Geethanjali

Rabindranath Tagore ([ɹobin̪d̪ɾonat̪ʰ ʈʰakuɹ] or [taˈgɔ(ɹ)] (help*info);[α] Bangla: রবীন্দ্রনাথ ঠাকুর (help*info);[β] 7 May 1861 - 7 August 1941[γ]), also known by the sobriquet Gurudev,[δ] was a Bengali poet, Brahmo Samaj (syncretic Hindu monotheist) philosopher, visual artist, playwright, novelist, and composer whose works reshaped Bengali literature and music in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. A cultural icon of Bengal and India, he became Asia's first Nobel laureate when he won the 1913 Nobel Prize in Literature.

A Pirali Bengali Brahmin from Calcutta (Kolkata), India, Tagore first wrote poems at age eight. He published his first substantial poetry--under the pseudonym Bhanushingho ("Sun Lion")--in 1877 and wrote his first short stories and dramas at age sixteen. His home schooling, life in Shilaidaha, and travels made Tagore a nonconformist and pragmatist ; however, growing disillusionment with the British Raj caused Tagore to back the Indian Independence Movement and befriend Mahatma Gandhi. Tagore's life was tragic--he lost virtually his entire family and was devastated to witness Bengal's decline--but his life's work endured, in the form of his poetry and the institution he founded, Visva-Bharati University.

Tagore's works included Gitanjali (Song Offerings), Gora (Fair-Faced), and Ghare-Baire (The Home and the World). His verse, short stories, and novels--many defined by rhythmic lyricism, colloquial language, meditative naturalism, and philosophical contemplation--received worldwide acclaim. Tagore was also a cultural reformer and polymath who modernised Bangla art by rejecting strictures