Tuesday, May 28, 2013

Rabindra Nath Tagore

Rabindranath Tagore
Author of Gitanjali and its "profoundly sensitive, fresh and beautiful verse",[2] he became the first non-European to win the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1913
Rabindranath Tagore (1861-1941) developed the Bengali novel after Bankim’s death. His early novels were historical; he later shifted to writing stories about domestic relationships. He was mainly preoccupied with the condition of women and nationalism. Both concerns are featured in his Ghare Baire (1916) translated in 1919 as The Home and the World.

At age sixteen, he released his first substantial poems under the pseudonym Bhānusiha ("Sun Lion")
His compositions were chosen by two nations as national anthems: India's Jana Gana Mana and Bangladesh's Amar Shonar Bangla.
Tagore released his Manasi poems (1890), among his best-known work
Baul Lalon Shah, whose folk songs greatly influenced Tagore.
Gitanjali: Song Offerings.[46] In 1915, the British Crown granted Tagore a knighthood. He renounced it after the 1919 Jallianwala Bagh massacre.
In 1921, Tagore and agricultural economist Leonard Elmhirst set up the "Institute for Rural Reconstruction", later renamed Shriniketan or "Abode of Welfare",
His last dictation: I'm lost in the middle of my birthday. I want my friends, their touch, with the earth's last love. I will take life's final offering, I will take the human's last blessing. Today my sack is empty. I have given completely whatever I had to give. In return if I receive anything—some love, some forgiveness—then I will take it with me when I step on the boat that crosses to the festival of the wordless end.
His brief chat with Einstein, "Note on the Nature of Reality"
His songs are known as rabindrasangit
At sixty, Tagore took up drawing and painting;
At twenty he wrote his first drama-opera: Valmiki Pratibha (The Genius of Valmiki)
Tagore wrote eight novels and four novellas, among them Chaturanga, Shesher Kobita, Char Odhay, and Noukadubi. Ghare Baire (The Home and the World
Tagore's three-volume Galpaguchchha comprises eighty-four stories that reflect upon the author's surroundings, on modern and fashionable ideas, and on mind puzzles.
Santiniketan and Visva-Bharati
Tagore despised rote classroom schooling: in "The Parrot's Training", a bird is caged and force-fed textbook pages—to death] Tagore, visiting Santa Barbara in 1917, conceived a new type of university: he sought to "make Santiniketan the connecting thread between India and the world [and] a world center for the study of humanity somewhere beyond the limits of nation and geography."[154] The school, which he named Visva-Bharati,η[›] had its foundation stone laid on 24 December 1918 and was inaugurated precisely three years later.[162] Tagore employed a brahmacharya system: gurus gave pupils personal guidance—emotional, intellectual, and spiritual. Teaching was often done under trees. He staffed the school, he contributed his Nobel Prize monies,[163] and his duties as steward-mentor at Santiniketan kept him busy: mornings he taught classes; afternoons and evenings he wrote the students' textbooks
Every year, many events pay tribute to Tagore: Kabipranam, his birth anniversary, is celebrated by groups scattered across the globe; the annual Tagore Festival held in Urbana, Illinois; Rabindra Path Parikrama walking pilgrimages from Calcutta to Santiniketan
He co-founded Dartington Hall School, a progressive coeducational institutionin Japan

Gitanjali:
Gitanjali (Bengali: গীতাঞ্জলি) is a collection of poems by the Indian poet Rabindranath Tagore. The original Bengali collection of 157 poems was published on August 14, 1910. The English Gitanjali or Song Offerings is a collection of 103 English poems of Tagore's own English translations of his Bengali poems first published in November 1912 by the India Society of London. It contained translations of 53 poems from the original Bengali Gitanjali, as well as 50 other poems which were from his drama Achalayatan and eight other books of poetry - mainly Gitimalya (17 poems), Naivedya (15 poems) and Kheya (11 poems)
The English Gitanjali became very famous in the West, and was widely translated. The word gitanjali is composed from "git", song, and "anjali", offering, and thus means – "An offering of songs"
As per Indian Govt website:Some highlights of the National Commemoration are:
  • Tagore Commemoration Grant Scheme (TCGS) to provide financial assistance to organisations/institutions for organising programmes and events related to Tagore, his ideas, works and philosophy and to hold exhibitions of Tagore’s paintings, photographs, documentaries and new media interventions.
  • Creation of new Tagore Centres and revitalising the existing centres created during the Centenary Celebrations of Gurudev’s Birth Anniversary in 1961. Revamping of Multipurpose Cultural Complexes (MPCCs) scheme and replacing it with “Scheme for Tagore Cultural Complexes”.
  • Instituting “Tagore Award for Promotion of Universal Brotherhood”.
  • Publication of Tagore’s works and contributions.
Tagore Commemoration Grant Scheme (TCGS) has been launched by the Ministry of Culture to provide financial assistance to Not for profit organization holding cultural programmes to commemorate the 150th Birth Anniversary of Rabindranath Tagore.

 


Under the new Tagore Cultural Complexes Scheme, the existing Rabindra ‘Bhawans’, ‘Manchas’, ‘Sadans’, ‘Rangshalas’ and other cultural centres will be upgraded and modernised into state-of-the-art cultural complexes. These structures were created as part of a nation-wide programme launched on the occasion of Centenary Celebrations of Rabindranath Tagore in 1961. Besides restoring these structures, new cultural complexes will be created in the State Capitals and other cities where no such complexes exist.

 

The ministry of culture announced a “visitng fellow scheme “ in 2009 .  As actual selection was made during Tagore's 150 year's celebrations (in May 2010), the Ministry of Culture approved renaming of the Scheme as Tagore National Fellowship and issued an extended version of the scheme on 7th May, 2011.
The objective of the Scheme is to invigorate and revitalise various cultural institutions which have vast treasures in the form of manuscripts, documents, artifacts, antiquities and paintings. The purpose is to encourage serious researches in the cultural resources of these institutions.

Online Electronic Variorium

“Bichitra”: An online Electronic Variorium Edition of Works of Rabindranath Tagore is a project undertaken by the School of Cultural textx and Records, Jadavpur University in association with Rabindra Bhavan supported by Ministry of Culture. GoI.


  • The Archaeological Survey of India’s (ASI) Kolkata circle has started the restoration work of the heritage buildings in Shantiniketan. Altogether 27 heritage buildings have been identified for Structural Conservation.
  • Shantiniketan Griha
  • Glass temple
  • Taladhwaja
  • Pampa Lake
  • Lily Pool
  • Chitrabhanu
  • Guhaghar
  • Parishista
  • Udichi
  • Dinantika
  • Dwija-Birama
  • Malancha

The National Implementation Committee (NIC) has decided to undertake a major project in which a chronological anthology of Rabindranath Tagore’s works will be published. After completion the project will be known as Kalanukramik Rabindra Rachnavali. The anthology will be able to capture how Tagore worked on a day to day basis during his creative period and help us to connect with his artistic and other activities such as painting, dramatic performances, music, education and nation building.

Tagore centres of learning: A committee of experts has been constituted by Ministry of HRD to evaluate National and Overseas proposals received by the Government for setting up educational institutes based on Tagore’s teachings, as part of Commemoration of 150th Birth Anniversary of the poet.



No comments:

Post a Comment