EXHIBIT OF THE MONTH

 

SPRING READINGS: RABINDRANATH TAGORE IN YIDDISH

 

Bialystok: A. Albek Publishing House, 1921. Printed by M. Pruzhanski’s printing house, p. 71, Acc. No. VŽM 7567

 

The exhibited poem from the poetry book The Gardener by Rabindranath Tagore (p. 71) tells us that whenever a man intervenes in the usual rhythm of creation – be it sheltering a lantern from the wind or passionately hugging a flower, daming up the river for his own purposes or intending to make a sound by surpassing the possibilities of a string – it always ends up in violating the harmony of creation. As a result, the lantern goes out, the flower wilts, the river dries out, and the string breaks (The text of this poem in Lithuanian (translated by Vytautas Nistelis) is included in the Lithuanian translation of Rabindranath Tagore’s Poetry. Prose published as part of the World Literature Library Series, Vilnius. Vaga, 2000, p. 87).

 

Rabindranath Tagore (1861–1941) was a Bengali, an Indian poet, prose writer, playwright and painter, composer, philosopher, educator, teacher, journalist, actor, director, and public figure who published over fifty plays, over a hundred short stories, numerous articles, and songs. He was a Nobel Prize Winner of 1913 for his poetry book Song Offerings. Tagore’s The Gardener, which he himself translated into English, was published in 1912. The poems in The Gardener are somewhat different from those included in his earlier poetry books. Here the author less often addresses the God, the love lyrics created by an exceptionally tender soul are more abundant, and the characters of the poetry are not real people, but rather those from dreams or daydreaming.

 

 

 

Tagore’s poetry book The Gardener, which is now part of the museum's collection, includes the translation of his poems into Yiddish. It was extremely popular among readers. Its original cover has not survived till nowadays and has been replaced with marble-look paper. The back of the book has not survived either. The exhibited title page of the poetry book clearly shows that it belonged to more than one library or organization. The exhibited page alone bears the following stamps: ‘Library and reading room of the Society of Jewish Science Lovers’ (stamp in Yiddish and Lithuanian in the centre of the page) and ‘Kaunas Kultur-lige (Yiddish for Cultural League) Library’ (stamp in Yiddish in the centre of the page).

 

The book was published in the historical area of the Lithuanian Jewish (Litvak) culture – Bialystok (current Poland). The book was carefully prepared for printing as the title page included both the information that was presented above and the name of the editor of the text – P. Kaplan. This translation of Tagore’s The Gardener is included in Henry Hollander's Bookseller Catalogue, No. 20 (https://tinyurl.com/2r39cww4).