Private Tagore Archive Goes on Public View in Mumbai

A collection of material from Rabindranath Tagore, the Indian writer, is being brought into public view for the first time at a Christie's exhibition opening in Mumbai in November 2026, The Guardian reported. The material comes from a private family archive.

The archive draws on Tagore's visits to the family home of Maitreyi Devi, a protégé of his, in Mungpoo, in the Darjeeling hills of West Bengal, between 1938 and 1940. Devi's family holdings form the basis of the show. Christie's is presenting it as an exhibition on Tagore and Mungpoo, featuring the collection and archive of Maitreyi Devi.

The display includes artworks, manuscripts, letters, photographs and personal effects. Together they offer a glimpse of Tagore's creative process and personal world in his final years. The exhibition is curated by Nishad Avari, head of South Asian modern and contemporary art at Christie's.

Among the items is a 1940 manuscript that appears to be a draft of Tagore's memoir, Chelebela or My Boyhood Days. Of the 10 complete manuscripts in the exhibition, it is the only one dictated to Maitreyi Devi.

Tagore was born on May 7, 1861, and died on August 7, 1941. He was the first non-European to win the Nobel Prize in Literature, according to The Guardian. His legacies include the national anthems of India and Bangladesh. Bangladesh's anthem, Amar Sonar Bengal ("My Golden Bengal"), was written by him. He also campaigned for the Indian nationalist movement.

W.B. Yeats, also a Nobel Prize winner, had a relationship with Tagore.