Meditation and Passive Mysticism in Hart Crane’s “To Buddha”

Abstract Book of the 11th International Conference on Research in Social Sciences

Year: 2026

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Meditation and Passive Mysticism in Hart Crane’s “To Buddha”

Gaogui Wang

ABSTRACT:

Hart Crane has long been associated with mysticism, yet critics have tended to emphasize its visionary and ecstatic dimensions while overlooking meditation as a more passive path toward mystical experience. This neglect is partly shaped by cultural bias and partly by a critical tendency to conflate vision, ecstasy, and meditation, despite their distinct roles within mystical discourse. Focusing on Crane’s marginalized poem “To Buddha,” this essay investigates his engagement with Buddhism and argues that meditation offers an alternative, passive mode of mysticism in his work. In doing so, it challenges the dominant critical emphasis on visionary intensity and ecstatic transcendence, and reconsiders the neglected meditative dimension of Crane’s poetic imagination.

Keywords: Hart Crane; "To Buddha"; Meditation; Mysticism