About the Book
This book, "Stories from Tagore," features a collection of narratives like "The Cabuliwallah," "The Home-Coming," "Once there was a King," and others. Addressing the challenges of instructing Indian children with English schoolbooks, the stories focus on familiar Indian environments, sentiments, and characters. Written in a simple style, the book aims to help Indian students understand English more easily. It includes stories previously published in English volumes, with slight revisions, and introduces two stories in English for the first time. The book also provides lists of words for study, aiming to spark interest in Indian words and their history among readers.
About the Author
Rabindranath Tagore (1861-1941), born in Calcutta, India, achieved early success with stories, songs, and plays in Calcutta. His acclaimed work, Gitanjali, translated into English in 1912, garnered a Nobel Prize in Literature in 1913, making him the first non-westerner honored. Knighted by King George V in 1915, Tagore later renounced the title in protest of the 1919 Amritsar massacre. A prolific writer, he produced over a thousand poems, eight volumes of short stories, nearly two dozen plays, eight novels, and numerous philosophical, religious, and social essays. Tagore also composed over two thousand songs, including national anthems for India and Bangladesh.
Preface
EVERY experienced teacher must have noticed the difficulty of instructing Indian children out of books that are specially intended for use in English schools. It is not merely that the subjects are unfamiliar, but almost every phrase has English associations that are strange to Indian ears. The environment in which they are written is unknown to the Indian school boy and his mind becomes overburdened with its details which he fails to understand. He cannot give his whole attention to the language and thus master it quickly.
The present Indian story-book avoids some at least of these impediments. The surroundings described in it are those of the students' everyday life; the sentiments and characters are familiar. The stories are simply told, and the notes at the end will be sufficient to explain obscure passages. It should be possible for the Indian student to follow the pages of the book easily and intelligently.
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