Hello All,
>Unfortunately, try as I may, I can not access the www.usafa.af.mil website.
> Do you know if access is restricted?
I had no difficulty. Two possibilities: (1) I'm writing from a
HoTMaiL account. I think HoTMaiL processes links in some way. Try
typing the webaddress into your browser instead of clicking on the
link. (2) The specific webaddress I gave was a .pdf file - to read it,
you need to have Acrobat Reader installed on your computer.
>I don't think the exactness of Mrs S's 'before and after' times indicate
>anything more than that she had been counting the days. Michael died
>towards the end of the battle of the Somme, say November '16, then two
>years to the Armistice and one year for Helen to recover, plus time to hear
>of his grave and organise a visit makes it over three years to Helen's
>encounter with her.
Do you really pitch upon November 1916 as your best guess for
Michael's death? You don't mean a year earlier? I had been thinking
it was fairly early in the War, and that the times therefore did not
match up. But if you are only three months out, then the dates
correspond pretty well. Another thing is that both you and I are taking "At
the end of another year" to be starting from the Armistice.
The text is consistent with it starting from when "something gave way
within her and all sensation... came to an end".
Concerning the starting point for this thread, "She lifted her joined
hands almost to the level of her mouth and brought them down sharply,
still joined, to full arms' length below her waist", my present feeling
is that there isn't any important symbolic content. It is possible
that it is starting as a prayer and finishing as a reaching out
("full arms' length below her waist" is consistent with reaching
in the direction of Helen), but I see the chief reason for the
description as being a general emphasising of the intense emotion.
That is, I attach no symbolic meaning to "sharply, still joined".
But I'm not 100% satisfied, and I wonder if it would be worth
asking some expert in gestures and nonverbal communication.
But the big question for me is, "What is this story really about?"
If the point is to grip the reader with the suffering on the front
and at home, and to surprise the reader with the revelation that
Michael is Helen's son, why is it Christ who guides Helen rather
than a workman or a signpost? Compassion for someone who has
seriously sinned might be the complete answer, but there might be
more to it.
(A) One issue is what would Kipling have expected his readers
to believe about Mary Magdalen - would readers in the 1920's have
considered her unchaste (close parallel to Helen), or a prostitute,
or neither? (I don't know what common belief is today, let alone
in the 1920's.)
(B) Another issue is what do Christians believe (or, what did
Kipling believe) that Christ does? He redeems, He saves. But does He
lead to truth, or to self-acceptance? What might be happening
towards the end of the story is: eruption of Helen's second
side; her initial rejection of it; struggle (sleeplessness), which
prepares her for what next happens; encounter with Christ, who
guides her to accept the truth, that she is a sinner. (I am unsure
about how theologically sound this is.)
Paul Hutchinson.
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