English literature: History, Authors, Books, & Periods Essay

Dear Kipling, You are my favorite writer in the English Language who well versed in both. Prose and verse in the late- nineteenth and early- twentieth century ’s.Being interested in your creations I took more interest in knowing about yourself. You were born in Bombay, British India on 30 December 1865. In 1870 you were taken to England and stayed with a foster family and did your education there.Later you came to India in 1882 and worked as a journalist, writing poetry and fiction in your spare time. I had gone through your oeuvre and I really marveled which made me go into a deep thought of your perspective on imperialism. In 1888 you wrote ‘plain Tales from the Hills’ which won success in England. Again in 1889 you went to live in London. There you met your soul mate Caroline Balestier and married her in 1892.And then you moved to a place called Vermont in the United States where her family lived, your two daughters were born there.Then you wrote the most fantabulous work â €˜The Jungle Book’ in1894.I think you got the inspiration to write this from your environment. Because when you were writing this, your abode was in the forested area called Vermont. Alright!I have to stop here Because I want to talk more about this work. So now I am going to discuss the rest with you. In 1896, you moved with your family from Vermont to England because of some family affairs. I do not want to discuss that. Because that is not my area, isn’t it? Then your most beloved son John was born in 1897, to whom you later addressed the poem ‘If’ which very much exhibited the qualities of men during Victorian times and it is often discussed by the critics as a â€Å"stoic poem†. Then you wrote the series of works like ‘Stalky and Co’ in 1899, ‘Kim’ in 1901 and ‘Puck of Pook’s Hill’ in 1906. Your contribution of ‘Just So Stories’ in 1902 were originally written for your beloved daughter Josephine,   who died unfortunately at the age of six because of pneumonia. That’s why this work reflects the stories of children. When I was analyzing your work I came to know that it offers us a clear and sensitive picture of English people who lived in the late 19th century in India. And it is obviously seen that you are an â€Å"accurate reporter† and was capable of giving the faithful account of the commonplace and people of what you had seen. In this time, I want to take account of your uni que perspective.This is one of the things that I loved in you –that your works do not reflect anyone else’s ideologies.It always stands a remarkable thing. The preliminary study of your works had revealed an idea which is to be taken into consideration. It displays that your works of six essays, ten addresses, four volumes of letters, five full-length books, one hundred and eleven short stories, and one hundred and seventy-eight poems were in quite touching with the phenomenon called ‘culture shock’. Kipling, don’t consider me as an over-talkative person for I am going to explain what is a culture shock. Because you know what it means, but the readers of this letter have to know about it something. Culture shock is a synonym for homesickness, an experience normally associated with insecurities of childhood. This will occur when a person is suddenly removed from a familiar environment to an unusual one commonly exhibits confusion and hostility. You suffered from this effect for about eight such times at approximately five years intervals of your first forty years of your life. Even though this happens continuously, your works were highly outstanding. But some critics made this culture shock as wide as possible and criticized you every angle. I had no opinion on this matter. But I want to tell something, I think because of this culture shock only you could deliberately deliver your mind about the things that surround you, otherwise, I would miss this unique use, Kipling.Once again I repeat that it was my own opinion and it can be interpreted in some other way. Another criticism is about your famous phrase ‘White Man’s Burden’. Actually, it means â€Å"the alleged duty of the white peoples to bring their civilization to other peoples regarded as backward†. But the critics took this phrase and classified you as a ‘Racist’. Their perspective is that you are the one who differentiated as white man and backward, so they criticized in that way. But I want to look it from your view. I think you wrote it in the perspective of how I understood ie.,† Imperialism was not just a way for countries to grab power; it was also a form of humanitarianism, a way to help fewer fortune people by the governing people.† So only you mentioned that it was the responsibility of ‘White Man’s Burden’. Alright Kipling, now I come to the point which I mentioned earlier to discuss that is – The Jungle Book. Actually, it is a collection of seven different short stories. However, only three of them have Mowgli and the characters associated with him. While the rest four stories happened completely elsewhere and in different situations. When I came to analyze this piece of work I understood that its culture period is during British Raj – British ruling over India (1858-1947). So many critics call you as a racist, misogynist, and imperialist. And some argue that this piece was about the politics occurred at that time. All that shouldn’t matter anyway, because it’s a great story of imagination and above all, it opens up the relationship between you and the forest in India. And I also enjoyed the way Mowgli grows up and the way he and other animals interact with each other, it’s completely breathtaking. I believe that while you were undoubtedly a man of your time and country, your stories are less about politics and more about your own humanity. The story seems to be more similar to your life history. Though the scholars criticized this work in a di fferent way, I can’t deviate my views from the eyes of imagination and enjoyable experience which I had when I read it. Last but not the least adding to your accolades, Nobel Prize for Literature in 1907 making you the youngest and first English language writer increased my zeal towards the language. With more Love, D. Joan Swarna. BIBLIOGRAPHY 1. Lohman, W.J. The Culture Shocks of Rudyard Kipling. P.Lang, 1990. 2. ebooks.adelaide.edu.au>kipling 3. www.study.com/academy/lesson/kipling_rudyard 4. www.bbc.co.uk/history/historic_figures/kipling_rudyard