The Home and the World

Tagore set this novel in Bengal during the Swadeshi agitation, when the boycott of British goods carried the fervor of a religious cause. Bimala has lived quietly inside her husband’s house until Nikhil, a landowner who believes freedom must be chosen rather than imposed, encourages her to step out into the world. What she finds there is Sandip, a nationalist orator whose confidence flatters her and whose politics excuse any cruelty committed in the nation’s name. Told in turn by all three voices, the book keeps asking what a movement owes the poor who end up paying for it. Tagore’s willingness to indict his own side made the novel contentious in 1916 and keeps it uncomfortable now. Available here as a free PDF and EPUB.