Dear Śrīla Prabhupāda,
Please accept my humble obeisances. All glories to you.
The Spirit of ’66
Richard Witty caught word that you had landed on the Lower East Side and went to film Happiness on Second Avenue. He remembers:
I was touched by, in a sense, their naïveté. One of the people, I remember asking him how he felt. He said, “Oh, this is the most wonderful thing. I am so moved, I want to devote my entire life to this.” I said, “How long have you been involved?” He said, “Since yesterday.”
What a spirit! Some may say immature, idealistic, and unsustainable, but it was also undeniably magical. That rebellion, activism, nonconformity, spontaneity, exploration, and restless search for freedom generated an amazing energy. All it required was an infusion of authentic spirituality. Enter A. C. Bhaktivedanta Swami.
How does someone from another generation, another country, another civilization look beyond all the differences and meet strangers with such love? You did just that. You didn’t lecture from a high seat wielding impersonal sermons. You went down – to the depths of the Lower East Side – lived with them, ate with them, befriended them. No distance, no performance, just complete generosity. Their beautiful spirit and your shining purity ignited something profound – a movement we now dedicate our lives to.
In another forty years, it will be ’66 again – though radically different. The world has changed, the movement has changed, the zeitgeist has changed. Here in ’26, amid all the changes, we realize that something of the ’66 spirit must endure if we are to dynamically catapult this movement into the next millennium. Are we still rebelling against materialism? Still willing to refuse the world’s ingrained conventions, to question its assumptions and ideologies? Do we have a progressively disruptive message? Are we prepared – not cautiously, but decisively – to present Śrī Kṛṣṇa to the world, knowing that without Him no philosophy, no practice, can ultimately satisfy? To “fit in” may mean to “fade away.”
Joan Suval, who took Misra’s classes at Ananda Ashram, recalled you vividly:
I always felt about him that he was a deeply serious man, serious about life. He never talked about his past, his personal life. I did ask him once or twice a question here and there, and he waved it away. He said, “Not important, that’s not important,” and then I began to feel it wasn’t important. What was important was what he was doing now.
The past is beautiful, and the spirit of ’66 makes the hair stand on end. It’s neither wholly present nor wholly absent, yet it demands serious recognition. We have inherited books, temples, and a global movement – but also a spirit. Will that spirit remain confined to history, or will it continue to shape it? You have serious work – lots more magic to manifest – and you’re looking for those who have the spirit. We have this opportunity, this responsibility – to internalize the spirit of ’66 and find our own unique, authentic expression. What we are doing is important, very important – for ourselves, for this crazy world, for the ongoing growth of this glorious movement … and for you, Śrīla Prabhupāda. May we become “deeply serious,” just as you were.
Begging to remain at your lotus feet,
S. B. Keśava Swami