Home and the World

Named as the 'Great Sentinel of Modern India' by Mahatma Gandhi, Rabindranath Tagore is one of the greats of literature, be it poetry, prose, drama and music. I had the priviledge of coming across this Nobel Laureate's novel, "Home and the World" or in Bengali: "Ghare Baire", buying it and reading it.

It is a story about three people. It is a story told from the view points of these three people. It is the story of Nikhilesh, the husband, a zaminder who holds truth and morales to be of the highest values; of Bimala, the wife, who has spent her entire life within the walls of, first, her father's house, then, her husband's house; of Sandip, the religious fanatic, who preaches "Vande Mataram" to gain more for himself.

The story starts with Sandip, an old friend of Nikhilesh, arriving at Nikhilesh and Bimala's house to stay during his "Vande Mataram" campaign to arouse the Bengalis during the period of 1905. Bimala, or 'Bimal', as lovingly called by her husband, although deeply in love with her husband and entirely devoted to him, finds herself becoming attracted to Sandip and his seemingly patriotic speeches and flamboyant ways. She who has being walking within the boundaries of her home, is suddenly thrown into disarray with the arrival of such upheaval.

Nikhilesh slowly understands the distance that appears between him and his wife. He is deeply saddened by the turn out of events:

- "Today my sobs are out of tune. I have got to stop this weeping. I shouldn't be cowardly enough to restrain Bimal with these tears. Where love has turned into a lie, tears shouldn't try and bind it. As long as my pain expresses itself, Bimal will not be free. But I have to free her completely or I will not be free of the lie"

Sandip, was the complete opposite of Nikhilesh. He did not mind exploiting others in the name of the country or the people. He was a fanatic in a sense, to get what he believes for the good of the country by any means; be it thuggery, thieving and even murder. He justified all this to himself by proclaiming his supposedly love for his country. Nikhilesh was someone who always believed in not exploiting his country, its people and it's dignity even for it's freedom. Classic example of this was when Sandip demanded and caused riots because he wanted all the shop keepers of the market place to burn their foreign bought clothes and buy swadeshi clothes. And he demanded Nikhilesh to order these people to do as Sandip desires since Nikhilesh owned the market place. Yet, Nikhilesh knew about the poverty that the poor people around him and around Bengal had to shoulder everyday. Burning the clothes that they bought thinking of investing in a business and buying more clothes will most definitely leave them destitute and therefore he refuses, bringing forth on himself the wrath of Sandip and even his wife.

Sandip had a power onto himself. The mysterious power that is inherent in some of the most devastating men of this century; Hitler, Prabhakaran. The power of speech and attraction. Bimala was a moth attracted to this flame of speech of Sandip. Yet, Sandip's innerself is portrayed in his words:

- "For that moment I forgot that this was the reason why the male species was the active one: we are meant to stir up the lives of the passive ones and make it a life worth living. If we hadn't made the women weep for so many years, the door to the vast treasury of their grief would have stayed shut forever. The male was meant to make the universe weep and gratify it thus. Why else would his hands be so strong, his fist so powerful?"

Chauvanism like this is an absolute disgrace to the male species itself.

Nikhilesh is a man who believes in truth. He realized amidst his grief his own salvation:

- "We think that freedom lies in getting in your hands whatever you have wished for. But in reality, freedom comes from giving up within yourself whatever you have desired" - How TRUE!!

This shows him the illusion that he has being under for the entire 9 years of his married life. It gives him the strength to set Bimala free and thus himself.

Meanwhile Bimala, who was convinced by Sandip, that in her resides the goddess of the entire nation, feels a power that she has never experienced before. She crosses the boundaries of her normal world, her home, and enters into the realms of the world and is immediately engulfed in the illusions that make it up. She believes that there is magic in her and she plans to use it to gain what Sandip wants from her husband, blind to the fact that Sandip is actually using her. Yet, when she encounters her husband, she finds that she has nothing left. The true power that she held over him, the bond that existed between them, has being released by him. It is echoed in her words:

- "In all those nine years, I had never seen such indifference in his eyes. It was like the desert sky without a drop of moisture, draining all colour from the object it chanced to look upon. I'd have been happier if he had at least shown some anger. I couldn't touch him anywhere. I felt I was a lie, a dream: and when the dream ended, I was just the dark night"

In her words, we also see the truth that we even today suffer from. It is true about most of the politicians, or enterpreneurs or anyone who holds the reins of power in his or her hands:

- "True power was exempt from all fault. The thief steals, but the victorious king loots"

Finally, the true nature of Sandip becomes apparent to Bimala and she realizes the mistakes that she has done. In provoking the villagers in a fruitless effort andin losing the only man she loved trully. Although she no longer lives blindfolded, she feels like the loneliest person on earth:

- "A lonely human is perhaps the biggest anomaly in Nature. Even the person who has lost every relation to death is not truly alone - he has company from beyond the grave"

I will finish my narration of the story here. I know very well, that anyone who wants to know the plot can definitely find it over the Internet, but I am not spilling it!! :) But may I finish it off with one of the best lines I have read, it's so true.

- "When the eternally familiar turned unfamiliar in an instant, it was a nightmare"

This was a book that I truly enjoyed reading. It is insightful, and it shows that no matter how many boundaries that you have created within yourself or by those around you, they will be crossed at some point in your life. The only things that we are armed with when we encounter the unknown, is the truth, our principles and our morales.