Chapter 6 coursebook where The mind …

Lines 9 – 11:

Where the mind is led forward by thee

Into ever-widening thought and action

Into that heaven of freedom, my Father, let my country awake.

In these lines, the poet speaks directly to God. He wants his countrymen to be led by Him so that they broaden the horizon of both their thoughts and their actions. If they were to do so, then India would be transformed into heaven – a heaven where all its citizens would be truly free.

This concludes the line by line summary of  Where The Mind Is Without Fear by Rabindranath Tagore.

Lines 5 – 8:

Where words come out from the depth of truth

Where tireless striving stretches its arms towards perfection

Where the clear stream of reason has not lost its way

Into the dreary desert sand of dead habit

In these lines, the poet says that in the India of his dreams, everyone should speak the truth. No person should lie for his own advantage. Every man should make an effort to improve himself and keep trying till he reaches a stage of self-perfection. Next, he imagines the reason to be an unsullied stream of water, through which one can progress easily and without encountering too many obstacles. On the other hand, he imagines habit to be a desert. The stream of reason seems to him to be lost in the sands of habit. This means that he is saying that the people of his country blindly believe in their superstitions at present, and he would like them to question these beliefs through the application of logic.

Lines 1 – 4:

Where the mind is without fear and the head is held high

Where knowledge is free

Where the world has not been broken up into fragments

By narrow domestic walls

In these lines, the poet starts to imagine what he would like his country to be like. He says that no countryman of his should live with fear on his mind at all times. Instead, they should hold their heads up fearlessly and have confidence in themselves. Knowledge should be available to all citizens. That is, educational institutes should admit students of all races and classes. All the various regions of India and their peoples should be united instead of fighting amongst themselves for supremacy. They should fight together against a common enemy to determine their common fate.