What according to the poet, is freedom?
Answers
Freedom from fear is the freedom
I claim for you my motherland!
Freedom from the burden of the ages, bending your head,
breaking your back, blinding your eyes to the beckoning
call of the future;
Freedom from the shackles of slumber wherewith
you fasten yourself in night's stillness,
mistrusting the star that speaks of truth's adventurous paths;
freedom from the anarchy of destiny
whole sails are weakly yielded to the blind uncertain winds,
and the helm to a hand ever rigid and cold as death.
Freedom from the insult of dwelling in a puppet's world,
where movements are started through brainless wires,
repeated through mindless habits,
where figures wait with patience and obedience for the
master of show,
to be stirred into a mimicry of life.
Rabindranath Tagore
This is a very beautiful poem written by Nobel Laureate Rabindranath Tagore. ‘Freedom’ is one of the many distinguished poems written by him.
The poem is about his motherland India. This poem was written during the period when India was colonized by British. India was fighting its one of the greatest freedom struggle. The poem is depicting the brutality borne by the country and its trying to contemplate its future and past. The lines-
Freedom from fear is the freedom
I claim for you my motherland!
Freedom from the burden of the ages, bending your head,
breaking your back, blinding your eyes to the beckoning
call of the future;
The poet is wishing that his country be free of the fear, the fear of oppression by its colonized rulers. According to him the freedom of fear is the real freedom. He wishes the country to be free of burden of the years it has been oppressed. The country has been tolerating enough and it can bear anymore. The poet says his country is looking forward for a little better future.
Freedom from the shackles of slumber wherewith
you fasten yourself in night's stillness,
mistrusting the star that speaks of truth's adventurous paths;
freedom from the anarchy of destiny
whole sails are weakly yielded to the blind uncertain winds,
and the helm to a hand ever rigid and cold as death.
These are the most difficult lines in the poem.
The poet is describing the brutality and injustice the country has bared. The poet wishes his country should be free of experiences of the past which was a nightmare and left it numb. “The anarchy of destiny” means the country was heading towards an undetermined future and the path was governed by random and uncertain events.
Freedom from the insult of dwelling in a puppet's world,
where movements are started through brainless wires,
repeated through mindless habits,
where figures wait with patience and obedience for the
master of show, to be stirred into a mimicry of life.
These are the most golden lines in the poem, these lines holds true still, even when we have been free for many years.
The poet says he wants his country to be from being controlled like the puppeteer controls the puppet. The rules and regulations laid by the unjust system which is being followed without raising any questions and reasons. The helpless people of the country are following them without using their brains, without questioning, with complete obedience. The life they are living is just “mimicry of life” which is inauthentic life as it is controlled by others.
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