On the Tagore trail
Rabindranath’s works and his fans are known to turn up at the most unexpected of places.
It isn’t everyday that the Sotheby’s auction house in New York comes across an unpublished notebook belonging to Rabindranath Tagore. Dating back to 1928, this previously unknown autographed manuscript proved to be an extremely rare find. And the timing of the discovery was perfect; the poet’s 150th birth anniversary celebrations were in full swing around the world. This discovery added to the flavour of the festivities. “Tagore had gifted this manuscript to a friend who had supported his university at Santiniketan. This friend and patron then shifted to the United States. Since it was the 150th birth anniversary of Tagore, his family thought that it was the right time to put this rare piece of Tagore memorabilia up for sale,” says Maithili Parekh, director (India), Sotheby’s.
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Tagore enthusiasts are amazed at how the memorabilia turns up in the most unusual and unexpected of places. For instance, Kolkata-based journalist and artist Barun Roy, who is a columnist with Business Standard, ended up finding the first edition copy of Tagore’s Personality a thousand leagues away from home. “I hadn’t expected to find it in my daughter’s personal library at her home in the United States. Apparently she had bought it years ago from a second-hand bookstore in Boston. I can’t explain the joy I felt when I beheld the copy that had been published by Macmillan in 1917,” he says. The book ignited Roy’s curiosity about its origins. After talking to several people, he came to know that a popular preacher, Reverend J Edgar Park, had reviewed the book. “I think for the western reader, Tagore’s writings carry a message of peace, serenity and brotherhood. All the people that I have spoken with say that they find spiritual solace in his writings. I think it is this element of universality that appealed to Reverend Park as well,” explains Roy. Also, folded within the book was a rare newspaper clipping with a conversation that an Italian student had had with Tagore during his trip to Italy. Roy, who has a book back home about this particular trip, went back to Kolkata and scanned through the publication for any reference to the clipping. “There was no mention of this clipping whatsoever. So that was a rare find too,” he says. Who would have thought that a book would turn out to be such a treasure trove of information!
During his many trips across the world, Roy has managed not only to find unique Tagore memorabilia but has also ended up meeting ardent fans of the bard in the most extraordinary circumstances. “I was in the Philippines some time ago and one day my wife and I decided to go to the beach. We were strolling about when a middle-aged Filipino man dressed in swimming trunks accosted me and asked if I was from India. He got so excited and told me that he loved Tagore, especially his book Gitanjali. Who would have thought that I would have this conversation somewhere on a beach in the Philippines.”
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With most of the Tagore paintings and memorabilia housed in museums and institutions, it is very hard for private collectors to come across his work. “That’s why if a work does come up, like the manuscript that was auctioned recently, people would certainly want to possess it. Aesthetically, I don't know how many people relate to his paintings, but most of them would like to own a Tagore so they look out for such works,” says Ashish Anand, director, Delhi Art Gallery. He has a collection of eight to ten paintings by Tagore in the gallery that he acquired from people whose parents were friends of Tagore. “Most of them are portraits, profiles of women, frontal faces. One very interesting piece has been done on Tagore’s letterhead which depicts the Royal Bengal Tiger. Another is an abstract work, which is also extremely difficult to come by. We have a few letters written by him and also a leather work in which he carried his letters and writing. I don’t know if that leather piece was done by him or by someone else for him,” elaborates Anand.
The rarity of these works makes provenance a huge concern and that's why some collectors prefer to acquire the writings and paintings through auction houses. Bangladesh-based Rajeeb Samdani, an ardent collector of Tagore's works, can't remember when his fascination with Tagore first began. “Tagore is a symbol of unity between the two Bengals. The national anthems of both India and Bangladesh were written by him. And we Bangladeshis believe that Tagore is ours; his poetry and literature are a part of us.”
This fascination with Tagore isn’t new, but his 150th birth celebrations have just acted as a reminder of the significance of the poet. His work touched a chord with the common man — of love, aspiration and breaking into a new horizon. And that’s why, galleries and museums across the world have been celebrating the spirit that he embodied by showcasing some of their rare Tagore memorabilia. For instance, UK-based Dartington Hall Trust engaged Sotheby’s services last year to sell 12 paintings from its Tagore collection to raise funds for its charitable programmes in arts, social justice and sustainability; everything that Tagore stood for and believed in. These paintings are just one part of the huge archive of photographs, letters and other artifacts related to Tagore in Dartington’s collection. Apparently, Leonard Elmhirst, who started the Dartington Hall Trust, was a close friend of Tagore and had even travelled to India to work as Tagore’s private secretary. And that's how the trust got this treasure trove of rare memorabilia related to Tagore.
Though people wax eloquent about the timelessness and appeal of Tagore’s work, yet some of his paintings and poems are lying in a derelict state. “Some of the works were earlier stored in trunks at the Visva-Bharati University. The paintings were all folded up and hence the paper is now coming apart. No care was taken,” rues Roy. It is a sad state for the work of a man who negotiated modernism before it even became the rage in the West. “He epitomised the beauty, the aesthetic and the philosophy of the nation state. And that’s what makes him relevant even today,” says Parekh.