Burke, Marie Louise 1912–2004

views updated

Burke, Marie Louise 1912–2004

(Sister Gargi)

PERSONAL: Born 1912; died of cancer, January 20, 2004, in San Francisco, CA.

CAREER: Vedanta (Hindu) researcher and writer.

AWARDS, HONORS: Vivekananda Purashkar Award, Ramakrishna Mission Institute of Culture, 1983.

WRITINGS:

Kamehameha, King of the Hawaiian Islands: The Story of His Life and of Captain Cook's Visits to These Islands in the Years 1778–1779 (limited edition), Colt Press (San Francisco, CA), 1939.

Seventeen Verses and Curses (limited edition), Press of Marie Louise and Jackson Burke (San Francisco, CA), 1940.

Little Music (limited edition), Aquarius Press (Belmont, CA), 1948.

Swami Vivekananda in America: New Discoveries, Advaita Ashrama (Calcutta, India), 1958, revised third edition published as Swami Vivekananda in the West: New Discoveries, six volumes, 1985–1987.

Swami Vivekananda, His Second Visit to the West: New Discoveries, Advaita Ashrama (Calcutta, India), 1973.

Swami Trigunatita: His Life and Work, Vedanta Society of Northern California (San Francisco, CA), 1997.

(As Sister Gargi) A Heart Poured Out: A Story of Swami Ashokananda, Kalpa Tree Press (New York, NY), 2003.

(As Sister Gargi) A Disciple's Journal: In the Company of Swami Ashokananda, Kalpa Tree Press (New York, NY), 2003.

Also author of Vedantic Tales and Hari the Lion.

SIDELIGHTS: In 1948, Marie Louise Burke was initiated into the Ramakrishna-Vivekananda movement in California by Swami Ashokananda (1893–1969), who was then the abbot of the Vedanta Society. She took her first vows from the Ramakrishna Order in India in 1974. Because of her accomplishments as a researcher and writer, she was given the name Gargi after the renowned Verdic scholar. She later took her final vows of "sanyasa" (reclusion) and was given the name Pravrajika Prajinaprana.

Sister Gargi was encouraged by her mentor, Ashokananda, to write about the order's founder, Swami Vivekananda, and her six-volume Swami Vivekananda in the West: New Discoveries was acclaimed around the world.

In her later years, after producing several volumes, Sister Gar gi wrote two books about Swami Ashokananda—one a tribute and the other a personal memoir. In A Heart Poured Out: A Story of Swami Ashokananda she tells of the holy man's beginnings in a small Indian village. The title reflects something he had once told her, that "the heart must be poured out." Born Yogesh Chandra Datta in East Bengal (now Bangladesh), Ashokananda also had a passion for reading and discovered Vedantic literature at an early age. As a teenager, he experienced the presence of Swamiji, who he said "was pouring his power and spirit into me." He also had a dream that Swamiji came to his home, and at another time, as he walked along a road, a mantra came to him. Although he had doubts, he was told by various swamis that his experiences had been valid and that he had been initiated by Swami Vivekananda.

Ashokananda became a monk of the Ramakrishna Order of Advaita Vedanta, which is dedicated to the principles of Vedanta and Swami Vivekananda, and he later became editor of the order's first English-language journal. In 1931, Swami Ashokananda was sent to the United States to disseminate the teachings of Vedanta, and under his guidance, three temples were built in San Francisco, Berkeley, and Sacramento, California. There were difficulties in establishing communities, and he was met with religious and racial prejudice and also legal battles with the U.S. government, which wanted to absorb one retreat into a national park. When the swami proposed that the community revise the bylaws to bring it in line with American legal requirements, he met with opposition from within. In 1959, while he was in the process of building a new convent, he was ordered by the trustees to build no more in the United States, and was forced to abandon the project. Problems plagued Swami Ashokananda, and his health suffered from overwork, and in 1969, he surrendered leadership.

Frederic and Mary Ann Brussat reviewed A Heart Poured Out for Spirituality and Health online, saying that it "conveys Swami Ashokananda's spiritual fervor as [Burke] discusses how he presented Vedanta as a philosophy and religion of infinite hope." William Page noted in Advaita Online that "the photos alone are worth the price of the book," while Library Journal reviewer James R. Kuhlman called A Heart Poured Out "a well-written, even compelling remembrance of a saintly life."

A Disciple's Journal: In the Company of Swami Ashokananda is a memoir of Burke's two decades of training by her spiritual leader. It begins in 1950, when she first began to learn meditation in the Hindu tradition of Vedanta. She writes of her periods of self-doubt and confidence, of her struggle with divorce and writer's block. Kuhlman, who called this book "a touching, well-written portrait," remarked that it "presents an important supplement to Burke's biography of Ashokananda."

Less than a year after the publication of her final two volumes, Burke succumbed to cancer. At the age of ninety-three, she died at the convent of the Vedanta Society in San Francisco.

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

BOOKS

Sister Gargi, A Disciple's Journal: In the Company of Swami Ashokananda, Kalpa Tree Press (New York, NY), 2003.

PERIODICALS

Library Journal, April 1, 2003, James R. Kuhlman, review of A Heart Poured Out: A Story of Swami Ashokananda, p. 105; November 15, 2003, James R. Kuhlman, review of A Disciple's Journal: In the Company of Swami Ashokananda, p. 73.

ONLINE

Advaita Online, http://www.advaitaonline.com/ (January 30, 2004), William Page, review of A Heart Poured Out.

Spirituality and Health Web site, http://www.spiritualityhealth.com (January 30, 2004), Frederic Brussat and Mary Ann Brussat, review of A Heart Poured Out.