Strong Women in Rabindranath Tagore’s “Laboratory” and “Mussulmanir Galpa”

Abstract

The paper examines two strong women characters in Rabindranath Tagore’s late short stories: “Laboratory” and “Mussulmanir Galpa.” In the former story, Tagore portrays an unconventional woman, vety different from his earlier fictional heroines, while in the latter he portrays a Hindu woman who, because of circumstances, takes the decision to convert to Islam. Both the stories reveal a changing world, unconventional in one, violent in the other. Through the strong women of these two stories, Tagore suggests that women cannot merely accept changes but must attempt to act to find positive solutions.