Rabindranath Tagore Quotes
Rabindranath Tagore was an Indian poet, philosopher, musician, and educator and the first non-European to receive the Nobel Prize in Literature. Born into a prominent Bengali family, he reshaped Bengali literature and music and produced a vast body of work in poetry, fiction, drama, essay, and song. The quotes below are attributed to Rabindranath Tagore, organized by topic.
Browse Rabindranath Tagore by topic
Rabindranath Tagore on Freedom
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“It was indeed a great day not only for the Sikhs but also for the whole of India when Guru Govinda , defying the age-long conventions of the Hindu society, made his followers one, by breaking down all barriers of caste and thereby made them free to inherit the true blessings of a self-respecting manhood. Sikhism has a brave message to the people and it has a noble record.”
Letter to Mahadevi Desai, 4 January 1937. Quoted in The Essential Tagore , Cambridge, Massachusetts : Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 2011. -
“(free translation from original Bengali in Tagore’s Collected Works, vol. 9, 4971: 512). Quoted from Chakrabarti, D. K., 1997. Colonial Indology: Sociopolitics of the Ancient Indian Past. New Delhi: Munshiram Manoharlal Publishers Pvt. Ltd.”
When such imagination and sympathy are essential to write India’s history, We cannot depend on others. There is no objection to receiving, help from others when it comes to the collection of facts, but to weave these facts into a whole and make them alive we have to use our own strength. If Indians write the history of India there is some chance of partisanship or bias, but it is contempt and lack
Rabindranath Tagore on God
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Attributed to Rabindranath Tagore:
“Faith is the bird that feels the light and sings when the dawn is still dark.”
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“Our real ties are with the Bharatavarsha that lies outside our textbooks. If the history of this tie for a substantially long period gets lost, our soul loses its anchorage. After all, we are no weeds or parasitical plants in India. Over many hundreds of years, it is our roots, hundreds and thousands of them, that have occupied the very heart of Bharatavarsha. But, unfortunately, we are obliged to learn a brand of history that makes our children forget this very fact. It appears as if we are nobody in India; as if those who came from outside alone matter.”
Rabindranath Tagore: The History of Bharatavarsha. quoted in The Problem of Indian History by Michel Danino* (Published in Dialogue, April-June 2012, vol. 13, no. 4) -
“The ancient Indians distrusted the pace and pomp of urbandom; they distrusted it strongly enough to resist central authority and conformism.... "To know my country one has to travel to that age, when she realized her soul and thus transcended her physical boundaries when she revealed her being in a radiant magnanimity which illumined the eastern horizon, making her recognized as their own by those in alien shores who were awakened into a surprise of life."... [He also said about the culture of Indonesia:] ' I see India all around me.”
Tagore, As attributed and quoted in Londhe, S. (2008). A tribute to Hinduism: Thoughts and wisdom spanning continents and time about India and her culture
Rabindranath Tagore on Knowledge
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“Tagore, As attributed and quoted in Londhe, S. (2008). A tribute to Hinduism: Thoughts and wisdom spanning continents and time about India and her culture”
The ancient Indians distrusted the pace and pomp of urbandom; they distrusted it strongly enough to resist central authority and conformism.... "To know my country one has to travel to that age, when she realized her soul and thus transcended her physical boundaries when she revealed her being in a radiant magnanimity which illumined the eastern horizon, making her recognized as their own by those
Rabindranath Tagore on Life
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“Let your life lightly dance on the edges of time like dew on the tip of a leaf.”
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Rabindranath Tagore on Nature
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“As early as 1902 (Bengali Samvat 1309) Rabindranath Tagore wrote that there was no Indian in the history of India written by foreigners: “as if Indians do not exist; only those who have fought and killed among themselves are real ... we are not parasites of India; through hundreds of centuries we have put down tens of thousands of roots in the heart of this land, but unfortunately we have to read a type of history which makes our children forget exactly this. It appears that in (the history of) India we are nobodies; only those who have come from outside matter in (the history of this) land.”
quoted from Chakrabarti, D. K., 1997. Colonial Indology: Sociopolitics of the Ancient Indian Past. New Delhi: Munshiram Manoharlal Publishers Pvt. Ltd.
Rabindranath Tagore on Time
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“The butterfly counts not months but moments, and has time enough.”
Stray Birds -
“As early as 1902 (Bengali Samvat 1309) Rabindranath Tagore wrote that there was no Indian in the history of India written by foreigners: “as if Indians do not exist; only those who have fought and killed among themselves are real ... we are not parasites of India; through hundreds of centuries we have put down tens of thousands of roots in the heart of this land, but unfortunately we have to read ”
quoted from Chakrabarti, D. K., 1997. Colonial Indology: Sociopolitics of the Ancient Indian Past. New Delhi: Munshiram Manoharlal Publishers Pvt. Ltd. -
“In the countries more fortunate than ours, the people discover their land in the ‘histories' of their countries which introduces them in their childhood to their land. In our case only the reverse has been true. It is the history of our country that has obscured the understanding, of our land... The way in which we receive education since our childhood leads everyday to a feeling of separation bet”
quoted from Chakrabarti, D. K., 1997. Colonial Indology: Sociopolitics of the Ancient Indian Past. New Delhi: Munshiram Manoharlal Publishers Pvt. Ltd. -
“Our real ties are with the Bharatavarsha that lies outside our textbooks. If the history of this tie for a substantially long period gets lost, our soul loses its anchorage. After all, we are no weeds or parasitical plants in India. Over many hundreds of years, it is our roots, hundreds and thousands of them, that have occupied the very heart of Bharatavarsha. But, unfortunately, we are obliged to”
Rabindranath Tagore: The History of Bharatavarsha. quoted in The Problem of Indian History by Michel Danino* (Published in Dialogue, April-June 2012, vol. 13, no. 4)
Rabindranath Tagore on Virtue
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“You can't cross the sea merely by standing and staring at the water.”
Stray Birds -
“The roots below the earth claim no rewards for making the branches fruitful.”
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Attributed to Rabindranath Tagore:
“Reach high, for stars lie hidden in your soul.”
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“We come nearest to the great when we are great in humility.”
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Things actually not said by Rabindranath Tagore
A number of widely-shared lines are circulated as Rabindranath Tagore but are in fact from someone else. Did Rabindranath Tagore say these? No. Each entry below pairs the line with the person who actually wrote it.
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Did Rabindranath Tagore say this? No.
“I slept and dreamt that life was joy. I awoke and saw that life was service. I acted and behold, service is joy.”
Quoted often without citation [6] [7] Compare this verse verse written by Ellen Sturgis Hooper: (Disputed.)