Rabindranath Tagore (1861-1941), the first non-European to receive the Nobel Prize for Literature (1913), was a Bengali poet, novelist, musician, painter and playwright. Tagore modernized Bengali art and literature by rejecting classical forms, and produced strongly poetic and spiritual works. He spoke largely to political and personal topics as he rejected the British Raj and supported independence. His 1916 novel, 'The Home and the World', illustrates a multitude of conflicts between tradition