May 7 is the birth anniversary of India’s first Nobel laureate Rabindranath Tagore. A poet, philosopher, patriot, and a social thinker put in one, Tagore is one of the greatest revolutionaries India has produced. His contribution to Bengali and English literature is unmatchable and he is known as the Bard of Bengal.
His birth anniversary falls on the 25th day of the Bengali month of Boishakh and is popularly called "Pachishe Boishakh". On this day numerous cultural programmes and events such as poetries, dances and dramas completion are held in various schools, colleges and universities.
Rabindranath Tagore was born on May 7, 1861 in the Jorasanko Thakurbari in Kolkata to Debendranath Tagore and Sarada Devi. He was a prolific writer with works ranging from poetry and songs to short stories and plays.
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: India's "Jana Gana Mana" and Bangladesh's "Amar Shonar Bangla". The Sri Lankan national anthem was inspired by his work.
On his birth anniversary, let us read some inspirational quotes by Gurudev:
*If you cry because the sun has gone out of your life, your tears will prevent you from seeing the stars.
*Love is the only reality and it is not a mere sentiment. It is the ultimate truth that lies at the heart of creation.
*Don't limit a child to your own learning, for he was born in another time.
*A teacher can never truly teach unless he is still learning himself. A lamp can never light another lamp unless it continues to burn its own flame. The teacher who has come to the end of his subject, who has no living traffic with his knowledge but merely repeats his lesson to his students, can only load their minds, he cannot quicken them.
"Let me not pray to be sheltered from dangers, but to be fearless in facing them. Let me not beg for the stilling of my pain, but for the heart to conquer it."
*The greed of gain has no time or limit to its capaciousness. It's one object is to produce and consume. It has pity neither for beautiful nature nor for living human beings. It is ruthlessly ready without a moment's hesitation to crush beauty and life.
*Death is not extinguishing the light; it is only putting out the lamp because the dawn has come.
*We come nearest to the great when we are great in humility.
*A dewdrop is a perfect integrity that has no filial memory of its parentage.
*By plucking her petals, you do not gather the beauty of the flower.
Faith is the bird that feels the light when the dawn is still dark.
*The smile that flickers on baby's lips when he sleeps- does anybody know where it was borne? Yes, there is a rumor that a young pale beam of a crescent moon touched the edge of a vanishing autumn cloud, and there the smile was first born . . . .
*Beauty is truth's smile when she beholds her own face in a perfect mirror.
*Let your life lightly dance on the edges of Time like dew on the tip of a leaf.
