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Who was Rabindranath Tagore?

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Rabindranath Tagore

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• Victoria and Albert Museum - Rabindranath Tagore: Poet And Painter
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Rabindranath Tagore was a Bengali poet , short-story writer, song composer, playwright, and painter. He introduced new prose and verse forms and the use of colloquial language into  Bengali literature , helped introduce Indian culture to the West and vice versa, and is generally regarded as the outstanding creative artist of early 20th-century  India .

What did Rabindranath Tagore write?

Rabindranath Tagore published several poetry collections, notably Manasi  (1890),  Sonar Tari  (1894;  The Golden Boat ), and Gitanjali  (1910); plays, notably  Chitrangada (1892;  Chitra ); and novels, including Gora  (1910) and  Ghare-Baire  (1916). He also wrote some 2,000 songs , which achieved considerable popularity among all classes of Bengali society.

What awards did Rabindranath Tagore win?

In 1913 Rabindranath Tagore became the first non-European to receive the  Nobel Prize for Literature . Tagore was awarded a knighthood in 1915, but he repudiated it in 1919 as a protest against the  Amritsar (Jallianwala Bagh) Massacre .

Rabindranath Tagore (born May 7, 1861, Calcutta [now Kolkata], India—died August 7, 1941, Calcutta) was a Bengali poet, short-story writer, song composer, playwright, essayist, and painter who introduced new prose and verse forms and the use of colloquial language into Bengali literature , thereby freeing it from traditional models based on classical Sanskrit . He was highly influential in introducing Indian culture to the West and vice versa, and he is generally regarded as the outstanding creative artist of early 20th-century India . In 1913 he became the first non-European to receive the Nobel Prize for Literature .

The son of the religious reformer Debendranath Tagore , he early began to write verses, and, after incomplete studies in England in the late 1870s, he returned to India. There he published several books of poetry in the 1880s and completed Manasi (1890), a collection that marks the maturing of his genius. It contains some of his best-known poems, including many in verse forms new to Bengali , as well as some social and political satire that was critical of his fellow Bengalis.

In 1891 Tagore went to East Bengal (now in Bangladesh) to manage his family’s estates at Shilaidah and Shazadpur for 10 years. There he often stayed in a houseboat on the Padma River (the main channel of the Ganges River ), in close contact with village folk, and his sympathy for them became the keynote of much of his later writing. Most of his finest short stories, which examine “humble lives and their small miseries,” date from the 1890s and have a poignancy, laced with gentle irony , that is unique to him (though admirably captured by the director Satyajit Ray in later film adaptations). Tagore came to love the Bengali countryside, most of all the Padma River, an often-repeated image in his verse. During these years he published several poetry collections, notably Sonar Tari (1894; The Golden Boat ), and plays, notably Chitrangada (1892; Chitra ). Tagore’s poems are virtually untranslatable, as are his more than 2,000 songs, which achieved considerable popularity among all classes of Bengali society.

In 1901 Tagore founded an experimental school in rural West Bengal at Shantiniketan (“Abode of Peace”), where he sought to blend the best in the Indian and Western traditions. He settled permanently at the school, which became Visva-Bharati University in 1921. Years of sadness arising from the deaths of his wife and two children between 1902 and 1907 are reflected in his later poetry, which was introduced to the West in Gitanjali (Song Offerings) (1912). This book, containing Tagore’s English prose translations of religious poems from several of his Bengali verse collections, including Gitanjali (1910), was hailed by W.B. Yeats and André Gide and won him the Nobel Prize in 1913. Tagore was awarded a knighthood in 1915, but he repudiated it in 1919 as a protest against the Amritsar (Jallianwalla Bagh) Massacre .

From 1912 Tagore spent long periods out of India, lecturing and reading from his work in Europe , the Americas, and East Asia and becoming an eloquent spokesperson for the cause of Indian independence. Tagore’s novels in Bengali are less well known than his poems and short stories; they include Gora (1910) and Ghare-Baire (1916), translated into English as Gora and The Home and the World , respectively. In the late 1920s, when he was in his 60s, Tagore took up painting and produced works that won him a place among India’s foremost contemporary artists.

Rabindranath Tagore

Rabindranath Tagore was a Bengali poet, novelist and painter best known for being the first non-European to be awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1913 with his book Gitanjali, Song Offerings . He was highly influential in introducing Indian culture to the West and is generally regarded as the outstanding creative artist of modern India. He was hailed by W.B Yeats and André Gide.

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• Article Title: Rabindranath Tagore Biography
• Author: Biography.com Editors
• Website Name: The Biography.com website
• Url: https://www.biography.com/authors-writers/rabindranath-tagore
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• Original Published Date: April 2, 2014

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The Essential Tagore

Rabindranath Tagore

Edited by Fakrul Alam and Radha Chakravarty

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ISBN 9780674417045

Publication date: 11/24/2014

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The Essential Tagore showcases the genius of India’s Rabindranath Tagore, the first Asian Nobel Laureate and possibly the most prolific and diverse serious writer the world has ever known.

Marking the 150th anniversary of Tagore’s birth, this ambitious collection—the largest single volume of his work available in English—attempts to represent his extraordinary achievements in ten genres: poetry, songs, autobiographical works, letters, travel writings, prose, novels, short stories, humorous pieces, and plays. In addition to the newest translations in the modern idiom, it includes a sampling of works originally composed in English, his translations of his own works, three poems omitted from the published version of the English Gitanjali , and examples of his artwork.

Tagore’s writings are notable for their variety and innovation. His Sonar Tari signaled a distinctive turn toward the symbolic in Bengali poetry. “The Lord of Life,” from his collection Chitra , created controversy around his very personal concept of religion. Chokher Bali marked a decisive moment in the history of the Bengali novel because of the way it delved into the minds of men and women. The skits in Vyangakautuk mocked upper-class pretensions. Prose pieces such as “The Problem and the Cure” were lauded by nationalists, who also sang Tagore’s patriotic songs.

Translations for this volume were contributed by Tagore specialists and writers of international stature, including Amitav Ghosh, Amit Chaudhuri, and Sunetra Gupta.

There have been a number of attempts, in the century since Yeats made [the] request, to give the English reader a fuller and more accurate sense of Rabindranath Tagore—through new translations, anthologies of his work, critical studies, and biographies. But The Essential Tagore , published to coincide with the hundred-and-fiftieth anniversary of Tagore’s birth, is the most substantial one yet. —Adam Kirsch, New Yorker

It is the 150th anniversary of the birth of Rabindranath Tagore, the Indian poet, playwright, novelist, composer, choreographer, educator and philosopher. So I propose as book of the year the splendid new anthology The Essential Tagore , edited by Fakrul Alam and Radha Chakravarty, which contains an unparalleled selection of poems, plays, stories, letters and more, mostly in excellent up-to-date translations. Initially known in the West as a mystical poet, Tagore was among India’s most important social critics and thinkers; his depiction of the limits of women’s lives is especially acute. —Martha Nussbaum, New Statesman

Tagore is one of the greatest literary figures of our time, who commands universal admiration from native readers of Bengali, but the excellence of whose work is difficult to preserve in translation. In rising to this challenge, the editors and translators of The Essential Tagore have done a splendid job of producing a beautiful volume of selections from Tagore’s vast body of writings. The book is also powerfully strengthened by an enjoyable and remarkably far-reaching foreword by Amit Chaudhuri. —Amartya Sen

[A] treasure trove… Imagine the task that was before the editors of The Essential Tagore . They have done a wonderful job, it is almost all gold. Here you can find some of the best of Tagore’s Chekhovian stories, as well as his stunningly various poems (many revitalised by Fakrul Alam’s translations), plus vivid extracts from the great novels, essays, letters, and travel writing. —Barry Hill, The Australian

[While T. S.] Eliot is a major poet for a single era of one literary tradition, Tagore is the most important poet of all eras for an entire culture. It can be said without doubt that Tagore should be compared to the preeminent poets of all cultures: Greece’s Homer, Italy’s Virgil and Dante, Germany’s Goethe, England’s Shakespeare, and—though he is a novelist—Russia’s Tolstoy… The Essential Tagore is a publication for readers all over the world, for all times. —Mohit Ul-Alam, Kali O Kalam

There have also been a number of anthologies of Tagore’s works translated into English over the years… As of this year, a new anthology of Tagore’s works in English edited by Fakrul Alam and Radha Chakravarty dwarfs all previous efforts… Because knowledge of Tagore has been so limited for so long, it’s especially welcome to see The Essential Tagore . The anthology contains many fresh translations of Tagore’s works, including some excellent contributions by Fakrul Alam himself, and I hope its availability will help to broaden perceptions about Tagore’s writing. —Amardeep Singh, Open Letters Monthly

As the generously weighty and elegantly produced Essential Tagore from Harvard testifies, Tagore wrote in many diverse modes, and quite distinct aspects of his genius often come into play. —Seamus Perry, Times Literary Supplement

This new anthology, edited by Fakrul Alam and Radha Chakravarty, is so welcome, because it starts the process of freeing Tagore for a contemporary audience. The first thing that strikes you about The Essential Tagore is the diversity of its subject’s talents: In a career that stretched over seventy-three years (he finished his first poem when he was seven, and was composing a story on his deathbed), Tagore wrote novels, plays, literary criticism, political essays on the iniquities of the British Raj, and descriptions of his travels in Persia and Japan. Yet it is to the poems that one turns immediately. The range is dizzying—Tagore composed devotional, patriotic, erotic, and nature verse—and is tackled here by a phalanx of gifted translators, including [Amit] Chaudhuri… [ The Essential Tagore ] reintroduces a great writer to the world. The most luminous discovery in this anthology is not any particular poem or essay but the cumulative evocation of the poet’s personality… The experience of living in today’s India—a country that is agrarian, industrializing, and postindustrial, all at once—still forces a multiplicity of viewpoints on the individual, and Tagore must have some claim to being the prototypical modern Indian. —Aravind Adiga, Bookforum

• Fakrul Alam is Professor of English at the University of Dhaka.
• Radha Chakravarty is Associate Professor of English at Gargi College, University of Delhi.

Book Details

• 6-3/8 x 9-1/4 inches
• Belknap Press
• Foreword by Amit Chaudhuri

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Biography Online

Rabindranath Tagore

Poet, writer and humanitarian, Rabindranath Tagore was the first Indian to be awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature and he played a key role in the renaissance of modern India. Tagore is most widely known for his poetry, but he was also an accomplished author of novels, short stories, plays and articles. He took an active interest in a widespread range of social, cultural and artistic endeavours. He has been described as one of the first Twentieth Century’s global man.

“So I repeat we never can have a true view of man unless we have a love for him. Civilisation must be judged and prized, not by the amount of power it has developed, but by how much it has evolved and given expression to, by its laws and institutions, the love of humanity.”

— Sadhana: The Realisation of Life, (1916)

Short Biography Rabindranath Tagore

Rabindranath began writing from an early age and impressed with his free-flowing style and spontaneous compositions. He mostly rejected formal schooling; he spent much time being taught at home. In 1878 he travelled to England and sought to study law at University College, London, but he left before finishing the degree.

After returning to India, in 1901, Tagore moved to Shantiniketan to found an ashram which became his focal point for writing and his view on schooling. He chose the name for the ashram – Shantiniketan meaning ‘Abode of Peace.’

“Love is the ultimate meaning of everything around us. It is not a mere sentiment; it is truth; it is the joy that is at the root of all creation.”

– Tagore, Sādhanā : The Realisation of Life (1916)

Friendship with Gandhi

Tagore was firm friends with Gandhi and admired him very much. But, despite this friendship, he could be critical of his views. For example, he disagreed with Gandhi’s views on Swaraj protests and upbraided Gandhi when Gandhi claimed an earthquake was ‘divine retribution for the mistreatment of Dalits in India.’ Yet despite the frequent divergence of opinions, they could admire each other. When Gandhi went on a fast unto death, it was Tagor who was able to persuade Gandhi to give up his fast and look after his health.

Nobel Prize for Literature 1913

In 1913, Tagore was awarded the Nobel Prize for literature for his work ‘ Gitanjali ‘ This made his writings internationally known and his fame spread throughout the world.

“My debts are large, my failures great, my shame secret and heavy; yet I come to ask for my good, I quake in fear lest my prayer be granted.” – Gitanjali

Rabindranath Tagore with Einstein

This gave Tagore the opportunity to travel extensively giving lectures and recitals in many different countries. He also became acquainted with many of the leading cultural contemporaries of the day; this included W.B.Yeats, George Bernard Shaw , Romain Rolland, Robert Frost and Albert Einstein .

Tagore had a great love for nature and many of his poems invoke the simple beauties of the natural world. For Tagore, his religion could be found in the wonders and mysteries of nature – as much as in temples and sacred books.

Tagore was a prolific composer of music. He composed over 2,000 songs which have been popularised and sung widely across Bengal. Like his literature, he broke away from classical constraints to offer a great emotive and spiritual appeal. Tagore is unique for being the official composer for the national anthem of two countries – India’s Jana Gana Mana and Bangladesh’s Amar Shonar Bangla .

Tagore was an opponent of British imperialism, though he also felt Indians had a duty to improve their self-education; he said that British rule was partly due to the state India had fallen into. In particular, he was very denigrating about India’s obsession with caste.

‘the ultimate truth in man is not in his intellect or his possessions; it is in his illumination of mind, in his extension of sympathy across all barriers of caste and colour, in his recognition of the world, not merely as a storehouse of power, but as a habitation of man’s spirit, with its eternal music of beauty and its inner light of the divine presence.’ – Tagore, The Poet’s Religion’ in Creative Unity (1922) [ 1 ]

In 1919, Tagore returned his knighthood in protest at the Jallianwala Bagh Massacre, in which many peaceful Indian protesters were killed.

Tagore was a polymath, and towards the end of his life he took up art and also pursued an interest in science. Tagore was also very much an internationalist, criticising nationalism, though also writing songs and articles in support of the general principle of the Indian independence movement.

“Patriotism cannot be our final spiritual shelter; my refuge is humanity. I will not buy glass for the price of diamonds, and I will never allow patriotism to triumph over humanity as long as I live. “

– Rabindranath Tagore

Tagore view on Religion

Tagore had mixed views on religion. He was brought up in a traditional Hindu family and taught to pray and meditate from an early age. He remembers the peace of mind he developed from chanting the Gayatri Mantra, but at the same time was detached from the more formalistic aspects of religion. He tended to see religion as not scriptures and places of worship but the life we lead. As he explained:

“My religion is my life – it is growing with my growth – it has never been grafted on me from outside.” ~ Tagore to Robert Bridges, 8 July 1914.

He was keen to avoid any fanaticism and saw the strength of his own Hindu religion as its ability to see more than one path to the goal. His life-long aspiration was to see a harmony of religions flourish in India – not from mere tolerance but an appreciation of the different merits other religions had.

‘The Idea of freedom to which India aspired was based upon realization of spiritual unity…India’s great achievement, which is still stored deep within her heart, is waiting to unite within itself Hindu, Moslem, Buddhist and Christian, not by force, not by the apathy of resignation, but in the harmony of active cooperation.’ ~ Tagore in Berlin, 1921.

However, he was also critical of the Hindu caste system.

Tagore’s poetry frequently hint at a mystical view of the world.

“In this playhouse of infinite forms I have had my play, and here have I caught sight of him that is formless.” – Gitanjali “The human soul is on its journey from the law to love, from discipline to liberation, from the moral plane to the spiritual.” Sādhanā : The Realisation of Life (1916)

Tagore died on 7th August 1941, after a long and painful illness, aged 80. He died in his family home.

Citation: Pettinger, Tejvan . “ Rabindranath Tagore ”, Oxford, UK www.biographyonline.net , 1st Jun. 2009. Last updated 1 March 2019.

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The Essential Tagore

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External Links

• Short poems of Rabindranath Tagore 
• Tagore Bio at Nobel.org

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Rabindranath Tagore was an Indian writer who won the Nobel prize for Literature in 1913.

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Rabindranath Tagore; a biography

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• Dimensions 19.05 x 0.97 x 23.5 cm
• ISBN-10 9789384225209
• ISBN-13 978-9384225209
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• ASIN ‏ : ‎ 9384225207
• Publisher ‏ : ‎ Om Books International (1 January 2016); Om Books International, 107 Ansari Road, Daryaganj, New Delhi-110002, India, Tel.(11) 4000 9000, Fax, (11) 23278091
• Language ‏ : ‎ English
• Hardcover ‏ : ‎ 80 pages
• ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 9789384225209
• ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-9384225209
• Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 476 g
• Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 19.05 x 0.97 x 23.5 cm
• Country of Origin ‏ : ‎ India
• Packer ‏ : ‎ Om Books International, 107 Darya Ganj, New Delhi - 110002
• #233 in Biographies for Children (Books)
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Rabindranath Tagore: A Pictorial Biography Hardcover – August 16, 2012

• Print length 280 pages
• Language English
• Publisher Niyogi Books
• Publication date August 16, 2012
• Dimensions 9 x 0.95 x 11.03 inches
• ISBN-10 8189738755
• ISBN-13 978-8189738754
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• Publisher ‏ : ‎ Niyogi Books; 2012th edition (August 16, 2012)
• Language ‏ : ‎ English
• Hardcover ‏ : ‎ 280 pages
• ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 8189738755
• ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-8189738754
• Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 3.2 pounds
• Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 9 x 0.95 x 11.03 inches
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Famous Books by Rabindranath Tagore

• Updated on  
• Nov 28, 2022

Revered as Gurudev and Biswakabi , the Bengali poet, writer, singer and painter Rabindranath Tagore is amongst the most famous Indian authors and illuminated the Bengali Literature with his glorious poetry, short stories and novels. A man of many talents, Tagore was the one to confer Gandhi with the renowned title of Mahatma and was known to be a good friend with Albert Einstein as they shared similar interests in music. He was globally acclaimed for his collection of poems Gitanjali and was the first non-European Nobel Laureate as he was honoured with a Nobel Prize in Literature in 1913. If you are planning to explore the amazing works of this well-known Bard of Bengal, we have curated a perfect reading list of famous books by Rabindranath Tagore through this blog!

“ A mind all logic is like a knife all blade. It makes the hand bleed that uses it.”

This Blog Includes:

The home and the world, the postmaster, chokher bali, the post office, waiting , friend , on the nature of love , paperboats .

A striking storyteller and soulful poet, Rabindranath Tagore explored the unconventional themes of his times and painted a stunning portrait of the Bengali culture through his amazing works. He was gifted with the art of storytelling as he wove even the simplest of stories into internationally accoladed writings. Here are some of the best books by Rabindranath Tagore everyone must read once in their lives.

“The small wisdom is like water in a glass: clear, transparent, pure. The great wisdom is like the water in the sea: dark, mysterious, impenetrable.”

“ When I sing to make you dance I truly now why there is music in leaves, and why waves send their chorus of voices to the heart of the listening earth—when I sing to make you dance. “

Gitanjali is actually an anthology of poetry and is the most renowned and influential work by Rabindranath Tagore. Published originally in 1910, Tagore rereleased it as a series of translated prose poems in English, titled ‘Gitanjali: Song Offerings’, and came out in the printed form in the year 1912. W.B. Yeats authored the introduction of the English version. Tagore was inspired by the Indian lyrics of devotion from medieval times and emphasised on ‘Love’ is the principal subject of Gitanjali. Amongst the most famous books by Rabindranath Tagore, this series was internationally lauded for its musical and rhythmic poetry and led Tagore to win the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1913.

Originally named as Ghare Baire in Bengali, The Home and the World is a novel set in the early years of the Indian independence struggle and was published in the year 1916. In the context of the Swadeshi Movement, Tagore has masterfully created three characters, Nikhil, Bimala and Sandip, struggling their own ideas about the self amidst the revolutionary times of the freedom struggle in India. As both a love story and political saga, the novel beautifully portrays Tagore’s self-struggle as he was torn between the cultural ideas of West and his defiance against them. Amongst the famous books by Rabindranath Tagore which has strikingly broken the traditional portrayal of male and female protagonists, it has also underlined several aspects of Swadeshi movement through the contrast between conventional and radical perspectives.

Alas for our foolish human nature! Its fond mistakes are persistent. 

Known to be written by him in complete isolation, The Postmaster established Tagore as India’s greatest romantic as the story beautifully explores human condition its varied forms, from the innocence of childhood to the contrast between a bustling city and a rustic village as well as love and loss and the natural and supernatural! It is one of the best books by Rabindranath Tagore which you can pick if you are just starting out with reading his immensely rich and amazingly endearing literature!

Often referred to as the first modern Indian novel, Chokher Bali tells the story of a beautiful and educated widow Binodini in a society that believed in isolating widows from the community and leaving them for a life filled with despair and nothingness. As a well-read woman, Binodini is aware of this negligence prevalent towards widows in her society and as the novel progresses, Tagore intricately builds a complicated web of relationships which begins with Binodini’s jealousy towards Mahim and Asha’s marital bliss and concludes with her leaving a potentially happy ending which is something largely debated on!

Amongst the famous books by Rabindranath Tagore, this novel brings an incredible interplay of relationships and has been adapted to the silver screen in 2003 by Rituparno Ghosh and starred Aishwarya Rai as Binodini!

“Perhaps the crescent moon smiles in doubt at being told that it is a fragment awaiting perfection.”

Another uniquely written series of Proverbs, Aphorisms and Maxims, Fireflies is amongst the popular poetry books by Rabindranath Tagore. The title of this work is inspired from the initial lines of his poem ‘Lekhan’ which reads as ‘My fancies are fireflies. Fireflies is a collection of 256 poems, verses and has many parallels with his popular epigram ‘Stray Birds’. Poetry in this book is presented more like aphorism and maxims than actual poems. Many critics do not rule out the potential influence of Japanese ‘Haiku’. The brevity of these poems has not stopped Tagore from expressing different poetic ideas with sheer eloquence. While going through these poems a reader is swept with delight and awe.

“If only they let me, I’ll go right into the dense forest where you can’t find your way. And where the honey-sipping hummingbird rocks himself on the end of the thinnest branch, I will flower out as a champa.”

The Post Office or Dak Ghar is actually a play written by Rabindranath Tagore and tells the story of a child’s liberation not only in terms of physical context but also social, psychological and emotional freedom. The protagonist of the play is Amal, who is a small boy languished between the four walls of his uncle’s home due to an irrecoverable illness. W.B. Yeats produced its maiden English version. In 1913 it was played first in Irish theatre located in London. Tagore was also a part of the audience. In Bengal, it was played in 1917 in the city of Calcutta. In Germany , its run lasted for over 105 dazzling performances all over the country. It is also one of the most adapted plays by Rabindranath Tagore and can be a perfect quarantine read for your pastime as we are all confined within the four walls of our homes!

“…those in this world who have the courage to try and solve in their own lives new problems of life are the ones who raise society to greatness! Those who merely live according to rule do not advance society, they only carry it along.”

Amongst the long list of excellently written works by Rabindranath Tagore, Gora finely portrays the social , political and religious society of Bengal during the colonial rule of 1880s. It is Tagore’s fifth literary novel and brings forwards the profoundly created protagonist Gora who is fraught with philosophical questions, theological and political debate, as well as on the subjects of freedom, universal brotherhood, gender, female rights, the malaise of caste, class disparity, tradition and modernity, urban and rural gap, nationalism, colonialism, and much more. 

“Reach high, for stars lie hidden in you. Dream deep, for every dream precedes the goal.”

“The song I came to sing remains unsung to this day. I have spent my days in stringing and in unstringing my instrument.”

In this poem, Tagore talks about recognizing the divine within oneself. Tagore was a man who was deeply inspired by Hindu philosophy , especially the Upanishads. He refers to the Hindu belief that God resides as the soul in each being. Therefore devotion or spirituality , according to him, is a deeply personal journey. He tries to make the reader understand that devotion is progression till we reckon with our innermost self. Tagore says that although he as a seeker is progressing towards unison with god, he says it cannot happen as his own journey towards enlightenment is still developing.

“Art thou abroad on this stormy night on thy journey of love, my friend? The sky groans like one in despair. I have no sleep tonight. Ever and again I open my door and look out on the darkness, my friend!”

This poem is more of a dialogue in nature. Tagore, in this poem, expresses his concern to a friend who is braving a storm in order to visit him. The speaker of this poem says that because the friend is coming to visit him, despite the bad weather, he wouldn’t rest until his friend reaches. Due to the heavy storm, the poet laments unable to spot anything outside and consequently worries about his well-being. Enunciating the shore of the black river and the depth of gloom outside he wonders if his friend is shortening his life, only to visit him.

“The night is black and the forest has no end; a million people thread it in a million ways. We have trysts to keep in the darkness, but where or with whom – of that we are unaware.”

This poem by Tagore elucidates the quest that an individual undergoes in order to find their partner. The subject of this poem is the physical search for a life partner or a companion. The poem rests on the idea that our life partner is predestined and therefore the poet is seen to be searching for his soul mate. In this poem, the search through the forest is the search for true love and the lightning represents destiny, which according to the poem is the end of the final search. To put it simply, life according to the poet is a quest for a soulmate that seems to be never-ending. The driving force for pursuing the search is that it would bring eternal happiness on its completion.

“Day by day I float my paper boats one by one down the running stream. In big black letters, I write my name on them and the name of the village where I live.”

Paperboat is a poem from his collection ‘The crescent Moon’ which captures the childhood memory of the poet. Much like Wordsworth and Walter de la Mare, Tagore finds a mystic quality in his children. This poem puts forth a child’s experience of floating paper boats down a stream and evinces the innocent psychology of a child. This poem of Tagore shows a keen insight into the innocence and purity of a child’s mind.

The following are the popular works of Rabindranath Tagore: Manasi Sonar Tari Gitanjali Gitimalya Balaka

In 1913, Rabindranath Tagore was the first Indian to won a Nobel prize. He won the Nobel prize in literature.

Most famous poem of Rabindranath Tagore is Gitanjali

Cherished for his heartfelt stories and eloquent characters who were way ahead of their times, Tagore’s literary world was reflected in the many colours of Bengali society and culture and his aspirations of an ideal world filled with strong and determined yet humane characters. We hope that our list of famous books by Rabindranath Tagore helps you explore the colossally exquisite literature of Gurudev! Planning to study English Literature courses? Our Leverage Edu experts are here to help you explore the best combinations of courses and universities and find the best-matched one as per your interests and preferences! Sign up for a free session with us today!

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