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Selected Poems of Rabindranath Tagore (Penguin Classics) by Rabindranath Tagore
The poems of Rabindranath Tagore are among the most haunting and tender in Indian and world literature, expressing a profound and passionate human yearning. His ceaselessly inventive works deal with such subjects as the interplay between God and mortals, the eternal and the transient, and the paradox of an endlessly changing universe that is in tune with unchanging harmonies. Poems such as “Earth” and “In the Eyes of a Peacock” present a picture of natural processes unaffected by human concerns, while others, as in “Recovery—14,” convey the poet's bewilderment about his place in the world. And exuberant works such as “New Rain” and “Grandfather's Holiday” describe Tagore's sheer joy at the glories of nature or simply in watching a grandchild play.
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First published January 1, 1985
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About the author
Rabindranath Tagore
2,829 books4,203 followersAwarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1913 "because of his profoundly sensitive, fresh and beautiful verse, by which, with consummate skill, he has made his poetic thought, expressed in his own English words, a part of the literature of the West."
Tagore modernised Bengali art by spurning rigid classical forms and resisting linguistic strictures. 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—or panned—for their lyricism, colloquialism, naturalism, and unnatural contemplation. His compositions were chosen by two nations as national anthems: India's Jana Gana Mana and Bangladesh's Amar Shonar Bangla.
The complete works of Rabindranath Tagore (রবীন্দ্র রচনাবলী) in the original Bengali are now available at these third-party websites:
http://www.tagoreweb.in/
http://www.rabindra-rachanabali.nltr....
Tagore modernised Bengali art by spurning rigid classical forms and resisting linguistic strictures. 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—or panned—for their lyricism, colloquialism, naturalism, and unnatural contemplation. His compositions were chosen by two nations as national anthems: India's Jana Gana Mana and Bangladesh's Amar Shonar Bangla.
The complete works of Rabindranath Tagore (রবীন্দ্র রচনাবলী) in the original Bengali are now available at these third-party websites:
http://www.tagoreweb.in/
http://www.rabindra-rachanabali.nltr....
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 56 reviews
June 4, 2024
I've been waiting all week to write this review. By that, I mean that ever since I started reading this collection of poems, I have been quite honestly bursting to write about them.
I got this book for two dollars, knowing nothing of Tagore. I have never really read Indian poets (and my poetry knowledge in general is quite lacking). Reading poetry frankly often feels like a chore.
Tagore is no chore.
I started off by reading his short biography that William Radice wrote. I felt immediately impressed by the depth and breadth of Tagore's life; a spirited educator, poet, leader, speaker, and community member, he is one of Bengal's most revered figures. Then, I read this paragraph:
in this image we have the paradox of his jiban-debata: his sense on the one hand that his works were endlessly diverse, but on the other hand that they were all part of a unified play; that he was creatively free, always at liberty to try new things, but on the other hand at the mercy of a life-deity, a personality higher than his own, guiding him from outside. The jiban-debata concept accounted for his dual sense of involvement in and detachment from his own creations. That same paradox he felt to be at the heart of the Universe itself; so his own creative personality was but a microcosm of the universal Personality, who was also simultaneously detached and involved; and the diversity and extravagance of his art was but a reflection of the extravagance of Nature itself
That, in sum, describes his poetry. A look into the world of the universe by the stringing together of the world of his words. A need to form a unified end (one of nondualism) but via the interplay (maybe perhaps, he would call it the khela) between the dual. His poetry read like a wave, a constant, undulating, giant wave that peaks and troughs before splashing against the shore, spreading its fingertips into the sand and then retreating again, ultimately all its particles coalescing and intermixing with the unity of the water itself. It was wonderful.
His writing was frank and sincere. It was layered, sure, but it was not with pretense. It was all with thoughtful curiosity, that felt to me like he was speaking to himself much more than he was speaking to any audience. The earnestness of it, the fact that his voice was able to carry not only across time but across languages is remarkable. I can only imagine what it would be like to read his work in Bengali.
I loved so many of his poems. I loved the way they told a story, the way they painted a picture of India that I had seen myself yet that I had seen retreating, the way they transported me like a novel yet touched me like a song, the way they lilted and tilted and spun all around, dancing to the beat of the universe's drum. To name a few of my favorites:
Unending Love
The Golden Boat
Broken Song
Highest Price
Gift
Grandfather's Holiday
The Borderland
Leaving Home
The Sickbed
Shah-Jahan
In short, this man is amazing. I want to read his biography. Feel like I have a new answer to the question 'if you could meet a dead person for dinner who would it be.' Rabindranath Tagore. Absolute legend.
One man opens his throat to sing, the other sings in his mind.
Only when waves fall on the shore do they make a harmonious sound;
Only when breezes shake the woods do we hear a rustling in the leaves.
Only from a marriage of two forces does music arise in the world.
Where there is no love, where listeners are dumb, there never can be song.
~Broken Song
I got this book for two dollars, knowing nothing of Tagore. I have never really read Indian poets (and my poetry knowledge in general is quite lacking). Reading poetry frankly often feels like a chore.
Tagore is no chore.
I started off by reading his short biography that William Radice wrote. I felt immediately impressed by the depth and breadth of Tagore's life; a spirited educator, poet, leader, speaker, and community member, he is one of Bengal's most revered figures. Then, I read this paragraph:
in this image we have the paradox of his jiban-debata: his sense on the one hand that his works were endlessly diverse, but on the other hand that they were all part of a unified play; that he was creatively free, always at liberty to try new things, but on the other hand at the mercy of a life-deity, a personality higher than his own, guiding him from outside. The jiban-debata concept accounted for his dual sense of involvement in and detachment from his own creations. That same paradox he felt to be at the heart of the Universe itself; so his own creative personality was but a microcosm of the universal Personality, who was also simultaneously detached and involved; and the diversity and extravagance of his art was but a reflection of the extravagance of Nature itself
That, in sum, describes his poetry. A look into the world of the universe by the stringing together of the world of his words. A need to form a unified end (one of nondualism) but via the interplay (maybe perhaps, he would call it the khela) between the dual. His poetry read like a wave, a constant, undulating, giant wave that peaks and troughs before splashing against the shore, spreading its fingertips into the sand and then retreating again, ultimately all its particles coalescing and intermixing with the unity of the water itself. It was wonderful.
His writing was frank and sincere. It was layered, sure, but it was not with pretense. It was all with thoughtful curiosity, that felt to me like he was speaking to himself much more than he was speaking to any audience. The earnestness of it, the fact that his voice was able to carry not only across time but across languages is remarkable. I can only imagine what it would be like to read his work in Bengali.
I loved so many of his poems. I loved the way they told a story, the way they painted a picture of India that I had seen myself yet that I had seen retreating, the way they transported me like a novel yet touched me like a song, the way they lilted and tilted and spun all around, dancing to the beat of the universe's drum. To name a few of my favorites:
Unending Love
The Golden Boat
Broken Song
Highest Price
Gift
Grandfather's Holiday
The Borderland
Leaving Home
The Sickbed
Shah-Jahan
In short, this man is amazing. I want to read his biography. Feel like I have a new answer to the question 'if you could meet a dead person for dinner who would it be.' Rabindranath Tagore. Absolute legend.
One man opens his throat to sing, the other sings in his mind.
Only when waves fall on the shore do they make a harmonious sound;
Only when breezes shake the woods do we hear a rustling in the leaves.
Only from a marriage of two forces does music arise in the world.
Where there is no love, where listeners are dumb, there never can be song.
~Broken Song
September 5, 2011
The problem with reading Tagore is that, if you know anything about the man, it's difficult to raise your face from a prostrated we're-not-worthy position long enough to make sense of what's on the page. The first non-Western winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature, Tagore was a polymath: painter, poet, political theorist, physicist. This is a dude who chatted it up with Einstein. That's an awful lot of impressed to bring to any reading of verse, particularly one rendered in translation.
From what little I've read on the subject, it seems Tagore's own translation of his work from Bengali to English were less than successful, hence William Radice trying his hand at it here. The results are mixed.
Radice's introduction and extremely thorough afternotes (which both explicate the poems and discuss why he chose certain phrases, noting any deviations from the strictly faithful translation)are both interesting and helpful. The poetry itself fares slightly less well, though the strength of the images wins through more often than not. But those same marvelous afternotes reveal the sometimes extensive liberties Radice takes, which leaves one wondering just whom one is truly reading. Interesting, but unlikely to inflame those new to Tagore.
From what little I've read on the subject, it seems Tagore's own translation of his work from Bengali to English were less than successful, hence William Radice trying his hand at it here. The results are mixed.
Radice's introduction and extremely thorough afternotes (which both explicate the poems and discuss why he chose certain phrases, noting any deviations from the strictly faithful translation)are both interesting and helpful. The poetry itself fares slightly less well, though the strength of the images wins through more often than not. But those same marvelous afternotes reveal the sometimes extensive liberties Radice takes, which leaves one wondering just whom one is truly reading. Interesting, but unlikely to inflame those new to Tagore.
April 22, 2018
Acreditava piamente que ia gostar da poesia de Tagore, pois o seu romance A Casa e o Mundo está no monte dos meus 100 livros favoritos. Afinal, não...
Religião é o tema de quase todos os poemas. Reconheço que são bonitos, mas não me dou bem com "orações"...
=================================
"O bosque seria muito triste se só cantassem os pássaros que cantam melhor."
— Rabindranath Tagore
Rabindranath Tagore nasceu em Calcutá, Índia, no dia 7 de Maio de 1861 e morreu em Calcutá, Índia, no dia 7 de Agosto de 1941. Foi poeta, romancista, músico e dramaturgo. Em 1913 foi-lhe atribuído o Prémio Nobel da Literatura "pela sua poesia profundamente sensível, fresca, e bela, pela qual, com consumada perícia, ele fez do seu pensamento poético uma parte da literatura do ocidente."
Religião é o tema de quase todos os poemas. Reconheço que são bonitos, mas não me dou bem com "orações"...
=================================
"O bosque seria muito triste se só cantassem os pássaros que cantam melhor."
— Rabindranath Tagore
Rabindranath Tagore nasceu em Calcutá, Índia, no dia 7 de Maio de 1861 e morreu em Calcutá, Índia, no dia 7 de Agosto de 1941. Foi poeta, romancista, músico e dramaturgo. Em 1913 foi-lhe atribuído o Prémio Nobel da Literatura "pela sua poesia profundamente sensível, fresca, e bela, pela qual, com consumada perícia, ele fez do seu pensamento poético uma parte da literatura do ocidente."
February 5, 2008
poems in the vein or Rumi and Hafiz, subtly political. lyrical.
May 8, 2021
I recently joined the National Poetry Library and am consequently going through a phase of reading lots of poems. I did realise though how Western centric my reading has been and I know very few non American or British poets. Hence I stumbled across this book and thoroughly enjoyed it! The poems are quite varied; some on nature, some on love and some filled with wisdom.
May 14, 2012
Tagore may have been the greatest poet ever. His work was originally done in Bengali and I've read that the poetry is even more beautiful in Bengali than in English. Tagore spent considerable time in England and was born in Calcutta. It was Tagore who first called Gandhi "Mahatma" (Great Soul). Tagore knew too much of sadness. His mom died when he was 14, his wife when he was 43, his sister in law committed suicide, a daughter died a year after his wife and his youngest son died four years after that. His poetry, is complex. It can be uplifting and it can plumb the depths of sadness. Here's a sample:
Whatever gifts are in my power to give you,
Be they flowers,
Be they gems for your neck,
How can they please you
If in time they must surely wither,
Crack,
Lose luster?
All that my hands can place in yours
Will slip through your fingers
And fall forgotten to the dust
To turn into dust.
Ineffable sadness,yes Tagore knew that. But, if Gandhi was the "Great Soul, Tagore was the "Beautiful Soul"
Whatever gifts are in my power to give you,
Be they flowers,
Be they gems for your neck,
How can they please you
If in time they must surely wither,
Crack,
Lose luster?
All that my hands can place in yours
Will slip through your fingers
And fall forgotten to the dust
To turn into dust.
Ineffable sadness,yes Tagore knew that. But, if Gandhi was the "Great Soul, Tagore was the "Beautiful Soul"
January 6, 2009
The Play of the Universe
From a deep appreciation of the varied imperfections of earth, Tagore's poems yearn for the single, perfect ineffable. The narrative poems tell the stories of ordinary people, but tell them in such a manner as to evoke that deep yearning, so that the ordinary matter is suffused with immense dignity. The allegorical poems are dream-like and imaginative, at once passive and active. The lyrics are his supreme achievement, to my mind. Ardent, yet harmonious, they map human love onto the love of God.
According to Radice, the ideas in "Yaksha" lead right into the heart of Tagore's religious and artistic thought. In Creative Unity (p. 35), in the chapter on the Creative Ideal, Tagore writes: "this world is a creation . . . in its center there is a living idea which reveals itself in an eternal symphony, played on innumerable instruments, all keeping perfect time." Radice identifies this 'living idea' with the Yaksa's ideal, with his Beloved. However, the revelation of this idea through time and space involves separation from that ideal, and thus the pain of yearning for it. Joy and pain are thus an inextricable reflection of the creative khela (play) of the universe.
That ideal is not the unalloyed joy of Christian heaven nor the dissolution of self of nirvana. That ideal is perfection but a perfection lacks the power to express itself through pain and yearning, just like the Beloved trapped in the permanent perfection of "eternal moonlight." Perfection would indeed be a torment if it is unable to enter into a relationship with imperfection. The Yaksa, beating at the door of his Beloved, is advantaged by his mortality: "his freedom to yearn is a gift from God," as Radice puts it.
A more personal poem than "Yaksa," but with some of the same ideas is one written for the Argentinian feminist and writer Victoria Ocampo who found a villa for Tagore to rest in when he fell ill in Buenos Aires. In "Guest," by linking the music of the stars to human love, Tagore puts a Personality at the heart of the universe. Radice's translation makes an alluring music.
Guest
Lady, you have filled these exile days of mine
With sweetness, made a foreign traveller your own
As easily as these unfamiliar stars, quietly,
Coolly smiling from heaven, have likewise given me
Welcome. When I stood at this window and stared
At the southern sky, a message seemed to slide
Into my soul from the harmony of the stars,
A solemn music that said, 'We know you are ours--
Guest of our light from the day you passed
From darkness into the world, always our guest.'
Lady, your kindness is a star, the same solemn tune
In your glance seems to say, 'I know you are mine.'
I do not know your language, but I hear your melody:
'Poet, guest of my love, my guest eternally.'
Is the original written in fourteen lines, in rhyming couplets? Radice's notes are useful on Tagore's ideas and diction, but I wish they give more information about his versification. The sonnet form is certainly appropriate here, shaping the matter of human and divine love. Grateful and considerate, the guest gives the Host-God the last line of the poem. The poem's courtesy reminds me of Herbert's "Love (III)" but it has none of that Anglican's consciousness of unworthiness. The universal drama, here, is not one of redemption, but of homecoming; more, of self-realization.
From a deep appreciation of the varied imperfections of earth, Tagore's poems yearn for the single, perfect ineffable. The narrative poems tell the stories of ordinary people, but tell them in such a manner as to evoke that deep yearning, so that the ordinary matter is suffused with immense dignity. The allegorical poems are dream-like and imaginative, at once passive and active. The lyrics are his supreme achievement, to my mind. Ardent, yet harmonious, they map human love onto the love of God.
According to Radice, the ideas in "Yaksha" lead right into the heart of Tagore's religious and artistic thought. In Creative Unity (p. 35), in the chapter on the Creative Ideal, Tagore writes: "this world is a creation . . . in its center there is a living idea which reveals itself in an eternal symphony, played on innumerable instruments, all keeping perfect time." Radice identifies this 'living idea' with the Yaksa's ideal, with his Beloved. However, the revelation of this idea through time and space involves separation from that ideal, and thus the pain of yearning for it. Joy and pain are thus an inextricable reflection of the creative khela (play) of the universe.
That ideal is not the unalloyed joy of Christian heaven nor the dissolution of self of nirvana. That ideal is perfection but a perfection lacks the power to express itself through pain and yearning, just like the Beloved trapped in the permanent perfection of "eternal moonlight." Perfection would indeed be a torment if it is unable to enter into a relationship with imperfection. The Yaksa, beating at the door of his Beloved, is advantaged by his mortality: "his freedom to yearn is a gift from God," as Radice puts it.
A more personal poem than "Yaksa," but with some of the same ideas is one written for the Argentinian feminist and writer Victoria Ocampo who found a villa for Tagore to rest in when he fell ill in Buenos Aires. In "Guest," by linking the music of the stars to human love, Tagore puts a Personality at the heart of the universe. Radice's translation makes an alluring music.
Guest
Lady, you have filled these exile days of mine
With sweetness, made a foreign traveller your own
As easily as these unfamiliar stars, quietly,
Coolly smiling from heaven, have likewise given me
Welcome. When I stood at this window and stared
At the southern sky, a message seemed to slide
Into my soul from the harmony of the stars,
A solemn music that said, 'We know you are ours--
Guest of our light from the day you passed
From darkness into the world, always our guest.'
Lady, your kindness is a star, the same solemn tune
In your glance seems to say, 'I know you are mine.'
I do not know your language, but I hear your melody:
'Poet, guest of my love, my guest eternally.'
Is the original written in fourteen lines, in rhyming couplets? Radice's notes are useful on Tagore's ideas and diction, but I wish they give more information about his versification. The sonnet form is certainly appropriate here, shaping the matter of human and divine love. Grateful and considerate, the guest gives the Host-God the last line of the poem. The poem's courtesy reminds me of Herbert's "Love (III)" but it has none of that Anglican's consciousness of unworthiness. The universal drama, here, is not one of redemption, but of homecoming; more, of self-realization.
April 10, 2022
I decided to read this book because, in a horror movie that explains the history of my country, this book was mentioned and was a banned book. But people risked their lives reading it. So half curiously I decided to read this book. To be honest I didn't understand a lot of it and it took me forever to read one, let alone understand it. A lot of older language was used and I had to constantly look up words and translations so I can understand a little of it. It's not easy to read, at least for me, but I was interested and still decided to read it. Once I understand a part, it feels rewarding and beautiful. I looked up some background information on Tagore and realized that he too was in a time of war, where things people dislike were imposed on them. And it's kind of like my country was, and maybe still is. I am still interested in this person as he inspired many people and contributed to modern poetry, I think I will read more of his works in the future.
December 29, 2013
Već odavno je Tagore jedan od mojih omiljenih pisaca. Šta je to što ga čini posebnim?
Ne postoji jednostavan odgovor, postoje pokušaji da se dočara lepota i svevremenost njegovih stihova. Posebnom lepotom zrače ljubavni stihovi: nenametljivi, puni poštovanja i obzira prema vrhuncu stvaralačke moći koju je Bog pokazao: ženi. Ali nikako ne treba misliti da je za njega žena apstrakcija, platonska ljubav, biće nedodirljivo, naprotiv. Ona je slika čulnosti ali opisane delikatno, sa poštovanjem, erotično, zavodljivo, zagrnuta velom a dovoljno otkrivena da se nazre sve što krije njena lepota. Slika kojoj se pisac najpre divi a potom razjašnjava sve njene boje, poteze. Potom je oživljava izvodeći je sa platna koje se zove život da bi je uzdigao svojom ljubavlju na mnogo veće platno nego što je slikarsko: nebesko.
Može li se na lepši način odati počast ženi koja se voli?
Ne postoji jednostavan odgovor, postoje pokušaji da se dočara lepota i svevremenost njegovih stihova. Posebnom lepotom zrače ljubavni stihovi: nenametljivi, puni poštovanja i obzira prema vrhuncu stvaralačke moći koju je Bog pokazao: ženi. Ali nikako ne treba misliti da je za njega žena apstrakcija, platonska ljubav, biće nedodirljivo, naprotiv. Ona je slika čulnosti ali opisane delikatno, sa poštovanjem, erotično, zavodljivo, zagrnuta velom a dovoljno otkrivena da se nazre sve što krije njena lepota. Slika kojoj se pisac najpre divi a potom razjašnjava sve njene boje, poteze. Potom je oživljava izvodeći je sa platna koje se zove život da bi je uzdigao svojom ljubavlju na mnogo veće platno nego što je slikarsko: nebesko.
Može li se na lepši način odati počast ženi koja se voli?
September 5, 2017
It took me over two months to get through this slim volume. Tagore's poetry is beautiful, quite extravagant, and unusual, but very complex. Luckily in this Penguin Classics volume there was an extensive section of notes at the back of the book which was fairly helpful.
October 16, 2018
"Trust love even if it brings sorrow. Do not close up your heart."
"Ah no, my friend, your words are dark, I cannot understand them."
"The heart is only for giving away with a year and a song, my love."
"Ah no, my friend, your words are dark, I cannot understand them."
"Pleasure is frail like a dewdrop, while it laughs it dies. But sorrow is strong and abiding. Let sorrowful love wake in your eyes."
"Ah no, my friend, your words are dark, I cannot understand them."
"The lotus blooms in the sight of the sun, and loses all that it has. It would not remain in bid in the eternal winter mist.''
"Ah no, my friend, your words are dark, I cannot understand them."
"Ah no, my friend, your words are dark, I cannot understand them."
"The heart is only for giving away with a year and a song, my love."
"Ah no, my friend, your words are dark, I cannot understand them."
"Pleasure is frail like a dewdrop, while it laughs it dies. But sorrow is strong and abiding. Let sorrowful love wake in your eyes."
"Ah no, my friend, your words are dark, I cannot understand them."
"The lotus blooms in the sight of the sun, and loses all that it has. It would not remain in bid in the eternal winter mist.''
"Ah no, my friend, your words are dark, I cannot understand them."
November 6, 2019
Translation of poetry is a monumental challenge, even more so if hoping to make it accessible to readers who do not share the cultural background of the poet. Reading this collection I felt I got glimpses of Tagore's brilliance in a particular image or stretch of lines but I often felt I was missing something essential. Still a worthwhile exercise.
May 29, 2016
I read one of these poems at my mother's funeral. I don't think she knew anything about Rabindranath Tagore, but I hope she would have appreciated the poem.
Read
March 4, 2010Selected Poems by Rabindranath Tagore
February 2, 2023
“I seem to have loved you in numberless forms, numberless times...
In life after life, in age after age, forever.
My spellbound heart has made and remade the necklace of songs,
That you take as a gift, wear round your neck in your many forms,
In life after life, in age after age, forever.
Whenever I hear old chronicles of love, it's age old pain,
It's ancient tale of being apart or together.
As I stare on and on into the past, in the end you emerge,
Clad in the light of a pole-star, piercing the darkness of time.
You become an image of what is remembered forever.
You and I have floated here on the stream that brings from the fount.
At the heart of time, love of one for another.
We have played along side millions of lovers,
Shared in the same shy sweetness of meeting,
the distressful tears of farewell,
Old love but in shapes that renew and renew forever.
Today it is heaped at your feet, it has found its end in you
The love of all man's days both past and forever:
Universal joy, universal sorrow, universal life.
The memories of all loves merging with this one love of ours -
And the songs of every poet past and forever.”
In life after life, in age after age, forever.
My spellbound heart has made and remade the necklace of songs,
That you take as a gift, wear round your neck in your many forms,
In life after life, in age after age, forever.
Whenever I hear old chronicles of love, it's age old pain,
It's ancient tale of being apart or together.
As I stare on and on into the past, in the end you emerge,
Clad in the light of a pole-star, piercing the darkness of time.
You become an image of what is remembered forever.
You and I have floated here on the stream that brings from the fount.
At the heart of time, love of one for another.
We have played along side millions of lovers,
Shared in the same shy sweetness of meeting,
the distressful tears of farewell,
Old love but in shapes that renew and renew forever.
Today it is heaped at your feet, it has found its end in you
The love of all man's days both past and forever:
Universal joy, universal sorrow, universal life.
The memories of all loves merging with this one love of ours -
And the songs of every poet past and forever.”
January 6, 2023
There are three kinds of poems in this book. The first kind is straight lectures on different topics like spiritualism and Indian myths, which are not necessarily the most artistic achievements but are intriguing as essays in verse. The second kind is narrative stories, some of which are really interesting, the best one "The Bride". The third kind are descriptive poems about nature and these are the best, with a nuanced and complicated approach that are still very clearly environmentalist yet without ignoring the harsher aspects of nature, and the descriptions are incredibly atmospheric and evocative. In general, it's clear that Tagore was a great poet.
June 23, 2020
Rabindrananth Tagore's poetry is a thing of easy beauty, a flowing natural stream of language and imagery that can take you away on romantic or tragic narratives or throw you into far off landscapes. It doesn't feel the weight of its age - Tagore's poetry feels fresh and modern despite being written over 150 years ago. For students of British and American poetry of the period, it maybe lacks the delicacy, the cleverness and the intricacies of some of the great poets, but Tagore makes up for that with the sweeping, epic mood - it's a style of poetic narrative that would seem to fit perfectly to the old epics - The Divine Comedy, Paradise Lost - yet without the dust of ages. There are plenty of folkloric and cultural references, many not recognisable for the average reader, but name dropping is not overbaring or distracting. One can simply enjoy the elegance and the loveliness of the poetry.
The collection is divided into three eras of Tagore's career and they display a consistency of quality and style throughout. Two forms stand out; a free flowing, narrative style of poem and mantra-like repetitions that almost mimick popular song and folk lyrics. Tagore makes both of these distinct styles work and maintains his character in the writing. Form aside, all the poems feel like Tagore's work. The narrative poems range from the grand and the epic to small scale romances or personal musings. They are laden and decorated with sumptuous descriptions of flora and fauna, landscapes lush with colour and life and sadness. The emotions are bare and clear, verging on the melodramatic, but instead of seemingly over the top, Tagore invokes a sense of magical realism in his longer narratives. Opener "Brahma, Visnu, Siva" is a good example, all stars and gods and timelessness. The scope and the drama can be a little off-putting and inaccessible. When they are scaled down and focus on smaller, more human epics, like in "The Bride" then Tagore's poetry really shines and takes on that magical, fairy tale atmosphere.
But he is strongest in the focussed, shorter poems. Those focussing on love and romance are poignant and moving, dramatic like a Cure song but soft and lovely Nike Drake number. Sometimes they are even cheesy, repetitive and catchy like the Beatles singing "Love Me Do". "Unending Love" is the first in the collection in this form - simple, beautiful and moving. "Love's Question" has an insistent, mantra-like refrain, sandwiching juicy, dramatic similes. "New Rain" is the best of them, a quite magnificently evocative poem where the landscapes and the weather comes alive, all encased by the beautiful like "It dances today, my heart, like a peacock it dances".
Others are mini narratives and contain beautiful, tragic and adventurous stories. Among the best the dreamlike "Golden Boat", a little fable, "Broken Song" an elegy to the beauty of musical performance, "Day's End" and the mysterious "On the Edge of the Sea". "Deception" is the best of all these poems. It's strange in this collection because it is heavily grounded in reality. While Tagore's poems are not fantasy, they are often veiled in something otherworldly that colours the tales of hardship and real life. "Deception" is harsh and brutal in its portrayal of the final events of the life of Binu and the act of deceit that her husband, the narrator, struggles to reconcile with his conscience. From the opening line "Binu was twenty-three when illness struck her" to the final, awful "My lie will always stay with me", the poem has a deeply moving, searching feel that goes to the heart of our mortality and humanity, questions what we do and value with the ones we love and creates out of Binu a symbol for the meaningfulness, or meaninglessness, of our time on Earth, questions why we exist and what for.
There are so many lovely poems here that it seems unfair to lump so much praise on one particular poem, but "Deception" for me seems to sum up so many of Tagore's strength as a poet and a storyteller. He is a poet to read and revisit and enjoy again and again. 8
The collection is divided into three eras of Tagore's career and they display a consistency of quality and style throughout. Two forms stand out; a free flowing, narrative style of poem and mantra-like repetitions that almost mimick popular song and folk lyrics. Tagore makes both of these distinct styles work and maintains his character in the writing. Form aside, all the poems feel like Tagore's work. The narrative poems range from the grand and the epic to small scale romances or personal musings. They are laden and decorated with sumptuous descriptions of flora and fauna, landscapes lush with colour and life and sadness. The emotions are bare and clear, verging on the melodramatic, but instead of seemingly over the top, Tagore invokes a sense of magical realism in his longer narratives. Opener "Brahma, Visnu, Siva" is a good example, all stars and gods and timelessness. The scope and the drama can be a little off-putting and inaccessible. When they are scaled down and focus on smaller, more human epics, like in "The Bride" then Tagore's poetry really shines and takes on that magical, fairy tale atmosphere.
But he is strongest in the focussed, shorter poems. Those focussing on love and romance are poignant and moving, dramatic like a Cure song but soft and lovely Nike Drake number. Sometimes they are even cheesy, repetitive and catchy like the Beatles singing "Love Me Do". "Unending Love" is the first in the collection in this form - simple, beautiful and moving. "Love's Question" has an insistent, mantra-like refrain, sandwiching juicy, dramatic similes. "New Rain" is the best of them, a quite magnificently evocative poem where the landscapes and the weather comes alive, all encased by the beautiful like "It dances today, my heart, like a peacock it dances".
Others are mini narratives and contain beautiful, tragic and adventurous stories. Among the best the dreamlike "Golden Boat", a little fable, "Broken Song" an elegy to the beauty of musical performance, "Day's End" and the mysterious "On the Edge of the Sea". "Deception" is the best of all these poems. It's strange in this collection because it is heavily grounded in reality. While Tagore's poems are not fantasy, they are often veiled in something otherworldly that colours the tales of hardship and real life. "Deception" is harsh and brutal in its portrayal of the final events of the life of Binu and the act of deceit that her husband, the narrator, struggles to reconcile with his conscience. From the opening line "Binu was twenty-three when illness struck her" to the final, awful "My lie will always stay with me", the poem has a deeply moving, searching feel that goes to the heart of our mortality and humanity, questions what we do and value with the ones we love and creates out of Binu a symbol for the meaningfulness, or meaninglessness, of our time on Earth, questions why we exist and what for.
There are so many lovely poems here that it seems unfair to lump so much praise on one particular poem, but "Deception" for me seems to sum up so many of Tagore's strength as a poet and a storyteller. He is a poet to read and revisit and enjoy again and again. 8
May 11, 2024
Rabindranath Tagore was a prominent public figure in the early twentieth century, but he is not too well-known in many countries now. He died before Indian independence so he was therefore less important than Gandhi or Nehru. Even his prose and poetry are rarely read outside of India these days.
While Tagore’s poetry was briefly fashionable, it has always had its detractors. Tagore was disliked by Graham Greene, dismissed by Philip Larkin, and disowned by W B Yeats, who was originally a strong advocate for Tagore.
Of course Bengals venerate Tagore, but I wonder if the anti-nationalist Tagore would feel entirely comfortable with their adulation.
Another famous writer who disliked Tagore was Rudyard Kipling. Kipling was himself an Indian writer. He was born and raised in India after all. However while Tagore was Bengali, Kipling was an Anglo-Indian.
The childishly naïve introduction to the Collins selection of Tagore’s poetry has this to say about Kipling. “Like all racists, Kipling evidently needed to feel superior to mask his own insecurities, so Tagore’s success presented a psychological impasse to him as it didn’t fit with his model of the way things should be ordered to make him feel self-confident.” So there! Take that, Kipling!
The writer of the introduction also suggests that Tagore was the superior writer because Kipling’s characters were stereotyped and lacked the complexity observed in real people, unlike Tagore’s characters who were imbued with empathy and sympathy. Hmmm.
Alas, aesthetics and taste do not always follow the pattern of political correctness, even when we wish they did. I must make a confession here, but first a long digression to explain what I just said.
When I was at university, we had a lesson about World War One poetry. While we admired the sentiments of the anti-war poetry, my classmates and I were forced to make the shamefaced confession that from an artistic point of view we actually preferred the gung ho patriotism and naïve pro-war sentiments of Rupert Brooke’s poem, The Soldier.
I have drawn up a list of all the books that mean something to me. As someone who chooses books from a period of several thousand years rather than prioritising modern books, this means that my choices contain far more men than women, and have a bias towards white European and American literature. There are a sprinkle of LGBT writers, but most are straight.
Worse still my list of special books include a number of works that are sexist, misogynistic, homophobic, xenophobic, racist, colonialist and anti-Semitic. (To be fair, there are plenty of works expressing the opposite sentiments.)
I am not anti-woke, and I am not proud that my list is not as representative as many of the lists I see online, which dutifully include books that tick all the boxes for inclusivity. However I am at least honest, and would rather choose the books that I want on the list, rather than fill the list with books that I feel I ought to include, or remove from the list the books that I think I should exclude. Great literature is sadly not always that which expresses the right sentiments.
That brings me to my confession. I would rather read any work by Kipling than the poetry of Rabindranath Tagore. Kipling has his faults, but he is an entertaining and imaginative writer. Tagore’s poetry is not terrible, but I cannot say I liked it very much either.
Let us see why. The first work is this selection is Gitanjali, a pious work about Tagore’s god. Religious poetry is not very easy to write in an entertaining way. It needs the bold imagination of a Milton, or the intelligent wordplay of a John Donne or George Herbert to make it convincing.
Tagore’s poem is an endless series of cloying praises for his deity, mingled with some anguish for the failure of his god to appear before him. This simping for god seems curiously homoerotic, since Tagore talks like a creepy and persistent lover, rather than a mere devotee.
There is a fashionable online exercise at the moment in which men are asked whether they would prefer to meet a strange woman or a bear in the woods. The men always choose the woman. The question is reversed, and women are asked if they would prefer to see a strange man or a bear. The answer men hope to hear is not forthcoming. Women ask, What kind of bear? How big is it? What is the bear doing? Many women choose the bear.
I bring this up because I think that Tagore’s weird obsessive love for his god is so disturbing that if I was Tagore’s god, I think I would choose the bear too.
The Gardener is the best poetry in this collection. This is mostly love poetry, and it is rather pleasurable to read. More of this and I might have added a star to my rating. None of the poetry is remarkable however. There is none of the intensity of ‘How do I love thee? Let me count the ways?’
This is partly because the poems are lyrical, gentle and sentimental, but there is no real passion in them. The love, and indeed the object of the love is idealised. There is no sense that any real woman is inspiring Tagore’s feelings to any height.
Next comes The Crescent Moon. These poems are about a young child, perhaps Tagore’s? These poems are so mawkish that I found them unreadable.
Finally the book ends with Stray Birds, which is a series of axioms that sound like Tagore got them out of fortune cookies. They serve as a reminder that much of what westerners see as eastern wisdom is just vague flowery phrases that sound more profound than they really are.
Of course we have our own writers who are guilty of this. The aphorisms uttered by George Bernard Shaw and Oscar Wilde miss their target as often as they hit it. However Shaw and Wilde are at least witty and amusing, and often say things for the sound of the words rather than the meaning.
Tagore’s vague words of wisdom are entirely humourless, and generalised enough to sound wiser than they really are. Random samples:
“The hurricane seeks the shortest road by the no-road, and suddenly ends its search in Nowhere.”
“The cobweb pretends to catch dew-drops and catches flies.”
“Our names are the light that glows on the sea waves at night and then dies without leaving its signature.”
They can seem deeply meaningful or they can seem shallow and vacuous. It all depends on the empty vessel of the reader, and what we put into them.
Bengals insist that Tagore’s works lose meaning in translation, and he can only be appreciated in the original verse. Certainly translations can detract from the original text, but most great writers can carry over some of the essence of their genius, even when rendered in another language.
So perhaps there is a great Tagore somewhere out there, but this selection does not make the case for it.
While Tagore’s poetry was briefly fashionable, it has always had its detractors. Tagore was disliked by Graham Greene, dismissed by Philip Larkin, and disowned by W B Yeats, who was originally a strong advocate for Tagore.
Of course Bengals venerate Tagore, but I wonder if the anti-nationalist Tagore would feel entirely comfortable with their adulation.
Another famous writer who disliked Tagore was Rudyard Kipling. Kipling was himself an Indian writer. He was born and raised in India after all. However while Tagore was Bengali, Kipling was an Anglo-Indian.
The childishly naïve introduction to the Collins selection of Tagore’s poetry has this to say about Kipling. “Like all racists, Kipling evidently needed to feel superior to mask his own insecurities, so Tagore’s success presented a psychological impasse to him as it didn’t fit with his model of the way things should be ordered to make him feel self-confident.” So there! Take that, Kipling!
The writer of the introduction also suggests that Tagore was the superior writer because Kipling’s characters were stereotyped and lacked the complexity observed in real people, unlike Tagore’s characters who were imbued with empathy and sympathy. Hmmm.
Alas, aesthetics and taste do not always follow the pattern of political correctness, even when we wish they did. I must make a confession here, but first a long digression to explain what I just said.
When I was at university, we had a lesson about World War One poetry. While we admired the sentiments of the anti-war poetry, my classmates and I were forced to make the shamefaced confession that from an artistic point of view we actually preferred the gung ho patriotism and naïve pro-war sentiments of Rupert Brooke’s poem, The Soldier.
I have drawn up a list of all the books that mean something to me. As someone who chooses books from a period of several thousand years rather than prioritising modern books, this means that my choices contain far more men than women, and have a bias towards white European and American literature. There are a sprinkle of LGBT writers, but most are straight.
Worse still my list of special books include a number of works that are sexist, misogynistic, homophobic, xenophobic, racist, colonialist and anti-Semitic. (To be fair, there are plenty of works expressing the opposite sentiments.)
I am not anti-woke, and I am not proud that my list is not as representative as many of the lists I see online, which dutifully include books that tick all the boxes for inclusivity. However I am at least honest, and would rather choose the books that I want on the list, rather than fill the list with books that I feel I ought to include, or remove from the list the books that I think I should exclude. Great literature is sadly not always that which expresses the right sentiments.
That brings me to my confession. I would rather read any work by Kipling than the poetry of Rabindranath Tagore. Kipling has his faults, but he is an entertaining and imaginative writer. Tagore’s poetry is not terrible, but I cannot say I liked it very much either.
Let us see why. The first work is this selection is Gitanjali, a pious work about Tagore’s god. Religious poetry is not very easy to write in an entertaining way. It needs the bold imagination of a Milton, or the intelligent wordplay of a John Donne or George Herbert to make it convincing.
Tagore’s poem is an endless series of cloying praises for his deity, mingled with some anguish for the failure of his god to appear before him. This simping for god seems curiously homoerotic, since Tagore talks like a creepy and persistent lover, rather than a mere devotee.
There is a fashionable online exercise at the moment in which men are asked whether they would prefer to meet a strange woman or a bear in the woods. The men always choose the woman. The question is reversed, and women are asked if they would prefer to see a strange man or a bear. The answer men hope to hear is not forthcoming. Women ask, What kind of bear? How big is it? What is the bear doing? Many women choose the bear.
I bring this up because I think that Tagore’s weird obsessive love for his god is so disturbing that if I was Tagore’s god, I think I would choose the bear too.
The Gardener is the best poetry in this collection. This is mostly love poetry, and it is rather pleasurable to read. More of this and I might have added a star to my rating. None of the poetry is remarkable however. There is none of the intensity of ‘How do I love thee? Let me count the ways?’
This is partly because the poems are lyrical, gentle and sentimental, but there is no real passion in them. The love, and indeed the object of the love is idealised. There is no sense that any real woman is inspiring Tagore’s feelings to any height.
Next comes The Crescent Moon. These poems are about a young child, perhaps Tagore’s? These poems are so mawkish that I found them unreadable.
Finally the book ends with Stray Birds, which is a series of axioms that sound like Tagore got them out of fortune cookies. They serve as a reminder that much of what westerners see as eastern wisdom is just vague flowery phrases that sound more profound than they really are.
Of course we have our own writers who are guilty of this. The aphorisms uttered by George Bernard Shaw and Oscar Wilde miss their target as often as they hit it. However Shaw and Wilde are at least witty and amusing, and often say things for the sound of the words rather than the meaning.
Tagore’s vague words of wisdom are entirely humourless, and generalised enough to sound wiser than they really are. Random samples:
“The hurricane seeks the shortest road by the no-road, and suddenly ends its search in Nowhere.”
“The cobweb pretends to catch dew-drops and catches flies.”
“Our names are the light that glows on the sea waves at night and then dies without leaving its signature.”
They can seem deeply meaningful or they can seem shallow and vacuous. It all depends on the empty vessel of the reader, and what we put into them.
Bengals insist that Tagore’s works lose meaning in translation, and he can only be appreciated in the original verse. Certainly translations can detract from the original text, but most great writers can carry over some of the essence of their genius, even when rendered in another language.
So perhaps there is a great Tagore somewhere out there, but this selection does not make the case for it.
January 16, 2024
Although I have realised lately that I do not like poetry as much as I believed earlier, but then it is Tagore so the experience had to be good.
Rabindranath Tagore (1861-1941), also known as the Bard of Bengal, was the first non-european to win the Nobel Prize, for literature. He has a wide range of poems, songs, short stories & novels - majorly in Bengali, translated into English by himself (at times) and by others too. This particular collection of his poems are translated by William Radice, but a few are translated from the Bengali by Tagore himself too (and I loved them specifically).
A lot of these poems are about one's spiritual awakening, although using scenarios that would interest anybody, some are about nature and Tagore's absolute love for music while some show the patriotic side of Tagore who admired the motherland, or especially Bengal. My favourites are — 'Day's End' which is about detachment from the worldly desires, 'The Hero' which Tagore wrote for his daughter when she was hospitalized, 'Death-Wedding' which he wrote when he faced unfortunate & consecutive deaths in his family. I also loved 'A Half Acre of Land' but it was too metaphorical to understand the spiritual connotations although his understanding of god and his love for Bengal and the power structure of the society were all intermixed well in this one poem itself. Note : Tagore's view on spirituality or love for one's land shouldn't be appropriated with what is practiced today - it is more sinister today or not with the right intentions.
I am very patriotic in that classical sense haha and I would say I'm nobody to rate his work, although I am so looking forward to reading his prose or shorter stories in 2024 itself.
Rabindranath Tagore (1861-1941), also known as the Bard of Bengal, was the first non-european to win the Nobel Prize, for literature. He has a wide range of poems, songs, short stories & novels - majorly in Bengali, translated into English by himself (at times) and by others too. This particular collection of his poems are translated by William Radice, but a few are translated from the Bengali by Tagore himself too (and I loved them specifically).
A lot of these poems are about one's spiritual awakening, although using scenarios that would interest anybody, some are about nature and Tagore's absolute love for music while some show the patriotic side of Tagore who admired the motherland, or especially Bengal. My favourites are — 'Day's End' which is about detachment from the worldly desires, 'The Hero' which Tagore wrote for his daughter when she was hospitalized, 'Death-Wedding' which he wrote when he faced unfortunate & consecutive deaths in his family. I also loved 'A Half Acre of Land' but it was too metaphorical to understand the spiritual connotations although his understanding of god and his love for Bengal and the power structure of the society were all intermixed well in this one poem itself. Note : Tagore's view on spirituality or love for one's land shouldn't be appropriated with what is practiced today - it is more sinister today or not with the right intentions.
I am very patriotic in that classical sense haha and I would say I'm nobody to rate his work, although I am so looking forward to reading his prose or shorter stories in 2024 itself.
July 7, 2025
বইয়ের নাম: Selected Poems
লেখক: Rabindranath Tagore
প্রকাশনী: Oxford University Press
সংগ্রহের সাল: ২০১১, কলকাতা বইমেলা
২০১১-র কলকাতা বইমেলায় ভিড় ঠেলে কিনেছিলাম রবীন্দ্রনাথ ঠাকুরের এই Selected Poems—OUP থেকে প্রকাশিত একখানা টাঁকশাল-মার্কা সংকলন, যেখানে কবির ইংরেজি অনুবাদে ধরা পড়েছে তাঁর কাব্যজগতের বহুবর্ণ রূপ।
এই বইয়ের পাতা উল্টাতে উল্টাতে মনে হয়েছিল—এ যেন রবীন্দ্রনাথ নিজেই আমাকে পথ দেখাচ্ছেন, তাঁর লেখা থেকে অনুবাদের মধ্য দিয়ে, বাংলা থেকে ইংরেজিতে নিজের ছায়াকে খুঁজে নিতে নিতে। বইটিতে Gitanjali, The Gardener, Fruit-Gathering, Stray Birds প্রভৃতি সংকলনের নির্বাচিত কবিতা যেমন আছে, তেমনি আছে আরও কিছু অপেক্ষাকৃত পরিণত পর্যায়ের ভাবসম্পন্ন রচনা—যেখানে ঈশ্বরচিন্তা, প্রেম, দেশপ্রেম, মৃত্যুচেতনা ও আত্মোপলব্ধির মৃদু সুর এসে মিশে গেছে নিঃশব্দ সংগীতের মতো।
অনুবাদগুলি শুধু শব্দান্তর নয়—এ যেন রবীন্দ্রনাথের নিজের লেখা একটি ভিন্ন ‘রূপকথা’। কোথাও কোথাও ভাষা এতটাই খোলা, অলঙ্কারহীন এবং সোজাসাপ্টা যে পাঠ করতে গিয়ে মনে হয়—এই তো, এ আমরাই! আর কোথাও আবার তিনি এমনভাবে শব্দে আবেশ ছড়ান যে অনুভূতি আর বুদ্ধির মাঝখানে দুলে ওঠে হৃদয়।
যাঁরা বাংলা জানেন না, তাঁদের জন্য এটি এক অপূর্ব জানালা—তাঁরা এখানে রবীন্দ্রনাথের হৃদয়, ভাবনা ও কাব্যিক চেতনার সাথে একান্তভাবে পরিচিত হতে পারেন। আর যাঁরা বাংলা জানেন, তাঁদের কাছে এই অনুবাদগুলি একধরনের নতুন পাঠ—রবীন্দ্রনাথের নিজের কণ্ঠেই নিজের ব্যাখ্যা শুনে ফেলার দুর্লভ সুযোগ।
এই বইটি আজও আমার বুকশেলফে একটি নিঃশব্দ আলো হয়ে জ্বলজ্বল করে—যেন ২০১১-র সেই বইমেলার দিন, ভ্যাপসা দুপুর, কাগজের ব্যাগ, আর সেই তরুণ কবিপ্রেমিক আমি—সেই মুহূর্তটা এখানেই থেকে গেছে।
লেখক: Rabindranath Tagore
প্রকাশনী: Oxford University Press
সংগ্রহের সাল: ২০১১, কলকাতা বইমেলা
২০১১-র কলকাতা বইমেলায় ভিড় ঠেলে কিনেছিলাম রবীন্দ্রনাথ ঠাকুরের এই Selected Poems—OUP থেকে প্রকাশিত একখানা টাঁকশাল-মার্কা সংকলন, যেখানে কবির ইংরেজি অনুবাদে ধরা পড়েছে তাঁর কাব্যজগতের বহুবর্ণ রূপ।
এই বইয়ের পাতা উল্টাতে উল্টাতে মনে হয়েছিল—এ যেন রবীন্দ্রনাথ নিজেই আমাকে পথ দেখাচ্ছেন, তাঁর লেখা থেকে অনুবাদের মধ্য দিয়ে, বাংলা থেকে ইংরেজিতে নিজের ছায়াকে খুঁজে নিতে নিতে। বইটিতে Gitanjali, The Gardener, Fruit-Gathering, Stray Birds প্রভৃতি সংকলনের নির্বাচিত কবিতা যেমন আছে, তেমনি আছে আরও কিছু অপেক্ষাকৃত পরিণত পর্যায়ের ভাবসম্পন্ন রচনা—যেখানে ঈশ্বরচিন্তা, প্রেম, দেশপ্রেম, মৃত্যুচেতনা ও আত্মোপলব্ধির মৃদু সুর এসে মিশে গেছে নিঃশব্দ সংগীতের মতো।
অনুবাদগুলি শুধু শব্দান্তর নয়—এ যেন রবীন্দ্রনাথের নিজের লেখা একটি ভিন্ন ‘রূপকথা’। কোথাও কোথাও ভাষা এতটাই খোলা, অলঙ্কারহীন এবং সোজাসাপ্টা যে পাঠ করতে গিয়ে মনে হয়—এই তো, এ আমরাই! আর কোথাও আবার তিনি এমনভাবে শব্দে আবেশ ছড়ান যে অনুভূতি আর বুদ্ধির মাঝখানে দুলে ওঠে হৃদয়।
যাঁরা বাংলা জানেন না, তাঁদের জন্য এটি এক অপূর্ব জানালা—তাঁরা এখানে রবীন্দ্রনাথের হৃদয়, ভাবনা ও কাব্যিক চেতনার সাথে একান্তভাবে পরিচিত হতে পারেন। আর যাঁরা বাংলা জানেন, তাঁদের কাছে এই অনুবাদগুলি একধরনের নতুন পাঠ—রবীন্দ্রনাথের নিজের কণ্ঠেই নিজের ব্যাখ্যা শুনে ফেলার দুর্লভ সুযোগ।
এই বইটি আজও আমার বুকশেলফে একটি নিঃশব্দ আলো হয়ে জ্বলজ্বল করে—যেন ২০১১-র সেই বইমেলার দিন, ভ্যাপসা দুপুর, কাগজের ব্যাগ, আর সেই তরুণ কবিপ্রেমিক আমি—সেই মুহূর্তটা এখানেই থেকে গেছে।
January 26, 2016
I'm glad I read Gitanjali first, because even though I loved a few of these poems, they wouldn't have inspired me to read more Tagore. There's a lot of cultural knowledge needed to be able to understand most of these.
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September 14, 20214.5 stars. Translating poetry is a big ask- the translated works will not embody the expression of the original but the translator has done his best to make these poems accessible.
April 24, 2009
The rating is for the translation, not the originals.
September 19, 2012
Love it!!!!!!
June 22, 2013
Some interesting imagery and language. This includes many references to Hinduism which I did not understand.
June 3, 2023
“He starts to play runs in Sindhi-Bārõyā rāg,
And the whole sky rings
With eternal pangs of seperation.”
♥️
And the whole sky rings
With eternal pangs of seperation.”
♥️
September 22, 2007
a truely exceptional poet
Read
March 20, 2010i like very much rabi poem so...........
November 28, 2013
3.5Stars
October 26, 2021
An excellent collection of poems sampled over Tagore’s life, from age 21 to 79, with intelligent commentary and translation from William Radice. Tagore was truly enlightened, and an advocate for women, the poor, and children. He was well-read in Indian classics and loved his native Bengal, yet had regular contact with the West and traveled throughout his life, finding himself ‘discovered’ by W.B. Yeats and then winning the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1913. He was a deeply spiritual man and yet balanced, seeing a need to avoid asceticism, which he associated with science without poetry, and passionless intellect. He was an idealist who refused to compromise, criticizing the Rowlatt Act against Sedition five years after his Nobel Prize, angering Britain, and yet detaching himself from Gandhi and the Swaraj (home rule) campaign a few years later.
All of that comes out in his poems, which are lyrical, inventive, and often contain dual meaning. It seems translation is extraordinarily difficult, but I really enjoyed what I was able to read here, and that was true from beginning to end; his poems did not diminish in quality with age. Clearly an author to read more of for me.
Quotes:
On beauty:
“I can only gaze at the universe
In its full, true form,
At the millions of stars in the sky
Carrying their huge harmonious beauty –
Never breaking their rhythm
Or losing their tune,
Never deranged
And never stumbling –
I can only gaze and see, in the sky,
The spreading layers
Of a vast, radiant, petalled rose.”
On children, this to the “bespectacled grandfather” who is “trapped in my work like a spiderwebbed fly”:
“Flooding of my study with your leaps and your capers,
Work gone, books flying, avalanche of papers.
Arms round my neck, in my lap bounce thump –
Hurricane of freedom in my heart as you jump.
Who has taught you, how he does it, I shall never know –
You’re the one who teaches me to let myself go.”
On hospitality, and communicating without language:
“Lady, your kindness is a star, the same solemn tune
In your glance seems to say, ‘I know you are mine.’
I do not know your language, but I hear your melody:
‘Poet, guest of my love, my guest eternally.’”
On idealism:
“I know what a risk one runs from the vigorously athletic crowds in being styled an idealist in these days, when thrones have lost their dignity and prophets have become an anachronism, when the sound that drowns all voices is the noise of the market-place. Yet when, one day, standing on the outskirts of Yokohama town, bristling with its display of modern miscellanies, I watched the sunset in your southern sea, and saw its peace and majesty among your pine-clad hills, - with your great Fujiyama growing faint against the golden horizon, like a god overcome with his own radiance, - the music of eternity welled up through the evening silence, and I felt that the sky and the earth and the lyrics of the dawn and the dayfall are with the poets and the idealists, and not with the marketmen robustly contemptuous of all sentiment, - that, after the forgetfulness of his own divinity, man will remember again that heaven is always in touch with his world, which can never be abandoned for good to the hounding wolves of the modern era, scenting human blood and howling to the skies.”
On joy:
“It dances today, my heart, my heart, like a peacock it dances, it dances.”
On love without boundaries, without regard to convention (with a meaning that can be spiritual pursuit or beliefs):
���I find you when and where I choose,
Whenever it pleases me –
No fuss or preparation: tell me,
Who will know but we?
Throwing caution to the winds,
Spurned by all around,
Come, my outcaste love, O let us
Travel, freedom-bound.”
On the Taj Mahal, and undying love:
“The names you softly
Whispered to your love
On moonlit nights in secret chambers live on
Here
As whispers in the ear of eternity.”
On trees:
“O profound,
Silent tree, by restraining valour
With patience, you revealed creative
Power in its peaceful form. Thus we come
To your shade to learn the art of peace,
To hear the world of silence; weighed down
With anxiety, we come to rest
In your tranquil blue-green shade…”
All of that comes out in his poems, which are lyrical, inventive, and often contain dual meaning. It seems translation is extraordinarily difficult, but I really enjoyed what I was able to read here, and that was true from beginning to end; his poems did not diminish in quality with age. Clearly an author to read more of for me.
Quotes:
On beauty:
“I can only gaze at the universe
In its full, true form,
At the millions of stars in the sky
Carrying their huge harmonious beauty –
Never breaking their rhythm
Or losing their tune,
Never deranged
And never stumbling –
I can only gaze and see, in the sky,
The spreading layers
Of a vast, radiant, petalled rose.”
On children, this to the “bespectacled grandfather” who is “trapped in my work like a spiderwebbed fly”:
“Flooding of my study with your leaps and your capers,
Work gone, books flying, avalanche of papers.
Arms round my neck, in my lap bounce thump –
Hurricane of freedom in my heart as you jump.
Who has taught you, how he does it, I shall never know –
You’re the one who teaches me to let myself go.”
On hospitality, and communicating without language:
“Lady, your kindness is a star, the same solemn tune
In your glance seems to say, ‘I know you are mine.’
I do not know your language, but I hear your melody:
‘Poet, guest of my love, my guest eternally.’”
On idealism:
“I know what a risk one runs from the vigorously athletic crowds in being styled an idealist in these days, when thrones have lost their dignity and prophets have become an anachronism, when the sound that drowns all voices is the noise of the market-place. Yet when, one day, standing on the outskirts of Yokohama town, bristling with its display of modern miscellanies, I watched the sunset in your southern sea, and saw its peace and majesty among your pine-clad hills, - with your great Fujiyama growing faint against the golden horizon, like a god overcome with his own radiance, - the music of eternity welled up through the evening silence, and I felt that the sky and the earth and the lyrics of the dawn and the dayfall are with the poets and the idealists, and not with the marketmen robustly contemptuous of all sentiment, - that, after the forgetfulness of his own divinity, man will remember again that heaven is always in touch with his world, which can never be abandoned for good to the hounding wolves of the modern era, scenting human blood and howling to the skies.”
On joy:
“It dances today, my heart, my heart, like a peacock it dances, it dances.”
On love without boundaries, without regard to convention (with a meaning that can be spiritual pursuit or beliefs):
���I find you when and where I choose,
Whenever it pleases me –
No fuss or preparation: tell me,
Who will know but we?
Throwing caution to the winds,
Spurned by all around,
Come, my outcaste love, O let us
Travel, freedom-bound.”
On the Taj Mahal, and undying love:
“The names you softly
Whispered to your love
On moonlit nights in secret chambers live on
Here
As whispers in the ear of eternity.”
On trees:
“O profound,
Silent tree, by restraining valour
With patience, you revealed creative
Power in its peaceful form. Thus we come
To your shade to learn the art of peace,
To hear the world of silence; weighed down
With anxiety, we come to rest
In your tranquil blue-green shade…”
Displaying 1 - 30 of 56 reviews