Tagore place as a critic has been partly eclipsed by his fame as a creative writer. He is one of the founders of modern Bengali critical thought, and among the most perceptive literary analysts in the language. His corpus of critical writings is considerable, comprising more than one hundred pieces of varying length. The essays featured in this selection reveal his engagement with the central issues of criticism, as well as with literary theory and aesthetics. Standing outside the ambit of academic criticism and partly predating it, Tagore evolves his own critical idiom, drawing on terms and concepts from classical Indian aesthetics as well as modern Western theory and practice. His criticism is guided by his concerns as a creative writer, and is intimately linked to his philosophy of life; yet it is marked by detachment and rigour no less than by depth and sensitivity. The volume has been edited by Sisir Kumar Das, the eminent scholar of Bengali and comparative literature, and Sukanta Chaudhuri, the General Editor of the series. It presents an authoritative and highly readable selection of Tagore critical writings, most of which have not been translated before. They will be thought provoking for the professional literary theorist and linguist, and rewarding for the common reader.
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