Free Essays on Rudyard Kipling

Rudyard Kipling Rudyard Kipling, born in Bombay, India, on December 30, 1865, made a significant contribution to English Literature in various genres including poetry, short story and novel. His birth took place in an affluent family with his father holding the post of Professor of Architectural Sculpture at the Bombay School of Art and his mother coming from a family of accomplished women. He spent his early childhood in India where an "aya" took care of him and where under her influence he came in direct contact with the Indian culture and traditions. His parents decided to send him to England for education and so at the young age of five he started living in England with Madam Rosa, the landlady of the lodge he lived in, where for the next six years he lived a life of misery due to the mistreatment - beatings and general victimization - he faced there. Due to this sudden change in environment and the evil treatment he received, he suffered from insomnia for the rest of his life. This played an im portant part in his literary imagination. His parents removed him from the Calvinistic foster home and placed him in a private school at the age of twelve. The English schoolboy code of honor and duty affected his views in later life, especially when it involved loyalty to a group or a team. Returning to India in 1882 he worked as a newspaper reporter and a part-time writer and this helped him to gain a rich experience of colonial life which he later presented in his stories and poems. In 1886 he published his first volume of poetry, "Departmental Ditties" and between 1887 and 1889 he published six volumes of short stories set in and concerned with the India he had come to know and love so well. When he returned to England he found himself already recognized and acclaimed as a brilliant writer. Over the immediately following years he published some of his best works including his most acclaimed poem "Recessional" and most famed novel "... Free Essays on Rudyard Kipling Free Essays on Rudyard Kipling "If" ,written as a pendant to the story "Brothers Square-Toes," in Rewards and Fairies, deals with the misunderstandings and public pressures that confront statesmen, the ability to master of one’s dreams and thoughts and the capacity to take triumphs and loses in the stride without complaining (Henn, T.R.). This poem offers certain moral propositions - courage, reticent stoicism and supreme value of work (Henn, T.R.). Describing a person’s ability to resist one’s emotions even when a "loving [friend]" perpetrates an atrocity, as a virtue gives an ironical meaning to "loving friends" and suggests a quality of friendship less than the generally desired level, proves as the one flaw that plagues this poem (Henn, T.R.). This flaw offsets itself by the poem’s ability to relate to the moral values of plain-folks. By studying the variety of his poetry which included hymns and ballads we can see the diversity of his works and his greatness lies in the fact that he received recognition for not just one but various types of poetry. Variety in poetry also reflects the innate capabilities of a poet and the development in an authors poetic abilities over time. Right through his life Kipling experimented with various forms of poetry. Starting of with brief witty verses he went on to create some of the most memorable poems in English Literature. This reflects the improvement in poetic skills that he underwent throughout his career. Among these poetic skills, brilliant and rhetorical verse and power, originality and sincerity form the corner stone of his works. His capability to combine strength and exactness without sacrificing one for the other amazes critics even today. Kipling displays his real strength in fluency of rhyme, control of rhythm, and an intense awareness of the dramatic possibilities o f different patterns (Henn, T.R.). His innate ability to reach the literary class who reads for style, the average reader who reads for amuseme... Free Essays on Rudyard Kipling Rudyard Kipling Rudyard Kipling, born in Bombay, India, on December 30, 1865, made a significant contribution to English Literature in various genres including poetry, short story and novel. His birth took place in an affluent family with his father holding the post of Professor of Architectural Sculpture at the Bombay School of Art and his mother coming from a family of accomplished women. He spent his early childhood in India where an "aya" took care of him and where under her influence he came in direct contact with the Indian culture and traditions. His parents decided to send him to England for education and so at the young age of five he started living in England with Madam Rosa, the landlady of the lodge he lived in, where for the next six years he lived a life of misery due to the mistreatment - beatings and general victimization - he faced there. Due to this sudden change in environment and the evil treatment he received, he suffered from insomnia for the rest of his life. This played an im portant part in his literary imagination. His parents removed him from the Calvinistic foster home and placed him in a private school at the age of twelve. The English schoolboy code of honor and duty affected his views in later life, especially when it involved loyalty to a group or a team. Returning to India in 1882 he worked as a newspaper reporter and a part-time writer and this helped him to gain a rich experience of colonial life which he later presented in his stories and poems. In 1886 he published his first volume of poetry, "Departmental Ditties" and between 1887 and 1889 he published six volumes of short stories set in and concerned with the India he had come to know and love so well. When he returned to England he found himself already recognized and acclaimed as a brilliant writer. Over the immediately following years he published some of his best works including his most acclaimed poem "Recessional" and most famed novel "...