Sadhana the Realization of Life

Sadhana was first published in 1913. it contains eight essays and was written during Tagore’s Six-month stay in the USA in 1912-1913. Tagore hoped that through these essays ‘western readers will have an opportunity of coming into touch with the ancient spirit of India as revealed in our sacred texts and manifested in the life of today.’ Tagore used some of the translations (done by Satish Chandra Ray and Ajit Kumar Chakravarti) of passages from his discourses in Bengali, given to the students of Santiniketan. The sixth lecture, ‘The Realization of Action’, is translated by Surendranath Tagore from ‘Karmayog’. One of India’s most cherished renaissance figures; Rabindranath Tagore (1861-1941) put us on the literary map of the world when his Gitanjali was awarded the Nobel Prize for literature in 1913. a poet’s poet, he is a maker of not only modern Indian literature but also the modern Indian mind. Myriad-minded, he was a poet, short story writer, novelist, dramatist, essayist. Painter and composer of songs. Gandhi called his the ‘Great Sentinel’. His world-wide acclaim as a social, political, religious and aesthetic thinker, innovator in education and a champion of the ‘One World" idea makes him a living presence.