ALIENATION AND MYSTICISM: A REDISCOVERY OF THE SELF IN GIBRAN'S A TEAR AND A SMILE AND TAGORE'S GITANJALI.

Abstract

This paper is a humble attempt to describe elements of "Alienation" and "Mysticism" in two great creative works by two eminent poets and mystics, Gibran Kahlil Gibran's (1883-1931) A Tear and A Smile and Rabindranath Tagore's (1861-1941) Gitanjali. It is a comparative study of Kahlil Gibran's A Tear and A Smile and Rabindranath Tagore's Gitanjali. It is an appraisal of their sublime poetic works as a quest of precious wisdom, the cosmic truth, life and its temporal nature, through suffering and alienation from the illusive worldly reality. Both of them are the travelers on the same devotional path of spirituality and could the divine light through total surrender of the "Self". Their works strongly manifest the experience of the communion of soul with the Absolute power by emancipation of the soul from the earthly "cage" that is body; thus attaining the divine moment of trance, when "the created and the creator" seem face to face. This study, in short, explores spiritual themes interwoven in these great poetic works and vividly reflected in typical mystic, graceful, spontaneous, and lyrical style.