Rabindranath Tagore Biography and Works.

Rabindranath Tagore was born in the Jorasanko mansion in Calcutta (Kolkata) on May 7, 1861 to Debendranath Tagore and Sarada Devi.

Author of Gitanjali and its ‘profoundly sensitive, fresh and beautiful verse’, he became the first non-European Nobel laureate by earning the 1913 Nobel Prize in Literature. In translation, his poetry was viewed as spiritual and mercurial; his seemingly mesmeric persona, floccose locks, and empyreal garb garnered him a prophet-like aura in the West.

His ‘elegant prose and magical poetry’ remain largely unknown outside Bengal.

As a humanist, universalist, internationalist and strident anti-nationalist, he denounced the Raj and advocated for independence from Britain.

As an exponent of the Bengal Renaissance, he advanced a vast canon that comprised paintings, sketches and doodles, hundreds of texts, and some two thousand songs; his legacy endures also in the institution he founded, the Visva-Bharati University.

He started writing poetry at an age of 8. At the age of 16, he cheekily released his first substantial poems under the pseudonym, Bhanusingha (Sun Lion), his novels, stories, songs, dance-dramas, and essays spoke to topics – political and personal.

Gitanjali (Song Offerings), Gora (Fair-Faced), and Ghare-Baire (The Home and the World) are his best-known works, and his verse, short stories and novels were acclaimed for their lyricism, colloquialism, naturalism and unnatural contemplation. He penned two national anthems: the Republic of India’s Jana Gana Mana’ and Bangladesh’s ‘Amar Shonar Bangla’.

Trivia

He established the Bolpur Bramhacharya Ashram at Shantiniketan, a school based on the pattern of old Indian Ashram.

Quote

“I slept and dreamt that life was joy. I awoke and saw that life was service. I acted and behold, service was joy.”