Discovering Rabindranath Tagore

Rabindranath Tagore , our very own Leonardo Da Vinci. Poet-Laureate, musician, painter, science writer, first Asian to win the Nobel prize, the man who gave Gandhi the title "Mahatma" and our nation, its national anthem. Tagore was instrumental in keeping the left brain of the nation active and kept creative traditions going in India, when most of the nation and Gandhi & Nehru were busy with the movements and politics of Freedom.

I hadn't read any books by Rabindranath Tagore until recently. I kept "encountering" him at various places in the country during our travels. A well travelled man, between 1878 and 1932, Tagore visited thirty countries on five continents including countries such as Peru, UK, Switzerland, Iran, Iraq, Indonesia, Malaysia, Japan, Italy & Mexico. During his travels he met several notable persons of his era - Benito Mussolini!!, Henri Bergson, Albert Einstein, Robert Frost, Mahatma Gandhi, Thomas Mann, George Bernard Shaw, H.G. Wells, Subhas Bose and Romain Rolland.

"Discovering" Rabindranath Tagore (and other great people) in several places across India and the world during our trips has been an enlightening part of our travels. Descriptions of places by greats such as Tagore, Mark Twain, Rudyard Kipling and their ilk, helps us mere mortals see places in a new light. Here's a list of places where I discovered Tagore!

Karwar - Karnataka

I first discovered him in Karwar (other than school history books) on Rabindranath Tagore Beach and on the welcome sign as we entered Karwar "a place that inspired Rabindranath Tagore"! The place that inspired him to pen his first play in 1883 and write "The sea beach of Karwar is certainly a fit place in which to realise that the beauty of nature is not a mirage of imagination but reflects joy of the infinite and thus draws us to lose ourselves in it." His second brother was a judge posted in Karwar and Tagore spent a few years of his life there (aged 20) where he wrote many plays, poems and short stories.

Darjeeling

A taxi ride up to Tiger Hill at 4:00 am to watch the famous sunrise over the Kanchenjunga. Around 5:00 am, the sun rises and we don't quite get to see the first rays over the Himalayas. Too many clouds and probably too many people! Trudging back to our taxi, we have our sympathetic, Nepali driver ask us "Dikha nahi na shaab? Shaab, Bura mat mano, Rabindranath Tagore, hain na? Che (6) baar Darjeeling aaya, Kabhi sunrise nahi dekha". As if to say, "if the great man didn't see it, how would you?" Don't know if Rabindranath Tagore ever went to Gangtok, we saw the sunrise over the Kanchenjunga from our hotel window!

Jallianwallah Baug - Amritsar

During our visit to Amritsar, we saw as a part of the exhibits at Jallian Wallah Baug a famous letter by Rabindranath to the British government, returning his title of knighthood after the massacre by General Dwyer's troops in 1919. This protest inspired the nation to rise up against the British and launch a sustained campaign and freedom struggle until Independence.

Dalhousie - Himachal Pradesh

As we went on a early morning walk in the upper parts of Dalhousie, we chanced upon a sign that pointed towards "Tagore Bhavan", a place where Tagore spent a few months of his life in 1873 (aged 11 years). There, Tagore read biographies, studied history, astronomy, modern science, and Sanskrit, and examined the classical poetry of Kalidasa.The mighty Himalayas of the Dhauladhar range, inspired him to become what he did later in his life.

Argumentative Indians

Amartya Sen's aptly named book, that describes India's age old traditions of democracy promoted by several religions, kings and dynasties including Buddhist monasteries, Ashoka, Akbar, Vijaynagar empire and others has several references to Rabindranath Tagore and his life and work. Interesting comparisons between Gandhi and Tagore, their arguments, discussions and meetings is an interesting part of this book. Tagore, comes through as the more liberal, rational and the one with the scientific temperament, characterized by his disapproval of Gandhi's description of a earthquake in Bihar as "a divine chastisement sent by God for our sins — in particular the sins of untouchability".

Children's Stories

Looking for books for my children, I discovered a volume of short stories, poems and plays written by Tagore (Selected Writings for Children - Rabindranath Tagore edited by Sukanta Chaudhuri) when he himself was a child and his writings for children later in his life. This book is an interesting collection of poems and stories by Tagore that will make your children "think", providing no answers, raising questions and letting children ask many more! Great to stir the imagination of your kids on the stars, flying machines!, tigers, birds, and about siblings, if you can get today's kids to read his books!