_Gora_, a so-called “novel” by Rabindranath Tagore, has been issued this current year. It tells the story of a Hindu youth, a Brahmin, whose full name is Gourmohan Babu. He cherishes a large-souled ambition to “unify” India but he cannot break down the barriers of his religious fanaticism enough to consent to the marriage of his younger brother, Binoy Babu, to a girl of a lower Brahmin caste. The romantic interest vibrates from the love affairs of Gora to that of his brother. The chief merit of the book is not its art as fiction, for that is negative, but the graphic presentation of religious tenets and native customs. The author seems, at times, to be seriously concerned about the development of his hero and the more tolerant brother; in other places, he introduces an element of whimsical humor and kindly irony as in the unexpected sequel of Gora’s parentage. Poetry and essays or short tales, rather than fiction of long-sustained plot, are the forms of writing best adapted to his gifts. As _The Gardener_ represents the youth of Rabindranath Tagore, with normal desires fused with spiritual longings, so _Gitanjali_ is the expression of the mature philosopher-poet, still responsive emotionally but seeking for “joy eternal.” He has preserved for world literature, the philosophy and poetry of earlier teachers like Chaitanya Deva, usually called “Nimäi,” the Hindu poet, who lived near Bolpur, the home of Tagore. In addition to these revivals of the earlier tenets and aspirations in poetry, Rabindranath Tagore has become an international humanist. He has never lost his joy in Nature and in solitude but he has walked forward into the vision of a united brotherhood and a spiritual commonwealth. FOOTNOTES: [91] Inscription with the Nobel Prize Award in Literature, 1913. [92] _Rabindranath Tagore_ by Ernest Rhys, New York, 1915. [93] _Gitanjali_, with Introduction by W. B. Yeats, London and New York, 1913. [94] _Rabindranath Tagore: a Biographical Study_ by Ernest Rhys, New York, 1915, Preface, xiv. By permission of the Macmillan Co. [95] _My Reminiscences_ by Rabindranath Tagore, New York, 1917, p. 225. By permission of the Macmillan Co. [96] _Rabindranath Tagore_ by Basanta Koomar Roy, New York, 1915, p. 52. [97] _Ibid._, pp. 189-193. [98] _The Crescent Moon: Child-Poems_ by Rabindranath Tagore, translated from the original Bengali by the author, New York, 1913, 1916. By permission of the Macmillan Co. [99] _Mahatma Gandhi: The Man Who Became One with the Universal Being_, by Romain Rolland, translated by Catherine D. Groth, New York, 1924. By permission of the Century Co. [100] _Gitanjali: Song-Offerings_ by Rabindranath Tagore, New York, 1916. By permission of the Macmillan Co. CHAPTER XI ROMAIN ROLLAND AND _JEAN-CHRISTOPHE_ In 1916 the prize of 1915 has been awarded: