Swami Vivekananda at London - Meditating

Miss Emmeline Souter, an admirer of Swamiji and a wealthy friend of the Reverend Hugh R. Haweis, arranged for some photographs to be made of Swamiji. In a letter written from Kolkata on May 5, 1897, to Margaret Noble (Sister Nivedita), Swamiji said: “The only help I got in the world was in England, from Miss Souter and Mr. Sturdy.” According to New Discoveries Miss Souter had Swamiji professionally photographed before he left for India: “As the time for Swamiji’s departure from England drew near, Miss Souter, as though to stay the sun in its passage, had the professional photographer, Alfred Ellis, take [about] twelve studio pictures of him.” 39 However, “in recent years a proof sheet from the photographic studio of Alfred Ellis has come to light in which six (not twelve) poses of Swamiji are shown.”40 They are: (no. 48) the well-known meditation pose; (nos. 49 and 50) two full-length with robe and turban; (no. 51) one bust with robe and turban (right profile); (no. 52) one bust with bare head; and (no. 53) one full-length with robe and bare head. Three of the original photographs from the Ellis studio (nos. 49, 52, and 53) are in the archives of the Vedanta Society of Northern California. There is another view regarding where this photo (no. 48) was taken. According to Swami Prabhananda of the Ramakrishna Mission Institute of Culture, oral tradition has it that this photograph (which is worshipped in many shrines of the Ramakrishna Order) was taken when Swamiji went into samadhi while demonstrating asanas during a raja yoga class in London. ❊ ❊ ❊ This pursuit of the Infinite, this struggle to grasp the Infinite, this effort to get beyond the limitations of the senses—out of matter, as it were— and to evolve the spiritual man—this striving day and night to make the Infinite one with our being—this struggle itself is the grandest and most glorious that man can make. (JY, 14)