Margins
Red Oleanders book cover
Red Oleanders
1926
First Published
3.91
Average Rating
122
Number of Pages

Written immediately after his visit to the US in 1923, Tagore's creative stimulation behind this play was his response to the increasingly materialistic society that he had experienced first-hand in the States. He thus created an imaginary land Yakshapuri, a city full of wealth and riches where human beings are reduced to machines as they toil though their lives to cater to the insatiable greed of their ruler, the King. It is against this backdrop that the protagonist Nandini appears who dares to point a finger at the dominating authority eventually bringing about a change in the King while leading the soulless citizens to the discovery of happiness in its truest form. However, this liberation comes at a cost. With the degradation of humanistic values and the specter of another World War looming large before them, the Western society found much relevance in Tagore's vision of the revolutionary world portrayed in this piece of translated literature. However, despite this topical allusion, the greatness of this book remains unchanged and continues to be a source of inspiration for the free-spirited, independent-minded readers even today.

Avg Rating
3.91
Number of Ratings
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3 STARS
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Author

Rabindranath Tagore
Rabindranath Tagore
Author · 91 books

Awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1913 "because of his profoundly sensitive, fresh and beautiful verse, by which, with consummate skill, he has made his poetic thought, expressed in his own English words, a part of the literature of the West." 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 complete works of Rabindranath Tagore (রবীন্দ্র রচনাবলী) in the original Bengali are now available at these third-party websites: http://www.tagoreweb.in/ http://www.rabindra-rachanabali.nltr....

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