More infoat: http://nobelprize.org

Rabindranath Tagore was an icon of Indian culture. He was a poet, philosopher, musician, writer, and educationist. Rabindranath Tagore became the first Asian to became Nobel laureate when he won Nobel Prize for his collection of poems, Gitanjali, in 1913. He was popularly called as Gurudev and his songs were popularly known as Rabindrasangeet. Two songs from his Rabindrasangit canon are now the national anthems of India and Bangladesh: the Jana Gana Mana and the Amar Shonar Bangla.

Rabindranath Tagore was born on May 7, 1861 in a wealthy Brahmin family in Calcutta. He was the ninth son of Debendranath and Sarada Devi. His grandfather Dwarkanath Tagore was a rich landlord and social reformer. Rabindra Nath Tagore had his initial education in Oriental Seminary School. But he did not like the conventional education and started studying at home under several teachers. After undergoing his upanayan (coming-of-age) rite at the age of eleven, Tagore and his father left Calcutta in 1873 to tour India for several months, visiting his father's Santiniketan estate and Amritsar before reaching the Himalayan hill station of Dalhousie. There, Tagore read biographies, studied history, astronomy, modern science, and Sanskrit, and examined the classical poetry of Kalidasa.

In 1874, Tagore's poem Abhilaash (Desire) was published anonymously in a magazine called Tattobodhini. Tagore's mother Sarada Devi expired in 1875. Rabindranath's first book of poems, Kabi Kahini ( tale of a poet ) was published in 1878. In the same year Tagore sailed to England with his elder brother Satyandranath to study law. But he returned to India in 1880 and started his career as poet and writer. In 1883, Rabindranath Tagore married Mrinalini Devi Raichaudhuri, with whom he had two sons and three daughters.

In 1884, Tagore wrote a collection of poems Kori-o-Kamal (Sharp and Flats). He also wrote dramas - Raja-o-Rani ( King and Queen) and Visarjan (Sacrifice). In 1890, Rabindranath Tagore moved to Shilaidaha (now in Bangladesh) to look after the family estate. Between 1893 and 1900 Tagore wrote seven volumes of poetry, which included Sonar Tari (The Golden Boat) and Khanika. In 1901, Rabindranath Tagore became the editor of the magazine Bangadarshan. He Established Bolpur Bramhacharyaashram at Shantiniketan, a school based on the pattern of old Indian Ashrama. In 1902, his wife Mrinalini died. Tagore composed Smaran ( In Memoriam ), a collection of poems, dedicated to his wife.

In 1905, Lord Curzon decided to divide Bengal into two parts. Rabindranath Tagore strongly protested against this decision. Tagore wrote a number of national songs and attended protest meetings. He introduced the Rakhibandhan ceremony , symbolizing the underlying unity of undivided Bengal.

In 1909, Rabindranath Tagore started writing Gitanjali. In 1912, Tagore went to Europe for the second time. On the journey to London he translated some of his poems/songs from Gitanjali to English. He met William Rothenstein, a noted British painter, in London. Rothenstien was impressed by the poems, made copies and gave to Yeats and other English poets. Yeats was enthralled. He later wrote the introduction to Gitanjali when it was published in September 1912 in a limited edition by the India Society in London. Rabindranath Tagore was awarded Nobel Prize for Literature in 1913 for Gitanjali. In 1915 he was knighted by the British King George V.

In 1919, following the Jallianwala Bagh massacre, Tagore renounced his knighthood. He was a supporter of Gandhiji but he stayed out of politics. He was opposed to nationalism and militarism as a matter of principle, and instead promoted spiritual values and the creation of a new world culture founded in multi-culturalism, diversity and tolerance. Unable to gain ideological support to his views, he retired into relative solitude. Between the years 1916 and 1934 he traveled widely.

1n 1921, Rabindranath Tagore established Viswabharati University. He gave all his money from Nobel Prize and royalty money from his books to this University. Tagore was not only a creative genius, he was quite knowledgeable of Western culture, especially Western poetry and science too. Tagore had a good grasp of modern - post-Newtonian - physics, and was well able to hold his own in a debate with Einstein in 1930 on the newly emerging principles of quantum mechanics and chaos. His meetings and tape recorded conversations with his contemporaries such Albert Einstein and H.G. Wells, epitomize his brilliance.

In 1940 Oxford University arranged a special ceremony in Santiniketan and awarded Rabindranath Tagore with Doctorate Of Literature. Gurudev Rabindranath Tagore passed away on August 7, 1941 in his ancestral home in Calcutta.

Source: http://www.iloveindia.com/indian-heroes/rabindranath-tagore.html

The English Gitanjali was a landmark event that happened almost by accident. Tagore translated a group of his poems into English to pass the time while he was sick, then showed his translations to some influential English writers and editors, including William Rothenstein and William Butler Yeats—both of whom helped to publish and promote the English Gitanjali . A year later, Tagore made history by becoming the first Asian to win the Nobel Prize in Literature. Westerners were initially enamored of Tagore's poems for their peaceful, mystical qualities, which contrasted sharply with a world on the verge of a harsh, global war. "60," which features children playing on a universal seashore, contrasts metaphysical and religious ideas with the human world to demonstrate the blissful ignorance of children, who do not know about the adult world. The poem also emphasizes the idea of unity, underscoring Tagore's lifelong goal to unite Eastern and Western traditions—a challenge at the time in British-controlled India. Generally speaking, Bengali readers know Tagore for his body of work, while many Westerners still associate Tagore only with Gitanjali .

Source: http://www.bookrags.com/studyguide-60/

Like a rain-cloud of July hung low
with its burden of unshed showers let
all my mind bend down at thy door in
one salutation to thee.

Let all my songs gather together
their diverse strains into a single
current and flow to a sea of silence in
one salutation to thee.

Like a flock of homesick cranes
flying night and day back to their
mountain nests let all my life take its
voyage to its eternal home in one
salutation to thee.

I put my tales of you into lasting
songs. The secret gushes out from my
heart. They come and ask me, "Tell
me all your meanings." I know not
how to answer them. I say. "Ah. who
knows what they mean!" They smile
and go away in utter scorn. And you
sit there smiling.

It was my songs that taught me all
the lessons I ever learnt; they showed
me secret paths, they brought before
my sight many a star on the horizon of
my heart.

They guided me all the day long to
the mysteries of the country of
pleasure and pain, and, at last, to
what palace gate have they brought
me in the evening at the end of my
journey ?

No more sailing from harbour to
harbour with this my weather-beaten
boat. The days are long passed when
my sport was to be tossed on waves.

And now I am eager to die into the
deathless.

Into the audience hall by the
fathomless abyss where swells up the
music of toneless strings I shall take
this harp of my life.

I shall tune it to the notes of for
ever, and, when it has sobbed out its
last utterance, lay down my silent
harp at the feet of the silent.

Then take away your hands and
silently put up with your defeat, my
heart, and think it your good fortune
to sit perfectly still where you are
placed.

These my lamps are blown out at
every little puff of wind, and trying to
light them I fog get all else again and
again.

But I shall be wise this time and
wait in the dark, spreading my mat on
the floor; and whenever it is thy
pleasure, my lord, come silently and
take thy seat here.

I surely know my pride will go to
the wall, my life will burst its bonds in
exceeding pain, and my empty heart
will sob out- in music like a hollow
reed, and the stone will melt in tears.

I surely know the hundred petals
of a lotus will not remain closed for
ever and the secret recess of its
honey will be bared.

From the blue sky an eye shall gaze
upon me and summon me in silence.
Nothing will be left for me, nothing
whatever, and utter death shall I
receive at thy feet.

In the early morning thou wouldst
call me from my sleep like my own
comrade and lead me running from
glade to glade.

On those days I never cared to
know the meaning of songs thou
sangest to me. Only my voice took up
the tunes, and my heart danced in
their cadence.

Now, when the playtime is over,
what is this sudden sight that is come
upon me? The world with eyes bent
upon thy feet stands in awe with all
its silent stars.

I have tasted of the hidden honey
of this lotus that expands on the
ocean of light, and thus am I blessed-
¬let this be my parting word.

In this playhouse of infinite forms
I have had my play and here have I
caught sight of him that is formless.

My whole body and my limbs have
thrilled with his touch who is beyond
touch, and if the end comes here, let
it come-let this be my parting word.

What was the power that made me .
open out into this vast mystery like a
bud in the forest at midnight!

When in the morning I looked
upon the light I felt in a moment that
I was no stranger in this world. that
the inscrutable without name and
form had taken me in its arms in the
form of my own mother.

Even so, in death the same
unknown will appear as ever known
to me. And because I love this life. I
know I shall love death as well.

The child cries out when from the
right breast the mother takes it away,
in the very next moment to find in
the left one its consolation.

Ask not what I have with me to
take there. I start on my journey with
empty hands and expectant heart.

I shall put on my wedding garland.
Mine is not the red-brown dress of
the traveller, and though there are
dangers on the way I have no fear in
my mind.

The evening star will come out
when my voyage is done and the
plaintive notes of the twilight
melodies be struck up from the King's
gateway.

Here I give back the keys of my
door-and I give tip all claims to my
house. I only ask for last kind words
from you.

We were neighbours for long. but I
received more than I could give. Now
the clay has dawned and the lamp that
lit my dark corner is out. A summons
has come and I am ready for my
journey.

Yet stars will watch at night, and
morning rise as before, and hours
heave like sea waves casting up
pleasures and pains.

When I think of this end of my
moments, the barrier of the moments
breaks and I see by the light of death
thy world with its careless treasures.
Rare is its lowliest seat, rare is its
meanest of lives.

Things that I longed for in vain
and things that I got- let them pass.
Let me but truly possess the things
that. I ever spurned and overlooked.