Tagore’s 71th death anniversary being observed

The 71th death anniversary of Nobel laureate Rabindranath Tagore is being observed Monday, the 22nd of the Bengali month of Shraban, with elaborate programmes reflecting a rich literary life spanning over 60 years.

Bangladesh and India are observing the day with chalk out different programmes.

Different government and socio-cultural organisations have chalked out special programmes to mark the occasion..

Tagore dominates the Bangla literary scene with copiousness of works: over 10,000 poems, nearly two dozen plays and playlets, 12 novels, over 100 short stories, more than 6,000 songs and a mass of prose works on literary, social, religious, political and other topics.

Add to these his English translations, paintings, travels and lecture-tours in Asia, America, and Europe, and his activities as an educationist, as a social and religious reformer, and as a politician.

Tagore was the only litterateur who penned anthems of three nations - Amar Sonar Bangla, the Bangladeshi national anthem, Jana Gana Mana, the Indian national anthem, and Namo Namo Matha, the Sri Lankan national anthem.

As author of Gitanjali with its "profoundly sensitive, fresh and beautiful verses", he was the first non-European and the first Bengali-speaking person to be awarded Nobel Prize for Literature in 1913.

Tagore modernised Bengali art by spurning rigid classical forms and resisting linguistic strictures. His novels, stories, songs, dance-dramas, and essays spoke to topics political and personal. Gitanjali (Song Offerings), Gora (Fair-Faced), and Ghare-Baire (The Home and the World) are his best-known works, and his verse, short stories, and novels were acclaimed—or panned—for their lyricism, colloquialism, naturalism, and unnatural contemplation.

His compositions were chosen by two nations as national anthems: the Republic of India`s Jana Gana Mana and Bangladesh`s Amar Shonar Bangla. The composer of Sri Lanka`s national anthem: Sri Lanka Matha was a student of Tagore, and the song is inspired by Tagore`s style.

The youngest of 13 surviving children, Tagore was born in the Jorasanko mansion in Kolkata of parents Debendranath Tagore (1817-1905) and Sarada Devi (1830-1875). His ancestral home was in Pithabhog village under Rupsha upazila of Khulna, then part of British India; now Bangladesh.

To mark the day, Bangla Academy will hold a solo lecture and cultural function in its seminar room at about 3:00 pm on August 6. Mizarul Quayes will deliver the lecture titled `Three women figure in Rabindranath`s drama`.

Director-General of Bangla Academy Shamsuzzaman Khan will deliver the welcome address, while Academy Chairman Professor Anisuzzaman will preside over the function.

Shilpakala Academy, Chayanat, private Television Channels will observe the day with arrange of discussion-sing song and dance