By Labanya Das

ABSTRACT

In Nationalism, Rabindranath Tagore claimed nationalism to be ‘a great menace’. He further argued nationalism as ‘the particular thing which for years has been at the bottom of India’s troubles’. However, it seems quite paradoxical that Tagore, who is connected to (and credited for) the national anthems of two different countries (namely, India and Bangladesh), did not even subscribe to the very notion of nationalism.

A very conspicuous question, thus, emerges – what, according to Tagore, was nationalism? If he did not subscribe to the notions of nationalism then, what was the alternative that he was subscribing to? This study resolves to introspect and find an answer to such contentious questions.

Another aspect of discussing Tagore is his views on internationalism, cosmopolitanism, and pan-Asianism. Between 1915 and 1930 Tagore was consistently encountering intellectuals all around the world during his world tours. Also during the 1920s and 1930s Tagore’s literary works were being translated into several European languages. Did such an encounter beyond the colonial boundaries influence Tagore? If it did influence, then how? This paper endeavors to find an answer to such questions as well and also attempts to introspect the dialectical relation between Tagore’s notion of nationalism and internationalism – were Tagore’s views on internationalism and nationalism complementary to each other or were they conflicting?

Through a critical analysis of several dialogues and letters exchanged between Tagore and his contemporaries, both Asian and European, I have attempted to situate Tagore within a wider intellectual trend of emerging pan-Asianism during the 1920s and 1930s. His speeches on (or, against) nationalism delivered in Japan, America, and India, along with his several essays on the same are the main primary sources for this study.

PROLOGUE

I have come to your door seeking the voice of humanity……

-Rabindranath Tagore, 1925

The concept of nation and nationalism has changed over time. During the early twentieth century, nationalism made its appearance on the world stage as a major theme of discussion and debate when several nation-states emerged claiming their sovereignty. It was also during this time when nationalist discourses in India were also developing to counter colonial sentiment. A constellation of Indian nationalists and philosophers contributed to the development of nationalism in the country, from Bankim Chandra Chattopadhyay, Keshab Chandra Sen, Rabindranath Tagore to Deshbandhu Chittaranjan, Mahatma Gandhi and Jawaharlal Nehru. However, the scope of this paper confines itself to analyze nationalism from Tagore’s point of view. 

Rabindranath Tagore, a dynamic poet, lyricist, novelist, and philosopher, wrote several essays on the theme of nationalism from 1902 onwards, most of which had then been published in the Bharati newspaper in Bengali. Then while on his world tour between 1912 and 1916, Tagore was delivering lectures in different European and Asian countries on the theme of nationalism. While on his world tour, Tagore was encountering the intellectual trends around the world and it was also during the same time that his views on internationalism were developing. He was popularizing internationalism in Bengal as well, among the Bengali intellectual circles in Calcutta. Apart from preaching internationalism, Tagore was acting upon building a wider space in India where several cultures could converge. He made his dream real by establishing Viswa Bharati, where foreign intellectuals would impart education, which created a confluence of cultures at the heart of the sub-continent. Even while in India he maintained close communications with his friends who were miles apart from him. Romain Rolland and C F Andrews were some of his closest friends; they became eternal friends over time (a study of the innumerable letters exchanged between Rolland, Andrews, and Tagore throws light on the same). 

The countless letters exchanged between Tagore and his contemporaries, both Asian and non-Asian, have been compiled by scholars like Chinmoy Guha and Sabyasachi Bhattacharya, which has provided me with ample sources for my study. I have attempted to interpret these letters by adopting a method of critical discourse analysis. I have tried examining Tagore’s outlook in these letters while keeping in mind the socio-cultural context. Besides the letters, I have also attempted to examine the speeches delivered by him. Finally, I have tried to situate Tagore’s views on nationalism and cosmopolitanism within the wider arena of the then-emerging intellectual trend of cosmopolitanism and internationalism. 

This paper includes three parts. The discussion opens with Tagore’s views on internationalism and cosmopolitanism concerning his views on nationalism. It questions whether it is useful to view nationalism and internationalism as conflicting or complementary. For this section, a major chunk of information was taken from his correspondences with Romain Rolland, the famous French essayist, and Noble Laureate. The time for this section would roughly be from 1919 till his death in 1941. It is worth mentioning here that this time is rather interesting since Tagore was preaching the tenets of internationalism at a time when the world just witnessed the scourge of War (and was standing on the brink of yet another War). His views on Pan-Asianism are also discussed in this section with special reference to Okakura Tenshin’s views on the same.

In the first section of this paper, I have tried to move beyond the boundaries of nationalism and situate Tagore within the larger picture of the then-emerging intellectual trend calling for humanity and curbing imperialism. The second part, on the other hand, solely focuses on Tagore’s views on nationalism – how he defined a nation and how his definition was received by the Indian intellectuals. Tagore never gave a structured definition of a nation, what he did (as has been discussed later) was to ascertain what a nation ought to be. And, while discussing nationalism a major aspect that cannot be overlooked is Tagore’s debate with Mahatma Gandhi. Their exchanges were then published by the then popular newspapers like Modern Review and Young India, which throws light on what was the popular reaction to Tagore’s criticism of nationalism. Finally, in the concluding part of this paper, I have wrapped up the main arguments and tried to find out why Tagore ruminated on the theme of nationalism – what urged him to do so. During the last few years of his life, Tagore is very lonely, the loss of his close ones (especially, the demise of C F Andrews) has taken a toll on him, and he felt lonely. And, it is through this lonely path, I believe, if we follow Tagore, we will find why he ruminated on nationalism.

A discussion on Tagore’s views of cosmopolitanism opens the doors to many new arenas of research. It is an interdisciplinary study that focuses on the conflict between the different ‘isms’ and situates it within a larger context. We have, since time immemorial, been cosmopolitan – we just have not realized it. Looking back at Tagore is a step forward to such a realization since cosmopolitanism is not just an idea – it is an infinite being.

Yet another question that might emerge is, why Tagore? How are Tagore’s views on nation and nationalism relevant today? Firstly, Tagore is one of the first to uplift humanity over nationalism. He did not believe in a competition between nations, he rather wanted a peaceful co-existence where the only anthem would be the song of humanity. Secondly, he believed nationalism is incomplete without cosmopolitanism. Nationalism without internationalism gives rise to jingoism, which is a regular problem these days. Thirdly, Tagore not only criticizes jingoistic nationalism but also shows us an alternative path to avoid such a death trap. And finally, today when the world is once again standing at the brink of yet another war, which will lead to the unbearable destruction of human civilization, I feel that it is high time we look back and re-visit Tagore for the sake of saving humanity.

FINDING HOME WITHIN THE WORLD

The concepts of cosmopolitanism and globalization are themes that are presently being researched at most by intellectuals all around the world and across all disciplines. However, there is a prevailing tendency of associating everything ‘modern’ to be global. Also, globalization has often been related to belonging to the modern ‘progressive’ age. However, efforts are being made to keep such distorted tendencies at bay. As Frederick Cooper had pointed the concepts of global and modern to be ‘two-edged swords.’ He further added them to be ‘straightjackets’ that push us into the traps of Eurocentrism and other confinements. The early twentieth century marks the prominent period for the development of ‘cosmopolitan thought zones’ in India when attempts were made to oppose Eurocentrism. It was during this time that the Bengali intellectuals were constantly engaging in dialogues with the foreign intellectuals. Rabindranath Tagore was one of the earliest proponents of such transnational cultural and intellectual exchanges. The Bengali intellectuals inspired by Rabindranath led the way in forging encounters with German academics, for instance, in their pursuit of new intellectual authority outside the frame of the British. We hear of Meghnad Saha and Satyendranath Bose encountering Albert Einstein and Walther Nernst and Girindrasekhar Bose engaging in a long dialogue with Sigmund Freud. It was, therefore, not only Rabindranath who was entering into such ‘cosmopolitan thought zones’. These transnational and trans-cultural exchanges gave rise to cosmopolitanism among the Indian intelligentsia.

Throughout the nineteenth century, the Western imperial nations had defended colonialism, arguing that they were on a mission to civilize the uncivilized. Soon at the dawn of the twentieth century, such a notion was criticized and anti-colonial struggle produced an alternative paradigm countering the Western one. The anti-colonial struggles in the Asian nations crystallized the concept of cosmopolitanism. There was an urge to cross the territorial boundaries and annihilate imperial rule unanimously. And, it was this cosmopolitanism that played a major role in the development and evolution of the concept of pan-Asianism.

The spirit of pan-Asianism or ‘Asian universalism’ became prominent during the early twentieth century when cultural exchanges between India and Japan increased. It was during this time, that the famous Japanese artist, Okakura Kakuzo (also known as Okakura Tenshin), first visited India in 1902 on the eve of the publication of his book, The Ideals of the East. In India, Okakura met Sister Nivedita and as Rustom Bharucha has noted, Okakura had come to India ‘in search of a far more internationally recognized luminary’, Swami Vivekananda.Soon Okakura is introduced to the Calcutta-based Bengali intelligentsia, more specifically, he becomes acquainted with the Tagore family. Okakura’s views, a perfect blend of Japanese nationalism and pan-Asianism, made him quite acceptable among the Bengali intelligentsia. Among them, Rabindranath is one. There is very little evidence whether Tagore and Okakura met but it can be assumed that the latter was not ignorant of the former, at least at a time when the former was composing patriotic songs that were more than just popular. However, there were certain fundamental differences between Tagore’s views and that of Okakura’s. Okakura begins his Ideals of the East by declaring that ‘Asia is one’. Moreover, Okakura’s rhetoric of Asia might seem to be deceptive since he subtly argued ‘Japan is not part of Asia’; and later he concluded that it would be Japan who would lead Asia in the future. His depiction of Japan as ‘a museum of Asiatic civilization’ seems excessively Japanese and much less Asian. Such a notion or definition of Asia is at one level terrifying for such idealized reading can easily camouflage the violence of war, racism, and xenophobia.

Having placed Okakura’s emerging notion of ‘Asia’, we now turn to what Tagore was thinking at that time. Tagore’s views on ‘nationalism’ or ‘civilization’ did not pop up out of the blue. There was a gradual process for the same. During his early years, Tagore was interested in writing about the historical luminaries of India. For instance, in 1877, at the age of seventeen, Tagore wrote a historical essay on the Rani of Jhansi. Later in 1902, he wrote an essay titled, ‘Bharatvarsher Itihasa’, in Bengali where he lamented over the poor system of history writing and history reading in the country. He was consistently differentiating between colonial historiography and indigenous historiography and while differentiating, he concluded that the actual difference lies in the different cultures and different societies in the East and the West. Later in 1916, while on his world tour, he was actually developing the concepts of civilization. Tagore’s lectures in Japan and America in 1916 against imperialism reflect his thoughts on civilization. He emphasized the ancient history of the East:

For centuries we did hold torches of civilization in the East when the West slumbered in darkness, and that could never be the sign of sluggish minds or narrowness of vision.

He refers to the Eastern civilization as the spiritual head of the world. However, before long, he expressed his fear of Japanese imperialism.

I, for myself, cannot believe that Japan has become what it is by imitating the West. We cannot imitate life,……For it hampers our true nature……..It is like dressing our skeleton with another man’s skin, giving rise to eternal feuds between the skin and the bones at every moment.

Tagore, here, boldly condemns Japanese imperialism. He is referring to Japan as committing the same mistake as Europe – following the path of imperialism and destroying humanity. It is worth mentioning in this regard that, during 1904-1905, Japan was emerging as a powerful threat to the Western nations by defeating Russia in the Russo-Japanese wars. Thus Japan was carving her place in world politics with the tip of the sword, much to the horror and disappointment of Tagore. And, no wonder why, Tagore was criticized in and outside Japan after his speech there.

Japan has imported her food from the West, but not her vital nature. Japan cannot altogether lose and merge herself in the scientific paraphernalia she has acquired from the West and be turned into a mere borrowed machine.

In response to Tagore’s bold criticism of Japan’s ‘development’, Inow Tetsujiro argued, “As the people of a rising nation, I think we should make every effort to exclude the Indian tendency toward pessimism and dispiritedness.” Tagore was, thus, misunderstood and his love for humanity and fear of imperialistic aggressive policies were misinterpreted as ‘pessimism’ and ‘dispiritedness’. He was never against development nor did he fail to acknowledge the positive aspects of the Western civilization – he was simply asking the Japanese not to blindly imitate the West – not to repeat the mistakes the Western civilizations made.

In his essays, Tagore struggled with translating terms like ‘civilization’ and ‘nation’. He admitted that both these terms and the concepts were of Western origin and it would be better to keep them that way and thus in Bengali, he was using ‘nationalotto’ instead of ‘jatiyotaabad’. For civilization, he rejected Manu’s translation of the term as ‘sadacara’. The core structure of Tagore’s concept of cosmopolitanism and pan-Asianism was to break the then-prevalent Euro-centrism, but this doesn’t mean he was opposed to the positive aspects of the West. On the contrary, some of his closest associates were European. Among them were C F Andrews and Romain Rolland. 

Tagore and Rolland exchanged their first letters in 1919, just after the end of World War I, and continued to do so till Tagore’s death in 1941, and over time they became friends. During their initial exchanges, both intellectuals addressed each other as ‘Sir’ or by their full name; however, the latter exchanges show ‘Sir’ transforming to ‘my dear friend’, ‘dear and great friend’, and ‘my very dear friend’. Romain Rolland, a Nobel laureate (1915), incurred the wrath of the progressive and liberal French intelligentsia when he published Au-dessus de la melee, against nationalism and the frenzy of war in 1915. Meanwhile, by 1915, Tagore was a well-known figure in intellectual circles around the world. Thus, in 1919 Rolland first wrote to Tagore asking for his signature and solidarity for the former’s ‘Declaration of the Independence of the Spirit’ in which he declared:

Workers of the Mind,….we appeal to you at this hour when blockades are crumbling and borders are reopening, to reinforce our fraternal union – a new union which is more solid and convincing than ever before.

Needless to say that Rolland’s letter ‘cheered’ Tagore ‘with its message of hope.’ Thus, began the journey of a beautiful friendship that flourished amidst tumultuous times. Both intellectuals found solace in each other’s company. Hence we find Tagore writing to his friend:

There has been a great political upheaval……in our country. It has, no doubt, roused the minds of the people, but has led it through a narrow channel,……..What hurts me deeply is that this movement fails to draw its inspiration from a large vision of humanity……..I felt the utter loneliness of my position when I came back to India, longed from cooperation from men like yourself with whom I feel my kinship.

It can be assumed, here, that Tagore was talking about the politics surrounding the Non-Cooperation movement in India. He felt lonely since no intellectual in India at that time felt the same as he did. Hence he confided in his ‘very dear friend.’

The list of dissimilarities between Tagore and Rolland ran much longer than that of the similarities; still, their friendship became eternal. They met only once in 1926, even though their friendship dates back to April of 1919. What brought them closer was their mutual faith in universal fraternity and humanism. Both of them read each other’s works. Rolland was so fascinated with Tagore’s Gora and Nationalism that he translated them into French with the help of his sister, Madeleine Rolland. Rolland believed that there was nothing good left in the Western civilization and it was Asia’s turn to take the lead and restore the lost glory of human civilization. He opined that the Western and Eastern civilizations are both sides of the human brain, if one side collapses the whole functioning of the body collapses as well. Therefore, when in a letter to Rolland in February 1925, Tagore expressed that he felt ‘unnecessary’ in his own country and further added: 

I am afraid my own people would continue to consider my ideals of international amity as premature, nay more, a poetic luxury which our age cannot afford to indulge in……

Rolland consoled him by replying:

In every country, men like us are lonely. I believe they have always been so. But in this age of paroxysm, all the characters accuse each other in an accentuated manner, antipathy appears to be more bitter between the crowd which exists from day to day, and the small number of people who cherish the eternal.

A rather interesting exchange between Tagore and Rolland in this regard would be the one where Tagore wrote:

In Zurich I had an interview with Madam Salvadori, the result of which you will see later on. I have to pass through a purification ceremony for the defilement to which I submitted myself in Italy.

Who was Madam Salvadori? What was this ‘purification ceremony’ that Tagore was referring to? The answers to these questions become clear and the whole incident becomes quite clear following the series of letters exchanged between Tagore, Rolland, and Charles Andrews in 1926. Tagore visited Italy twice, first in 1925 and later in 1926. By then Italy was already under the Fascist control of Mussolini. However, Tagore saw in Mussolini ‘a living genius and a creative personality.’ And Tagore’s European friends like Rolland made him aware of the fact that Italy was projecting him as a friend and supporter of Fascism which distorted his image. In the aforementioned extract, Madam Salvadori was referred to as Giacinta Salvadori, the wife of an Italian anti-fascist living in exile, Guglielmo Salvadori. However, in a letter to Charlie Andrews, Tagore admitted:

Being ignorant of Italian I had no means of checking the result of this concoction. The only precaution which I could take was to repeat emphatically to all my listeners that I had had as yet no opportunity to study the history and character of Fascism.

Also earlier, Tagore had received ‘magnificent gifts from Mussolini, an almost complete library of Italian literature, for my institution’ (visva-bharati). Hence, Tagore’s ignorance and gratitude for the gifts received, made him think Mussolini possessed a ‘creative mind like Michelangelo.’ After issuing a public statement explaining this misunderstanding, which Tagore called ‘purification ceremony’, he received a letter from Guglielmo Salvadori, where the latter wrote:

You say that as a poet, it is the human element – even in politics – which touches you most deeply, and the expression of the personal man in his work. Well, try and go to the bottom of Mussolini’s morbid nature, and you will find, not a person, but a brute – not real humanity, but the semblance of humanity, humanity degenerated and corrupted and perverted to the lowest degrees.

Needless to say Rolland was already warning Tagore of what was to come:

……I had no other interest but your glory which is dearer to me than your rest. I did not want the monsters to abuse your sacrosanct name in history………The future – which has already become present – will show you that I have acted like an attentive and faithful guard.

The point in this whole fiasco was Tagore’s ignorance of the political situation in Italy, which shows that though Tagore was fighting for universalism, it would be difficult to achieve such universal fraternity. This upholds the conflict between nationalism and universalism. Thus, though Tagore saw nationalism and universalism as complementary, there existed a conflict between the two, which Tagore might have understood in 1926. The clearest conflict with nationalist agendas was provoked by Tagore when he critiqued Japanese imperialism.

Nonetheless, Tagore’s idea of cosmopolitanism had a humanist yet radical approach. He condemned the Asian nations for imitating the West in every aspect on the one hand, while on the other hand, he never proposed the destruction of the West. He wanted Eastern and Western countries to join hands culturally and socially not just through political treaties and allies. He dreamt of a wider space that would allow the convergence of the Eastern and Western cultures, where not any one culture would dominate the others – but there would exist a mutual solidarity among them. Hence, it would be safe to say, that Tagore’s ideas of universalism were one of a kind and it would be wrong, on our part,  to confine a discussion regarding Tagore within the territorial boundaries of any one nation – he is ‘too vast for it’ – he made the world his home. Thus, in his very last letter to Rolland, Tagore gifted him a poem as a token of their eternal friendship:

Though I know, my friend, that we are different
my mind refuses to own it….
…..but a magnanimous breath of life
has carried me to your side
and the dark line of our difference
is aglow with the radiance of a dawn.

PREACHING THE THEORY OF NO-NATION: LOOKING AT THE GENESIS OF NATIONALISM IN THE WORKS OF RABINDRANATH TAGORE

……I feel that the true India is an idea and not a mere geographical fact.

– Rabindranath Tagore

Nation, as Tagore stated, cannot be translated into Bengali or any other Indian language. We tend to equate ‘nation’ to ‘jati’ and ‘nationalism’ to ‘jatiyotaabad’ – which Tagore deems to be fallacious. Jati generally refers to race, not nation. Tagore perceives the very concept of nation to be of Western origin and he perceived India as a country of No-Nation.Interestingly, one can encounter two distinct portrayals of a Nation while reading Tagore. One, in his Bengali essays where he portrays a nation to be a ‘living entity’, which transcends the barriers of language, geography, religion, and the like. This nation, he writes, consists of an outer element and an inner element – where the inner element is of much importance. Popular memory and the will to live together, to preserve together its history and culture – a sense of togetherness binds the inner element of a nation. Au contraire, in a series of lectures delivered throughout the United States during 1916-17, he stated nation to be an ‘abstract being’ which might ‘threaten the whole future of our (Indian) people with a perpetual helplessness of emasculation.’

Why was Tagore portraying two diametrically opposite forms of nation? In the former case, Tagore was showing what a nation ought to be and in the latter, he pointed out what a nation ought not to be. More specifically, in the latter case, Tagore was describing and critiquing the Western concept of nation. While discussing nation and nationalism Tagore never gives a structured definition of a nation – he rather shows the elementary features of what a nation should be like. Tagore uses phrases like ‘a thick mist of a stifling nature’, ‘national machinery of commerce and politics’, ‘mechanical purpose’, ‘whole series of ropes and pulleys’, and many more, which indicates that he deemed the Western nation to be a machine, a non-living thing which produces ready-made products, which lacks in naturalness. Delving deeper he pointed out that the main difference lies between the evolution of society in India and the West. He inferred the Western society to be state-based, unlike India. Society, in India, had no ‘ulterior purpose’, it was ‘a natural regulation of human relationships, so that men can develop ideals of life in cooperation with one another.’ In the West, the political, power-hungry side of the society dominated unlike that in India. This power-hungry side of the society in the West ‘grew crossing boundaries with amazing speed’ and eventually ‘goaded all its neighboring societies with greed of material prosperity and consequent mutual jealousy.’ He feared that the Western nation had already started ‘spreading its tentacles in the Indian soil’.

Having explained the concept of nation, Tagore moves on to look into the problems India was facing as he stated, ‘Our real problem in India is not political. It is social.’ Emphasizing the political problems instead of the social ones, he believed, was an imitation of the West. In several essays, he emphasized that the ‘samaj’ is the basis of Indian civilization. Hence, imitating the state-based Western society would be a grave mistake in that case. Not just in the case of India, he despised the very act of blind imitation of each civilization. He vehemently critiqued Japan’s policies of imperial aggression which he deemed to be a blind imitation of the West. Why should not the West be emulated? Every country has its problems which should be dealt with separately at first. Just as Fanon believed that the colony must fight against itself. 

For Tagore, the prevailing concept of nation was less humane and much less spiritual. He wished India to acquire a humane and spiritual character, instead of becoming a megalomaniac machine. He rather laid stress on the issue of self-determination. Although Tagore highly acknowledged the gifts of the Western civilization to the world, he was at a crossroads between the spirit of the West and the ‘Nation of the West’. He never proposed to revolt against the West, rather he believed in cooperation and the establishment of a socio-cultural zone where cultures and ethics of both the Eastern and Western civilizations would flourish and co-exist. He despised the self-idolatry worship of one’s nation, thus, he critiqued the national movements in India during the early 20^th century.

When people all over India were demanding Swaraj, which means self-rule, Tagore defined swarajas ‘maya’ – ‘ a mist that will vanish leaving no stain on the radiance of the Eternal’. The idea of non-cooperation ‘did not sing to him’, it was to him ‘a congregated menace of negations’.He did not find the spiritual unity in the movements and thus he deemed the then ongoing national agitation to be ‘the anarchy of a mere emptiness’. For him, it was a ‘ceaseless discordance’ that prevailed in India which divided the people instead of uniting them. The aggressive nationalism was self-exhausting which ‘drains man’s energy from his higher nature where he is self-sacrificing and creative.’ He spoke about harmonizing the people not only within the boundaries of his Motherland but beyond it. For India he stated that the society is a plural one – plurality is the ornamental feature of the Indian society. This plurality needed to be preserved which did not mean the dominance of any one culture over the others. Peaceful coexistence was his anthem.

Tagore provided us with an alternative way to avoid the menace of mimicking the West. He takes the examples of the Provincial Conferences of 1905 in Dhaka and Rajshahi. He proposes that what if we did not name the conferences as ‘Provincial Conferences’ like the Europeans? He stated instead of giving a grave name to the conferences we should call them mela in our indigenous way. It would be a festival where people would gather and perform indigenous art forms like kirtan and jatra. He emphasized that such a mela should be held in every region of India, which will serve as the meeting ground of the home and the World. Thus, he proposed to return to our very own rural culture which during that point of time was deemed to be redundant. Tagore also traces the evolution of our culture from such rural grounds. Thus instead of suggesting something difficult to relate to the rural people, he suggested a solution that was organic and natural.

The late 19^th and early 20^th centuries were crowded with events of national importance. The will to oust the British imperial rule from Indian soil was at its zenith among the masses. Moreover, leaders preached the tenets of nationalism and self-sacrifice to the youth. He witnessed the upsurge of self-idolatry in India during the early 20^th century and felt that such nationalism was dividing people instead of bridging the gap. He found the national struggles to be self-exhausting not self-liberating. In one of his letters to C F Andrews, Tagore shares an anecdote, where during the swadeshi movement, a crowd of young boys came to him and said they were ready to leave their schools and colleges if Tagore would order them.However, on hearing Tagore’s refusal to do so, they became angry and doubted the former’s love and sincerity for his Motherland. Tagore himself wrote that he refused to do so ‘because the anarchy of a mere emptiness never tempts me, even when it is resorted to as a temporary measure.’ It was this spirit of nationalism that Tagore referred to as ‘a great menace.’ For him such nationalism was a machine-made product of the West that lacked the spirit of originality and naturalness:

Those of us in India who have come under the delusion that mere political freedom will make us free have accepted their lessons from the West as the gospel truth and lost their faith in humanity.

This is why Tagore who once played an active role in the swadeshi movement later quitted the same.

Yet Tagore’s views on nationalism as well as cosmopolitanism acquired several criticisms from Indian nationalists. In April 1917, at the Bengal Provincial Conference held in Calcutta Chitta Ranjan Das questioned and challenged the opinion of the Poet. The ‘whole of this anti-nation idea’ appeared to C R Das to be ‘insubstantial – based upon a vague and nebulous conception of universal humanity.’ He refused to accept that the idea of nationalism was ‘a foreign importation’ – for him ‘the spirit of nationalism ‘ was founded upon a ‘permanent and immutable relation which subsists between a particular people and the land which they inhabit.’ Yet another critic of Tagore’s ideas was Mahatma Gandhi. In 1921, Tagore wrote:

…..it hurts me deeply when the cry of rejection rings loud against the West in my country with the clamour that the Western education can only injure us.

The same year Gandhi responded to the ‘Poet’s Musings’ in Young India:

I want the cultures of all the lands to be blown about my house as freely as possible. But I refuse to be blown off my feet by any…I refuse to put the unnecessary strain of learning English upon my sisters for the sake of false pride or questionable social advantage.

The debate between Tagore and Mahatma extended to the Non-Cooperation movement as well. Tagore was disheartened with the spirit of non-cooperation, he wrote:

What irony of fate is this that I should be preaching cooperation of cultures between East and West on this side of the sea just at the moment when the doctrine of non-cooperation is preached on the other side?

This was followed by Gandhi’s answer to the Poet’s criticism of non-cooperation:

….Our Non-Cooperation is neither with the English nor with the West. Our Non-Cooperation is with the system the English have established, with the material civilization and its attendant greed and exploitation of the weak.

The debate between Tagore and Gandhi was between the state and society. Tagore opposed tendencies of thought elevating the state above society. This is why Tagore was skeptical of the national movement, as the national movement was directed primarily toward the political battle. Bhattacharya reports of an editorial of 1923 in Ananda Bazar Patrika that typically criticized Tagore:

Perhaps the terrible destruction of the last World War of Europe….have hurt the Poet’s soul. But, however much the poet’s soft and idealistic soul may be hurt….there is no denying that nationalism is a necessity for the oppressed countries like India.

In fact, Tagore’s views against nationalism made the British government look upon him with equal suspicion. His visits and associations with C F Andrews and foreign friends were kept under surveillance. Hence, Tagore’s views on nationalism were often misread as ‘ludicrous opinions’ or to be appealing to those who live in ‘a dream–world’.

The philosophical grounding of Tagore’s theory of No-Nation was that of self-liberation. He said of the presence of an inner being and an outer being and emphasized the inner being to be the master. He spoke of the liberation of this inner being. He upholds the ideals of self-determination, self-assertion, and self-liberation. He wasn’t against the Western nation only, but against all nations around the world, that did not let the self to flourish. Nations rather cage the inner self within ‘narrow domestic walls’. He wished the self to be liberated and connect with a wider world where a sense of oneness would prevail.

EPILOGUE

As I look around I see the crumbling ruins of a proud civilization strewn like a vast heap of futility. And yet I shall not commit the grievous sin of losing faith in Man.

-Rabindranath Tagore, 1941

Before moving to the concluding part and wrapping up Tagore’s visions on nationalism and internationalism, I would like to find out what made or urged Tagore to ruminate on the issues of nationalism. C F Andrews elaborately discusses Tagore’s ‘literary awakening’. Tagore read a lot of Vaishnava literature as well as the works of Chandidas and Vidyapati as a teenager, which led him to create his own style of writing rather than the Western one.Moreover, a rigorous reading of the Upanishads also spiritually awakened him. Also, he grew up in a family that played an active role in the Brahmo Samaj and was skeptical of the conservative Hindu traditions. Thus Tagore’s spirituality was bound to be radical. His religion was humanism. His religion was the religion of a poet – based on passionate experiences of love and beauty and the desire to make something whole and meaningful out of isolated fragments of one person’s perceptual experience. This spiritual basis led him to love humanity unconditionally, which often led to viraha. He wanted the freedom for struggle to be full of unconditional love for self-liberation. However, it was the widespread devastation of World War I that led him to think how necessary for the world it is to gain back its lost spirituality. Furthermore, the time of Tagore was crowded with national events. It would have been unnatural of him not to  participate in those national discussions or the protests. He, thus, actively participated in the Swadeshi movement but soon left it as his views on nationalism changed. He could not find in himself to reject everything European and believe in Non-Cooperation. But he was also not mimicking the West.

He realized that unless India fought against her inner evils it could not attain freedom. For him, freedom ‘cannot be given from outside, but has to be won through the awakened personality of the people truly claiming it with intelligence…’ It was this true meaning of freedom that evolved his views on nationalism. And, in the later years when he encountered intellectuals across the globe he realized that the situation in India was different than the European ones, so the method and path to attain liberation have to be different. Then during the World War, he was devastated to witness the immense destruction to mankind, which led him to move beyond the territorial boundaries of nationality. He cried for peace, for the restoration of humanity. He joined hands with intellectuals across the world who vowed to serve humanity and nobody else. He spoke about annihilating Eurocentrism and imperialism not only in India but all over the world. Thus, he emphasized creation rather than construction. ‘Construction’, he said, ‘is for a purpose….but creation is for itself.’ For him, creation was equivalent to the revelation of the truth of the world. And this truth was a sense of ‘universal relatedness’ of people all over the world. Therefore, liberation for Tagore had two facets, one that would liberate the inner self and, the other, that would make the inner self transcend all boundaries and relate to a wider population.

Tagore’s outlook on nationalism and internationalism was humanitarian yet radical. It had a strong sense of self-determination within. True emancipation was to be able to relate to all other fellow humans. True that Tagore’s ideals were misinterpreted as too idealistic to be true and often overlooked. However, while deeply disappointed with his surroundings for indulging in blind mimicry of the West, did not lose faith in humanity. He till his last breath believed there would be a bright morning when the truth would be revealed. He felt lonely since nobody in his country agreed with his outlook and his love for his Motherland was often questioned, but he never for once moved from his standpoint. He was lonely and devastated but strongly upheld his view. Just like the Stoics, by cosmopolitanism, Tagore did not propose forgetting one’s local and national identities; but believed that we should not give our first allegiance to a mere government, but to the moral community made up of human beings.

We often categorize Tagore as a ‘national’ poet. However, such a categorization is insufficient for, he was too vast to be limited within the narrow confines of a nation. He was a Poet, as he called himself. Not a national poet, but a poet of humanism.