Brief biography of the poet, basic facts of life and work:
RUDYARD KIPLING (1865-1936)
Joseph Rudyard Kipling was born on December 30, 1865 in Bombay, where his family then lived. The Kiplings were poor people, without capital, and lived on what they earned through personal labor.
John Lockwood Kipling, the father of the future poet, was a sculptor and decorator, but could not achieve recognition in England. In search of fortune, the family moved to India. John taught at the Bombay School of Art and became a major expert on the history of Indian art. He later received a prestigious and well-paid position as curator of the Museum of Indian Art in Lahore, the then artistic capital of India, where he did much to preserve the original forms of Indian art. The memory of Kipling the Elder is still revered in the country of yogis.
Rudyard's mother, Alice (MacDonald) Kipling, came from a prominent London family and wrote for local magazines.
The father of little Rudyard and his younger sister Alice was a Portuguese Roman Catholic. And the Hindu porter Mita was also looking after the boy. Thanks to his environment, Hindi became the baby’s first language. Subsequently, the poet said that as a child he spoke English, translating words from the local dialect in which he thought.
In order for the children to learn their native language well, six-year-old Rudyard and little Ellis were sent to England, in the care of people found through a newspaper advertisement. This modest private boarding house was run by the widow of a dead sailor, Mrs. Holloway. She immediately disliked the independent boy, and years of moral and physical torment began for Rudyard. This lasted for six whole years! In the end, the child's nerves could not stand it. After a particularly humiliating punishment (for some insignificant offense the boy was forced to go to school with the inscription “liar” on his chest), Rudyard became seriously ill and completely lost his sight for several months. They were afraid that the poor thing might go crazy.
But the mother arrived, found out about everything that had happened to the children during the years of their absence, and took them away from the boarding house.
From 1878 to 1882, Rudyard attended school on the other side of England. United Service College, according to Kipling himself, “was a kind of partnership organized by poor officers and other people of small means for the inexpensive education of their sons. It was located in the town of Westwood Howe, near Bideford. It was practically a caste school: about seventy-five percent of its students were born outside England and intended to follow in the footsteps of their fathers to join the army.”
Already in college, Rudyard chose his life path- he decided to become a writer. Therefore, immediately after graduation, and this happened in 1882, the young man returned to India, to Lahore, where his parents had moved. Rudyard was assigned to the position of assistant editor (actually a reporter) at the editorial office of the daily Civil and Military Newspaper, and he was even immediately given a salary that was quite decent for a beginner.
The newspaper was published for a very narrow circle of people - seventy officials of the Indian civil service and several hundred officers from military units located in Northern India. To the surprise of the seventeen-year-old boy, all the newspaper work fell on his shoulders. The publication's staff was still only editor-in-chief. Kipling had to work ten to fifteen hours a day. In addition to collecting reporting materials and writing articles, it was necessary to monitor the native typesetters, who did not speak a word of English, and to do proofreading work, since the local proofreaders drank heavily. In such conditions, the newspaper had to be published daily and on time. In search of newspaper material, I had to move around the country a lot and write, write, write...
One day, Rudyard's mother discovered a notebook with his school poems, read it and published it at her own expense. But Kipling himself identified the beginning of his literary activity in 1886, when his poetic “Department Songs” and his first prose collection “Simple Stories from the Mountains” were published in India. The circulation of “Songs” was very limited, but it was sold out instantly, so we had to re-release it the same year.
In 1887, Kipling went to work for the Pioneer newspaper, published in Allahabad, hundreds of miles south of Lahore. The weekly Pioneer supplement was distributed in England. Since the newspaper constantly published Kipling's poems and stories, he became famous in the metropolis.
This continued until 1889, when the poet sold to his publisher the rights to everything he had written for six years for 250 pounds and, receiving a severance package equal to six months' salary, set off for England via Japan and the United States. In October of the same year, Rudyard arrived in the capital and almost immediately became a celebrity.
In 1890, Kipling met the American writer and businessman Walcott Balestier, and they decided to write the adventure novel Naulaka together. The American part of the novel was to be written by Balestier, the Indian part by Kipling. In 1891, the novel was completed, but Kipling alone had to finalize it. At the end of 1891, Balestier went to Germany on business, contracted typhoid fever there and died.
Five weeks after the death of his co-author, Rudyard married his sister Caroline, and the newlyweds went to honeymoon- first to Canada and the USA, and then to Japan, where Kipling learned that his bank had burst and he was ruined. Using the loan, the newlyweds returned to the United States, to Caroline’s homeland in Brattleboro, Vermont. Soon after this, The Ballad of East and West was published, marking the beginning of a new style of English versification. The poet gained worldwide fame. And on December 29, 1892, his first daughter Josephine was born in Vermont.
During the four years he lived in America, Kipling created his best works. These are stories included in the collections “Mass of Fiction” and “Works of the Day”, poems about ships, about the sea and pioneer sailors, collected in the book “Seven Seas”. And one day in 1894, the American children's writer Mary Elizabeth Mapes Dodge, author of the popular book The Silver Skates, asked Kipling to write about the Indian jungle. Memories of his youth completely captured the writer. Soon the first “Jungle Book” was ready, the main part of which was stories about Mowgli. The success of the book was so great that the author, right on the heels of it, created the second “Jungle Book”.
The Kiplings' life in New England ended in an absurd quarrel with their brother-in-law. In the USA, a young family settled on a plot of land that previously belonged to Caroline’s brother, Biddy. The plot was soon purchased, but one day Biddy decided that his relatives were using the land incorrectly. The farmer became furious and promised to “blow Kipling’s brains out.” Rudyard seriously imagined that Biddy intended to kill him, and sued. A scandal broke out. And then at the family council it was decided to leave for England. This happened in 1896. Soon after the move, the Kiplings had a daughter, Elsie, and then a son, John, was born.
In 1899, Rudyard Kipling visited the United States for the last time. Here he and his beloved daughter Josephine fell ill with pneumonia. The girl died.
When the Anglo-Boer War began, Kipling boldly came out in support of it, which greatly undermined his reputation in the eyes of the democratic intelligentsia. In defiance of the demagogues, the writer became a bosom friend of the richest man in the British Empire, the master of South Africa, Cecil Rhodes. The billionaire learned that doctors recommended that the writer, who had weak lungs, live more often in South Africa, and gave the poet a new house not far from his residence. This monastery became the favorite refuge of the Kipling family for many years.
Kipling openly called himself an imperialist at a time when rabid freedom fighters (as in our days) publicly persecuted anyone who even hinted at their patriotic views.
The novel “Kim,” published in 1901, immediately received great recognition and brought significant capital to the author. This allowed the Kiplings to buy the Batemans estate in Sussex, which became the writer's main abode until his death.
At the beginning of the century, Kipling was active politically, spoke out in support of conservatives and against feminism and Irish Home Rule, and warned of an impending war with Germany.
In 1907, Rudyard Kipling was the first Englishman to be awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature. Immediately after receiving the prize, the writer was elected honorary doctor of the Universities of Oxford, Cambridge, Edinburgh and Durham; he was awarded by the universities of Paris, Strasbourg, Athens and Toronto.
From now on, Kipling began to receive legendary fees - a shilling per word. Each of his words was worth fifty kopecks in gold with our money. Dickens himself did not earn even a tenth of that kind of money.
Why was Kipling's work so valued? First of all, because of its extraordinary influence on the English reader, primarily on the military. According to numerous testimonies of contemporaries, right up to the First World War, most British officers diligently imitated the lifestyle and structure of speech of the courageous heroes from the stories of the “iron Rudyard”, and the Anglo-Indians he praised tried their best to live up to their “neo-romantic” image, which flattered their provincial pride .
It seemed that the time had come for calm rich life. But the First World War began. Kipling and his wife began working for the Red Cross. And in 1915, eighteen-year-old John Kipling, the only son of the writer, went missing to serve in the Irish Guards regiment.
From that time on, Rudyard Kipling's life seemed to stand still. But the war ended, and Kipling was drawn to travel. He traveled especially often to Europe as a member of the War Graves Commission. During one of these trips to France in 1922, the poet met the English King George V, and so began their great long-term friendship. During this period, the writer joined the right wing of the Conservative Party.
The long-term campaign of the democratic public of Europe to discredit the great writer eventually bore fruit. Despite the fact that last decades Kipling wrote a lot during his life, the general reader turned away from him. “Progressive” criticism declared that his work was hopelessly outdated.
Since 1915, the writer suffered from gastritis, which later developed into an ulcer. Rudyard Kipling died in London from intestinal bleeding on January 18, 1936. The writer was buried in Poets' Corner in Westminster Abbey.
Rudyard Kipling (1865-1936)
At the end of the 20th century, that is, quite recently, the English radio station BBC asked its listeners to name, in their opinion, the best poems of English poets. Thousands of people responded. The BBC published a book, The Nation's Favorite Poems, based on this survey. My favorite poem was “The Commandment” by Rudyard Kipling. This book opens to them.
But English poetry is very rich in names and masterpieces.
Let's quote this poem in full. Translated by M. Lozinsky.
Commandment
Control yourself among the confused crowd,
Cursing you for the confusion of everyone,
Believe in yourself, despite the universe,
And forgive those of little faith their sin;
Even if the hour has not struck, wait without getting tired,
Let liars lie - do not condescend to them;
Know how to forgive and don’t appear to be forgiving,
More generous and wiser than others.
Learn to dream without becoming a slave to dreams,
And think without deifying thoughts;
Meet success and reproach equally,
Stay quiet when it's your word
The rogue cripples to catch fools,
When your whole life is destroyed and again
You have to recreate everything from the basics.
Know how to put, in joyful hope,
On the card is everything that I have saved with difficulty,
Lose everything and become a beggar, as before,
And never regret it
Know how to force your heart, nerves, body
Serve you when in your chest
Everything has been empty for a long time, everything has burned down
And only the Will says: “Go!”
Stay simple when talking with kings,
Stay honest when speaking to a crowd;
Be straight and firm with enemies and friends,
Let everyone, in their own time, consider you;
Fill every moment with meaning
Hours and days are an inexorable rush, -
Then you will take possession of the whole world,
Then, my son, you will be a Man!
In the original, this poem is called IF—, so some translators give it the title “If ...”, which is how this word is translated into Russian. Lozinsky gave it the name “Commandment”, based on the solemn seriousness of tone and content.
Nowadays, Russian readers know Kipling primarily from the book (or cartoon) about Mowgli, from the funny song:
On the distant Amazon
I've never been.
Only “Don” and “Magdalene” -
Fast ships -
Only "Don" and "Magdalene"
They walk on the sea there...
There is another widely known song, more precisely, a romance from the film, sung by Nikita Mikhalkov:
The furry bumblebee is for fragrant hops,
Moth - on meadow bindweed,
And the gypsy goes where his will leads,
For your gypsy star!
And together along the path, towards fate,
Without wondering whether to hell or heaven.
This is how you have to go, without fear of the path,
Whether to the ends of the earth or beyond!
So forward - behind the gypsy nomadic star -
At sunset, where the sails tremble,
And the eyes look with homeless melancholy
Into the purple skies.
True, for some reason they never say that this romance was written based on poems by Kipling, and the translation was by G. Kruzhkov.
Classic English literature, poet and novelist Joseph Rudyard Kipling was born on December 30, 1865 in Bombay into the family of a sculptor. His father went to India with his young wife in search of permanent income. Until the age of six, the boy lived in a friendly family, in his own home, where Indian nannies and servants took care of his upbringing. Of course, in these early years the English boy absorbed India, as they say, with his mother’s milk, which was later reflected so strongly in his work.
Rudyard's parents sent him to school in England, to a private boarding school. The writer called this time of his life “The House of Despair.” The owner of this “House” did not like the independent boy and constantly mocked him. He will describe all this later in the story - “Meh, black sheep...”.
Once this mistress, for some offense, hung a sign on the boy’s chest saying “liar” and forced him to walk around the school like that. His nerves could not stand it and he became seriously ill. His mother arrived and took him back to India. Here he completed his education, also in a rather strict school, where, as they said, they trained “builders of the Empire.” He spoke about these years in the book “Stokes and Company.” Here he gained respect for Order and Discipline, which in fact he would later sing about.
At the age of seventeen, Rudyard decided that he would be a writer. To begin with, he becomes a colonial newspaperman. He writes reports about wars and epidemics, writes gossip columns, and interviews a variety of people. He is reputed to be an expert local customs and morals, even the British commander-in-chief, Earl Roberts of Kandahar, is interested in his opinion.
Kipling travels a lot - China, Japan, America, Australia, Africa. In 1890 he returned to England, then he would live in his wife’s homeland in the USA, in the state of Vermont, where, by the way, our compatriot Alexander Solzhenitsyn lived for many years in the 20th century. In 1902, after traveling as a correspondent to the war in South Africa, he settled permanently in England.
Kipling began to write both poetry and prose at the same time. Fame came to him immediately after his first publications. In England in those years, books written on exotic themes were popular - Stevenson's Treasure Island, Haggard's King Solomon's Mines. So Kipling's works came in handy.
And the British interest in all this is understandable. The British Empire was still developing new colonies and was proud of itself.
India is a country where two great cultures came into contact - “West and East”, stanzas from his “Ballad of East and West” were often quoted:
Oh, West is West, East is East, and they will not move from their place,
Until Heaven and Earth appear at the Last Judgment of the Lord.
It must be said that Kipling never belittled or denied the merits of Asian culture. He patiently tried to understand the internal law of the East, tried to decipher its code. Kipling's best novel, Kim (1901), tells exactly this. The main character rushes between Eastern and Western value systems, ultimately choosing the West, but yearning for the East.
One of the main and even the first theme of Kipling’s work is the theme of Empire. As experts write, “imperial messianism became his religion, and with the fervor of an apostle, he rushed to convert the entire globe to it.”
Kipling creates the myth of the Empire. As a Christian, he believes that only in the Empire a person remains a true Christian, only the Empire strengthens the Faith and preserves the Faith. The Empire is given the power to bring “great goals” to the lower races for their own good. He sees the conquest of new colonies as selfless sacrifice, as a “white burden,” as service, as the fulfillment of the moral Law.
Both in poetry and in prose, Kipling glorifies courage, energy, devotion, and perseverance. For Kipling, what is important first of all is the deed, the accomplishment of a person, and not his inner world. His heroes are sometimes extremely simple, selfless workers, soldiers. He respects their work, their feat. They bear the “white burden.” This is what the poem “Dust” is about.
Dust (Infantry Columns)
Day-night-day-night - we are walking across Africa,
Day-night-day-night - all in the same Africa.
(Dust-dust-dust-dust - from walking boots)
There is no vacation in war!
Eight-six-twelve-five - twenty miles this time,
Three-twelve-twenty-two—eighteen miles yesterday.
There is no vacation in war!
Throw-throw-throw-throw - see what's ahead.
(Dust-dust-dust-dust - from walking boots!)
All-all-all-all - they'll go crazy over her,
And there is no vacation during war!
You-you-you-you - try to think about something else,
God give me strength - not completely crazy!
(Dust-dust-dust-dust - from walking boots!)
And there is no vacation during war!
Count-count-count-count - lead the bullets in your sash,
A little bit of sleep takes over - the rear ones will crush you.
(Dust-dust-dust-dust - from walking boots!)
There is no vacation in war!
For us, everything is nonsense - hunger, thirst, a long journey,
But no, no, no - worse than always one thing -
Dust-dust-dust-dust - from walking boots,
And there is no vacation during war!
During the day we are all here - and it’s not so hard,
But the darkness lay a little - again only heels.
(Dust-dust-dust-dust - from walking boots!)
There is no vacation in war!
I-went-through-hell for six weeks and I swear
There-is-no-darkness - no braziers, no devils,
But dust-dust-dust-dust - from walking boots,
And there is no vacation during war!
(Translation by A. Onoshkovich-Yatsyts)
In 1907, Kipling was awarded the Nobel Prize.
In Russia, Kipling was very popular during the Civil War. If before this, perhaps, only Gumilyov at first relied on the work of Kipling, then the Soviet poets Vladimir Lugovskoy, Nikolai Tikhonov, Eduard Bagritsky and many others imitated him with might and main.
K. Simonov wrote that young Soviet poets liked Kipling “for his courageous style, his soldierly severity, sharpness and clearly expressed masculine, masculine and soldierly."
In Russia, Kipling is published a lot and, note, in very good translations.
* * *You read the biography (facts and years of life) in a biographical article dedicated to the life and work of the great poet.
Thanks for reading. ............................................
Copyright: biographies of the lives of great poets
English writer, poet and short story writer Joseph Rudyard Kipling was born on December 30, 1865 in Bombay. Presumably, Rudyard received his name in honor of the English lake near which his parents met. The boy's father, John Lockwood Kipling, was a major expert on the history of Indian art, as well as the director of the museum. His mother, Alice Kipling, came from a prominent London family, and both grandfathers were Methodist ministers. The future writer spent his childhood in exotic India. Perhaps these were the happiest years in Rudyard's life. However, at the age of five, he and his sister went to study in England. For six years he lived in a private boarding house, whose owner, Madame Rosa, treated the boy poorly. This attitude affected Kipling so much that he suffered from insomnia for the rest of his life. The experiences of a child persecuted by a cruel boarding house owner were reflected in the short story "Black Sheep" ("Baa Baa, Black Sheep"), published in 1888, and in an autobiography published in 1937.
At the age of 12, Rudyard's parents sent him to a private Devon school so that he could then enter a prestigious military academy. The school director, Cormell Price, was a friend of the father of the future writer. It was he who encouraged the boy's love for literature. Kipling was shortsighted, which prevented him from choosing a military career. Impressed by the stories written at school, his father found Rudyard a job as a journalist in the editorial office of the Civil and Military Newspaper, published in Lahore, now Pakistan. In October 1882, Kipling Jr. returned to India and decided to take up journalism. In his spare time, Rudyard wrote short stories and poems, which were then published in the newspaper along with reports. The work of a reporter helped the writer better understand various aspects of the country's colonial life. In 1883, his works began to be sold for the first time.
In the mid-80s, Kipling traveled around Asia and the United States as a correspondent for the Allahabad newspaper Pioneer, with which he signed a contract to write travel essays. Kipling's popularity as a writer grew rapidly. In 1888 and 1889, six books of his stories were published, which brought him recognition, notably "Soldiers Three" and "Wee Willie Winkie". At the same time, in 1888, a collection of laconic, often crude stories about the life of British India - “Plain Tales from the Hills” - was published.
In 1889, Rudyard Kipling made a long trip to England and then went to Burma, China and Japan. After some time, the writer returned to London, where he was recognized as the literary heir of Charles Dickens. In 1890, Kipling's first novella, "The Light That Failed", was published, and the most famous poems of that time were "The Ballad of East and West" and "The Last Song of Honest Thomas "("The Last Rhime of True Thomas").
While in London, Rudyard met the young American publisher Walcott Balestier, with whom the writer began working on the story “The Naulahka”. However, in 1892, Balestier died of typhus, and shortly after, on January 18 of that year, Kipling married his sister Caroline. During his honeymoon, the bank in which Kipling had all his savings went bankrupt. The couple only had enough money to get to Vermont, where Balestier’s relatives lived. The couple moved back in, renting a small house for just $10 a month. Meanwhile, Caroline was expecting her first child. For the next four years the Kiplings lived there.
In 1893, Kipling published a collection of short stories, Many Inventions, and in 1894 and 1895, the famous The Jungle Book and The Second Jungle Book were published. ). The collections of poetry “The White Theses” and “The Seven Seas” were also published, which collected poems about ships, the sea and pioneer sailors.
Soon the couple had two children - Josephine and Elsie. However, after a quarrel with his brother-in-law in 1896, Kipling and his wife returned to England. His story “Captains Courageous” was published in 1897, and a collection of short stories, “The Day’s Work,” was published in 1898. The writer continued to work hard, but suddenly his The family suffered a tragedy - in 1899, during a visit to the United States, his eldest daughter Josephine died of pneumonia, which was a huge shock for the writer.
That same year, having somehow recovered from the death of his daughter, he spent several months in South Africa, where he met Cecil Rhodes, a symbol of British imperialism. And already in 1901, the novel “Kim” was published, which describes the adventures of a “native-born boy” and a Buddhist monk wandering around India. This novel is still considered one of the best works of the writer. In Africa, Rudyard began selecting material for a new children's book, which was published in 1902 under the title Just So Stories. That same year, the writer bought a country house in Sussex, where he decided to settle for the rest of his life. It was there that from his pen the famous books "Puck of Pook's Hill" and "Rewards and Fairies" came out - tales of Old England, united by the narrator - the elf Puck, taken from the plays Shakespeare. Simultaneously with his literary activity, Kipling wanted to try himself in the field of politics. He wrote about the impending war with Germany, and also spoke out in support of conservatives and against feminism.
But Kipling's literary activity became less and less intense. Another blow for the writer was the death of his only son, John, in 1915. At the same time, Rudyard and his wife began working for the Red Cross. After the war, the writer became a member of the War Graves Commission. It was he who chose the biblical phrase “Their names will live forever,” which was written on the obelisks of memory. In 1917, Kipling's collection of short stories, A Diversity of Creatures, was published. During one trip to France in 1922, Rudyard met the English King George V, with whom he later developed a long and warm friendship.
Rudyard Kipling continued his literary activity until the early 30s, although success accompanied him less and less. In 1923, he published a book, The Irish Guards in the Great War, dedicated to the regiment in which his son served, and in 1926, a collection of short stories, Debits and Credits. and Credits"). Since 1915, the writer suffered from gastritis, which later turned into a stomach ulcer. It was she who caused Kipling's death on January 18, 1936 in London, three days before George V. Rudyard Kipling was buried in Poets' Corner in Westminster Abbey.
Kipling became one of the most popular writers of his time, both in prose and poetry. Kipling's autobiography, Something of Myself, was published posthumously in 1937. The work of this talented writer still inspires many; he has been admired by more than one generation. Rudyard Kipling put his whole soul into his works, and they, in turn, left an indelible imprint on world literature. In his 1977 biography of Kipling, The Mysterious Travels of Rudyard Kipling: His Books and Life, English writer and critic Angus Wilson wrote: “Kipling’s passionate interest in people, their language, their affairs and concerns is the essence of the magical charm of all his works.”
Three Soldiers (1888, collection)
In Black and White (1888)
Under the Deodars (1888)
Life's Handicap (1891)
The Lights Gone Out (1891, novel)
Songs of the Barracks (1892, poetry)
A Mass of Fiction (1893, collection)
The Jungle Book (1894)
"Mowgli's Brothers" (short story)
"Tiger! Tiger!" (story)
"White Cat" (story)
"Lukannon" (poem)
"Rikki-Tikki-Tavi" (story)
"Little Toomai" (short story)
The Second Jungle Book (1895)
"Kabir's Song" (poem)
"Gravediggers" (short story)
"A Ripple Song" (poem)
"Royal Ankas" (short story)
"Quikvern" (short story)
""Angutivaun Taina"" (poem)
"Red Dogs" (story)
"Chil's Song" (poem)
"Spring" (story)
"The Outsong" (poem)
Works of the day (1898, collection)
A Fleet in Being (1898)
Ambushed (story)
Slaves of the Lamp - I (story)
Impressionists (story)
Under a False Flag (short story)
Last trimester (story)
Slaves of the Lamp - II (story)
Kim (1901, novel)
“How the leopard became spotted”
"Baby elephant"
"Old Kangaroo's Request"
"How did armadillos appear"
Weiland's Sword
The Brushwood Boy (1907)
Cold Iron
Gloriana
If... (If, poem)
Conversion of Saint Wilfrid
Simon Simple
Kipling in Soviet animation
1936 - Baby Elephant - black and white
1965 - Rikki-tikki-tavi
1967 - Baby Elephant
1967-1971 - Mowgli
1981 - Hedgehog plus turtle
18.01.1936
Rudyard Kipling
Joseph Rudyard Kipling
English Writer
Nobel laureate
Joseph Rudyard Kipling was born on December 30, 1865 in Bombay, India. His father, a major specialist in the history of Indian art, worked as a museum director. The mother came from a prominent London family. Both grandfathers were Methodist ministers. When the boy was six years old he was sent to England.
In 1882, sixteen-year-old Rudyard returned to India and found work as an assistant editor at a Lahore newspaper. The precocious young man surprised local society with his insightful judgments about the secret springs of colonial rule and his knowledge of India, gleaned mainly from conversations with his encyclopedically educated father.
Annual holidays in the Himalayan city of Simla became the source of many of the writer's works. Since 1889, Kipling traveled around the world, writing travel notes. In October he arrived in London and almost immediately became a celebrity. Starting with the “Ballad of East and West”, he moved towards a new style of English versification, creating “Songs of the Barracks”.
Soon, due to overwork, the writer’s health began to deteriorate, and most of He spent 1891 traveling around America and the British dominions. Returning in January 1892, he married the sister of the American publisher Balestier.
During the four years he lived in America, Kipling wrote his best works. These are stories included in the collections “A Mass of Fiction” and “Works of the Day”, as well as poems about ships, about the sea and pioneer sailors, collected in the book “Seven Seas”, and two “Jungle Books”. In 1896 he wrote the book “Brave Sailors”.
At the height of his fame and fortune, Kipling avoided publicity and refused the title of poet laureate and honors. In 1902 he settled in a remote village in Sussex. During this period, he published the novel “Kim,” his farewell to India, and then the children’s book “Fairy Tales for Just So.” The writer wrote until the early 1930s, but his works of the late 19th century remained the most famous.
The rich and metaphorical language of Kipling's works made a great contribution to the treasury of the English language. His best works are considered to be “The Jungle Book” and “Kim”. Kipling became the first English Nobel laureate in literature.
Rudyard Kipling died in London on January 18, 1936. Kipling's body was cremated at Golders Green Crematorium and his ashes were buried in Poets' Corner in Westminster Abbey.
Works of Rudyard Kipling
Department songs (1886, collection of poems)
Simple Stories from the Mountains (1888, collection)
Three Soldiers (1888, collection)
The Story of the Gadsbys (1888, novel)
In Black and White (1888)
Under the Deodars (1888)
The Phantom Rickshaw and other Eerie Tales (1888)
This collection contained the short story The Man Who Would Be King
Wee-Willie-Winky (1888, collection)
The collection includes Me-e's story, black sheep
Life's Handicap (1891)
The Lights Gone Out (1891, novel)
American Notes (1891, non-fiction)
Songs of the Barracks (1892, poetry)
Naulaka: A Story of West and East (1892, novel, co-authored with W. Balestier)
A Mass of Fiction (1893, collection)
The Jungle Book (1894)
"Mowgli's Brothers" (short story)
"Hunting-Song of the Seeonee Pack" (poem)
"The Hunt of the Python Kaa" (M) (short story)
“The Road Song of the Banderlogs” (poem)
"Tiger! Tiger!" (story)
"Mowgli's Song That He Sang at the Council Rock When He Danced on Shere Khan's Hide"
"White Cat" (story)
"Lukannon" (poem)
"Rikki-Tikki-Tavi" (story)
"Darzee's Chaunt (Song in Honor of Rikki-Tikki-Tavi)" (poem)
"Little Toomai" (short story)
"Shiv and the Grasshopper (The Song That Toomai's Mother Sang to the Baby)" (poem)
"Her Majesty's Men" (short story)
"Parade-Song of the Camp Animals" (poem)
The Second Jungle Book (1895)
"How Fear Came to the Jungle" (story)
"Law of the Jungle" (poem)
"The Miracle of Purun Bhagat" (story)
"Kabir's Song" (poem)
"Jungle Invasion" (short story)
"Mowgli's Song Against People" (poem)
"Gravediggers" (short story)
"A Ripple Song" (poem)
"Royal Ankas" (short story)
"The Song of the Little Hunter" (poem)
"Quikvern" (short story)
""Angutivaun Taina"" (poem)
"Red Dogs" (story)
"Chil's Song" (poem)
"Spring" (story)
"The Outsong" (poem)
Brave Captains (1896, novel for young people)
The Seven Seas (1896, collection of poems)
White Theses (1896, collection of poems)
Works of the day (1898, collection)
A Fleet in Being (1898)
Stalky and Co. (1899, novel, from several short stories)
Ambushed (story)
Slaves of the Lamp - I (story)
An Unappetizing Interlude (story)
Impressionists (story)
Moral Reformers (short story)
Preparatory lesson (story)
Under a False Flag (short story)
Last trimester (story)
Slaves of the Lamp - II (story)
From sea to sea (travel notes) (1899, reporter's prose)
Five Nations (1903, collection of poems)
Kim (1901, novel)
Just So Stories (1902)
“Why does a whale only eat small fish?”
“How a hump appeared on the camel’s back”
“How folds appeared on the skin of a rhinoceros”
“How the leopard became spotted”
"Baby elephant"
"Old Kangaroo's Request"
"How did armadillos appear"
"How the first letter was written"
“How the first alphabet was compiled”
"The Sea Crab Who Played with the Sea"
"The cat who walked wherever he wanted"
"The Moth Who Stomped His Foot"
Paths and Discoveries (1904, collection)
Puck of Pook’s Hill, 1906, fairy tales, poems and stories
Weiland's Sword
Puck's Song (poem)
Hymn to the Trees (Tree Song, poem)
Young Men at the Manor
Sir Richard's Song (poem)
The Knights of the Joyous Venture
Harp Song of the Dane Women, poem
Thorkild's Song (poem)
Old Men at Pevensey
The Runes on Weland's Sword (poem)
Centurion of the Thirtieth
What kingdoms, thrones, capitals... (Cities and Thrones and Powers, poem)
British Roman Song, poem
On the Great Wall
Rimini (Rimini, poem),
Song to Mithras (poem)
The Winged Hats
Pict Song (poem)
Hal the Artist (Hal o" the Draft)
Prophets at Home (poem)
Smuggler's Song (poem)
Flight from Dymchurch Flit
The Bee Boy's Song, poem
A Three-Part Song, poem
The Treasure and the Law
Song of the Fifth River (poem)
Children's Song (The Children's Song, poem)
The Brushwood Boy (1907)
Action and Reaction (1909, collection)
Awards and Fairies (1910, fairy tales, poems and stories)
Cold Iron
Amulet (a Charm, poem)
Cold Iron (poem)
Gloriana
Two Cousins (poem)
The Looking-Glass, poem
That, but not that! (The Wrong Thing)
A Truthful Song, poem
King Henry VII and the Shipwrights (poem)
Marklake Witches
The Way through the Woods, poem
Brookland Road (poem)
The Knife and the Naked Chalk
From East to West (The Run of the Downs, poem)
Song of the Men's Side, poem
Brother Square-Toes
Philadelphia (Philadelphia, poem)
If... (If, poem)
A Priest in Spite of Himself
Lullaby of St. Helena (St Helena Lullaby, poem)
Poor Honest Men, poem
Conversion of Saint Wilfrid
Eddie's Service, poem
Song of the Red War-Boat, poem
Doctor of Medicine
Astrologer's Song, poem
Our Fathers of Old, poem
Simon Simple
The Thousandth Man (poem)
Frankie's Trade (poem)
The Tree of Justice
"The Ballad of Minepit Shaw" (poem)
A Christmas Song (a Carol, poem) The White Seal (cartoon) (The White Seal) - dir. Chuck Jones (USA, 1975)
Rikki-Tikki-Tavi (cartoon) (Rikki-Tikki-Tavi) - dir. Chuck Jones (USA, 1975)
"Rikki-Tikki-Tavi" - dir. Alexander Zguridi (USSR-India, 1975)
Mowgli's Brothers (cartoon) - directed by Chuck Jones (USA, 1976)
"Kim" - dir. John Howard Davies (UK, 1984)
The Jungle Book (anime series, 52 episodes) - dir. Fumio Kurokawa (Japan (TV Tokyo) 1989-1990)
"The Jungle Book" - dir. Stephen Sommers (USA, 1994)
The Jungle Book: Mowgli's Story - directed by Nick Mark (USA, 1998)
"The Jungle Book" - dir. Jon Favreau (USA, 2016)
Kipling in Soviet animation
1936 - Baby Elephant - black and white
1936 - Brave Sailor - black and white
1938 - Why does a rhinoceros have folds in its skin - black and white
1965 - Rikki-tikki-tavi
1967 - Baby Elephant
1967-1971 - Mowgli
1968 - The cat who walked by himself
1981 - Hedgehog plus turtle
1984 - How the first letter was written
1988 - The cat that walked by itself
Rudyard Kipling received the Nobel Prize at 42, the youngest writer to win it. The reason for such unusual success should be seen primarily in his amazing talent.
“Kipling is completely independent. He is original like no other in modern literature. The power of the means that he possesses in his creativity is literally inexhaustible. The magical fascination of the plot, the extraordinary plausibility of the story, amazing observation, wit, brilliance of dialogue, scenes of proud and simple heroism, precise style, or rather dozens of precise styles, exotic themes, the abyss of knowledge and experience and much, much more make up Kipling’s artistic talents, with which he dominates with unheard-of power over the mind and imagination of the reader.”
For Kipling, there were no unsolvable problems. He brilliantly mastered and varied poetic form, and a short story, and a novel, and a fairy tale, and an essay. Kipling became a reformer of English verse, and his stories became an encyclopedia of plots. In total, Kipling published 37 independent books of fiction, including 24 collections of short stories, 5 books of poetry, 4 novels, 2 books of travel essays, 1 play and 1 critical study, as well as a number of pamphlets on political and social topics.
He wrote a lot about India, and in his view the local population - great people with a proud soul. In world literature, it was he who showed this for the first time. At the same time, Kipling clearly understands the difference between the worldview and mode of action of people of different races and peoples. In “The Ballad of East and West” this is expressed in the following lines:
Oh, West is West, East is East,
and they will not leave their places,
Until Heaven and Earth appear
at the Last Judgment of the Lord.
Translation by E. Polonskaya
The predominance of oriental themes in his work is not accidental. Kipling was born in Bombay, where his father, an aspiring artist, went with his young wife in search of a reliable income and a stable position in society. The boy grew up in a friendly family, where he was desperately pampered. Everything changed when six-year-old Rudyard, along with his younger sister Beatrice, was sent to England to receive an education. The children were taken into the care of distant relatives, who ran something like a private boarding house. Here everything was run by a cruel and absurd mistress. She did everything to suppress the boy's will, and brought him to a nervous illness, accompanied by temporary loss of vision. The six years spent in this hell left Rudyard with a lifelong trauma in his soul. In one of his stories, he wrote: “When a child’s lips had a chance to drink to the fullest of the bitter cup of Malice, Suspicion, Despair, all the Love in the world is not enough for one day what was known to be erased without a trace.”
After this, the boy was sent to a closed school in London for five years, where the future “builders of the Empire” were raised. What was required of the pupils was not so much knowledge as submission to paramilitary discipline. Staying on the scale had a decisive influence on the formation of the worldview of the future writer. instilling in him an admiration for order and organization.
The first collection of his poems, School Lyrics, was published in India when Kipling was 16 years old. This summed up the adolescent experiences. Returning in 1882 to Lahore (now one of the largest cities in Pakistan), where his father worked at that time, Rudyard Kipling actively took up journalism and literature. For five years he worked as a staff member and then as co-editor of the Civil and Military Gazette in Lahore. His duties included publishing a weekly supplement to the newspaper with entertaining features and stories. Since it was not possible to attract famous authors for this, the young journalist took up the work himself. Then he had the opportunity to collaborate in the same capacity in another newspaper, after which he moved to England, having previously traveled to Japan and the USA. Kipling last visited India at the age of 26, having previously visited South Africa (where, by the way, he subsequently went every summer), Australia and New Zealand. He soon married a young American woman and tried to settle in America, but life in the USA was darkened by the death of his eldest daughter, six-year-old Josephine, and from 1902 he settled in one of the towns of England, where he lived until the end of his days.
Kipling is characterized by an unusually early achievement of creative maturity. Already in the first book of poems, “Department Songs,” which was published when the author was only 21 years old, and in several collections of short stories that appeared in the next two years, the firm hand of the master was felt.
By the time of his Nobel glory, Kipling had written almost all of those works whose significance has survived to this day: the novel “The Light Has Gone Out,” reproducing the story of the author’s tragic youthful love, the story “Mowgli” about a boy living among animals, the novel “Kim” about an Indian teenager, in the spy service of the British, the book “Just So Fairy Tales for Little Children,” many stories and poems.
Kipling's fame was worldwide. And the reason for this is not only his rare talent, but also the fact that he was able to offer readers his own, non-standard vision of the world, his interpretation of universal human problems and personal problems. Irish poet William Bugler Yeats, a peer of Kipling who received the Nobel Prize 16 years later, called his generation tragic. It was this generation, the first in history, that had to face the collapse of the religious worldview, the result of which Friedrich Nietzsche summed up with the formula “God is dead!” Along with this loss, people lost their understanding of the highest meaning of the world, and the standards with which a person could compare his thoughts and actions were destroyed.
Many people were looking for a way out of this ideological catastrophe, including those who were on the list of Nobel Prize winners. Kipling, along with his generation, experienced horror at the empty Universe and tried to construct his own understanding of the new world. He saw the only salvation from its meaninglessness in action, sanctified by a higher, supra-individual goal. This is where Kipling's central idea was born - the idea of the highest moral Law, that is, the system of prohibitions and permissions dominating over man and society, the “rules of the game”, the violation of which is unacceptable. If you are a wolf, he claims, you are obliged to live by the Law of the Pack, if a sailor - by the Law of the Command, if an officer - by the Law of the Regiment. The highest law for him was the Law of the British Empire, in which he wanted to see a legislator and leader leading the “chosen peoples” to eschatological salvation.
The most gifted seer of disasters of the 20th century, George Orwell, who cannot be suspected of trying to reconcile his point of view with the canons of narrow-minded materialist criticism, said: “It is pointless to pretend that Kipling’s view of things, taken as a whole, can be acceptable or excusable to any civilized person.” ...Yes, Kipling is a rabid imperialist.” Kipling received particular punishment for his programmatic poem “The White Man’s Burden” (1898). It begins with the words:
Carry this proud Burden -
Native sons went
To serve those under your control
To the peoples to the ends of the earth -
To hard labor radl gloomy
Restless savages
Half demons
Half the people.
Translation by A. Sergeev
The inadequacy and even dead end of Kipling's worldview doctrine became evident relatively soon. The First World War, on the fronts of which his only son died, put an end to this sentence of time. Kipling's work has ceased to be a cultural factor. When he was buried in Westminster Abbey (an honor few are given), not a single writer of any significance wished to participate in the ceremony, which was attended by the Prime Minister of England.
And yet, Kipling’s books are still appreciated today. And not only for their highest artistry. Of no small importance is his preaching of a person’s personal responsibility to the world. He best expressed his worldview in the brilliant “Commandment” - a poem written in the form of an address to his son. The epigraph to this essay is taken from it; we’ll finish with another passage characterizing the attitude of the “iron Rudyard” to life:
Know how to force your heart, nerves, body
Serve you when in your chest
Everything has been empty for a long time, everything has burned down
And only the Will says: “Go!”
Translation by M. Lozinsky
KIPLING EDITIONS
Lispett: Stories. L.: KhL, 1968. 487 p.
Poems. Stories//BVL. T. 118. M.: KhL, 1976. P. 339-732.
Selected [novel “The Light Has Gone Out”, stories, poems]. L.: HL, 1980.
Kim. Novel. M.: VSh, 1990, 287 p.
LITERATURE ABOUT KIPLING
Kuprin A. Rediard Kipling//Kuprin A. Collection. Op. in 9 volumes. T. 9. M.: Pravda, 1964. P. 478-483.
Dyakonova N., Dolinin L. About Rudyard Kipling//Kipling R. Favorites. L., 1980. P. 3-26.
Dolinin A. Mysteries of Rudyard Kipling//Kipling P. I Brave [in English. lang.]. M.: Raduga, 1983. P. 9-32.
Article from A. Ilyukovich’s book “According to the will”
Joseph Rudyard Kipling was born December 30, 1865 in Bombay, British India in the family of local art school professor John Lockwood Kipling and Alice (MacDonald) Kipling.
He received the name Rudyard, it is believed, in honor of the English Lake Rudyard, where his parents met. Early years, full of exotic sights and sounds of India, were very happy for the future writer. But at the age of 5, Kipling, along with his 3-year-old sister, was sent to a boarding school in England - in Southsea, Portsmouth. The next six years - from October 1871 to April 1877- Kipling lived in the private boarding house Lorne Lodge (4 Campbell Road), which was maintained by the married couple of Price E. Holloway, former captain Merchant Marine, and Sarah Holloway. They treated the boy poorly and often punished him. This attitude affected him so much that he suffered from insomnia for the rest of his life.
At the age of 12, his parents enrolled him in a private Devon school so that he could then enter a prestigious military academy. Later, Kipling would write about the years he spent at the school. autobiographical work"Stalky and Company." The director of the school was Cormell Price, a friend of Rudyard's father. It was he who began to encourage the boy’s love for literature. Myopia did not allow Kipling to choose a military career, and the school did not provide diplomas for admission to other universities. Impressed by the stories his son wrote at school, his father finds him a job as a journalist in the editorial office of the Civil and Military Gazette, published in Lahore (British India, now Pakistan).
In October 1882 Kipling returns to India and takes up work as a journalist. In his free time, he writes short stories and poems, which are then published by the newspaper along with reports. The work of a reporter helps him better understand various aspects of the country's colonial life. The first sales of his works begin in 1883.
In the mid 1880s Kipling began traveling around Asia and the United States as a correspondent for the Allahabad newspaper Pioneer, with which he signed a contract to write travel essays. The popularity of his works is rapidly increasing, in 1888 and 1889 6 books with his stories are published, which brought him recognition.
In 1889 he makes a long journey to England, then visits Burma, China, and Japan. He travels across the United States, crosses the Atlantic Ocean and settles in London. He is beginning to be called the literary heir of Charles Dickens. In 1890 His first novel, The Light That Failed, is published. The most famous poems of that time are “The Ballad of East and West”, as well as “The Last Rhime of True Thomas”.
In London, Kipling meets the young American publisher Walcott Balestier, they work together on the story “The Naulahka”. In 1892 Balestier dies of typhus, and soon after, Kipling marries his sister Caroline. During his honeymoon, the bank in which Kipling had his savings went bankrupt. The couple only had enough money to get to Vermont (USA), where Balestier’s relatives lived. They live here for the next four years.
At this time, Kipling again began to write for children; in 1894-1895 The famous “The Jungle Book” and “The Second Jungle Book” are published. The collections of poetry “The Seven Seas” and “The White Theses” were also published. Two children are soon born: Josephine and Elsie. After a quarrel with his brother-in-law, Kipling and his wife in 1896 return to England. In 1897 The story “Captains Courageous” is published. In 1899, during a visit to the USA, his eldest daughter Josephine dies of pneumonia, which was a huge blow for the writer.
In 1899 he spends several months in South Africa, where he meets Cecil Rhodes, a symbol of British imperialism. The novel “Kim” is published, which is considered one of the best novels of the writer. In Africa, he begins to select material for a new children's book, which is being published in 1902 called Just So Stories.
In the same year, he buys a country house in Sussex (England), where he remains for the rest of his life. Here Kipling wrote his famous books “Puck of Pook’s Hill” and “Rewards and Fairies” - tales of Old England, united by the narrator - the elf Puck, taken from Shakespeare's plays. Simultaneously with his literary activity, Kipling began active political activity. He writes about the impending war with Germany, speaks out in support of conservatives and against feminism.
Literary activity is becoming less and less intense. Another blow for the writer was the death of his eldest son John in the First World War. in 1915. He died during the Battle of Los September 27, 1915, while part of a battalion of Irish Guards. John Kipling's body was never found. Kipling, who worked with his wife in the Red Cross during wartime, spent four years trying to find out what happened to his son: he always had a glimmer of hope that perhaps his son had been captured by the Germans. In June 1919 Having lost all hope, Kipling admitted in a letter to the military command that his son was most likely dead.
After the war, Rudyard Kipling becomes a member of the War Graves Commission. It was he who chose the biblical phrase “Their names will live forever” on the obelisks of memory. During one trip in 1922 In France, he meets the English King George V, with whom he later develops a great friendship.
Kipling continued his literary activity until the early 1930s, although success accompanied him less and less. Since 1915 the writer suffered from gastritis, which later turned out to be an ulcer.
Rudyard Kipling died January 18, 1936 in London. He was buried in Poets' Corner in Westminster Abbey.
