TAGORE (Rabindranath). Gitanjali (Song Offerings). A collection of prose translations made by the author from the original Bengali. With an Introduction by W. B. Yeats. London, The Chiswick Press for The India Society, 1912. In-8, bradel percaline écrue, gilt title on front cover, untrimmed (Publisher's binding). First edition in English, translated from Bengali by the author and preceded by an introduction by the Irish poet William Butler Yeats. It was printed in an edition of 750 copies on laid paper, 250 of which were placed on the market. The frontispiece features a portrait of the author by William Rothenstein. It was largely for this English translation that Rabindranath Tagore was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1913. The collection appeared in French in 1913 in a translation by André Gide entitled L'Offrande lyrique. A precious copy given by W. B. Yeats to Maud and Iseult Gonne, with this autograph on a flyleaf: Maude Gonne / Iseult Gonne / from W. B. Yeats / Dec. 23, 1912. An important figure in Irish nationalism, the actress Maud Gonne (1866-1953) was the muse and great, disappointed love of W. B. Yeats (1865-1939), who proposed to her four times, in 1891, 1899, 1900 and 1901, all in vain. In 1917, Yeats proposed to the young Iseult Gonne (1894-1954), daughter of Maud and the Boulangist MP Lucien Millevoye, who also refused, but became attached to Yeats as a father figure. Iseult Gonne met Rabindranath Tagore personally in 1913; inspired by his poetry, she began learning Bengali and translated Le Jardinier d'amour into French with Devabrata Mukerjea. Some underlining and reading marks in pen. Handwritten note at the bottom of p. 46 on the notion of unbroken perfection. Small tears at the head of a few leaves; pp. 5-6 a little creased. Attached is an autograph poem signed by Rabindranath Tagore, copied onto an in-4 sheet of laid paper and dated July 28, 1926; it is poem no. 58 in the collection (pp. 33-34).