On the eve of his 80th birthday on Monday, Soumitra Chatterjee speaks to Metro on Sunday about Rabindranath Tagore, his 'road sign for life', his ambitious project of doing solo audio recordings of a series of Tagore's writings - short stories from Galpaguchchho , the memoir Jeebansmriti and now the entire volume of his letters - for Bhavna Records and the need to read Tagore for a proper critical evaluation rather than to mindlessly deify him. Excerpts:

Why choose Jeebansmriti over Chhelebela, which is written in a more lucid language and is easier to read?

Chhelebela smritir onubhob tuku (just the hint of a memory), that too mostly happy memories, but Jeebansmriti gives a taste of all that went into the making of Tagore. He made use of every element of his growing-up experience - getting beaten up by servants, being given less to eat.... All the experiences of pain. His mother died so young; he hardly had any time with her. Yet whenever Mother appears in his writings, like in Sishu Bholanath, she is incomparably alive.

He extracted the maximum from limited experience...

Yes, not just extracted but he sometimes created the figure anew in his writing. His love for Notun Bouthan (Kadambari Devi), for example. She died when Tagore was still in his 20s. It could have destroyed him, so all-encompassing was his love for her. He dedicated more books to her than anyone else. He made her his muse all his life.

Didn't he also grow up in an extraordinary family where a child would be taught by teachers as varied as a wrestler and a medical student armed with a skeleton?

The Tagore family understood the necessity of education. The elders could make out that these children, especially Rabi (Rabindranath), Satya (Satyendranath) and their nephew, were unable to fit into school. So they arranged for all-round education at home, from wrestling to anatomy. He read whatever he could lay his hands on without thinking whether it suited his age. That created a liberal outlook. The age at which he memorised Joydeb, how many would touch such works of intense love?

Is that why he took his manuscript of Bhanusingher Padabali to Jyotirindranath, claiming it was an old manuscript he had found?

Yes, it was a fun exercise for him. He used an artificial language. Brajabuli is not his own tongue. He could not make it as fluent as Vidyapati's, for whom Brajabuli was integral to his craft.

In every case, Tagore managed to overcome the hurdles. After his Bouthan died when he was around 23-24, he was sent off to look after the zamindari. His own share was little but he was to manage the zamindari affairs of the entire family in Silaidaha or Patisar. He was then a young man, who had never stepped out of Calcutta. In most cases, one would either hate it as exile or enjoy it as an outing. But Tagore took it as an opportunity to get an intimate look into the life that 80 per cent of the people of Bengal led - in villages. In our youth, we used to be critical of Tagore, thinking how could a zamindar's son know of the common man's life. But later I realised that he got to know so much only by being a zamindar's son. Of course, he was different from others of the ilk.

Rather, he had reservations about the urban Bengali. He was sometimes more critical of them than he should have been, like in case of those who wanted to felicitate him after he won the Nobel. He should not have behaved so badly with them after they travelled all the way by train to meet him. It might have played at the back of his mind that these very people had opposed him all through. Yet a person of his stature should have been beyond that.

People do not read Tagore's letters as much as his novels or short stories. Are you taking this opportunity for close reading as a bonus from the project?

It is a great takeaway for me. As a performer, when I undertake a project I try to go deep into the subject. As I prepare everyday, I am discovering a lot of Tagore. I used to think the servants were cruel in not feeding him well. But now I see how that gave birth to a man who was not daunted by difficulties. Who would have undertaken such projects for rural development? A slipper (once) fell off his feet and he jumped into the Padma to swim and retrieve it. Who would do that?

He must have been a daredevil.

Yes, he was. But that boldness and daredevilry were intertwined with his civility and courteous upbringing.

You brought Tagore to the screen when you were much younger. But that was through a director's interpretation...

It was much before being part of Tagore films that I came in touch with Tagore. I graduated with honours in Bengali literature. I also studied MA but never took the exam. So you can imagine how involved I was with Tagore in those years. So when I was doing Nashtaneer - he (Satyajit Ray) was forced to change the name to Charulata as registration was a problem - I could repeat Nashtaneer by rote. The text was in my syllabus. So the story was not new for me. But what I could not understand is when the story reflects Tagore's love for his sister-in-law, who the author was standing up for. He strangely rejects Amal. He is all out for the woman!

Can it be an author's ability to be a neutral bystander to his own life?

Yes, it is an ability to dissociate oneself from one's own experience. We tend to think of him as a school-bunking boy who read up a bit at home. But as a 17-year-old, he read up more than even MA students would. He was an intellectual also but he was not just an intellectual.

Was Chhelebela part of your matriculation syllabus?

We were the last batch of matriculation, but I don't remember the syllabus. I used to read Chhelebela on my own. Love for books was in my family. I loved school because I could play with friends. Afterwards, I hated institutionalised education. What saved me was my passion for reading.... It helps me understand young Tagore. But of course there can be no more comparisons with such a doyen. For me, he is a road sign, providing direction in life.

You have recorded some stories from Galpaguchchho too but they were more dramatic with multiple voices and a plotline. Was Jeebansmriti, a man's reflections on life, a bigger challenge?

Yes, it was, but not because I was scared of Tagore as a performer. I have been one all my life. The stories required me in that role. But Jeebansmriti is like a narration, jekhane ekjon kathak thakur byakto kore, byakhya kore (a story-teller expresses something and explains it). I should not be saying this myself, but this project needed someone with undiluted love for the language. In fact, I feel unsettled when I am abroad and cannot speak in Bengali for long.

You write in Bengali too...

Yes, I write poetry. About 10-12 volumes have been published. I've written 30 plays.... After ISC, I opted for Bengali honours. Whoever heard about my choice of subject, slighted it and asked what good it would do. The one person who lauded my choice was my guru, Sisir Kumar Bhaduri. When he first met me he asked me my name and what I did. As soon as he heard I was a Bengali MA student, he said 'bah'! It was spontaneous appreciation. He used to say 'What kind of an actor am I if I cannot be a Bengali actor'. Yet few knew English like he did. He was a professor of English.

Wasn't it the norm of the time for educated people to be equally strong in both Bengali and English? Tagore himself translated his Gitanjali...

Yes. But he suffered from an inferiority complex too about his English.

...whatever critics might say now about its quality, he did so after all.

(William) Radice's translation is better. He really knows the language. Once we met in Boston. He had just landed after a trans-Atlantic journey. He asked me nonchalantly where I was from. Let's say, I did not get a good reception (from him). After a while, he jumped up: 'Orey baba, o moshai, apni etokkhon bolenni apni Soumitra! I have a jetlag. It didn't register who you were.' His Bengali is so good. He even speaks idiomatically. His translation of Tagore is really as good as it can get. It is tough to translate Tagore, especially his poetry and music. It has so many layers of meanings. Prose is still manageable.

Is the Bengali losing this bilingual capability?

Absolutely. Those who read in the English medium neglect Bengali, and think it is fashionable to do so. They they turn their nose up at the mention of Bengali. Those who read in Bengali medium are scared of English.

Now that you are recording Tagore's letters, isn't he a lot different here from the Tagore of Jeebansmriti?

Yes. To know Tagore fully, it is necessary to read his letters. Here he is an outright commoner. Well, one can never call Tagore a commoner. Maybe a simple man without reservations or inhibitions. Osongkoch, nihsongkoch ekjon sadharon manush. He speaks so openly of his financial difficulties. There is no other piece of writing where there is even a hint of this. [Laughs]

Given that we are so prone to worshipping him, is it all the more necessary to read his letters?

This deification has been going on for some time. That's why we find it difficult to understand him. When Bhavna Records landed this job in my lap, I took it on as a professional assignment. But now increasingly I realise how important a project it is.... Around the time Tagore turned 150, Shakespeare turned 450. But the kind of research that has been done on Shakespeare not just in his own country but across the world has not been done on Tagore. Even in our own country not as much significant work has been done on Tagore as should have been done. Forget Shakespeare. Perhaps no one has been written about so much barring Jesus Christ! [Laughs] .... Last year, I was reading 1599: A Year in the Life of William Shakespeare (by James Shapiro). What a marvellous book, discusses so many angles! He even talks of what Shakespeare might have experienced during his horse ride from London to Stratford that might have influenced him. Where are such works on Tagore? Only recently, there has been some work. About 30 years ago, Pratap Chandra Roy, an Oxonian who taught at Serampore College, had written an article saying the tendency to worship Tagore is harming our critical appraisal of him. There is no yardstick in Bengali literature to measure him critically. On top of that, Tagore himself compounded the problem. To supply fodder for the magazines, while he has written some amazing stories in Galpaguchchho, he has also partially borrowed some plots from Edgar Allan Poe. But for writing that, the gentleman was pilloried wherever he went! E ki re baba! Once I had said Ghare Baire, the film, is better than Ghare Baire, the novel, because the role I had played was not written convincingly in the novel. In the film, Sandip was a believable bad man. You have no idea how many letters I received criticising me.

Even Girish Karnad recently criticised Tagore's plays...

Girish Karnad's criticism was extremely unjust but... one should have the right.... And you should logically refute his argument. And that is why we need to read Rabindranath more. He is so tough to understand. Playing his songs at traffic lights does not help. For example, he was a Brahmo and sometimes actively so. Yet he writes in a letter that he is not a Brahmo! And he is not writing in jest. Letters are the only place where he has committed a rare factual mistake or two. Nowhere else, be it in his novels, speeches or essays, has he committed a single error, so conscious was he as a writer. Also while most letters start with the usual ' Kalyaniyashu', when he writes to his daughter, with a few exceptions, it starts with the stark 'Meeru' and ends with 'Baba', bereft of all social trappings. Here he is a family man.

Have other Bengali luminaries of the time been overshadowed by the brilliance of Tagore?

This has happened in the last 35 years or so. Was Prafulla Chandra overshadowed before that? We still tend to remember those whom Tagore has eulogised, like Jagadis Chandra Bose. Tagore was fascinated by his talent in basic scientific research. Prafulla Chandra was more of an all-round personality.... He was a friend of Tagore's and his interactions with him were on the lines of 'How are you? What are you working on?' That sense of wonderment was not there.

And what about other authors like Bankim Chandra Chattopadhyay?

It is true that the way Bankim was read in every household, thanks to Basumati Sahitya Mandir, is no longer happening. He is largely restricted to the literature classroom. But why are people forgetting Tarashankar (Bandyopadhyay), Manik (Bandyopadhyay), Bibhutibhushan (Bandyopadhyay) too? In England, they have not forgotten Dickens while remembering Shakespeare. They are all writers of international standard.... Even then, one man who shines through is Jibanananda Das, the greatest Bengali poet.

Haven't you recorded his Kuri Bochhor Pore?

Yes. And Banalata Sen too.

Is the recorded voice a better medium than the printed word to reach Tagore to today's readers?

The audio version has an advantage in that one can play it at leisure. Porte gele loke bhabe 'Orey baba, ar lekhapora korte parchhi na. Saradin file dekhechhi.' (When it comes to reading, people often put it off after paper work all day). Listening is an entertainment. And those staying abroad can listen to it even while driving.

Are you thinking of bringing Tagore to the stage anytime soon?

We have discussed a project in which four or five stories would be dramatised...

What is your message for Soumitra Chatterjee on his 80th birthday? Tell ttmetro@abpmail.com