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Audiobook editionPaperback · 6 × 9 in · 154 pagesHardcover · 6 × 9 in · 154 pagesAbout this book
An empty palace draws a traveller toward vanished pleasures, while ordinary homes hold their own kinds of longing.
In Rabindranath Tagore’s The Hungry Stones, and Other Stories, haunted places stand beside intimate family lives. In the title story, a traveller recalls staying in an old palace while working as a tax collector. Its rooms seem empty, yet traces of another age begin to threaten his attachment to ordinary life.
Elsewhere, the ache lies closer to home. The Home-coming follows a country boy living with relatives in Calcutta, far from familiar places and affection. In The Cabuliwallah, a little girl befriends an Afghan trader. Alongside fable and tales that blur life and death, these stories explore love, wounded pride, and the pressures of social custom.
What you’ll discover
- An alluring, haunted palace Enter rooms where vanished pleasures stir, and unanswered questions deepen the pull of the past.
- Childhood far from home Feel a country boy’s homesickness as familiar places and affection slip beyond his reach.
- Friendship across distant households Meet a little girl and an Afghan trader whose playful bond carries a father’s longing.
- Devotion tangled with guilt My Lord, the Baby brings a servant’s loyalty into painful contact with loss and family demands.
- Pride met with compassion The Babus of Nayanjore finds both mockery and tenderness in a family’s faded standing.
Who will love it
Readers who love ghost stories, fairy tales, family dramas and gentle satire will enjoy this collection. It suits those drawn to Bengal's village and city life and to themes of love, duty and pride.
What’s inside
The key ideas, in the 15-minute summary
- A beautiful past can take hold
- Feeling matters more than clever display
- Quiet love can go unseen
- Living wishes unsettle fixed rules
- Women exceed the roles they inherit
- Laughter exposes the supports of pride
- Custom divides while kindness draws close
- Small scenes carry large human questions
- The heart knows beyond argument
Who’s who
- PhatikA restless village boy, leader of his friends, who is sent to his uncle's city home and longs to return to his mother.
- RaicharanA devoted servant who cares for his master's baby son and loves the child more than anything in his own life.
- KumoA young wife who loses her sight and tries to keep her husband's love and goodness alive with patience and courage.
- KadambiniA widow who loves her nephew like a son and wakes in a cremation ground, unsure whether she is alive or dead.
- Kailas BabuThe last of a ruined family of great landowners, who guards his dignity and boasts of Nayanjore to every neighbor.
- ShekharA court poet who sings for a princess he has never seen and faces a proud rival in a contest of words.
- RahmunA fruit seller from Kabul who befriends a little Calcutta girl and carries an ink impression of his own daughter's hand.
- MiniA five-year-old who chatters all day, fears the stranger with the bag, and then becomes his friend.
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The Hungry Stones, and Other Stories
by Rabindranath Tagore · 1916
A tax collector hears bathing girls on the empty steps of a marble palace at Barich and cannot stay away.
Medium level2–5 hours to read20 languages
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“There happen more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are reported in your newspapers.”
In short
Why would a tax collector hurry home each evening to a deserted marble palace where he has been warned never to sleep? That is the first question in The Hungry Stones, and Rabindranath Tagore lets it pull you in before you can answer.
The Hungry Stones, and Other Stories at a glance
- Reading time
- About 3 h 10 min2 h 30 min fast, 3 h 45 min slow
- Length
- 44,600 words
- Library level
- Medium longer sentences, everyday words
- First published
- 1916by Rabindranath Tagore
Reading time at 238 words a minute (fast 300, slow 200). How long the classics take to read · Updated
From the 15-minute summary · Key idea 1
A haunted palace slowly claims its tax collector
The Hungry Stones begins on a train. Two travellers heading back to Calcutta meet a stranger who talks as if he knew every secret of the age. While they wait at a junction, he tells them how he once served as a young collector of cotton duties at Barich.
Above a flight of 150 steps stands a marble palace built about 250 years earlier by an emperor for his pleasure. The old clerk Karim Khan warns the young man to spend his days there but never his nights. He dismisses the warning with a laugh.
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A tax collector hears bathing girls on the empty steps of a marble palace at Barich and cannot stay away.
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Details
- First published
- 1916
- Language
- English
- Reading time
- 3 h 30 min
- Level
- Medium level
- Paperback
- 154 pages · 6 × 9 in
- Hardcover
- 154 pages · 6 × 9 in
- Large print paperback
- 240 pages · 6 × 9 in
- Large print hardcover
- 240 pages · 6 × 9 in
- Delivery and returns
- Printed when you order. Usually here in 12 to 14 days.Arrives Wed 2 Dec to Tue 8 Decto United States, printed for you at cost
For Christmas, order by Thu 12 Nov
Cite this edition
Tagore, Rabindranath. The Hungry Stones, and Other Stories. Library of Alexandria, 2026, libraryofalexandria.com/products/the-hungry-stones-and-other-stories.
Tagore, R. (2026). The hungry stones, and other stories. Library of Alexandria. https://libraryofalexandria.com/products/the-hungry-stones-and-other-stories (Original work published 1916)
Tagore, Rabindranath. The Hungry Stones, and Other Stories. Library of Alexandria, 2026. https://libraryofalexandria.com/products/the-hungry-stones-and-other-stories.
@book{tagore2026hungry,
author = {Tagore, Rabindranath},
title = {The Hungry Stones, and Other Stories},
publisher = {Library of Alexandria},
year = {2026},
url = {https://libraryofalexandria.com/products/the-hungry-stones-and-other-stories},
note = {First published 1916}
}
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What is The Hungry Stones about?
The title story follows a young tax collector who moves into a lonely marble palace at Barich. The old house begins to draw him into dreams of its past, while his clerk warns him never to spend the night there.
What other stories are in The Hungry Stones and Other Stories?
The book holds thirteen tales, including The Victory, The Home-Coming, My Lord the Baby, The Kingdom of Cards, The Devotee, Vision, Living or Dead?, The Renunciation and The Cabuliwallah.
Who is the Cabuliwallah?
He is Rahmun, a fruit seller from Kabul who walks the streets of Calcutta. He befriends a chattering five-year-old girl named Mini, though her mother fears him, and he keeps a small keepsake of his own daughter.
The author
Rabindranath Tagore
1861–1941 · Bengali poet and philosopher
Rabindranath Tagore (1861–1941) was a Bengali poet and writer born in Calcutta, British India, where he also died. He lived in Bengal and founded a school at Santiniketan in 1901. He wrote poetry, stories, plays and essays. His Bengali collection Gitanjali appeared in 1910; his English version appeared in 1912.
“There happen more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are reported in your newspapers.”
More by Rabindranath Tagore
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