Because Debendranath wanted his son to
become a barrister, Tagore enrolled at a public school in Brighton, East
Sussex, England in 1878.[27] He stayed for several months at a
house that the Tagore family owned near Brighton and Hove, in Medina Villas; in
1877 his nephew and niece—Suren and Indira Devi, the children of Tagore's
brother Satyendranath—were sent together with their
mother, Tagore's sister-in-law, to live with him.[42] He briefly read law at University
College London,
but again left school. He opted instead for independent study of Shakespeare, Religio Medici, Coriolanus, and Antony and Cleopatra. Lively English, Irish,
and Scottish folk tunes impressed Tagore, whose own tradition of Nidhubabu-authored kirtans and tappas and Brahmo
hymnody was subdued.[27][43] In 1880 he returned to Bengal
degree-less, resolving to reconcile European novelty with Brahmo traditions,
taking the best from each.[44] In 1883 he married 10 year old[45] Mrinalini Devi,
born Bhabatarini, 1873–1902; they had five children, two of whom died in
childhood.[46]
In 1890 Tagore began managing his vast
ancestral estates in Shelaidaha (today a region of Bangladesh); he was joined by his wife and children
in 1898. Tagore released his Manasi poems (1890), among his
best-known work.[47] As Zamindar Babu,
Tagore criss-crossed the riverine holdings in command of the Padma,
the luxurious family barge. He collected mostly token rents and blessed
villagers who in turn honoured him with banquets—occasionally of dried rice and
sour milk.[48] He met Gagan Harkara,
through whom he became familiar with Baul Lalon Shah,
whose folk songs greatly influenced Tagore.[49] Tagore worked to popularise Lalon's
songs. The period 1891–1895, Tagore's Sadhana period, named
after one of Tagore's magazines, was his most productive;[28] in these years he wrote more than
half the stories of the three-volume, 84-story Galpaguchchha.[40] Its ironic and grave tales examined
the voluptuous poverty of an idealised rural Bengal.[50]
Tagore and his wife
Mrinalini Devi, 1883.
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