Rabindranath and his literary diction

Tagore's literary reputation is disproportionately influenced very much by regard for his poetry; however, he also wrote novels, essays, short stories, travelogues, dramas, and thousands of songs. Of Tagore's prose, his short stories are perhaps most highly regarded; indeed, he is credited with originating the Bengali-language version of the genre. His works are frequently noted for their rhythmic, optimistic, and lyrical nature. However, such stories mostly borrow from deceptively simple subject matter — the lives of ordinary people
Dramas
Tagore's experiences with drama began when he was sixteen with his brother Jyotirindranath Tagore Tagore wrote his first original dramatic piece when he was twenty — Valmiki Pratibha which was shown at the Tagore’s' mansion. Tagore stated that his works sought to articulate "the play of feeling and not of action". In 1890 he wrote Visarjan it has been regarded as his finest drama. In the original Bengali language, such works included intricate subplots and extended monologues. Later, Tagore's dramas used more philosophical and allegorical themes. Lastly, Tagore's Chandalika was modeled on an ancient legend describing how Gautama Buddha's discipline asks water of an tribal girl.
Tagore's plays also are important to Bengali literature. All of his plays have been repeatedly staged and re-interpreted over the years. His most famous play, perhaps, is Raktakaravi ("Red Oleanders") — the name of a red flower. It tells of a king who lives behind an iron curtain while his subjects have cruelty and death delivered upon them at the slightest pretext. People are forced to work in the mines so that the kleptocratic king and his cronies may render themselves even more wealthy. The play follows the heroine Nandini, who leads the people and finally the king himself towards the destruction of this artifact of subjugation. However, this ultimate victory is preceded by numerous deaths, most importantly that of Ranjan, Nandini's lover, and Kishore a young boy devoted to her. Tagore devoted much effort to Raktakaravi, with (at least) eleven extant revisions. However, Tagore's motivation in writing Raktakaravi is disputed, with some suggesting negative opinions formed during his visit to the mines of Bombay. Others attribute it to dislike of the West, while others think that a woman motivated him to create Nandini. Tagore's other notable plays include Chitrangada, Raja, Valmiki-Pratibha, and MayarKhela.


A drawing by Nandalall Bose illustrating Tagore's short story "The Hero", an English-language translation of which appeared in the 1913 Macmillan publication of Tagore's The Crescent Moon.
Tagore began his career in short stories in 1877—when he was only sixteen—with "Bhikharini" ("The Beggar Woman").[1] With this, Tagore effectively invented the Bengali-language short story genre.[2] The four years from 1891 to 1895 are known as Tagore's "Sadhana" period (named for one of Tagore's magazines). This period was among Tagore's most fecund, yielding more than half the stories contained in the three-volume Galpaguchchha, which itself is a collection of eighty-four stories.[1] Such stories usually showcase Tagore's reflections upon his surroundings, on modern and fashionable ideas, and on interesting mind puzzles (which Tagore was fond of testing his intellect with). Tagore typically associated his earliest stories (such as those of the "Sadhana" period) with an exuberance of vitality and spontaneity; these characteristics were intimately connected with Tagore's life in the common villages of, among others, Patisar, Shajadpur, and Shilaida while managing the Tagore family's vast landholdings.[1] There, he beheld the lives of India's poor and common people; Tagore thereby took to examining their lives with a penetrative depth and feeling that was singular in Indian literature up to that point.[3] In particular, such stories as "Cabuliwallah" ("The Fruitseller from Kabul", published in 1892), "Kshudita Pashan" ("The Hungry Stones") (August 1895), and "Atithi" ("The Runaway", 1895) typified this analytic focus on the downtrodden.[4] In "The Fruitseller from Kabul", Tagore speaks in first person as town-dweller and novelist who chances upon the Afghani seller. He attempts to distill the sense of longing felt by those long trapped in the mundane and hardscrabble confines of Indian urban life, giving play to dreams of a different existence in the distant and wild mountains: "There were autumn mornings, the time of year when kings of old went forth to conquest; and I, never stirring from my little corner in Calcutta, would let my mind wander over the whole world. At the very name of another country, my heart would go out to it ... I would fall to weaving a network of dreams: the mountains, the glens, the forest .... ".[5] Many of the other "Galpaguchchha" stories were written in Tagore's SabujPatra period (1914–1917, again, named after one of the magazines that Tagore edited and heavily contributed to).[1] Tagore's Golpoguchchho ("Bunch of Stories") remains among the most popular fictional works in Bengali literature. Its continuing influence on Bengali art and culture cannot be overstated; to this day, Golpoguchchho remains a point of cultural reference. Golpoguchchho has furnished subject matter for numerous successful films and theatrical plays, and its characters are among the most well known to Bengalis. The acclaimed film director Satyajit Ray based his film Charulata ("The Lonely Wife") on Nastanirh ("The Broken Nest"). This famous story has an autobiographical element to it, modelled to some extent on the relationship between Tagore and his sister-in-law, Kadambari Devi. Ray has also made memorable films of other stories from Golpoguchchho, including Samapti, Postmaster and Monihara, bundling them together as Teen Kanya ("Three Daughters"). Atithi is another poignantly lyrical Tagore story which was made into a film of the same name by another noted Indian film director TapanSinha. Tarapada, a young Brahmin boy, catches a boat ride with a village zamindar. It turns out that he has run away from his home and has been wandering around ever since. The zamindar adopts him, and finally arranges a marriage to his own daughter. The night before the wedding Tarapada runs away again. StrirPatra (The letter from the wife) has to be one of the earliest depictions in Bengali literature of such bold emancipation of women. Mrinal is the wife of a typical Bengali middle class man. The letter, written while she is traveling (which constitutes the whole story), describes her petty life and struggles. She finally declares that she will not return to his patriarchical home, stating Amiobachbo. Eibachlum ("And I shall live. Here, I live").


In Haimanti, Tagore takes on the institution of Hindu marriage. He describes, via StrirPatra, the dismal lifelessness of Bengali women after they are married off, hypocrisies plaguing the Indian middle class, and how Haimanti, a sensitive young woman, must — due to her sensitiveness and free spirit — sacrifice her life. In the last passage, Tagore directly attacks the Hindu custom of glorifying Sita's attempted self-immolation as a means of appeasing her husband Rama's doubts (as depicted in the epic Ramayana). Tagore also examines Hindu-Muslim tensions in MusalmaniDidi, which in many ways embodies the essence of Tagore's humanism. On the other hand, Darpaharan exhibits Tagore's self-consciousness, describing a young man harboring literary ambitions. Though he loves his wife, he wishes to stifle her literary career, deeming it unfeminine. Tagore himself, in his youth, seems to have harbored similar ideas about women. Darpaharan depicts the final humbling of the man via his acceptance of his wife's talents. As with many other Tagore stories, Jibito o Mrito provides the Bengalis with one of their more widely used epigrams: Kadombinimoriyapromankorilo she more nai ("Kadombini died, thereby proved that she hadn't").
Novels
Among Tagore's works, his novels are among the least-acknowledged. These include Chaturanga, Gora (1910), ShesherKobita, GhareBaire, Char Odhay, and Noukadubi. GhareBaire or The Home and the World, (which was also released as the film by Satyajit Ray, GhareBaire) examines rising nationalistic feeling among Indians while warning of its dangers, clearly displaying Tagore's distrust of nationalism — especially when associated with a religious element. In some sense, Gora shares the same theme, raising questions regarding the Indian identity. As with GhareBaire, matters of self-identity, personal freedom, and religious belief are developed in the context of an involving family story and a love triangle.
ShesherKobita (translated twice, as Last Poem and as Farewell Song) is his most lyrical novel, containing as it does poems and rhythmic passages written by the main character (a poet). Nevertheless, it is also Tagore's most satirical novel, exhibiting post-modernist elements whereby several characters make gleeful attacks on the reputation of an old, outmoded, oppressively-renowned poet (named Rabindranath Tagore).
Though his novels remain under-appreciated, they have recently been given new attention through many movie adaptations by such film directors as Satyajit Ray, TapanSinha and TarunMajumdar. The recent among these is a version of Chokher Bali and Noukadubi directed by RituparnoGhosh, which features AishwariyaRai (in Chokher Bali). A favorite trope of these directors is to employ rabindrasangeet in the film adaptations' soundtracks.
Among Tagore's notable non-fiction books are IuropJatrirPatro ("Letters from Europe") and ManusherDhormo ("The Religion of Man").
[edit] Poetry
Internationally, Gitanjali (Bengali: গীতাঞ্জলি) is Tagore's best-known collection of poetry.Tagore was awarded the Nobel Prize in 1913 for his book 'Gitanjali' . Song VII from Gitanjali reads as follows:


Title page of the 1913 Macmillan edition of Tagore's Gitanjali.
Original text in Bengali and Roman scripts (গীতাঞ্জলি 127):
আমারএগানছেড়েছেতারসকলঅলংকার,
তোমারকাছেরাখেনিআরসাজেরঅহংকার।
অলংকারযেমাঝেপড়েমিলনেতেআড়ালকরে,
তোমারকথাঢাকেযেতারমুখরঝংকার।

তোমারকাছেখাটেনামোরকবিরগর্বকরা,
মহাকবিতোমারপায়েদিতেযেচাইধরা।
জীবনলয়েযতনকরিযদিসরলবাঁশিগড়ি,
আপনসুরেদিবেভরিসকলছিদ্রতার।
AmAr e gAnchheRechhetArsakalalaMkAr
tomArkAchherAkheniArsAjerahaMkAr
alaMkAr Je mAjhepaRemilaneteARAlkare,
tomArkathADhAke Je tArmukharajhaMkAr.

tomArkAchhekhATenAmorkabirgarbakarA,
mahAkabi, tomArpAyeditechAi Je dharA.
jIbanlayeJatankariJadisaralbA.MshigaRi,
Apan sure dibebharisakalchhidratAr.

Free-verse translation by Tagore (Gitanjali, verse VII):[6]
"My song has put off her adornments. She has no pride of dress and decoration. Ornaments would mar our union; they would come between thee and me; their jingling would drown thy whispers."
"My poet's vanity dies in shame before thy sight. O master poet, I have sat down at thy feet. Only let me make my life simple and straight, like a flute of reed for thee to fill with music."


Tagore's rendition of a Malanggan mask from New Ireland, done in pastels.
Besides Gitanjali, other notable works include Manasi, Sonar Tori ("Golden Boat"), Balaka ("Wild Geese" — the title being a metaphor for migrating souls),[7] and Purobi. Sonar Tori's most famous poem — dealing with the ephemeral nature of life and achievement — goes by the same name; it ends with the haunting phrase "শূন্যনদীরতীরেরহিনুপড়ি / যাহাছিললয়েগেলসোনারতরী" ("shunya nadir tire rahinupari / jahachhiloloyegeloshonar tori" — "all I had achieved was carried off on the golden boat — only I was left behind."). In Dui BighaJomi ("A Strip of Land"), Tagore explores the plight of a sharecropper whose meager parcel of farmland is taken over — using falsified papers — by a moneylender; the poem concludes: "rajarhostokoreshomostokangalerdhonchuri" ("it is the king's hand that steals from the downtrodden"). Sonar Tori also contains Hing Ting Chhot. Although comic in form, it illuminates what Tagore saw as Bengali society's crippling lack of vision, originality, and wisdom: durbodhjachhilokichuhoyegelojol, shunnoakashermotoottontonirmol ("Oh yes, now all has been explained, like the empty expanse of the open sky"). Throughout his life, Tagore experimented with different poetic styles. For example, in his early years, he occasionally wrote his works in ShadhuBhasha (a Sanskritizeddialect of Bengali); later, Tagore moved seamlessly to using Chalit (a more popular dialect). Lastly, the poems in Balaka mark the start of an epoch; the most notable of these reads:


"Dancing Girl", an undated ink-on-paper piece by Tagore.
Ore nabin, ore amaarkaNcha,
ore shobujh, ore abhujh,
aadhmaraderga mere tuibancha. Oh youth, oh the tender,
oh green, oh unknowing,
hit the bodies of the halfdead to bring them back to life.

Later, with the development of new poetic ideas in Bengal — many originating from younger poets seeking to break with Tagore's style — Tagore absorbed new poetic concepts, which allowed him to further develop a unique identity. Examples of this include Africa and Camalia, which are among the better known of his latter poems.
The Bangla poet Rabindranath Tagore was the first person (excepting Roosevelt) outside Europe to get the Nobel Prize. He is considered as the pioneer of Bangla literature and culture. The year 1893 AD, was the turn of the century in the Bangla calendar. It was the Bangla year 1300. Tagore wrote a poem then. Its name was ‘The year 1400’. In that poem, Tagore was appealing to a new future poet, yet to be born. He urged in that poem to remember Tagore while he was reading it. He addressed it to that unknown poet who was reading it a century later.
[edit] Music and artwork
Tagore was also an accomplished musician and painter. Indeed, he wrote some 25000 songs; together, these comprise rabindrasangeet now an integral part of Bengali culture. Yet, Tagore's music is inseparable from his literature, most of which — poems or parts of novels, stories, or plays alike — became lyrics for his songs. These ran the gamut of human emotion, and are still frequently used to give voice to a wide range of experiences. Such is true of two such works: Bangladesh's AamaarSonaarBaanglaa and India's JanaaGanaaManaa Tagore thus became the only person ever to have written the national anthems of two nations. Tagore also had an artist's eye for his own handwriting, embellishing the cross-outs and word layouts in his manuscripts with simple artistic leitmotifs.
At age sixty, Tagore took up drawing and painting; successful exhibitions of his many works — which made a debut appearance in Paris upon encouragement by artists he met in the south of France[8] — were held throughout Europe. Tagore — who likely exhibited protanopia ("color blindness"), or partial lack of (red-green, in Tagore's case) colour discernment — painted in a style characterized by peculiarities in aesthetic and colouring style. Nevertheless, Tagore took to emulating numerous styles, including that of craftwork by the Malanggan people of northern New Ireland, Haida carvings from the Pacific Northwest region of North America, and woodcuts by Max Pechstein.