Memoir (Tagore's Memoir)

Author: Rabindranath Tagore (India), translated by Xie Bingxin
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2005-10-01
Features: He is regarded as a poet who shows compassion for the weak and empathy for the oppressed masses. He is seen as a distinguished representative who hates darkness and strives for light. He is considered "the life of life" and "the fountain of life." He is regarded as having a heart of "serene beauty and melancholy." He sang for "the humble life and the insignificant suffering," cried out against poverty, backwardness, and national humiliation. At the age of fifty-two, he won the Nobel Prize in Literature with his poem "Gitanjali—The Hungry Stone," which was described as "extremely sensitive, fresh, and beautiful." He was the first Asian to receive this honor. He is called the "saint of poetry," the "conscience of India," and the "soul of India." He represents justice and humanity. In this chaotic world filled with slaughter and hatred, he is an unextinguished lamp of hope.
Biographies and memoirs about him are numerous, but only this book, along with his later work "My Childhood," was written by him personally. All other writings cannot bypass this book. It was translated into English and published by Macmillan in 1917. This is a masterpiece filled with poetry, exquisite prose, lofty ideals, and rare beauty.
Reasons to read this book: With his "extremely sensitive, fresh, and beautiful poetry," he became the first Nobel Prize laureate from the East. The renowned Swedish poet Hjalmar Gullberg highly praised him as an "ideal poet of true greatness." The famous Irish poet W. B. Yeats believed his poetry was a "product of a highly civilized world," revealing the world he had long dreamed of. The American modernist poet Ezra Pound even said, "We have discovered our new Greece," adding that in his presence, "I felt like a wild man holding a stone club and wearing animal skins."
He was one of the most influential figures in introducing Indian culture to the West while also bringing Western culture to India. This autobiography, titled "Reminiscences," was written in 1916 when he was fifty-five. This book records only his life and ideals from birth to the age of twenty-four. By the age of twenty-five, he had already become a highly accomplished and outstanding lyrical poet among his peers. His father was a religious philosopher, a reformer, and a key figure in the Brahmo Samaj. When his grandfather passed away at the age of twenty, he lamented, "Life is so desolate, the world is like a graveyard." He grew up in a family filled with wisdom, talent, passion, and a spirit of freedom. His mother bore fifteen children and managed a large family of over a hundred members across four generations. He was the fifteenth child and had six older brothers. He married at the age of twenty-two, arranged by his parents. In this book, he records many people and events related to him but makes no mention of his marriage or his "wise Tagore wife."
Suitable for: Scholars or enthusiasts of Sino-foreign cultural exchange history, Indian culture, the Nobel Prize in Literature, or poetry. Students and teachers at all levels.