Most of us know Rabindranath Tagore as the author of ‘Jana Gana Mana’, India’s national anthem, and as the poet who won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1913, making him the first Asian to receive the honour. Tagore began writing poetry as a child and spent the next seven decades producing a massive body of work of over two thousand songs, hundreds of poems, novels, short stories, essays, and plays.   

Alongside all of this, Tagore was a devoted reader of India’s ancient epics, especially the Mahabharata. One of the longest poems and stories ever, it is said to be longer than the Iliad and the Odyssey together. The epic is mainly concerned with dharma, war, and destiny. In its vastness, the epic often left aside the inner lives of characters, whether it be the grief of a mother, the fractured identity of a warrior or the desperation of a woman who is watching her son walk toward his own destruction. Tagore noticed these gaps. Beginning with his collection ‘Kahini’, he wrote a series of poems and plays that returned to the Mahabharata and reimagined the characters, taking up the questions that were set aside.   

The Abandoned Son 

One of Tagore’s most touching retellings is his poem ‘Karna-Kunti Sambad’, meaning ‘Dialogue Between Karna and Kunti’. Kunti was the mother of the Pandavas, and of Karna, whom she kept a secret. Karna grew up with charioteers, not knowing his true identity. By the time the great war of Kurukshetra approached, Karna had become the greatest ally of the Kaurava side, the very enemy of his own brothers. 

In the Mahabharata, Kunti finally faces Karna knowing he is already aware of his origins. He offers Kunti a practical answer based on Dharma — that she will always have five sons as he will either kill Arjuna or be killed by him. 

But Tagore looked beyond the debate on dharma and duty. He set this scene in the soft glow of the Ganga’s banks. In Tagore’s poem, Karna does not know who Kunti is until she tells him herself. He is just a son hearing for the first time, from a stranger’s lips, that he was abandoned at birth. Here, Karna is not a practical warrior, he is a child who misses his mother and does not know how to say so. And yet, in the end, he still refuses to switch sides. Tagore chooses to show the sadness and devastation both feel in this moment, elaborating on the heaviness of dharma that the Mahabharata already speaks about.  

The Warrior Princess 

One of the lesser-known characters in the Mahabharata is Chitrangada, the warrior princess of Manipur. In Ved Vyasa’s telling, she is just one of Arjuna’s many wives, appearing only briefly. Chitrangada is raised as a prince because the king of Manipur had been blessed by Shiva to have only sons, and when she was born, he chose to raise her as a boy.  

In Tagore’s play, Chitrangada falls in love with Arjuna, who rejects her because he has taken a vow of celibacy. Hurt, yet determined to win Arjuna over, she asks the god of love, Madana, also called Kamadeva, to grant her extraordinary beauty for a year. Arjuna falls in love with her, but Chitrangada slowly begins to feel suffocated in the false beauty she asked for. In the end, she sheds this illusion and embraces her true self, leaving it to Arjuna to decide if he likes this version of her. Here, Tagore explores not just their love story, but also Chitrangada’s journey to accepting herself and being proud of it. 

A Mother’s Impossible Plea 

In Gandharir Abedan (Gandhari’s Plea), Tagore turns to Gandhari, the queen of the Kauravas, mother of a hundred sons and wife of the blind king Dhritarashtra. The play opens after Duryodhana has won the dice match against the Pandavas and is gloating to his father. Then, Gandhari enters with her plea, urging her son to step back from the path he is on. She sees exactly where his pride is taking him and cannot stop it. She is a mother who has watched her child’s choices lead toward catastrophe, able to name what is happening but is powerless to change it. 

In the Mahabharata, Gandhari is limited to the blindfold she takes in solidarity with her husband. She is a figure of devotion and grief but rarely given a scene of her own. In his play, Tagore gives those emotions a voice. 

Long before mythology retellings became popular, Tagore took up the questions lurking just below the surface of the great epic. He did not rewrite the stories to contradict tradition, but expanded them, giving voice to characters always present but never previously heard. 

As we celebrate Rabindranath Tagore on his 165th birth anniversary, let us also remember him as the writer who had the patience to sit with the questions the original had moved past. 

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Masti Venkatesha Iyengar was born in a village called Masti, in Kolar district, in 1891. He completed his education in 1914 and joined the civil service. He worked in various positions of high responsibility and was known to be an exceptional administrator. The time he spent in the bureaucratic world helped him later during his literary phase. M. V. Iyengar took voluntary retirement in 1943 and began writing under the pen name ‘Srinivasa’. Most of his writing was inspired by the knowledge and experience he gained during his working years. Known as the forefather of Kannada short stories, his language and style are of the highest literary quality and his themes are rich in thought and contemporary relevance.

In 1983, his historical novel Chikkareera Rafeidra won the Jnanpith award. Masti has written more than 120 books in Kannada and around seventeen books in English. Some of his famous works are Snhhama. Channahavala Nayaka and Chikkareem &Osaka. He also edited a monthly journal, Jeetrina. from 1944 to 1965. Kakana Kale, from which the Amar Chitra Katha story, The Elusive Kaka, has been taken is based on the life of the legendary Kaka Nayaka, who was the leader of the local forest-dwelling Jenu Kuruba community. Masti Venkatesha Iyengar’s writings are steeped in reality and therefore strike an instant chord in the reader’s heart. This legendary literateur passed away in 1986.

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P. Sundaram Pillai was born on the 4th of April, 1855, in Alappuzha, in Kerala, to Perumal Pillai and Madathy Ammal. He was educated in the Tamil literary tradition, reading widely and deeply in classics like the Tirukural. He went to Trivandrum, where he studied in the Maharaja’s College. In 1877, a year after he finished his BA, he was married to Shivagami Ammal. He taught, first at the Thirunelveli English-Tamil School, and later as Professor of Philosophy at his old college. Pillai continued to study and got an MA degree. He also worked for the Travancore Education Service. Sundaram Pillai’s learning was vast – he was familiar with philosophy and literature in Tamil, English, and Sanskrit.

He noticed that though the Tamil language had a rich and ancient literature, there were no plays, not in the Western sense. He set out therefore, to write a great drama in blank verse. The play was called Manonmaniyam and became immensely popular, shortly after it was published in 1891. Though the play is too long to be performed in full, it has been adapted and enacted, and is popular even today. The play also features an invocation to the Tama language, Niraaarum Kadal Udutha, that has been adopted by the Government of Tamil Nadu as the state song.

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Jyon naino me putli

Tyon malik ghat mahin

Moorakh log na janhin

Bahar dhundan  jahin

– Kabir

Simple language garbing a complex thought process; that is the essence of the poetry of Kabir Das. He used the language of the common man and examples from an ordinary life and spoke that extraordinary truth, which is beyond the grasp of many a learned scholar and philosophical tomes.     

Life

Born in 1398, Kabir’s parentage is unknown and hotly debated.  He was brought up by a weaver named Niru and his wife Nima in Varanasi. They practised Islam. His spiritual teacher was Swami Ramanand, a Hindu. However, his own religion was one that he discovered within himself. He followed a path illuminated by his own experience, which was a far cry from the dogmas and doctrines of any of the faiths around him. He married a hermit’s daughter named Loi, but was not really interested in the affairs of the world. The religious leaders of all the faiths around him found his unconformity threatening. However, Kabir was unconcerned with their views and distilled his inner growth into a treasure of poetry.

Kabir’s Work

Coming from an economically humble background, Kabir was unlettered and had no opportunity to study any of the scriptures. Yet, his poems are filled with a deep meaning and spirituality that is hard to find elsewhere. His ‘koi bole Ram Ram, koi Khudai…’ reflects his belief in the oneness of the Godhead. This thread of oneness forms the bedrock of Kabir’s literary and philosophical work. 

In some other verses, he urges people to follow the path of righteousness and maintain a purity of heart and mind. Devotion, unshackled by the fetters of caste, colour, creed, rituals and religion is the dominant aspect of Kabir’s philosophy and reflected in his poetry.  He talks about a formless God, who can be attained only by inward reflection, devotion and love. 

His work exists in three major regional variants namely the Eastern (the Bijak), Rajasthani (Kabir – Granthavali) and Punjabi and Hindi (contained in the Adi Granth of the Sikhs). The language he used is a mixed dialect also known as the ‘khadi boli’. His poems are not adorned with any literary embellishments, they spring from the earth he was connected to and are simple and straightforward.  

Kabir is famous for his ‘dohas’, which are still popular among the common people and are very lyrical.  He also wrote ‘padas’, which are short rhymed poems. The shlokas or ‘sakhis’ that he wrote are a part of the Granth collection. They are terse utterances that are the ‘witnesses’ to the ultimate truth. He mixed Hindu and Muslim references to convey his belief in the oneness of God. He openly spoke about the weaknesses of both Hinduism as well as Islam.

This mystic poet is studied by scholars of poetry as well as philosophy. He is probably one of the most iconic figures of the Bhakti and Sufi movements in 15th century India, which stood for a coming together of all humans in a surge of devotion towards God. 

The Kabir Panthis

The followers of Kabir’s philosophy are called Kabir Panthis. Many of them write poetry along the same lines as Kabir. However, Kabir himself encouraged people to explore and learn for themselves.

Kabira kabira kya kare, socho aap sharir
Pancho indriya vash kare, so hoy das Kabir.

 

Why are you quoting Kabir, think for yourself
Control your five senses and then you can be Kabir.

Kabir’s poems have been translated by many scholars both in India and abroad. Rabindranath Tagore too translated and made available these verses in his ‘One Hundred Poems of Kabir’. This mystic poet is said to have passed away around 1518. His death, too, is shrouded in mystery. It is said that his body turned into a heap of flowers, half of which was claimed by the Hindus and half by the Muslims. Kabir’s poetry remains as relevant today as it was so many years ago. 

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A small boy from Bengal wasn’t able to attend college due to financial constraints,  nevertheless, he continued to believe in his dreams. He struggled and overcame all the hardships that life threw at him and became an iconic writer whose works had been adapted in multiple languages all over India.  Most Indian movie buffs would easily recall characters like Devdas and Parineeta which are Bollywood adaptations from this genius’s vast literary work. This storyteller was Sarat Chandra Chattopadhyay.  

Sarat Chandra Chattopadhyay was born on September 15, 1876, in a small village in West Bengal to Motilal Chattopadhyay and Bubanmohini Debi. He studied in a village school and was known as a bright student. Though he wasn’t able to continue his education further, Sarat, in his teenage years, started writing several short stories and plays including some bestsellers such as Kashinath and Korel. He adopted the pseudonym St. C. Lara. During this period, he was fascinated by the writings of Charles Dickens and Henry Wood. 

Later, Sarat worked as a government clerk in Rangoon (present Yangon) to provide financial assistance to his family. However, he continued to write profusely and the writer in him blossomed. He published the short story named Mandir which gave him the prestigious Kuntalin Puraskar. Some of his finest works like, Ramer Sumoti, Bindur Chhele, Narir Mulyo and Charitraheen were written during this period. He portrayed women as strong characters. He also took it upon himself to teach his wife to read and write. This task further enhanced his own creativity.

 When he returned to Bengal in 1916, Sarat started writing for various Bengali magazines using the pseudonym Anila Devi. During this time, Sisir Kumar Bhaduri who was considered a theatrical genius adapted his work, Shoroshi for the theatre and it became a huge hit. Following this success, Sisir Kumar directed Andhare Alo for the movie adaptation.

 It was the novel Devdas published in 1917 that became an important milestone in the life of Sarat Chandra Chattopadhyay as it became very successful on-screen too.  It was first released as a silent movie in 1928.  Then it was adapted twenty times on-screen in different languages. The irony was that though Sarat Chandra himself did not consider Devdas as his best work, it brought him the limelight he deserved and made him known and appreciated all over India. His novels, such as Parineeta and Pandit Moshai were later adapted into movies. 

Chattopadhyay’s portrayal of strong women characters in his novels also made him famous as a crusader for the cause of women. He wrote two significant essays on women emancipation, Narir Mulya and Swaraj Sadhonay Nari. His book Pather Dabi was about a fictional superhero-esque character fighting against the atrocities of British. It was, of course, banned by the British Government and the ban was lifted only a year after his demise.

Sarat Chandra Chattopadhyay died on January 16, 1938, at the age of sixty-one. Though his books were written in Bengali, his words and character reached people all over India. He created a major impact in the minds of his readers and is still being remembered for his contribution to Indian literature.

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Known as the Bard of Bengal, Rabindranath Tagore was a humanist and a universalist. He denounced the rule of British in India and supported the Independence of India from Britain. He was the first non-European to receive a Nobel prize for Literature. He received it for his most memorable work, ‘Gitanjali’. He was also awarded a knighthood in 1915 which he eventually repudiated to show his disapproval against the Jallianwala Bagh Massacre. Tagore is also known for modernising the art of Bengal by spurning rigid classical forms and resisting linguistic structures.

Rabindranath Tagore was born on May 7, 1861, at Jorasanko Mansion in Calcutta. Tagore wrote his first poem when he was only eight years old and was encouraged warmly by his brother Jyotirindranath Tagore. Rabindranath continued writing and created various musical plays which exhibited his talents to a larger audience. He wrote his first play named ‘Valmiki Pratibha’ at the age of twenty and it was enacted at Tagore’s own mansion. During his early years, Rabindranath Tagore also published his poems under the pseudonym Bhanusimha and elevated himself as the author of short stories and dramas in the later years publishing in his own name.

Tagore’s novels, stories, poems, songs echoed his personal and political views on various social and national issues. He questioned superstitions and various social issues such as child marriage, the dowry system, and widow remarriage in his novels. He was known for his strong women characters who were educated and made independent decisions. In 1891, during his visit to East Bengal, Tagore interacted with the village people and his sympathy for them inspired him to write on themes based on a humble lifestyle. During these years he wrote several poetries such as ‘Sonar Tari’ and plays, notably ‘Chitra.’ When Bengal was gripped by the wave of nationalism, he wrote several powerful songs and one of them named Amar Sonar Bangla eventually became the National Anthem of Bangladesh.

Tagore wrote novels and novellas of various genres, among which Chaturanga, Shesher Kobita, Char Odhay, and Noukadubi can be considered to be his most memorable works. Tagore, from the age of sixteen, had written various short stories including known stories such as Kabuliwala, Adithi, Kshudhita Pashan and Bhikharini. Tagore was also a talented composer who composed around two thousand songs in his lifetime. His songs were known as Rabindra Sangeet as it merged fluidly into his literature. His composition ‘Jana Gana Mana’ was chosen as the National Anthem of India and the National Anthem of Sri Lanka was also inspired by his work. Around the 1920s, Tagore’s works were circulated in free editions with the works of Plato, Dante, Cervantes, Goethe, and Tolstoy.

Rabindranath Tagore died on August 7, 1941, six years before the independence of India which he dreamt of witnessing. His legacy was kept alive through the translation of his works by various authors to introduce Tagore to a wider and international audience. Various universities have been named to honour him in both India and Bangladesh. His works such as Chokher Bali, Gora, Ghare Bhaire and various others were adapted for big screens to familiarise his characters to more and more people to keep his memory alive forever.

Read the complete life story of Tagore in our title ‘Rabindranath Tagore’. Now available on the ACK Comics app, Kindle, Flipkart, Amazon, and other major e-tailers. 

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Married when she was 12, she was ill-treated in her husband’s house and walked away at the age of 24 to become a devotee of Shiva.
Her mystic verses, called Vakh, have influenced generations to shun the path of rituals and tradition and to embrace the Divine as a path to self-realization. Vakh is traced to be one of the earliest composition in the Kashmiri language, making it a crucial building block of Kashmiri literature. Here is one of her popular verses.

OCEAN AND THE MIND OF MAN ARE BOTH ALIKE

 

Under the ocean’s bottom lies
the destructive fire, vadvaagni;
And in the breast of man doth rage
the fire of wrath.
When the fire breaks out, its flames
of angry, abusive words,
sear and scorch and burn.
But if one ponders unruffled and calm,
and weighs the words, though angry they be,
They have no substance, no, nor weight.

– Lalleshwari

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Bhai Vir Singh was born in Amritsar on December 5, 1872. He was a great poet and scholar and played an active part in the movement to revive the Punjabi literary tradition. Unlike many other young men of his time, Bhai Vir Singh did not take up a government job after he had completed his education. He chose to be a writer and set up a lithograph press with one of his father’s friends, Wazir Singh. He soon started taking an active interest in the Singh Sabha movement. The main aim of this society was to increase awareness among people in the teachings of the Sikh gurus and to promote the Gurmukhi script.

Bhai Vir Singh started the Khalsa Tract society in 1894 to promote the interests of the Sikhs. The society brought a revolutionary change in the literary scene in Punjab. The members started a low-cost publication called Nirguniara, which highlighted Sikh history and philosophy. Bhai Vir Singh used this as an effective platform to express himself.

Bhai Vir Singh’s first novels were romances. They emphasised courage and morality. Some of his novels in this genre were Sundari, Bijay Singh and Satwant Kaur. His novel Baba Naudh Singh was serialised in Nirguniara from 1907 onwards and published in book form in 1921. Bhai Vir Singh also wrote poetry. Some of his famous poetic works are Dil Tarang, Lahiran de Har and Matak Hulare. Bhai Vir Singh was honoured with the Sahitya Academy Award in 1955 and the Padma Bhushan in 1956. He died in Amritsar on June 10, 1957.

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Ilango Adigal was a Jain monk, a Chera prince, and a poet. Legend has it that when he was born, an astrologer prophesied that he would become king. But since his elder brother was alive, Ilango chose to become a monk instead, removing himself from the line of succession. Silappadikaram is estimated to have been written in the 5th or 6th Century, but it is set some centuries earlier. Ilango Adigal describes a rich and cosmopolitan culture, where people from many different backgrounds – Greeks, Arabs and Tamil people – mingle, living and trading in the cities of Poompuhar and Madurai. He talks about a great flowering of the arts, of music and literature, which people from all sections of society could enjoy and contribute to. Much of our modern understanding of the way ancient Tamil cities were built, organised, and governed can be traced back to Ilango’s work and to other literature from the period.

Unlike the Sanskrit epics, the Ramayana and the Mahabharata, Ilango Adigal’s Silappadikaram is not the story of royalty, or of gods, but the story of ordinary people and their struggles. The protagonist, Kannagi, is in every way the equal of the king and queen, and even their moral superior, since they fail to provide justice.

Amar Chitra Katha’s take on Kannagi is available on the ACK Comics app and on all major e-tailers like Amazon, Flipkart and others.

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During India’s freedom struggle, it was not only necessary to strategize freedom movements but also lift the morale of fellow countrymen. Many poets instilled patriotism and amplified the freedom struggle through their words. While there are many poets we know about such as Kalidas, Mirabai, Kabir das, Rabindranath Tagore, Harivansh Rai Bachhan, and Sarojini Naidu, there are many national poets who are now lost in the pages of history. Let’s take a look at some of them. 

Maithili Sharan Gupt

Rashtra Kavi and a Padma Bhushan awardee, Maithili Sharan Gupt, was one of India’s modern Hindi poets. 

As a child, like many kids, he did not like to go to school and gave up schooling in between. He was home-tutored in Sanskrit, Bengali, and English. A great devotee of Kabirdas, Maithili started writing poems since then. Born and brought up in Chirgaon, Jhansi in Uttar Pradesh, he entered the world of Hindi literature by publishing his poems first in Indian magazines. His writing style was unique as he wrote in Khari Boli (plain dialect) while most of the others preferred the use of Braj Basha dialect. His works were mostly based on patriotic themes and revolved around the plots of Ramayana, Mahabharata, Buddhist stories and lives of religious figures.

His first poem published by the Indian press was, Rang mein Rang. His most appreciated work was Bharat-Bharati where he wrote about the freedom struggle. People were greatly inspired by his words. In fact, Gandhiji was so impressed by this that he honoured him with the title Rashtra Kavi. Another famous work of Maithili Sharan Gupt is Saket, Jayadrath Vadh, Kirano Ka Khel, and Yashodhara, among others.

Mahadevi Varma

Mahadevi Varma was not only a Hindi poet but also a freedom fighter and educationist from India. Once a secretive poet, now regarded as the modern Mirabai, she was a prominent leader.

Born and brought up in Farrukhabad, Agra, she was originally put in a Convent School, and later joined the Crosthwaite Girls College in Allahabad. Mahadevi initially wrote her poems in secret but her inner talent was exposed by her roommate Subhadra Kumari Chauhan. Both these young girls decided to write poetry together. They would often submit their poems to weekly magazines where they got published. They would also attend poetry seminars and meet eminent poets. Sometimes they also read out their poetry to the audience. Mahadevi Varma often writes about the time when a girl child was considered a burden to the family. She was grateful to be born in a liberal household where her mother was well educated and fluent in Sanskrit and English. Her grandfather envisioned her to become a great scholar. 

In 1903, she started her professional career by teaching at village schools around Allahabad. She was greatly influenced by Gandhi’s ideology and adopted his ideals. She became the headmistress and later the chancellor of Allahabad Mahila Vidyapeeth but she continued to write extensively while teaching. Her notable works include Yama, Mera Parivar, Path Ke Saathi and her famous childhood biography, Mere Baachpan ke Din. One of her heart touching stories is Gillu, the story of a little squirrel. Some of her works are also included in various board syllabi. She was awarded the Padma Bhushan in 1956 and the Jnanpith Award for her extensive poetry collection. 

Subramania Bharati 

Chinnaswami Subramanian Bharathi was a pioneer of modern Tamil poetry and was considered one of the greatest Tamil literary figures of all time. He was a revolutionary poet and due to this strong ideology, the British officials didn’t want to spare him alive. 

Born and brought up in Ettayapuram, Madras, he studied in M.D.T Hindu College. He was an excellent student and a proficient linguist. In fact, he knew up to 14 languages and his favourite was Tamil. Many wonder the reason for him wearing a turban and growing a beard. It was because he had a great admiration for Sikhs. 

His work started as a court poet for the Raja of Ettayapuram, but he soon began actively participating in the freedom struggle movement. He started to publish his writing regularly in Tamil weeklies and English newspapers, from hymns to nationalistic writings. He had strong ideals on the aspects of society such as the caste system in the Hindu society. Even though he was born in an orthodox Brahmin family, he regarded all living beings equally. His poetry was a collaboration of contemporary and classical elements. Few of his notable works are Panchali Sapatham, Pappa Pattu and Shakthi. His words were so influential that he faced the prospect of arrest by the British in 1908. To save himself, he had to flee to Pondicherry which was under French rule then. Later, the government of India established a Bharathiar University named after him in Coimbatore. Today, the Subramanyam Bharati Award is annually conferred on writers contributing outstanding work in literature. 

Ramdhari Singh Dinkar 

Another poet who is hailed as a Rashtrakavi and has given India some of the most inspiring poems is Ramdhari Singh Dinkar. He participated in the freedom struggle as a leader, poet and a member of the parliament. 

Ramdhari was born in Simaria in the Bengal Presidency during British India in 1908. As a young student, he was interested in history, politics and philosophy and had studied a multitude of languages. He was greatly influenced by Rabindranath Tagore and translated works of Tagore from Bengali to Hindi.  His poetry shows the impact of his poverty as unlike most of his peers he had to struggle due to his family economic circumstances.

One of his most famous works is, Sanskrit ke Chaar Adhyay  for which he was awarded the Sahitya Akademi award. He wrote this in the context of values emerging from the freedom movement such as anti-colonialism, secularism, and integrated culture. A rebel at heart, he fiercely supported the youth, burning with the flame of vengeance against the British. His beliefs were strong and influential, giving voice to the freedom struggle’s more revolutionary movements. It is believed that his poetry created a sense of awakening in the youth, drawing allegories with heroes of the Mahabharata and Ramayana, such as Karna. His work Rashmirathi is considered one of the best versions of the Mahabharata. He was awarded the Padma Bhushan for his inspiring patriotic compositions.0

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