Rabindranath Tagore 7 May 1861 7 August 1941), was a Bengali poet, novelist, musician, painter

and playwright who reshaped Bengali literature and music. As author of Gitanjali with its "profoundly
sensitive, fresh and beautiful verse",he was the first non-European and the only Indian to be awarded
the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1913. His poetry in translation was viewed as spiritual, and this
together with his mesmerizing persona gave him a prophet-like aura in the west. His "elegant prose and
magical poetry" still remain largely unknown outside the confines of Bengal.
Tagore modernised Bengali art by spurning rigid classical forms. His novels, stories, songs, dancedramas, and essays spoke to political and personal topics. Gitanjali (Song Offerings), Gora (FairFaced), and Ghare-Baire (The Home and the World) are his best-known works, and his verse, short
stories, and novels were acclaimed for their lyricism, colloquialism, naturalism, and contemplation.
Tagore was perhaps the only litterateur who penned anthems of two countries Jana Gana Mana, the
Indian national anthem and Amar Shonar Bangla, the Bangladeshi national anthem.
Twelve O'Clock by Rabindranath Tagore
Mother, I do want to leave off my lessons now.
I have been at my book all the morning.
You say it is only twelve o'clock.
Suppose it isn't very late; can't you ever think
it is afternoon when it is only twelve o'clock?
I can easily imagine now that the sun has reached
the edge of that rice-field, and the old fish-woman is
gathering herbs for her supper by the side of the pond.
I can just shut my eyes and think
that the shadows are growing darker
under the MADAR tree, and the water
in the pond looks shiny black.
If twelve o'clock can come in the night,
why can't the night come when it is twelve o'clock?

A Moments Indulgence - Poem by Rabindranath Tagore

I ask for a moment's indulgence to sit by thy side. The works
that I have in hand I will finish afterwards.
Away from the sight of thy face my heart knows no rest nor respite,
and my work becomes an endless toil in a shoreless sea of toil.
Today the summer has come at my window with its sighs and murmurs; and
the bees are plying their minstrelsy at the court of the flowering grove.
Now it is time to sit quite, face to face with thee, and to sing
dedication of life in this silent and overflowing leisure.
Sarojini Naidu
Sarojini Naidu, born as Sarojini Chattopadhyay (Bengali: ) also known by the
sobriquet as The Nightingale of India, was a child prodigy, Indian independence activist and poet.
Naidu served as the first governor of the United Provinces of Agra and Oudh from 1947 to 1949; the
first woman to become the governor of an Indian state. She was the second woman to become the
president of the Indian National Congress in 1925 and the first Indian woman to do so.
Political career
Sarojini Naidu (extreme right) with Mahatma Gandhi during Salt Satyagraha, 1930
Naidu joined the Indian national movement in the wake of partition of Bengal in 1905. She came into
contact with Gopal Krishna Gokhale, Rabindranath Tagore, Muhammad Ali Jinnah, Annie Besant, C.
P. Ramaswami Iyer, Mahatma Gandhi and Jawaharlal Nehru.
During 19151918, she travelled to different regions in India delivering lectures on social welfare,
women's empowerment and nationalism. She also helped to establish the Women's Indian Association
(WIA) in 1917. She was sent to London along with Annie Besant, President of WIA, to present the
case for the women's vote to the Joint Select Committee.
Literary career: Naidu began writing at the age of twelve. Her Persian play, Maher Muneer,
impressed the Nawab of Hyderabad.
In 1905, her first collection of poems, named "The Golden Threshold" was published. Her poems were
admired by many prominent Indian politicians like Gopal Krishna Gokhale.

Her collection of poems entitled "The Feather of The Dawn" was edited and published posthumously
in 1961 by her daughter Padamaja.
Death and legacy: Sarojini Naidu died of a heart attack while working in her office in Lucknow on 2
March (Wednesday), 1949.
Autumn Song
LIKE a joy on the heart of a sorrow,
The sunset hangs on a cloud;
A golden storm of glittering sheaves,
Of fair and frail and fluttering leaves,
The wild wind blows in a cloud.
Hark to a voice that is calling
To my heart in the voice of the wind:
My heart is weary and sad and alone,
For its dreams like the fluttering leaves have gone,
And why should I stay behind?
Snake Charmer
WHITHER dost thou hide from the magic of my flute-call?
In what moonlight-tangled meshes of perfume,
Where the clustering keovas guard the squirrel's slumber,
Where the deep woods glimmer with the jasmine's bloom?
I'll feed thee, O beloved, on milk and wild red honey,
I'll bear thee in a basket of rushes, green and white,
To a palace-bower where golden-vested maidens
Thread with mellow laughter the petals of delight.
Whither dost thou loiter, by what murmuring hollows,
Where oleanders scatter their ambrosial fire?
Come, thou subtle bride of my mellifluous wooing,
Come, thou silver-breasted moonbeam of de- sire!