Cheap Selected Short Stories (Book) (Rabindranath Tagore) Price

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Customer Reviews of Selected Short Stories

Would have given it no stars
if possible. This is just a collection of mushy, sentimentalist garbage ... and if you are not Indian (or Bengali), please ... dont buy this thinking it will give you any accurate idea of Indian life and society at any given point in time. I have never understood why Tagore has such a reputation as a writer of novels and short stories ... stick to his music and art (which ARE terrific) and avoid this stuff at all costs.

Vivid, Magnificent, Haunting, Mysterious Stories
Rabindranath Tagore is best known for his Bengali devotional songs, which were translated to English as poetry. His most famous book of poems, Gitanjali, won the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1913. However, Tagore also wrote short stories which reflect the people, customs, social structure, turmoil, and relationships of the times in which they were written. When the stories were written, Tagore lived on a houseboat. He watched the ebb and flow of life in villages along the river. He captured the essential features of Bengali village life. He saw the caste system, the inequality, the struggles and limitations imposed on people. He wrote about the realities he witnessed. He saw that women were treated as second class citizens, despite their intelligence and talents. He witnessed death as a part of life, when antibiotics had not yet been developed, infections killed children and adults alike. Orphans remained to be raised by next of kin. Tagore manages to capture teh feelings and emotions of the disenfranchised, the poor, and the helpless. His stories are often haunting and eery - the reader gets the feeling for where the stories are leading but suddenly an unexpected twist can change the outcomes. Whatever the theme or topic, Tagore maintains a spiritual awareness or presence in all his stories ... he is sensitive to the innocent, the vulnerable, the unprotected ones in society. His characters have unique personalities. He describes family relationships and explores prescribed roles and society's expectations. He also reveals what happens when people challenge their roles and fall outside behavioral norms. Although the stories were written in the 1890s, the message Tagore conveys has meaning in modern times.
Expressions of love, respect, and decency toward one's fellow human being are universal, therefore Tagore will be held in high esteem by future generations, just as he has been revered by past and present readers. The content of his stories are not bound by space or culture, they are spiritual and therefore timeless. Erika B. (erikab93)