Why is Tagore still important?

Last week on 7th May it was the 150th birth anniversary of Gurudev Rabindranath Tagore (7 May 1861 – 7 August 1941). Tagore as we know him was a Bengali poet, philosopher, artist, playwright, composer and novelist. Just late last year we even saw the inauguration of a Tagore library here in Auckland at the Mahatma Gandhi centre.

Tagore has been acclaimed as perhaps the greatest literary figure in history. His extraordinary output in literature includes approximately 50 dramas, 1000 poems, 2000 songs, 38 plays, 12 novels, 100 books of verse (much of which he set to music), 200 short stories, innumerable essays covering every important social, political and cultural issue of his time. Tagore also left numerous drawings and paintings, and songs for which he wrote the music himself.

There is any hardly any Indian from mainland India who doesn’t know about the great bard of Bengal – Tagore. But do we know enough about Tagore and his major ideas which renewed Indian culture in his writings?

Full report here Indian Weekender