Author: Humayun Kabir
Several Contributors/
Translator(s)/ Editors(s): Humayun Kabir
Publisher: UBS Publishers
Year: 2008
Language: English
Pages: 252
ISBN/UPC (if available): 9788174765475
Description
The sheer volume and diversity of Rabindranath Tagore’s work in a creative life of over six decades makes one gasp. In translation, only a very small fraction of this voluminous body of work can give pleasure comparable to that of great literature in the original.
Nearly forty years back, Humayun Kabir, himself a leading figure in English scholarship in India, brought together as many as eighteen of the most well know literary figures and finest minds of English scholarship in Bengal to translate a hundred and one of the best poems of Tagore. The poetic sensibilities and contribution to the study of, and research on Tagore literature of each of the translators resulted in this outstanding anthology of Tagore’s poems in translation.
The Poems included in this book have composed over a period of as many as sixty years, the first as early as 1881 and the last barely a week before his death in 1941. The poems illustrate an astounding variety of interests and a great imaginative sweep.
A number of manuscript pages and twenty colour reproductions of Rabindranath’s painting add to the value of this new edition.
The difficulties faced by a translator of Tagore’s poetry are pointed out by Tagore himself in a few lines:
“It will be difficult for you to imagine the blazing summer sky of ours with hot blasts of air repeatedly troubling the fresh green leaves of a tree whose name will be no use to you. This is as unlike the climate and country where your poems were written as anything could be.”
Later, reiterating similar apprehension while in Germany, in 1930, Tagore said, “My poetry is for my countrymen” And for his audience beyond the boundaries of India, he says, “…my paintings are my gift to the West.”
It would barely be an exaggeration to say that the beat of Tagore’s paintings are, for all those who are alien to Bengal and its language, the best way to understand the poet’s mind. It is through his painting that Tagore speaks to those with no particular interest in, or understanding of, his homeland.
Totally uninfluenced by any school of painting or any before us the creations of his playful visions in all simplicity. The poet gives no descriptive titles to his pictures, giving his viewers full freedom to see and interpret as they wish.
Contents
Publisher’s Note
Acknowledgements
Introduction HUMAYUN KABIR
The Look
Translated by AMALENDU BOSE
The Fountain Awakes
Translated by HIREN MUKHERJI
Rahu’s Love
Translated by J.C. GHOSH
Life
Translated by J.C. GHOSH
The Prisoner
Translated by J.C. GHOSH
Vain Desire
Translated by J.C. GHOSH
On a Rainy Day
Translated by CHIDANANDA DAS GUPTA
Infinite Love
Translated by BUDDHADEV BOSE
The Cloud-Messenger
Translated by AMALENDU BOSE
Two Birds
Translated by HIREN MUKHERJI
‘I Will Not Let you Go’
Translated by HUMAYUN KABIR
My Heart is Like a River
Translated by CHIDANANDA DAS GUPTA
Destination Unknown
Translated by HUMAYUN KABIR
Call Me Back to Work
Translated by HUMAYUN KABIR
Brahman
Translated by HIREN MUKHERJI
Urvashi
Translated by J.C. GHOSH
Lord of My Life
Translated by AMIYA CHAKRABARTY
Last Night and this Morning
Translated by CHIDANANDA DAS GUPTA
1996
Translated by SOMNATH MOITRA
Renunciation
Translated by AMALENDU BOSE
Sister
Translated by J.C. GHOSH
The Introduction
Translated by J.C. GHOSH
First Kiss
Translated by SAMAR SEN
Bad Times
Translated by HIREN MUKHERJI
The Dream
Translated by AMALENDU BOSE
Invention of Shoes
Translated by J.C. GHOSH
Summer
Translated by HUMAYUN KABIR
The Lord’s Debt
Translated by HIREN MUKHERJI
A Sojourn in Hell
Translated by BHABANI BHATTACHARYA
Karna and Kunti
Translated by HUMAYUN KABIR
The Right Place
Translated by AMALENDU BOSE
Immodesty
Translated by AMALENDU BOSE
Krishnakali
Translated by J.C. GHOSH
False Alarm
Translated by SAMAR SAN
Vitality
Translated by AMALENDU BOSE
Deliverance
Translated by V.S. NARAVANE
Alone
Translated by HUMAYUN KABIR
The Wise One
Translated by AMALENDU BOSE
The Critic
Translated by AMALENDU BOSE
The Hero
Translated by J.C. GHOSH
Restless
Translated by BHABANI BHATTACHARYA
The Eternal Cycle
Translated by BHABANI BHATTACHARYA
Birth and Death
Translated by SOMNATH MOITRA
The Golden Moment
Translated by KSHITISH ROY
In the Morning
Translated by KSHITISH ROY
The Portrait
Translated by AMIYA CHAKRABARTY
Shah Jehan
Translated by KSHITISH ROY
The Unresting
Translated by AMALENDU BOSE
Flying Cranes
Translated by LILA Ray
Two Women
Translated by AMALENDU BOSE
The Deception
Translated by MONIKA VERMA
Sunday
Translated by ABU SAYEED AYYUB
Fullness
Translated by AMALENDU BOSE
The Fleeting One
Translated by AMALENDU DAS GUPTA
The Last Spring
Translated by SAMAR SAN
Beholden
Translated by HIREN MUKHERJI
Homage to the Tree
Translated by V.S. NARAVANE
The Lady of the Sea
Translated by HUMAYUN KABIR
The Riddle
Translated by ABU SAYEED AYYUB
The Eternal
Translated by AMIYA CHAKRABARTY
Question
Translated by HIREN MUKHERJI
Wonder
Translated by AMALENDU BOSE
The Journey
Translated by AMALENDU DAS GUPTA
The Voice of Eternal Form
Translated by V.S. NARAVANE
The First Worship
Translated by SOMNATH MOITRA
Eternity
Translated by TARAK SEN
The Casual
Translated by SISIR K. GHOSH
The Impermanence
Translated by SOMNATH MOITRA
Vaisakh 25
Translated by SISIR K. GHOSH
The Couple
Translated by KSHITISH ROY
The Earth
Translated by TARAK SEN
Peyali
Translated by AMIYA CHAKRABARTY
This I
Translated by MONIKA VERMA
The Caress
Translated by MONIKA VERMA
A Sense of Being
Translated by MONIKA VERMA
Africa
Translated by CHIDANANDA DAS GUPTA
A Strange Dream
Translated by HUMAYUN KABIR
The Beacon
Translated by HUMAYUN KABIR
Farewell
Translated by SISIR K. GHOSH
The End
Translated by TARAK SEN
Invocation
Translated by SISIR K. GHOSH
Hissing Serepents
Translated by CHIDANANDA DAS GUPTA
Shyama
Translated by ABU SAYEED AYYUB
The Introduction
Translated by HUMAYUN KABIR
The Station
Translated by BUDDHADEV BOSE
The Night Express
Translated by BUDDHADEV BOSE
All that Remains
Translated by ABU SAYEED AYYUB
Of Two Minds
Translated by ABU SAYEED AYYUB
Not My Achievement
Translated by ABU SAYEED AYYUB
On My Birth Day
Translated by SISIR KUMAR GHOSH
Assurance
Translated by SAMAR SAN
The Poet of Man
Translated by AMALENDU DAS GUPTA
The Cosmic Stage
Translated by TARAK SEN
The Final Offering
Translated by SOMNATH MOITRA
They Work
Translated by HIREN MUKHERJI
Salutation
Translated by HUMAYUN KABIR
On The Banks of the Rupnarayan
Translated by HUMAYUN KABIR
The Unanswered Question
Translated by HUMAYUN KABIR
Through the Dark Night
Translated by AMALENDU DAS GUPTA
The Right to Peace
Translated by AMALENDU DAS GUPTA