Discovering century-old documents on Rabindranath
Jahidul Islam Shah
It is a great credit of the Bengali nation that the world has celebrated the 150th birth anniversary of Rabindranath Tagore, the Nobel Laureate Bengali Poet. As readers, how much do we know about Rabindranath? We do not know more about the world famous poet, as huge information about him are unknown to us till date. As the foremost poet of Bangla language, the occasion of receiving Nobel by Rabindranath is a past event of hundred years. In the then magazines and newspapers of different countries, there had been an enormous announcement about his life and literature, but the very little part of such publication was retrieved and got back with the hard endeavor of many aficionados and lovers of the world’s famed poet. Due to the rapid development of modern information and technology, those unknown information is being unveiled to the readers of the world. Subrata Kumar Das, an eminent essayist and a very information-technology-loving man has given his utmost effort to include such old-fashioned information in this book ‘Rabindranath: Kom-jana, Ojana’.The book contains twelve articles such as ‘Nobel Sahityo Purosker 1913’,‘Bismritoek Rabindra-Vashyokor’,‘Rabindranather Prothom Ingregi Jiboni’,‘Rabindranather Prothom Jiboni’,‘Rabindra-Golpogronther Prothom Onubad’,‘New York Times-aNobel Purosker O Rabindra-prosonga’,‘New York Tribune-a Nobel Purosker O Rabindra-prosonga’, ‘Rabindranather Ekti Ojana Sakshatkar’, ‘Australian Potro-Potrikay Rabindranather Nobel Purosker Sombad’, ‘Rabindranather Australia Vromon Porikolpona’, ‘Americay Rabindra Ostitter Sonkot: Hindu-German Sorojontro Mamla’ and ‘Poetry Potrikay Rabindranath Prosongo’.The first article focuses on many untold facets of the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1913and thus the book bears the worth for those who will engage themselves to conduct research about the life of Rabindranath and his literature. Like this one, all the articles of this book are independent with regard to its expression and elaborate discussion with the reference. The writer has dug out much information that was unknown to the Rabindra-enthusiasts till date. The many documents that had been beyond reach, are coming online gradually and thus the accessibility has helped the writer of the present book to contribute in the study of Rabindranath from a broader perspective. The first article ends with an excerpt of the Nobel speech delivered by Rabindranath which reads, ‘for this, I have come to you. I ask you this and claim it of you in the name of the unity of men and in the name of love and in the name of god. I ask you to come. I invite you.’ There are many people who are working for decades on the life of Rabindranath and his literature but very unfortunately one Benoy Kumar Sarkar was quite unremembered though he was very much optimistic about the poet and worked on
the works of Rabindranath till his death. It is important to mention that it was Benoy Kumar who wrote a very worth reading Bangla book in 1914, but the mention of the book has gone unnoticed by the biographers of the poet. In the next article, the readers will get a taste of seeing scan copy of an article titled ‘An Evening in July’ of Rabindranath Tagore, published in ‘The Atlantic Monthly’ (1913, July) translated by Ajit Kumar Chakravarty without any mention of him. ‘New York Times’ and ‘New York Tribune’, the two leading US newspapers began to publish news on Rabindranath’s getting the Nobel Prize. Subrata Kumar has chronologically presented us the news treatment of those two news dailies and shown how they gave importance on the poet. This book has become more worthy to the readers and researchers as it has attached an unknown interview ‘A talk with Sir Rabindranath Tagore’ by Joyce Kilmar which was published in ‘New York Times’ on 29 October 1916 with a sub-title ‘Bengali poet, Nobel Prize winners, Now in this country, gives its/ poetic creed and explanations oriental attitude towards literature. ’It seems the interview which gives a nice presentation of the Asian poet, went unnoticed by the devotees of Rabindranath. After the declaration of Nobel Prize for literature in 1913, the Australian newspapers namely ‘Sydney Morning Herald’, ‘Register’, ‘Sunday Times’, ’Morning Bulletin’, ‘Mail’, ‘Argus’, ‘Brisbane Courier’, ‘Kalgoorlie Western’ on 13 November. It is to be said that Subrata had done a very great job to make it available to the Bengali readers of unknown information in connection to Australia. We know Rabindranath was highly hailed in America right after the Nobel announcement and after a case against the Hindu revolutionaries in San Francisco,
Rabindranath began to be unwelcomed. Subrata Kumar has gone deep of the case, and brought out many unknown facts that will give a new evaluation to judge the poet as a pro-revelatory. The last article briefs about Rabindranath Tagorein the literary periodical ‘Poetry ’ from the USA. The monthly ‘Poetry ’ would come from the city of Chicago in which many poems of Rabindranath were published. What the present writer has done is making a complete list of the poets’ writing as well as writings by other Bengali poets in that periodical. Subrata Kumar explores the truths in his articles very sharply. He makes an in-depth analysis in every article. It is clearly evidenced that without a full-mind setup and austere ascetic practice, it might not have been possible to compose those articles. This book has a variety of bringing reference of journals, newspapers, books and magazines, where the then scholars presented Rabindranath Tagore in many ways. This book enables to fascinate the readers, researchers and the fellows who are always very keen to learn something new about Rabindranath Tagore. The stakeholders of this book, of course, will appreciate the hardship and firmness of the writer as it is bears the testimony of all out efforts of the writer. The well designed and good-looking cover is a creation of Mostafiz Karigor. The quality of printing is maintained in all respects. Inclusion of scan copies of some important pages from the distant-old periodicals and rare books only available in some European, American or Australian newspapers and periodicals have added new value to the book. We believe, the excellence of this book will be hailed by the Rabindra researchers.