Rabindranath Tagore is known internationally as a revolutionary poet and for founding a school and university in Bengal. This memoir describes Tagore's childhood growing up in a joint family in late 19th century Calcutta. It provides an exquisite portrait of both Tagore's childhood and India at a turning point in its history, describing the city he played in, his family, and being sent to school against his will through the eyes of the young Tagore.

1. From Rabi Thakur to
Rabindranath Tagore
My Boyhood Days.
Rabindranath Tagore.

2. “
Best known internationally for
his revolutionary poetry,
Rabindranath Tagore is also
well known for the school and
university he founded in the
Bengal countryside.
Seen through the amused
eyes of a precocious young
boy growing up in turn-of-
the-century Calcutta, this
memoir describes the joint
family he grew up in, the city
he played in, and the school
he was sent to against his
will.
It is an exquisite portrait of
both Tagore‟s childhood and
his country, India, at a
turning point in its history.
”

3. „ A poet‟s autobiography is
his poetry. Anything else
is just a footnote‟
-Yevgeny Yvtushenko

4. Precisely we need
to seeand talk that
why in particular
Tagore has been
chosen?
Why is it so critical and
interesting to read him, know
him ,talk him, glory him or
bury him.
Who tagore had been? Where
he had been? By whom?
What kind of relevance does he
have in today‟s time? And
why?
What he did in his life

7. The Text
Time play
Memory
Poetic text

8. Time play
Contrast
Metaphor

9. Now and Then
Contrast
„there was no gas then in
the city, and no electric
light. When the kerosene
lamp was introduced, its
brilliance amazed us. „
„there were no trams
then, no buses, no motors.‟
„there were no water-
pipes laid on in those
days.‟
Painting by Rabindranath Tagore
The Art Institute of Chicago

10. “ The clouds have had no rest
since yesterday evening. The
rain is pouring incessantly. The
trees stand huddled together in
a seemingly foolish manner;
the birds are silent. I call to
mind the evenings of my
boyhood.”
Now and Then
Metaphor
Painting by Rabindranath Tagore
The Art Institute of Chicago

11. Memory interchanges
"So many versions of just one memory, and yet none of
them were right or wrong. Instead, they were all pieces.
Only when fitted together, edge to edge, could they even
begin to tell the whole story.”
- Sarah Dessen

12. “our „jamadar‟ Sobha Ram, who was a wrestler….”
“another story was connected with the thick-leaved Badam
tree at the western corner ….”
“there was a narrow passage, enclosed by latticed walls,
leading from the outer apartments to the interior of the
house.”
“then nine o‟clock would strike, and Shyam would swoop
down on me like a hawk on a dove…”
- Rabindranath Tagore
My Boyhood Days

13. Poetic text
"Always be a poet, even in prose."
- Charles Baudelaire

14. “Liony, liony, off with your head,
Liony, liony, now you are dead.
Woofle the walnut goes clappetry clap,
Snip, snop, SNAP!”
- My Boyhood Days
Vase -Painting by
Rabindranath Tagore

15. Theme
Calcutta
Jorasanko Thakur Bari
Society
Education

16. Kolkata
‘The City of Joy’

17. Landscape-Painting by
Rabindranath Tagore
National Gallery of Modern

18. The
Abode

19. Jorasanko Thakur Bari

21. Thou hast made me endless, such
is thy pleasure. This frail vessel
thou emptiest again and again,
and fillest it ever with fresh life.
This little flute of a reed thou hast
carried over hills and dales, and
hast breathed through it melodies
eternally new.

22. “ Your flute plays in the
thunder:
No light note to hear.
I would wake to that tune:
O grant me such an
ear.
……”
- A few lines from the song ‘Your Flute
Plays in the Thunder’
A video still from Satyajit Ray’s
Documentary on Tagore

23. Society
Poet as an
‘Activist’
Painting by Rabindranath
Tagore

24. “Women used to go about in
the stifling darkness of closed
palanquins”
“An additional covering, a kind
of thick tilt, completely
enveloped the palanquin of a
rich man‟s daughters and
daughters-in-law, so that it
looked like a moving tomb.”
-Rabindranath Tagore
My Boyhood Days
Brooding -Painting by
Rabindranath Tagore

25. “Why should you not let
woman empowered be
With right to conquer her own
destiny,
O Lord?
Why must I sit and watch
beside the road
With lowered head, in tired
patient wait
For the day ordained by fate
To grant my hopes? Why
should I gaze in space?
…..”
-Woman Empowered
Translated by Sukanta Chaudhuri
Woman -Painting by
Rabindranath Tagore

26. Poet as an Artist

27. “This screen that thou hast raised is
painted with innumerable figures with
the brush of the night and the day. Behind it
thy seat
is woven in wondrous mysteries of curves,
Casting away all barren lines of straightness.
The great pageant of thee and me
has overspread the sky.
With the tune of thee and me
all the air is vibrant, and all ages pass
with the hiding and seeking of thee and me.”
- Rabindranath Tagore
Gitanjali
Bird Fantastic-Painting by
Rabindranath Tagore

28. “I came out alone on my way to my
tryst.
But who is this that follows me in the
silent dark?
I move aside to avoid his
presence
but I escape him not.
He makes the dust rise from
the earth
with his swagger; he adds his loud voice
to every word that I utter.
He is my own little self, my
lord, he knows
no shame; but I am ashamed
to come to thy door in his company”
-Gitanjali
Self Portrait 1935
Medium: Water color

29. Truth be told:
The Autobiographical Pact
“After these eighty years
even the picture of myself
that comes before me does
not correspond line for line
with the reality, but is largely
a product of the
imagination.”
-Rabindranath Tagore
My boyhood days

30. Thank You!