Rudyard Kipling Books

Kitty & Mr. Kipling is the cute story of a little girl who becomes enamored by the Kipling family, who have moved into her small Vermont town. The story is a great mix of fiction and historical facts on Rudyard Kipling's life during his time in Vermont. An entertaining story for kids (and adults!) along with some educational facts. I really enjoyed it and look forward to reading it to my children.

Being a polo player myself, I found The Maltese Cat a very interesting and accurate view of the game. Being from the ponies perspective is original and entertaining and it makes me wonder what my ponies are thinking when I play them!

Loved reading it to pieces and can read it over and over again...

This is a review for the Melville House edition which is a part of a series of Novellas. Don't be influenced by the movie, which is great, for the book is different on many points. The story reads quickly (around 70 pages) and is fun in and of itself. You get a feel for what it may have been like should you have travelled over the Hindu Kush into remote parts of Afghanistan back in the day of the Engllish Empir

This is an excellent story!

I disagree with the assertion that the elegance of this book won't appeal to children (as is stated in the book description). With my kids, they appreciate well designed and artful things because they are exposed to them. I don't underestimate their ability to discern and appreciate good design. The color of the paper stock complements the engravings and provides a nice ambience to the story. Christopher Wormell is one of my favorite illustrators - check out The New Alphabet of Animals by him.

I was captivated, and dismayed, while reading this story...which is true. My heart goes out to Mr. Kipling, and his family, living through such harrowing times. I cannot imagine the pain but come close by reading the words. It breaks my heart such a brilliant young man was lost so soon.

This edition has great illustrations in color and black and white by Burt Silverman. Includes:

The House Surgeon
At the Pits Mouth
Bertran and Bimi
The Finest Story in the World
The Strange Ride of Morrowbie Jukes
A Matter of Fact
The Sending of Dana Do
The Phantom Rickshaw
The Bull that Thought
The Mark of the Beast
The Man Who Would Be King
They
My Own True Ghost Story
Beyond the Pale
In the House of Suddho
Quiquern
The Bisara of Pooree
The Return of Imray
By Word of Mouth
The Miracle of Purun Bhagat

Very freaky stuff, this is a Kipling perfect for scaring each other around the campfire or maybe a gift for an academic goth you might know.

This is a small booklet of poems (including Recessional, Vampire, and Fuzzy Wuzzy). I have learned more about the British occupation of India through Kipling's writing than any other source, even if you total up all those other sources (history books, films, fiction, whatever!). He is extremely gifted in getting to the crux of a particular matter.

One thing about his poetry that I really enjoy is that it is written for the ear, not the eye. Some poets, like William Cullen Bryant or Walt Whitman, are a feast for the eyes. You can drink in the words and phrases and they look so darned pretty. Not Kipling. You won't even know what he's said unless you read it aloud. And then you're in for a surprise. In one sentence you will be transported to the barracks room where common soldiers are talking. If not there, perhaps to the battlefields themselves, or maybe a high-falutin' well-born man's outpouring of love. You'll never know which until you open your mouth and read. I love that about him.

I read it in 7th grade, and I loved it! It's so cute! I've always loved mongooses. <- isn't that weird? I would have thought that it's mongeese. ::shruggs::

Even after being held spellbound by every page of this fascinating and enjoyable biography, the reader may still find large areas of Kipling's personality an enigma. Other than Hardy, it is difficult to think of another English writer who combined such facility in writing poetry as well as fiction, nor one who can so transfix the reader with such deadly accuracy of phrase and immediacy of description. And yet, and yet...... while Hardy largely dealt with one corner of Britain, at one specific period, and nevertheless achieved a timeless universality worthy of his own beloved Greek dramatists, Kipling, who drew on the whole world and the whole span of human history for his themes, ultimately became a prisoner of the prejudices and even hatreds of his own time. It is this failure, no less than the dreadful personal tragedies that marred Kipling's middle and later years, that is the core of this fine book. As perhaps no other great writer, Kipling recognised, as Orwell so correctly identified, that it is not enough to be a critic, and that the world is only moved forward by those who act. The author describes very well how it was this positive aspect of the Imperial Dream that so fascinated and inspired Kipling. The tragedy was however that this man of such broad vision and talents, and whose genius had so much of the timeless and universal, should, apparently willingly, have allowed himself to be taken over by, and identified with, some of the meaner-minded aspects of that same phenomenon. One gains an impression of a man of considerable personal charm, decency and kindness who nevertheless shrank back from the challenge of true greatness. In the process he managed to identify himself with some very ignoble sentiments and causes (he seems to have disliked just about every racial or religious group at some stage or other) and to write about his targets in terms that were offensive and hateful even in his own time. This factor may well be the crucial one in ensuring that, though the best of Kipling is superb, much of the rest is dross.

It is hard to praise this biography enough. Not only does it flow with all the pace of a well-written novel, but it conveys all the detail required to portray a rich and complex world without ever overwhelming the reader. One is amazed by the social linkages - for Kipling seemed to know everybody, both passively through his inherited family network, as well as actively through his courting of the great and (often not so) good. Kipling's writings are discussed in relation to his life in enough of detail to return one to the originals or to vow to read what one has hitherto missed. I forged through this biography with Kipling's Collected Verse by my side and found items that I had previously ignored illuminated splendidly by the author's placement of them in context.

In summary: a marvellous read, whether you already know Kipling or not. If you don't, it will send you scurrying to his writings.

An extremely well written and well researched book, all together very readable and engrossing. Indepth account of the four troublesome years of Rudyard and Carrie Kipling while in Vermont. All in all, however, a too short book.