Summary on Savitri by Dr. M.P Pandit

Book Nine Canto I: Towards the Black Void

Savitri is alone in the huge forest with the dead body of her husband on her breast. She does not grieve, but leans over his body in great stillness. Suddenly a change comes over her like what sometimes overtakes men in moments of crisis. The mind is no more, only the spirit sees. A calm Power seated above the brows sees and moves Nature. The spirit grows and voices and thoughts come from on high. A new birth takes place.

It takes place in Savitri. Her spirit soars high and joins its source on the summits of her being. A new Force descends into her soul and she is totally changed. Her mortal elements are displaced by a young divine infusion. Pain, grief, all are left behind. Her mind is still.

She lays down the dead body on the forest soil and turns to meet the dreadful God of Death who is a veritable Denial of all. He fixes his forbidding look upon her and asks her to unclasp her hold upon the soul of Satyavan and return back to earth.

Savitri does not move. The Voice warns her that her husband suffers and she should let him go. She then draws back her heart’s force that has held him still and rises gathered in her strength. Death leans to the earth and then rises; Satyavan forsakes his body and a new luminous form of him rises up.

Savitri is unable to reach this lustrous form through her mind and senses, but her spirit knows his spirit. He stands between Savitri on one side and the God of Death on the other. There is a silent struggle to draw him from either side. They now move on, Satyavan in front, Death behind him and Savitri behind eternal Death. Their journey proceeds through eerie spaces, as if on the tops of the forest trees. The earth’s pull on Savitri increases. It looks, at one stage, as if both Satyavan and Death are fast moving away from her reach. But her passionate spirit soars towards Satyavan and she goes into deep trance. Human Savitri is forgotten. Her will oceans out and holds Satyavan captive. They proceed on their course through strange realms where souls are not, only living moods exist.

They arrive at the brooding gates of pillared rocks opening into the giant Night. They have reached a boundary. Death speaks to Savitri that she must now go back and not aspire to accompany him to his home. She cannot survive there. Man can live safe only within human limits and she must be sensible. Otherwise she is sure to perish.

But Savitri does not answer. Her high nude soul stands up against fixed destiny and the grooves of law and against the dark abysses piled up in front of her. She rises up like a columned shaft of fire and light.