"Where the mind is without fear" () is a poem written by
1913 Nobel laureate
Rabindranath Tagore
Rabindranath Thakur (; anglicised as Rabindranath Tagore ; 7 May 1861 – 7 August 1941) was a Bengalis, Bengali polymath who worked as a poet, writer, playwright, composer, philosopher, social reformer, and painter of the Bengal Renai ...
before
India's independence
The Indian independence movement was a series of historic events in South Asia with the ultimate aim of ending British colonial rule. It lasted until 1947, when the Indian Independence Act 1947 was passed.
The first nationalistic movement t ...
. It represents Tagore's vision of a new and awakened India. The original poem was published in 1910 and was included in the 1910 collection ''
Gitanjali
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''Gitanjali'' () is a collection of poems by the Bengali poet Rabindranath Tagore. Tagore received the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1913, for its English translation, '' Song Offerings'', making him the first non-European and the fi ...
'' and, in Tagore's own translation, in its 1912 English edition. "Where the mind is without fear" is the 35th poem of ''Gitanjali'', and one of Tagore's most anthologised poems.
It is an expression of the poet's reflective spirit and contains a simple prayer for his country, the India of pre-independence times.
Original Bengali script - By Rabindranath Thakur or Tagore
:চিত্ত যেথা ভয়শূন্য, উচ্চ যেথা শির,
:জ্ঞান যেথা মুক্ত, যেথা গৃহের প্রাচীর
:আপন প্রাঙ্গণতলে দিবসশর্বরী
:বসুধারে রাখে নাই খণ্ড ক্ষুদ্র করি,
:যেথা বাক্য হৃদয়ের উৎসমুখ হতে
:উচ্ছ্বসিয়া উঠে, যেথা নির্বারিত স্রোতে
:দেশে দেশে দিশে দিশে কর্মধারা ধায়
:অজস্র সহস্রবিধ চরিতার্থতায়,
:যেথা তুচ্ছ আচারের মরুবালুরাশি
:বিচারের স্রোতঃপথ ফেলে নাই গ্রাসি,
:পৌরুষেরে করে নি শতধা, নিত্য যেথা
:তুমি সর্ব কর্ম চিন্তা আনন্দের নেতা,
:নিজ হস্তে নির্দয় আঘাত করি, পিতঃ;
:ভারতেরে সেই স্বর্গে করো জাগরিত৷
English translation
Tagore's own translation, in the 1912 English edition of ''
Gitanjali
__NOTOC__
''Gitanjali'' () is a collection of poems by the Bengali poet Rabindranath Tagore. Tagore received the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1913, for its English translation, '' Song Offerings'', making him the first non-European and the fi ...
'':
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;
Where tireless striving stretches its arms towards perfection;
Where the clear stream of reason has not lost its way into the dreary desert sand of dead habit;
Where the mind is led forward by thee into ever-widening thought and action—
Into that heaven of freedom, my Father, let my country awake.
History and translation
This poem was most likely composed in 1900. It appeared in the volume ''
Naivedya'' in the poem titled "Prarthona" (July 1901, Bengali 1308 Bangabda). The English translation was composed around 1911 when Tagore was translating some of his work into English after a request from
William Rothenstein
Sir William Rothenstein (29 January 1872 – 14 February 1945) was an English painter, printmaker, draughtsman, lecturer, and writer on art. Though he covered many subjects – ranging from landscapes in France to representations of Jewish synag ...
. It appeared as poem 35 in the English ''
Gitanjali
__NOTOC__
''Gitanjali'' () is a collection of poems by the Bengali poet Rabindranath Tagore. Tagore received the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1913, for its English translation, '' Song Offerings'', making him the first non-European and the fi ...
'', published by
The India Society, London, in 1912. In 1917, Tagore read out the English version (then titled 'Indian Prayer') at the
Indian National Congress
The Indian National Congress (INC), colloquially the Congress Party, or simply the Congress, is a political parties in India, political party in India with deep roots in most regions of India. Founded on 28 December 1885, it was the first mo ...
session in
Calcutta
Kolkata, also known as Calcutta (List of renamed places in India#West Bengal, its official name until 2001), is the capital and largest city of the Indian States and union territories of India, state of West Bengal. It lies on the eastern ba ...
.
[ Prabhat Kumar Mukhopadhyay, ''rabIndrajIbanIkathA'', 1981, p.104]
As in most of Tagore's translations for the English ''
Gitanjali
__NOTOC__
''Gitanjali'' () is a collection of poems by the Bengali poet Rabindranath Tagore. Tagore received the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1913, for its English translation, '' Song Offerings'', making him the first non-European and the fi ...
'', almost every line of the English rendering has been considerably simplified. Line 6 in the English version omits a reference to ''manliness'' (পৌরুষ), and the stern ending of the original, where the Father is being enjoined to "strike the sleeping nation without mercy" has been softened.
This poem often appears in textbooks in India and is also popular in Bangladesh. There is a
Sinhala translation of this song by the name "''Mage Deshaya Avadi Karanu Mana Piyaneni''" (
Sinhala: ''මාගේ දේශය අවදි කරනු මැන පියාණෙනි''; lit. "My father, let my country awake") which was translated into Sinhala by
Mahagama Sekara.
See also
*
Freedom of thought
Freedom of thought is the freedom of an individual to hold or consider a fact, viewpoint, or thought, independent of others' viewpoints.
Overview
Every person attempts to have a cognitive proficiency by developing knowledge, concepts, theo ...
*
Independence Day (India)
Independence Day is celebrated annually on 15 August as a Public holidays in India, public holiday in India commemorating the nation's Indian independence movement, independence from the United Kingdom on 15 August 1947. On this day the Ind ...
*
National revival
National revival or national awakening is a period of ethnic self-consciousness that often precedes a political movement for national liberation but that can take place at a time when independence is politically unrealistic. In the history of Euro ...
References
External links
Quoted by the Prime Ministerat
Visva-Bharati University
Visva-Bharati (IAST: ''Viśva-Bhāratī''), () is a public central university and an Institute of National Importance located in Shantiniketan, West Bengal, India. It was founded by Rabindranath Tagore who called it ''Visva-Bharati'', which ...
(15 December 2001)
Quoted at the 66th Session of the Indian History Congress"Where the mind is without fear and the head is held high"Where The Mind Is Without Fear - SummaryWhere the Mind is Without FearBengali Songs - Rabindra Sangeet
{{Rabindranath Tagore , state=uncollapsed
Bangladeshi poems
Poems in Bengali
Indian poems
Poems by Rabindranath Tagore