- Paperback: 352 pages
- Publisher: Univ Of Minnesota Press; 1 edition (Sep 27 2001)
- Language: English
- ISBN-10: 0816638640
- ISBN-13: 978-0816638642
- Product Dimensions: 20.6 x 14 x 2 cm
- Shipping Weight: 431 g
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: #499,004 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
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Product Details |
Product Description
Review
A rambling, agreeable diary-cum-commentary of Isherwood's long (1939-76) connection with Swami Prabhavananda. The "disciple" - who looms much larger in the book than the guru - cuts a contradictory figure as a devotee. He starts out from an admittedly simpleminded Marxist atheism (God the "symbol of the capitalist superboss"), but ends in an equally uncritical pious Hinduism. (At Charles Laughton's deathbed, he prays to Ramakrishna and urges Laughton to pray to "God": "Do it for Brahmananda's sake, for Vivekananda's sake, for Prabhavananda's sake.") On the other hand, Isherwood has next to no theology. His religion is simply the hints and glimpses he gets of transcendence from observing the swami's spiritual life. (And yet, he claims, this is not a personality cult.) Isherwood, despite his passionate, eager homosexuality, champions his celibate guru, and spends more than a year as an aspirant monk. (Shortly before this, he and his current lover get into the habit of afternoon car trips, with the non-driver reading aloud from some religious work to keep the driver's mind off "sexy pedestrians.") Typically Isherwood makes no excuses for these and other follies and inconsistencies - any more than he paints halos around the head of his guru. In these scattered, impromptu sketches we see Prabhavananda as a messy (belching, hawking up phelgm), imperfect (politically chauvinist, jealous of "competition" from other swamis), and therefore highly believable saint: a humble, loving, selfless, transparent human being. What difference he made in his disciple's life - beyond a purely personal intimacy - is hard to say. In his conclusion Isherwood regrets that he can't assure his fellow mortals that "all is ultimately well." Prabhavananda might say this with "the absolute authority of a knower," but he can't. No cosmic panoramas, then, just a handful of casual, but convincing and artfully drawn portraits. (Kirkus Reviews)
--This text refers to the
Hardcover
edition.
Book Description
"My Guru and His Disciple is a sweetly modest and honest portrait of Isherwood's spiritual instructor, Swami Prabhavananda, the Hindu priest who guided Isherwood for some thirty years. It is also a book about the often amusing and sometimes painful counterpoint between worldliness and holiness in Isherwood's own life. Sexual sprees, all-night drinking bouts, a fast car ride with Greta Garbo, script-writing conferences at M-G-M, and intellectual sparring sessions with Bertolt Brecht alternated with nights of fasting at the Vedanta Center and a six-month period of celibacy and sobriety. Seldom has a single man been endowed with such strong drives toward both sensuality and spirituality, abandon and discipline. . . . In these pages, Isherwood has reinvented the spirit of devotion for the modern reader." Edmund White, New York Times Book Review
"This book is a humbling tribute to someone who revealed to Isherwood inner grounds for spiritual awareness." Alan Hollinghurst, New Statesman
A major figure in twentieth-century fiction and the gay rights movement, Christopher Isherwood (1904-1986) is the author of Down There on a Visit, Lions and Shadows, A Meeting by the River, The Memorial, Prater Violet, A Single Man, and The World in the Evening, all available from the University of Minnesota Press.
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5.0 out of 5 stars (5 customer reviews)
15 of 15 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars
account of a heart relationship between student and teacher, Nov 24 1998
By Gursel Ali (therealgursiedog@hotmail.com) - Published on Amazon.com
This review is from: My Guru and His Disciple (Paperback)
One of the most intelligently written books on the subject. Here, Isherwood recounts the events that lead him to meet a man who was to seriously effect the way christopher approached life as a pacifistin a war torn world. A remarkable relationship between a very modern man and a direct desciple from the lineage of Ramakrishna Paramahamsa. I think that this is one of the best books I have ever read. Christerpher Isherwood is economical with words and yet is evocative,candid and funny. Auden, Huxley and meany more characters of the time walk through this memoir. I cried at the end. Written by a master. If you are a cynic on the subject of swamis read this... it was written by one..
15 of 16 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars
An English writer in America meets an Indian swami, Nov 24 1998
By Gursel Ali (therealgursiedog@hotmail.com) - Published on Amazon.com
This review is from: My Guru and His Disciple (Paperback)
Surely one of Isherwoods finest works. This memoir tells of his time in Hollywood during World War II and of his meeting and subsiquent association with Swami Prabhavananada. Isherwood approaches the subject with candid reflection and in his usual minimal style takes the reader on a a spiritual quest for the truth behind god and the trail of the pacifists dilemma during a crippling war. Auden, Huxley and a host of others walk through the work. An absolute must for Isherwood fans. I cried at the end...one of the best books I've ever read.
14 of 15 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars
Swami, How I Love Ya, How I Love Ya....., Jan 18 2005
By B. Morse - Published on Amazon.com
This review is from: My Guru And His Disciple (Paperback)
Indulging in a third Christopher Isherwood 'novel', after being left flat by 'The Memorial' was a truly enlightening experience. Much like the 'Boy's Own Story' trilogy of Edmund White, though supposedly not an amalgamation of characters (like White's novels) the story outlines 30 years of tutelege under Swami Prabhavananda, and how the influence of this holy man helped shape Isherwood's life.Beginning in the first half of the 20th century, Isherwood spent many years in and out of the Hindu Vedanta Center run by the Swami. As he struggled with his faith in juxtaposition with his homosexuality, the author found great comfort in the love of the Swami, which was unwavering, despite his knowledge of Isherwood's lifestyle.
Along for the ride are many of Isherwood's contemporaries, including author Aldous Huxley, and an occasional weaving in of other celebrities of the time, such as Greta Garbo, and his lover of many years, Don Bachardy. Isherwood, amongst publication of his own novels, aids in translating the Baghad-Vita with the Swami, and publishes Ramakrishna and His Disciples, a study of a 19th century holy man who embraced all religions as worthy of learning, to appreciate the unity of all.
An interesting portrait of Isherwood himself, this book also delves into the day-to-day workings of the Hindu faith, a Vedanta center, and the life of a Swami, albeit in a Western Cultural setting.
A good read, and as much a peaceful pursuit to read as the pursuit of Isherwood's own inner peace.
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