Rabindranath Tagore and Freudian thought

The paper draws our attention to the Indian poet and philosopher Rabindranath Tagore's notion of psychoanalysis. Focusing on the period between 1926 and his death in 1941, during which Tagore had not only met Freud but had also spoken to several persons on psychoanalysis, the author has unearthed a mass of archival material, primarily in Bengali, and translated most of it into English for the first time, in order to show how Tagore's opinion regarding Freudian thought gradually changed from severe criticism and a near complete rejection to appreciation, especially of its good use in literature and literary criticism. The author has also identified a number of literary works, both prose and verse, from the final years of Tagore's life and tried to document the extent of influence of Freudian thought on their composition. In short, the author explores a significant interdisciplinary area that has not been looked into either in India or abroad.