Rabindranath Tagore

     RabindranathTagore was an Indian poet, philosopher, and Nobel laureate. He was born in 1861 in Calcutta, India, into a wealthy family. He was the son of Debendranath Tagore, a philosopher. Rabindranath Tagore began to write poetry as a child. When he was 17 years old, his first book appeared. In 1878, after a brief stay in England, he returned to India where he quickly became the most important and popular author of the colonial era. He wrote poetry, short stories, novels, and plays. His Collected Poems and Plays was published in 1966. He also composed several hundred popular songs. In 1929 he also began painting.
     Rabindranath Tagore was a dedicated internationalist and educator. He established a school in 1901 in his estate in Bengal. He did this to teach a blend of eastern and western philosophies. His school was expanded into an international university in 1921 called Visva-Bharati. He also lectured and traveled throughout the world.
     Rabindranath Tagore wrote primarily in Bengali, but translated a number of his works into English himself. Tagore’s writing is full of imagination, religion, and his love of his homeland and nature. The Nobel Prize in literature was awarded to him in 1913. He was knighted by the British king, George V in 1915, but renounced his knighthood in 1919 following the massacre of almost 400 Indian demonstrators by British troops. Rabindranath Tagore died in 1941.