The Home and the World by Rabindranath Tagore
Bimala, the young wife of the modernizing zamindar Nikhil, opens by recalling her devoted mother and her marriage into Nikhil's princely household, where his grandmother favored her and where Nikhil, unusually for his class, refused liquor, brought in the English companion Miss Gilby, and resisted claiming the wifely worship Bimala longed to offer him. She envied her sister-in-law the Bara Rani's beauty and endured her mockery, while Nikhil pressed Bimala to leave purdah and meet the outside world, a step she long refused out of loyalty to his late grandmother and pride against the Bara Rani. When the Swadeshi movement sweeps Bengal, Bimala catches fire with patriotic passion, wants to burn foreign cloth, and demands Miss Gilby's dismissal after an insult to a Swadeshi youth; Nikhil expels the offender but escorts Miss Gilby to the station himself, drawing public scandal that Bimala resents. At a mass meeting Sandip, the charismatic agitator and Nikhil's old friend whom Nikhil bankrolls, addresses the crowd invoking Bande Mataram; Bimala, transfixed, sees him as the nation's champion and herself as Bengal's womanhood incarnate. She insists on hosting him to dinner, appears before him elaborately dressed despite her sister-in-law's mockery, and is drawn into his intense flattery, casting her as the country's Shakti. Sandip openly argues with Nikhil over patriotism, force, and truth versus illusion, with Nikhil insisting on restraint and universal ideals against Sandip's creed of desire, cruelty, and "necessary" untruth. Nikhil, sensing his marriage slipping, refuses to compel Bimala's loyalty by force, reasoning that love coerced is worthless; he grows increasingly isolated, visited by his old teacher Chandranath Babu, while his estate manager Nanku is dismissed after conflict with the Bara Rani over Sandip's access to Bimala. Sandip's narrative reveals his calculated seduction: he cultivates Bimala's infatuation, praises her as "Queen Bee" of the movement, lends her provocative books, deliberately provokes jealousy and shame, and privately confesses his creed of ruthless self-interest, comparing himself to Ravana and dismissing truth in favor of successful illusion. He begins fleecing Nikhil's household under the guise of Swadeshi expenses and starts scheming to extract fifty thousand rupees from Bimala for "the Cause." Meanwhile Nikhil enforces no compulsion on his tenants regarding Swadeshi, appalling student followers of Sandip who admire the ruthless coercive tactics of rival zamindars Harish Kundu and Chakravarti, who burn tenants' foreign goods and financially ruin dissenters. Nikhil and his master defend the poor tenant Panchu, whose wife has died and who faces ruinous purification fees and a false inheritance claim manufactured by a rival landlord; Nikhil buys Panchu's holding to protect him, and his master personally intervenes with Panchu's fraudulent "aunt." Sandip orchestrates the sinking of a boatman's cargo to enforce the boycott and plots to have Bengal's Swadeshi movement centered on a manufactured goddess-image of the nation, arguing usefully that illusion, not truth, moves masses—a philosophy Nikhil rejects. Bimala, caught between infatuation and guilt, secretly steals gold coins from her husband's safe—money set aside as her sister-in-law's annual religious offering—to give Sandip his demanded funds, spending an anguished night wracked with shame over the theft. She recruits the fervent young disciple Amulya, dissuading him from robbery and threatened violence against the household's cashier, taking his pistol from him and blessing him as a brother even as she recognizes her own moral collapse. Nikhil, meanwhile, privately confronts his own diminished self-image, resolves not to hold Bimala against her will, formally tells her she is free, and reflects at length on truth, illusion, and his failing marriage. The account leaves Bimala clutching her stolen gold, en route to deliver it to Sandip, consumed by shame and unable to retreat from the path she has taken.
By Rabindranath Tagore · First published 1916 · Genre: Literary Fiction, Philosophical Fiction, Political Novel · 49 chapters · 79,820 words
First lines
Mother, today there comes back to mind the vermilion mark at the parting of your hair, the sari which you used to wear, with its wide red border, and those wonderful eyes of yours, full of depth and peace. They came at the start of my life's journey, like the first streak of dawn, giving me golden provision to carry me on my way.
The sky which gives light is blue, and my mother's face was dark, but she had the radiance of holiness, and her beauty would put to shame all the vanity of the beautiful.
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The Home and the World is listed on Textopian as a novel by Rabindranath Tagore, dated 1916 CE.
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- Work type: Novel
- Author: Rabindranath Tagore
- Date: 1916 CE
- Language: English
- Genres: Literary Fiction, Philosophical Fiction, Political Novel, Psychological Novel, Domestic Fiction
- Length: 79,820 words
- Structure: 49 chapters, 1,461 paragraphs
- Reading fit: Fairly Easy (7th Grade)
Good citation fit
- Work identity for The Home and the World by Rabindranath Tagore
- Canonical title URL and first readable passage URL
- Genre and topic classification from the Textopian catalog
- Readability and classroom-planning context
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Genres
- Literary Fiction — Complex narrative structure with multiple first-person perspectives, psychological depth, thematic sophistication, and literary merit characteristic of serious literary works.
- Philosophical Fiction — Extensive philosophical debates on patriotism, morality, duty, truth, and the nature of strength versus weakness; characters engage in explicit moral discourse about righteousness and national interest.
- Political Novel — Central plot revolves around the Swadeshi nationalist movement; explores political ideology, activism, and the tension between principled opposition and pragmatic compromise in pursuit of national independence.
- Psychological Novel — Deep exploration of characters' internal states, motivations, desires, and psychological transformation through introspective first-person narration revealing consciousness and unconscious impulses.
Tags
colonial India · nationalism · independence movement · patriotism · gender dynamics · love triangle · political activism · swadeshi movement · identity crisis · literary modernism · tradition vs modernity · social commentary
Contents
- PART 1
- PART 2
- PART 3
- PART 4
- PART 5
- PART 6
- PART 7
- PART 8
- PART 9
- PART 10
- PART 11
- PART 12
- PART 13
- PART 14
- PART 15
- PART 16
- PART 17
- PART 18
- PART 19
- PART 20
- PART 21
- PART 22
- PART 23
- PART 24
- PART 25
- PART 26
- PART 27
- PART 28
- PART 29
- PART 30
- PART 31
- PART 32
- PART 33
- PART 34
- PART 35
- PART 36
- PART 37
- PART 38
- PART 39
- PART 40
- PART 41
- PART 42
- PART 43
- PART 44
- PART 45
- PART 46
- PART 47
- PART 48
- PART 49