these three writers.

UNESCO is also setting up a sponsoring committee made up of academics, scientists and artists whose task will be to oversee the development of the project and to help establish a network for research and the exchange of ideas. “A whole network of partners has been established to implement this project,” explains Edmond Moukala, the programme’s coordinator. “We have established links with universities, research centres, NGOs, non-profit associations, festivals as well as the media, to plan conferences and exhibitions and to encourage scientific research projects and documentary films.”

Post-scriptum

As socially committed writers who have helped make history, Rabindranath Tagore, Pablo Neruda and Aime Cesaire shared a vision of the world that was both humanist and poetic. The task of this project, dedicated to them, is to challenge minds in the contemporary world to think about what humanism means today. A task defined subtly by the Haitian poet Rene Depestre: “This expedition should lead us from the homes of each of the three authors towards other cultural areas and to a whole, unified universe.” 

FURTHER READING:
 

For further information on the project, contact Edmond Moukala, programme coordinator and specialist in intercultural dialogue: e.moukala@unesco.org; tnc_reconciled@unesco.org

Back to previous page