Rabindranath Tagore, a renowned Indian poet, who became the first Asian poet to be awarded the 1913 Nobel Prize for Literature, for his extraordinary work ‘Gitanjali’. He also became the first non-European to win the Nobel Prize in Literature.
Tagore was born on 7th May 1861, in Calcutta, India. He wrote his first poem at the age of six, and as a young boy, studied the classical poetry of Kalidasa.
After a brief stay in England to attempt to study law, he returned to India, and instead, pursued a career as a writer, playwright, songwriter, poet, philosopher and educator.
He authored almost 50 odd volumes of poetry. Tagore’s poetic songs were viewed as spiritual and mercurial. Initially, Tagore wrote his poems in his native language Bengali. Later, his works were translated into foreign languages. Gradually, he became well known in the West. In fact he toured many countries, and delivered many lectures on international platforms.
In 1950, his song ‘Jana Gana Mana’ was adopted as India’s national anthem.
