Robinson Jeffers’s inhumanism vs. Tao’s unconcern

The aim of this paper is to show and explain the similarities that can be identified between the early Taoists philosophy of Lao-Chuang and the poetry of the American poet Robinson Jeffers along with his doctrine of inhumanism. In the books of Tao Te Ching and Chuang Tzŭ, Tao has been depicted as a natural force (or even nature itself) that creates but then leaves its creation alone for good or bad. A Taoist sage accepts such natural manifestations of violence as death or suffering, for it is the way things work in the world. Jeffers’s attitude toward nature and society resembles that of Tao and Taoist sages. Jeffers, however, goes a step further: not only does he accept violence and suffering as part and parcel of life, but he praises them, as a classical poet would praise beauty and love.