Prof. Shyamal Kumar Sarkar laid down a valuable discussion on these 12 poems, Titled "The Manuscript of Gitanjali ; A supplementary Note" (vide V/B.Q.,Vol.44. nos 3 & 4 /150-75) This has been preserved in Rabindrabhavan transforming into Micro-film by Prof.sarkar. This microfilm revealed that Yeats suggested 3 corrections for the first one and 4 corrections for the second one in these two poems ( it was written by pencil on the original manuscript). Among these corrections one in the first one and four in the second one has been accepted during final print. On scruitiny of the manuscript and the printed book contained some small changes which are visible..It seems that these changes have been made during joint reading of the manuscript.
Prof. Sourindra Mitra discussed in detail about these corrections;
Observaions:
1. The no. of words in the manuscript of 83 poems : about ten thousands
2. It reveals from the printed book no. of corrections
in words .............................................................: 45 only
3. No. of sentences in the 83 poems ........................: about 500
4. No. of sentences where corrections are made ......: 43 maximum, moreover
5. No. of minute changes in changing a word, or
changing the order of the word or deleted or any
comma or foolstop, taking each as one unit.........: about 250; i.e. 1/40 of the total no. of words.
On a random verification it is seen that the observations made by Prof.Mitra is almost correct.
Reviewing all these discussions, Ernest Rhys, Secretary of Everyman's Library Series remarked that "....it has been rumoured by sceptical critics in India that Gitanjali was in the process indebted to an English Ghost ; and the name of Mr. W.B. Yeats has been particularly associated with this mysterious office, thanks, it may be, to his known uncanny powers. It may be as well to say, then, that the small manuscript book in which the author made these new English versions when he was on his way here in 1912, is still in the possession of Mr. W. Rothenstein ; and any one who takes the trouble to compare the pocket book with the printed text will find that the variations are of the slightest, while in certain instances the printed reading may be criticised as not an improvement on those in the Ms.
There were some serious changes other than these . Those changes were the formation of paragraphs and poetic metres. But it was not known by whom the changes were made. No reliable information was available about this.
