BOOK REVIEW

GITANJALI : A Selection of Poems by Rabindranath Tagore, translated into Sanskrit verse by Pandit Amarendra Mohana Tarkatirtha, Professor of Nyaya Philosophy in the Holkar Sanskrit College, Indore, and formerly Professor of Sanskrit at the Visvabharati. Published by S. K. Majumdar, The Emporium, 155-A, Russa Road, Calcutta. p. 113, paper cover, Price Re. 1-8, cloth Rs. 2.

I suppose Rabindranath Tagore has been translated into almost all the civilized languages of the world, and that is more than can be said of many a great writer, living or dead. The classic speech of India was so long an exception. Rendering a popular work into Sanskrit is even now something more than a mere literary and linguistic exercise: for still there is a wide group of Sanskrit scholars—their number is decreasing every year, no doubt—who can be best approached through Sanskrit; for they would seldom care to read any other language; and for emotional or intellectual pleasure, Sanskrit and Sanskrit alone has an undisputed sway over their hearts and minds. The Christian missionaries had to translate the Bible—portions of it at least—into Sanskrit for propaganda among them, besides some tracts and pamphlets. Present-day polemical literature in Sanskrit on topics connected with Hindu philosophy or social reform presents a considerable volume. So it is no wonder that Rabindranath’s genius will be sought to be introduced to our Sanskrit scholars in the garb of the language of the Gods. The wonder is that this did not happen earlier—at least publicly, as in the little work under review.

In the present volume twenty-five poems (these do not correspond to the English Gitanjali) have been translated, including some of the poet’s finest things, which have not yet been rendered into English. Eminent Sanskrit scholars of Bengal and Benares like Mahamahopadhyayas Phanibhushana Tarkavagisa, Pramathanatha Tarkabhushana, Vamacharana Nyayacharya, Lakshmana Sastri Dravida, and others, have praised this effort on the part of Pandit Amarendra Mohana. I cannot pretend to give an opinion on the quality of the Sanskrit verse, and I am content to take the views of the above eminent scholars. But from what I have read of these translations I have found that the verses run smooth and read well. I have compared some of the poems with the original Bengali. On the whole they are faithful enough renderings, although through the exigencies of the metre a little condensation here and a little expansion there have become at times unavoidable. The metres employed are mostly the usual classical metres, and in one or two cases an imitation of the metre of the original has been attempted as an innovation in Sanskrit. The result has been to my mind quite pleasing (e.g. in the poem Patitā). Poems with which we are familiar in original Bengali appear to us Bengalis as rather quaint when we read them again in their Sanskrit version, and not the least reason for that is the diversity of metre. For example, take the Bengali poem named Madan Bhasmer Purbe, one of the finest of the earlier compositions of the poet. The cadence of the original with its regular pauses and stresses is quite different from the formal and rather stiff and limited lift of the Sikharini metre in which it has been rendered. The result is quite good, though inevitably a little too different in the impression it leaves in our ears : and as one who loves the poem in the original where the music of the verse is inalterably bound up with the poem, I would have liked to see it rendered in the original metre;—this metre although a vernacular one has been already employed for Sanskrit in Jayadeva’s Gitagovinda, in the lyric vadasi yadi kincid opi etc. The genius of Bengali versification as that of a modern language is impossible of being adequately represented in Sanskrit and when we speak of translations, we must bear in mind all the limitations and the curtailments and the alterations of the qualities of the original which they imply. Nevertheless, the experiment was worth making, and from the testimony of people competent to speak on the matter, the experiment has been a success.

Sanskrit scholars will be able to obtain from these translations a good idea of the contents of some of the best poems of Rabindranath, though naturally not of their original form and music. And we should be content to get half where it is not possible to get the whole. Pandit Amarendra Mohana’s work should have a wide circulation among those for whom it is intended, and can very well have a place in a library of modern compositions in Sanskrit.

The get up of the book is excellent, being printed in fine and bold Devanagari type.

Modern Review, December 1930 pp. 645-46