1
Viktors Ivbulis
Latvia
Awarding the Nobel Prize to RabindranathTagore in 1913 was an event of far-reaching international literary and political significance. It honoured not only his poetic power and love of man but also the Indian literary tradition he represented. Indeed, he became the spiritual ambassador of India to the whole world and certainly also to Latvia.Althoughhe did not visitLatviain person, my motherland welcomed translations of his works with extraordinary warmth.
The Latvian reception of Tagore can be divided into several periods. There was scant interest in him before World War Ibecause Latvia was a part of Russia with limited exposureto information, but a few years after this war ended,translations from English began to appear, and Tagore became one of the most – if not the most –widely published and read foreign authors in Latvia. In 1940 the two occupations – German and Soviet – began,and only after Stalin’s death in 1954 Tagorecouldagain become a beloved author in the Soviet Union. In a littlemore than ten years,eight volumes of Works and twelve volumes of Collected works, translated from the original Bengali or English,werepublishedin Moscowin very large print runs. There followed many publications of separate works and translations from Russian in many other languages except Latvian. The Russian publication of thepoet’s Collected works in 1961-1965 was perhaps the most important achievenement in the history of Western Tagoryana after the success of British poets and other intellectuals in presentingTagore as an outstanding author to Western readers. Their efforts were crowned by the proposal to award him the Nobel Prize in literature. On the side of national translations of his poetry, novels, stories and plays of Tagore the efforts of the well-known Latvian culture worker Kārlis Egle (1887-1974)maybesecond only to those of the Spanish Nobel laureate Juan Ramón Jiménez and his wife Zenobia Camprubí Aimar.[1] There is a noteworthy parallel: Kārlis Egle, like Juan Ramón Jiménez was greatly helped by his wife, Elmīra Egle; who also was more proficient in English but never allowed her name to be mentioned.
From the very beginning, Latvia’s intellectuals, with very few exceptions, received the Bengali poet as if he were a close ethnic relative. There were several reasons for this. The name of India was already very familiar here since the middle of the 19th century, when German linguists proved that Lithuanian – our only sister tongue - was more closely related to Sanskrit than any other living European language. At the end of the 19th century and even until 1940, Indians in our press were called brothers; in this way we identified ourselves with their great civilisation rather than with those of the the Germans or the Russians who ruled Latvia before (the Germans ruled from the 13th century and Russians were added to them only in the beginning of the 17th century).
In Europe it was the Romanticists who after centuries of admiring the classic Greco-Roman culture looked beyond Greece towards the East. In Latvia many aspects of Romanticism survived until World War II, which also contributed to the popularity of the Bengali poet.[2] In our many conversations during the last ten years of his life, this idea was always stressed by Kārlis Egle, whose efforts, as well as the work by his friend and companion Rihards Rudzītis (1998-1960), were perhaps the most decisive factors in establishing Rabindranath’s long-standing fame in Latvia.
The Indian poet entered Latvian culture via an article written by Andrejs Upīts (1877-1970), a very knowledgeable, talented, influential and politically controversial prosewriter and critic. He published a remarkable and rather long article in the journal Domas (Thoughts) in August 1913, that is, before Tagorereceived the Nobel Prize. Andrejs Upīts callsTagore „a strange, attractive and splendid phenomenon”. He points out that Rabindranath,
in his admirable simplicity and sincerity really reminds us of legendary saints... And yet someone who can sit so calmly and desribe to us the bird’s morning song or man’s passionate aspiration for love is not a ‘saint’ after all. He knows life in its loftiness and meanness. He has been as aware of human passions as few others....This Indian is a man of the people, but great and free he stands above the base and the brutal. One feels in him an heir of an old culture who tries to seek out the inner value in all phenomena of life... He believes that God and man are one, that death is not the end but only a transition, that visible things are both real and symbols of another unknown life, that an individual human soul, overcoming and discarding everything sordid, comes near the Universal Soul – all this for him goes without saying and is beyond doubt and criticism.[3]
The first article written after the poet became world famous appeared in the widely read newspaper Dzimtenes Vēstnesis (Motherland’s Messenger) on November 16, 1913. Its unknown author reproaches the Times and other conservative British newspapers for ignoring the awarding of the Nobel Prize to Tagorebecause he was a hostile „local” (i.e. "native"). One can doubt if this reproach was deserved, yet it is clear that the Latvian newspaper expresses sincere appreciation for the honour bestowed on the Indian poet. The same article contains a brief biography of Tagore, as well as a few translations from his Gitanjali. The December 1913 issue of the literary monthy „Druva”contains an admission that the SwedishAcademy in the past haderred in not awarding the Nobel Prize to great European writers, such as Tolstoy, Ibsen and Anatole France. „Yet it will be hardly possible to deny that this time the award was received by a poet who truly deserves it.” But the author of the article expresses a view that subsequently was shared by very few Latvian intellectuals: „...The content of Tagore’swritings is mainly contemplatively religious; they are full of transcendental and mystical thoughts and are far from politics.”
The Latvian treatment of the poet is interestingly characterised by the fact that the first translations by Valts Dāvids, which appeared in periodicals at the end of 1913, were from The Crescent Moon and not fromthe Gitanjali, for which the poet got the Nobel Prize. The same collection was also the first one translated by Zenobia Camprubí Aimar and Juan Ramón Jiménez in 1915. Gitanjali in Spanish came three years later after other works, including The Gardener.Valts Dāvids soon rendered The Crescent Moon in full and translated Chitra (Chitrangada).
The whole of Gitanjali was translated by Austra(the pen name of a poet who remains unknown) in 1913-1914. Teodors Lejas-Krūmiņš in 1921 published a number of Tagore’sshort stories under the title Indian women.
Kārlis Egle translated The Post office in 1921. His translations of Tagore’spoetry into Latvian began with The Gardener in 1921. By 1940 the collection had run into five editions. The Gardener is the first work in the comprehensive Latvian Tagore collection Lirika (Lyrics, 1961 and 1967) and in the nine-volume Raksti (Works)(1927-1939). Looking back in 1967 on the history of his translations, Kārlis Egle mentioned the first edition of The Gardener as „the small booklet in yellow covers, which made me so glad as none of the books prepared by me later. I held it in my hands already a few weeks after [submission].”[4]
The Gardener poems, which Bengali and Western critics regard as less well translated from English by Tagore than those of the Gitanjali, were the compositions that the highly respected and deeply loved actress Elza Radziņa was fond of to recite. Clad in a red sari, she addressed sometimes thousand-strong audiences for around sixty times between the 1960s and the 1980s. Studying the reception of Tagorein the WestI have never encountered such an ardent admirerof Tagore in the world of theatre. When Elza Radziņa recitated Tagore in the 1970s and 1980s, I was usually priviliged to make introductory remarks on the poet and his life’s work. The Gardener may have appealed to the actress and her audiences because the translation byKārlis Egle conveyed a vivid picture of Bengali life in beautiful Latvian making use of a metre close to iamb, which, on the whole, is not characteristic of our poetry. (We do not feel this rythm so well in his translations of the rest of Tagore’s poetry. In the nine-volume Raksti Egle'scompanion Rihards Rudzītisalso translated some of the poetry but in clear prose as Tagore did.
Reception in the twenties was up to the promising beginnings before the war and the best of his writings from those then available could be published as a collection in nine volumes between 1927 and 1939. A good stimulus for this very complicated undertaking was the eight-volume German edition in 1921 called RabindranathTagore:Gesammelte Werke (Collected Works; München, 1921). These volumes had neither introductions nor commmentaries. Possibly Kārlis Egle and Rihards Rudzītis were also inspired by the two unfinished Tagore’scollected works projects in Russian before World War I. For the nine-volume edition, Kārlis Egle translated poetry, novels (The Wreck, Gora, The Home and the World) and stories, and the acknowledged poet Rihards Rudzītis translated mainly Tagore’s plays and essays (Sādhanā, Personality and others).
KārlisEgle provided each volume of Raksti with explanations and briefsummaries of its contents, which often are particularly pertinent. For instance, the essence of Gora is compressed just into a few sentences,
[It reflects] the time full of impetuous and ardent enthusiasm in India when the national prayer created by Bankim Chandra Chatterji, theBande Mataram, began to be heard. Gora, in reality, an Irishman brought up in India (Bengal), gives himself up to the national dreams and aspirations so profoundly that he sinks into one-sidedeness and intemperance, almost fully denying the new India until his foster-mother, Anandamoyi - a wonderful image personifying woman as mother in Tagore’s works - opens his eyes and enables him to discern the true shape of India, the shape that can be seen only with clear humane eyes, not fettered by dogmas and fanaticism[5]—
In the first volume in addition to the long and laudatory introductory essays by Kārlis Egle on Tagore’s life and work and by Rihards Rudzītis on his philosophical, social and religious views articles on the poet’s contribution to Indian music (by Jānis Zālītis) and Indian painting (by Alberts Praude) were also included.
After the ban on publishing Tagore’sworks in the Soviet Union was lifted , his previously published poems and novels could reappear in Latvian; they could also use the Russian spelling of Bengali names, which are closer to the Bengali original than they are in the English translation. The text in the earlier editions was also slightly changed (!) as Kārlis Egle tried to improve on his own work. One of these seven books was in Braille so that blind people would be able to become acquainted with the Tagore heritage. (Words “changed” and “as” were joined).
Kārlis Egle’s writing on the poet is generally matter-of-fact when he discusses Tagore’scloseness to nature, his treatment of the woman or his pedagogical activities. However, his style changes when discussing the poet’s verse, for in „his poetry Tagore raises the reader above everyday life, raises him to such spiritual heights where all worldly noises disappear, where the vastness of eternity and the depths of everlasting peace open up, which fascinates and stirs the reader’s soul”.[6]
In such utterances,Egle approaches Rihards Rudzītis, who in a rather detailed way is preoccupied with the poet’s religion and his attitude to the ancient Indian spiritual heritage; nevertheless Rudzītis never forgets to mention the challenges facing India – the need to overcome caste inequality, to raise the status of women, to educate people, and to get rid of foreign rule. He does not call Tagore a prophet, but, surprisingly, he states that the poet is not interested in politics. At the same time Rudzītis analyses the political importance of his lectures on Nationalism published during World War I (Rabindrants Tagore.Raksti, Vol. 1, pp.156-158). Rihards Rudzītis stresses:
Tagore wants to present to us the initial religious surmises which essentially were the same in all ages and in all religions but which were revealed in the consciousness of only somepeople or race... Tagore believes in the unity of all races and peoples in their rich diversity. Humanity is above all nations. But man’s mission should adapt itself to the mission of all peoples.[7]
Note that the use of the word race here contains nothing offensive to any person whatevertheir origin. In some circles it is now in vogue to affirm that even outstanding Western indologists in the colonial epoch succumbed to racist attitude; it is even asserted (usually without mentioning any names) that such an attitude was dominant in British indology as a whole. I dare say that the attitude to Tagorein Latvia or Russia, and in the West as a whole, except for some authors in Germany and France in the mid-1920s, refutes such sweeping accusations. Everywhere Tagore was received as equal — if not superior — to the best national poets and his works did not lack readers. True, this attitude did not last in all countries for a long time. But it was hardly so, because the people had realised that he was racially unacceptable. Tagore’s very high reputation in Germany, in the English speaking countries and partly also in France suffered greatly for other reasons — first of all because of his denouncement of both sides involved in World War I, as we see it in his Nationalism lectures, and the spreading influence of modernist ideology in Western Europe and the USA, the authors of which stated disbelief in all social and political "utopias". They expressed this disbelief also in literature. Something of that can be perceived in Tagore’s late poetry. But the indomitable idealist as we see him also in the many lectures abroad could not fit well in the after-war atmosphere. In Latvia as in most eastern European countries the attitude towards Tagore in the late twenties and thirtees changed much less due to their different historical situation. During WorldWarI. people of these countries had to die under foreign flags. However, their unwillingness to fight soon turned into enthusiastic establishment of their own states. Tagore’s fame also could survive in the Baltic and eastern European countries because sympathies for the Indian national liberation struggle were greater. Besides, Romanticism which very much can be associated with Tagore was still a living force there.
Both Latvian translators were in correspondence with Tagore since 1921. On April 5, 1936, the Bengali poet wrote to Kārlis Egle,
Dear Friends,[8]
Your letter and a mere present of a few books in Latvian gave me the greatest pleasure, and I send you my heartfelt gratitude for them. This is not the first time I have been told of the spiritual kinship between your people and mine, and it is so refreshing to learn that there are ardent souls like you in the West who are not willing to submit themselves to the grip of machine civilisation and are seeking light from the inspiring sources of Oriental philosophy and culture. I am so happy that my poems and other writings have given some hope and some peace. With warm greetings,
Yours sincerely,
Rabindranath Tagore
Jānis Zanders’ book Rabindranats Tagore published in 1934 was little noticed by reviewers. The ideas expressed by this Latvian author are a mixture of laudable and unacceptable statements. This previously unknown admirer of Tagore writes very appreciatingly on his poetry and calls the Bengali poet „the greatest lyricist of our time”. He isalso deeply moved by the depiction of the child by the poet and calls the novel Gora „the most beautiful song Tagore devotes to his love of the motherland”. Zanders dwells on the poet’s sharp criticism of Western and Japanese nationalism, but strangely concludesthat Indians, being representatives of a womanly culture, could not imagine themselves as a nation. Therefore, their country is subject to fate and the wishes of strong nations. Zanders was convinced that the self-sacrifice shown by Indian freedom fighters also reveals an aspect of their womanly nature. He writes well on the Swadeshi movement depicted in Tagore’s novel The Home and the World, but in mentioning Bimala – the „home” – he sees her as the personification of the womanly India, which will experience great hardships upon entering a world where masculine behaviour – hatred, noise, revolts and not domestic tranquility – dominates. The author states: „The great message to the world by Tagore and India is this: all races should be joined on the basis of a common God or, rather, idea... And the thought to unite people on the road of deity is also the thought of many Europeans.”[9]
Several outstanding Latvian poets commented on Tagore’s writings. The poem published in 1926 by Jānis Sudrabkalns is especially interesting.
Rabindranath Tagore! He is received like a king, like the loveliest prima donna, like a boxing champion;