Rabindranath Tagore 

Question- "Tagore is a lyric poet par excellence." Comment.

Or

"The Gitanjali should be read for its lyrical essence and not for its mystical depth." Discuss.

Or

Tagore is first and foremost a lyric poet'. Discuss. 

Ans-
Rabindranath Tagore is a lyric poet par excellence. Both in quality and quantity his lyrics are better than those of English lyricist and Indian bands. Except epic, Tagore tried his hand at every other kind of poetry but his genius is best in his lyrics. It is on his collection of lyrics that his reputation as a world poet chiefly rests. It is for The 'Gitanjali, that he was awarded the Nobel Prize for literature. It was a translation of some of his poems by himself that took England by storm and won the appreciation of great poets like Y. B. Yeats. There are few other Indo-Anglian poets who displayed an exquisite lyric talent in their lyric poems but only Tagore can be singled out as our whe remains a supremely lyric poet from first to last.
Tagore's output as a lyric poet is large. He has written about 2000 lyrics. His English poetical works of lyrics are The Gitanjali, The Garden, The Lovers' Gift, The Fugitive and Other Poems, The Crescent Moon etc. but Tagore's world-wide reputation is based on Gitanjali which is mainly a collection of devotional lyrics. Tagore's lyrics offer as a large variety of moods and subject matter. For the convenience of study they can be divided into: devotional lyrics, love lyrics, nature lyrics, patriotic lyric and humanistic lyric but Tagore is remembered most as a writer of devotional and nature lyrics. It is said for Tagore that his reputation as a mystic and philosopher has tended to obscure his greatness as a lyric poet. Even when his lyric are admired they are admired for their "spiritual ecastay" and not for their greatness as a work of art.
Gitanjali is mainly a collection of devotional lyrics. In it, poetry approximates to the condition of prayer and prophecy. It is a collection of mystical lyrics in which the poet is concerned with relationship of man, God and nature. Gitanjali is the soul's yearning to merge with God. "Heaven is not stormed nor the earth abandoned in Gitanjali." The poet shares his life with mankind his country and the universe while the seasons bring him "tidings from the unknown" and all his love flowers towards the secrets of death.
As said in the preceding paragraph Gitanjali is the soul's yearning to merge with God. The poet expresses this desire of the human soul for reunion with the divine saying.

"The woodlands have hushed their songs
and doors are all shut at every house. Thou art the
solitary way farer in this deserted street. Oh my only
friend do not pass by like a dream."

While all other doors are shut, the poet's-beloved has kept his doors open like a dream. He should come in and accept the beloved waiting for him. The idea, here, is that God comes to rescue of his devotees when they are surrounded by the storms of misfortune.
The central theme of the Gitanjali is mainly devotional in the great Indian tradition particularly created a sensation in the West. Abbe Bremond declared, "Such poetry is half prayer from below and half a whisper from above, the prayer evoking the response, or the whisper provoking the prayer and always prayer and whisper chiming into song." The poet begins his song- offering in the very first poem of Gitanjali.

"Thou has made me endless such is they pleasure.
This frail vassel thou empliest again and again and filled it ever with fresh life.
One such prayer is sung in following lines:
"Deliver me from my own shadows, my lord, from the wrecks and confusion of my days,
For the night is dark and thy pilgrim is blinded,
Deliver me from despair.

Tagore acknowledges all-pervading presence of God everywhere throughout this universe. And Yet God is not an abstraction. He is also a living being who appears to us as friend and comrade as our father and sometimes even as our lover. He visits man silently and unexpectedly in many forms and at all times and man should always be ready to welcome him.

"Have you not heard his silent steps?
He comes comes ever comes.
Every moment and every age every day and every night
He comes, comes, ever comes.
In the fragrant days of Sunny April through the forest path
He comes, comes, ever comes
In the rainy gloom of July nights on the thundering
Chariot of clouds he comes, comes, ever comes.

This beautiful lyrics from Gitanjali proclaim that God is immanent in Nature and in the life of man.
The lyrics of Gitanjali also show that Tagore is a great poet of man. Many of his lyrics are an expression of what has been called 'spiritual
humanism."
Tagore has left behind him a number of patriotic lyrics. In one of his inspiring lyric the poet prays to God for the spiritual inspiration of his country.

Where the mind is without fear and the head is held high;
Where knowledge is free;
Where the world has not been broken up into
fragments by narrow domestic walls;
Where words come out from the depth of truth
Into that heaven of freedom, my Father let my
country awake.

Tagore's lyrics are remarkable for all the general qualities found in the lyrics of other major lyrical poets of the world subjectively, economy of expression, simplicity, melody and direct appeal, spontaneity, intensity of emotion etc. They have the qualities of sublimity, feminine grace, charm, delicacy and softness. They are smooth like pieces of marble; they are marvellous like magic lamps, they have the power to captivate our hearts and splendour of magic easements.
Consider apt, suggestive and imaginative use of extremely delicate simile in following lines from a lyric in Gitanjali:

"The sweet, soft freshness that blooms on baby's limbs-
Does anybody know where it was hidden, so long?
Yes, when the mother was a young girl it lay
pervading her heart in tender and silent mystery of love-
The sweet, soft freshness that has bloomed on baby's limbs."

"The songs are there not to be intellectually understood, but to be heard and felt by the heart within. Awareness in stirred by them to sense the touch of someone from a far."
To conclude we quote Edward Thompson, "Tagore is essentially a lyricist and the beauty of his religious lyrics is adequately presented by the English Gitanjali a book that will stir men as

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