FOUND IN TRANSLATION With its excellent translations, Songs of Tagore makes Rabindrasangit accessible to the non-Bengali reader

In 1912, Ezra Pound famously wrote how the poet Rabindranath Tagore had sung Bengal into a nation. And yet despite Pound’s enthusiastic endorsement of the English version of the poet’s work, Rabindrasangit (literally Rabindranath’s songs and music) and its appeal remains elusive to non-Bengali language speakers. The latter are often told that the magic lies in the poetry, in the lyrics that index a unique sensibility fashioned by landscape, seasons, metaphors passed down from experience that escape the outsider. But does this need to be so? Ananda Lal’s project suggests the contrary and argues that the poet was after melody and music and that words followed this deep quest. Lal’s work is a deeply sensitive and measured treatment of the poetry and melody of the poet’s songs, while showing several shortcomings of our understanding of Rabindrasangit in the process. The exercise involves an excellent introduction, a fine translation of a profound essay by Satyajit Ray on Tagore’s songs and a detailed translation and transliteration of 40 songs with notation. It is a compelling read and readers at the end will at least try and search for these songs even if they do not hum them spontaneously. The introduction starts o€ with a reference to the relative absence of reliable writings on Rabindrasangit and sketches the basic features of the genre with themes. What was important was Tagore’s ear for musical cadence in poetry and how he privileged music over words. Also, the poet was knowledgeable about classical music and his decision to carve a very special style to render his songs was informed by deep emotional and musicological considerations. The points made by Lal set up the basis of a conversation with Satyajit Ray’s essay ‘Thoughts on Rabindrasangit’ that is a deeply insightful review of Rabindrasangit. The poet drew from several elements but infused them with a Bengali feeling and a certain ‘class of Bengaliness’. Ray was of the opinion that Tagore did not engage with raga music very deeply or consider its evolution and transformation in the hands of celebrated ustads; what he set out to do was to express a certain freedom in the act of composing songs, where melody would drive the words and where the traces of conventional raga music would be barely audible. It was a revolutionary move and provided the sca€olding for an extraordinary oeuvre. What remains opaque is the limits of Rabindrasangit as far as a non-Bengali listening audience is concerned. How has translation and rendering the same songs in languages like Hindi or in filmi versions added to its appeal? This is a question that the author could have considered given that one of his principal intentions is to make the music and the songs intelligible to a wider audience. Having said that, there is absolutely no doubt that this is an extremely important book and in its selection of 40 songs with transcription and notation, there is an underlying fidelity to the thematic and structural unity the songs represent. The care with which the selection, transcription and notation has been done is exemplary, making the book a true labour of love and o€ering a genuine tribute to Tagore’s undying enthusiasm for artistic creativity.

SONGS OF TAGORE: Poetry and Melody Authored by Rabindranath Tagore, Satyajit Ray Edited and translated by Ananda Lal ROUTLEDGE `1,295; 225 pages