[Ads-l] Tagore Quote

Fri Oct 7 18:31:13 UTC 2016

Stephen Goranson wrote:
> According to hathitrust (unconfirmed) "life was joy" and "service was joy" both appear
> on page 149 of Message of the East, Vedanta Monthly [Boston] in either v. 30 1941
> or v.31 1942 (bound together).

Thanks for the interesting match, SG. Google Books apparently has the
same double volume of "Message of the East". When I search for
"service was joy" in the volume GB displays a snippet showing the
following phrase on GB page 149:

[Begin extracted text]
. . . I was glad that my subject for Sunday Service was "Joy of God."
[End extracted text]

GB does have a match for "life was joy" in the double volume on page
149, but it is not visible in a snippet.

Years: 1941 and 1942 (Based on volume numbers and visible in snippets;
1941 unlikely based on date mentioned in extracted text; see below)
Journal: Message of the East
Volumes 30-31
Publisher: Boston, Vedanta Centre. (WorldCat information)
Quote Page GB 149
Database: Google Books Snippet; data nay be inaccurate

[Begin extracted text]
JOY OF GOD
By Srimati Gayatri Devi
(An address delivered at the Ananda-Ashrama, California, in April, 1942.)

On this beautiful spring day when the Ashrama awoke early at the
calling of the songbirds, I was glad that my subject for Sunday
Service was "Joy of God."
[End extracted text]

It is still possible that the poem is on the page, and GB is unable to
display it. Some snippets are blocked for unknown (to me) reasons.
HathiTrust OCR results sometimes differ from GB OCR results.

Garson
 ________________________________
> From: American Dialect Society <...> on behalf of ADSGarson O'Toole <...>
> Sent: Wednesday, October 5, 2016 12:09 PM
> To: ...
> Subject: Re: [ADS-L] Tagore Quote
>
> The bartleby.com website has an interesting thematically related poem.
> The phrase "life was beauty" appeared instead of "life was joy".
> Also, the word "duty" was used instead of "service". The attributed
> author died in 1848. Tagore lived from 1861 to 1941.
>
> https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=http-3A__www.bartleby.com_339_60.html&d=CwIFaQ&c=imBPVzF25OnBgGmVOlcsiEgHoG1i6YHLR0Sj_gZ4adc&r=uUVa-8oDL2EzfbuMuowoUadHHcJ7pjul6iFkS5Pd--8&m=ekYLxQ-tYqirR0SP3O3CIWuITMolTAittQcJ8Isn_gc&s=mWBIOCeYh-7Qi7Tv6f877_xEC-ezxifzAyJ12Zkviiw&e=
>
> [Begin excerpt]
> Beauty and Duty
> By Ellen Sturgis Hooper (1812-1848)
>
> I SLEPT, and dreamed that life was beauty;
> I woke, and found that life was duty.
> Was thy dream then a shadowy lie?
> Toil on, sad heart, courageously,
> And thou shalt find thy dream to be
> A noonday light and truth to thee.
> [End excerpt]
>
> The entry at bartleby.com is based on a 1903 anthology. Here is an
> instance in "The Dial" in 1840.
>
> Date: 1840 July (Reprint in 1901)
> Periodical: The Dial
> Quote Page 123
>
> https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=https-3A__books.google.com_books-3Fid-3Dt5c-5FAQAAMAAJ-26q-3Dcourageously-23v-3Dsnippet-26&d=CwIFaQ&c=imBPVzF25OnBgGmVOlcsiEgHoG1i6YHLR0Sj_gZ4adc&r=uUVa-8oDL2EzfbuMuowoUadHHcJ7pjul6iFkS5Pd--8&m=ekYLxQ-tYqirR0SP3O3CIWuITMolTAittQcJ8Isn_gc&s=ug1QQCVtb2z8Jhcz99HJGEDCk422VccNy9E4Et0Fdok&e=
>
> [Begin excerpt]
> I SLEPT, and dreamed that life was Beauty;
> I woke, and found that life was Duty.
> Was thy dream then a shadowy lie?
> Toil on, sad heart, courageously,
> And thou shalt find thy dream to be
> A noonday light and truth to thee.
> [End excerpt]
>
> Here is an attribution of two lines to Tagore circa 1942. This version
> used "duty".
>
> Year: 1942
> Book Title: Being alive: human structure and functions
> Author: Worldcat lists one author: Clifford Lee Brownell
> Authors: GB lists three authors: Clifford Lee Brownell, Jesse Feiring
> William, William Leonard Hughes
> Publisher: New York; Cincinnati: American Book Company
> Quote Page GB 287
> Database: Google Books snippet; data may be inaccurate. 1942 copyright
> notice is visible in snippet. Worldcat entry also specifies 1942
> copyright.
>
> [Begin excerpt]
> Tagore, the Indian philosopher, wrote,
>
> "I slept and dreamed that life was joy.
> I awoke and learned that life was duty."
>
> What duties do you discern with respect to the facts you have learned
> in this book?
> [End excerpt]
>
> Here is another attribution to Tagore with "duty". The book was
> published in 1979 according to Worldcat, but it was based on a thesis
> from 1951. So the excerpt below might be in the 1951 thesis at Temple.
>
> Year: 1979 (An outgrowth of the author's thesis, Temple University, 1951)
> Book: Jesse Herman Holmes, 1864-1942: A Quaker's Affirmation for Man
> Author: Albert J. Wahl
>
> [Begin excerpt]
> It was his duty - a thought, we may be sure, which was for him only
> reinforced by his friend Rabindranath Tagore:
>
> I slept and dreamt
> That life was joy
> I awoke and saw
> That life was duty
> I acted and behold
> Duty was joy.
>
> This joy in duty was constantly stressed, as in the time (1917)...
> [End excerpt]
>
> Please double-check all information in this message before using it.
>
> Garson
>
> On Wed, Oct 5, 2016 at 10:42 AM, Shapiro, Fred <...:
>> The following quotation is often attributed to Rabindranath Tagore, without precise citation:
>>
>> I slept and dreamt that life was joy.
>> I awoke and saw that life was service.
>> I acted -- and behold, service was joy.
>>
>> Can anyone help me to trace this quote to an actual source in Tagore's writings, or at least to early mentions of it in secondary sources?
>>
>> Fred Shapiro
>
>
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