Rabindranath Tagore’s, “The Home and the World,” is set in the aftermath of the Indian Swadeshi movement. Tagore utilizes the dichotomy of the home as well as the world. This dichotomy also refers to the spiritual and material, to which the author displays his inclination to believe that self-interest motivates individuals. A possible argument regarding this inclination is that it determines their cooperation or resistance to different issues. Tagore identifies the ideological turmoil existing within the nationalist activities, which focused on resolving questions about women in the post-colonial world. The nation-state and the guiding principles of the same are imagined as women, which means that by extension, the family unit could be considered as a nation. 1 This provision calls for the identification of the apparent turmoil that existed during nationalism, in which women participated in nationalist movements that created changes in the domestic sphere.
Tagore’s book reveals how the society inscribes the nationalist actions and thoughts. In this case, the society’s thoughts and actions inform the practices that included disciplining women and exploiting their sexuality to fulfill nationalistic objectives, which is a situation that affected them significantly. The author looks into the aspect that the nationalist project failed since it was based on false essentialism. In this case, the nationalist project did not develop a suitable balance between the characteristics of the home and the world, or the material and the spiritual. Tagore’s presumption could be founded on the notion that the nationalist project was the ideological consideration of the home as a symbol that creates room for nationalist politics as well as nonviolent activism, in the context of the Swadeshi era.
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Through Bimala, one of the characters in the book, the crisis of the nation is created. Nikhil, Bimala’s husband, and a wealthy landowner reconstruct the female character in the country. In this light, he represents native elites, who were acting as the caretakers of tradition, but were exposed to the modern world during the colonial period. Bimala represents a nation in crisis after she exposes the privacy that characterized the zenana to the public. 2 She does so after receiving support from her husband, who enlightens and supports her reformation under the traditions that were characterized by patriarchal authority. 3 In this case, her husband wishes to free her from the oppressive traditions that characterized Indian marriage.
While exploiting the public sphere, she meets Sandip. Sandip was not only Nikhil's friend but also a fiery nationalist. It is possible to consider Bimala's reconstruction as a signal of an idealized connection between a man and a woman or the East and West. According to Singh, the union is vital for fulfilling the purpose of educating a woman under well-brought-up English norms. This education enables her to venture into the world without having to jeopardize her home. The situation could be used to indicate that Nikhil desired to ensure that tradition and modernity would co-exist harmoniously. However, the desire leads to the destruction of the home after Bimala was sexually attracted to Sandip, a situation that signifies the existence of disorder in the world.
There is a possibility of arguing that the struggle between Bimala, Sandip, and Nikhil, which took place after the realization that Bimala was attracted to Sandip, is a struggle for the future of the nation. In this regard, the struggle represents the opposing visions that would determine the future of Bengal. According to Atkinson, Nikhil represents an enlightened individual who does not believe in the imposition of the truth. 4 Instead, he focuses on ensuring that freedom is essential and critical for the realization of individual growth. Nikhil considers freedom as an essential tool that would enable him and Bimala to know each other. While he supports Swadeshi initially, he recognizes the value of the world and he focuses on serving a more significant cause outside the confines of national interests. In this case, he indicates that he is willing to serve the country, but does not wish to worship the country since he considers that worshipping the country would bring like cursing it. 5
Sandip could be considered as a realist presumably because he brutally confronts the world. For instance, he criticizes Nikhil for the way in which he is delightful about a “misty vision of this world.” 6 In this case, he considers Nikhil, as well as those that share his worldview, as individuals that criticize the nation’s beliefs. For Nikhil, the word is chaotic, which means that individuals can only participate in creating a new world by exploiting their freedom. His understanding of the world can influence a person to celebrate endless possibilities, which is a concept that Sandip does not approve. Instead, he is a single-minded individual that intends to do away with all the traces of the old politics as well as moral order.
Bimala is caught between the beliefs and cause of both Nikhil and Sandip. She is initially attracted to Sandip’s cause, even though she seemingly does not understand the nature of the cause. Her lack of understanding displays the ambiguity of Sandip's cause. However, her personal attraction to him influences her to remain committed to fulfilling his cause but retrieves to reflect on what Sandip was representing after she was driven to betray and leave her husband. Initially, she thought Sandip was reduced to nothing or in-existence. 7 Before abandoning her husband, Bimala did not understand the consequences that her actions would bring. She only understood these consequences after being reduced to spiritual nothingness. In this case, the psychological as well as spiritual vacuum she experiences to build up to become physical nothingness. 8 For this reason, she does not have any sense of certainty about her future towards the end of the book, which was a period during which her husband was close to death.
Modernity brought about anxiety as well as the conflict in the Indian nation. The tension and conflict could be considered as a manifestation of the restructuring of the Indian country during the nationalist movement. This period was characterized by the need to educate women to ensure that they could blend in with their Western-educated husbands. On the other hand, the concern of patriarchal authority over female sexuality brought forth significant concerns. The developments led to the consideration of women as sexually liberated individuals. The dichotomies that existed in the discourse of the nationalists, home, and the world, material and spiritual, were transformed to the dichotomies of the mind and body, which later developed to the psyche of males and females in the society. Under the education system, authentic female education attempted to arouse pure thoughts in women so that they would be more passionate, devout, and live a virtuous life. This realization would create distinctions between the male and female, consequently adjusting femininity according to the nationalist needs. These characters would qualify to be regarded as the spiritual qualities of the new woman in the Indian society.
Through the book, Tagore lays down the groundwork of his call to international order. In this case, he advocates for a world order that would create room for the mutual interaction of individuals, male or female. For this reason, an individual could identify that Tagore was not advocating for individuality and distinctiveness. In this case, these provisions would only ignore the nature of the world. He presumably calls for the need to return to sanity, consequently indicating that nationhood is more important than pride since pride can lead to arrogance and the repression of other people in the society. This provision is indicative of the idea that Tagore is rooted in Indian philosophical traditions that are concerned with determining the truth between the concepts of materialism and spirituality. He communicates this message through the Nikhil, Bimala, and Sandip, who follow different causes while battling for the future and realization of the vision of Bengal.
Bibliography
Atkinson, David W. "Tagore's the Home and the World: A Call for A New World Order." The International Fiction Review 20, no. 2 (1993): 95-98.
Datta, Pradip Kumar. Rabindranath Tagore's The Home And The World . Delhi: Permanent Black, 2003.
Tagore, Rabindranath. Nationalism . New Delhi, India: Penguin Books India, 2009.
Tagore, Rabindranath. The Home and the World . New York: Macmillan Co., 1919.
