Born on the 30th of December, 1865, in Bombay, India, Joseph Rudyard Kipling was a famed writer responsible for the iconic “Jungle Book” and other exceptional short stories and poems. The multifaceted writer specializes in prose and short stories, and also dabbled in the world of science fiction. To learn more about the pride of British Indians and the literary world, here are 10 facts about the great Rudyard Kipling:
Fact 1: Leander Adrian Paes, one of the world’s most professional doubles and mixed doubles tennis superstar tennis players, has said that apart from being a fan of Rudyard Kipling, is inspired about his masterpiece entitled “If”. The tennis player goes on to say that the second verse which reads ‘If you can meet with triumph and disaster and treat those two imposters just the same,’ are words he lives by every day.
Fact 2: Rudyard Kipling’s greatest works include “The Jungle Book” in 1894, “Kim” in 1901, “Just So Stories” in 1902, as well as several other short stories, most notably “The Man Who Would Be King” in 1888. Kipling is the proud recipient of the Nobel Prize for Literature, given to him in 2007.
Fact 3: Aside from specializing in short stories, children’s books, and prose, Rudyard Kipling has also tried his hand at writing science fiction. His short stories entitled “The Night Mail” from 1905 and “As Easy As A.B.C.” from 1912 were short stories both set in the 21st century, and are his most famous pieces from the genre.
Fact 4: The little boy in Kipling’s “The Jungle Book” was named “Mowgli”, and his name translates to “The Frog”. The original name for the character was supposedly “Nathoo”, but the produces thought Mowgli would have made a better fit for the character. His first job is being the village herdsman.
Fact 5: His father was a professor that taught architectural sculpture at the Bombay School of Art. Oddly enough, instead of studying at the school where his father taught, he was sent to England instead. Here, he received an education at the prestigious United Services College at Westward Ho! In the boarding school, he was given the nickname “Gigger” and was often bullied at ridiculed. However, the bright boy didn’t let this deter him from excelling in his studies and eventually finding true friendships. In his later work called “Stalky & Co.” written in 1899, he records his hardships and fun times during life at the boarding school.
Fact 6: Rudyard Kipling’s close friend George Beresford described the writer as a “short, but rather very cheery, capering, podgy little fellow” who sported a thick pair of spectacles and a megawatt smile. Kipling had a pair of brilliant blue eyes, and his dark and thick eyebrows would often bop up and down as he spoke.
Fact 7: Showing a lot of potential at an early age, the headmaster of the boarding school grew very fond of Kipling and had him edit the school newspaper and often praised the poems he wrote for it. Kipling’s literary ambitions were fueled. When he had them sent over to India, his father had them printed as “Schoolboy Lyrics” in 1881. This was Kipling’s first published piece.
Fact 8: Great deals of his writings were influenced by his favorite writers such as Edgar Allen Poe, Guy de Maupassant, and Bret Harte. Though their writing style and influence is evident in his work, the substance is entirely his own. Kipling has created pieces that tackled Anglo-Indian society, the lives of British soldiers, and the lives of Indian Natives; all of which he portrayed truthfully and sympathetically.
Fact 9: In 1892 Rudyard Kipling fell in love with Caroline Balestier. They wed and moved to Brattleboro, Vermont where they spent four of the best years of Kipling’s life. During this time he produced some of his best loved pieces such as “Many Inventions” in 1893 and as well as “The Jungle Book” and “The Second Jungle Book” in 1894 and 1895, respectively.
Fact 10: Kipling was the proud recipient of several prestigious awards, including a poet laureateship and a knighthood! However, it was the Nobel Prize for Literature that he could not refuse. He was the first English author to be given the author.
October 21, 2015 1:26 pm
One interesting fact about him is missing. Kipling was a strict racist and considered the white skinned Caucasians to be the superior race. His point of view is aptly shown in his well known lines ” The East is East and the West is West and never the twain should meet”.
Kipling also nurtured the idea that the ‘white man’ was responsible for the welfare of the world in general. He composed a poem “The Burden of the White Man” where he holds forth the view that Britain was once the principal nation of the world. However, along withe times, the US has now become the world leader , both in affluence and in power. Therefore the Baton has now passed from Britain to the US, to lead the world . This heavy burden comes with power and world domination. He sent the poem to Roosevelt through a messenger but Roosevelt did not think much of it. ‘The burden of the white man” died at an early age hereafter.
The poem can be looked up in the Internet. Please note that this is not meant to be a correction or a revision. Any article on Kipling without the above fact, appears to me as incomplete.