I would say that Paul Hutchinson's question is not an easy one to answer
precisely.
One needs to start by defining "an imperialist" - which I'm not going to do,
even though it's there in the dictionary, because for most thinking people,
the precise meaning was coloured by your political opinions.
But received opinion, at the time (and THAT is important) was that he was an
imperialist, believing in the positive effects of empires, Roman, British
(and maybe even the French - he admired France), as he knew them. And his
views were, indeed, adopted consciously - he'd seen the British empire at
work, and in his view, it worked - warts and all.
Alastair Wilson
Paul is perfectly right, that there was a wide variety of opinion in Britain
about the Empire (as RK well knew himself from family differences over the
Boer War), but the great mass of people, I suggest, just didn't think of the
empire - they were worried about making ends meet.
Nonetheless, I think Jane and Sharad were right, and struck the right note
in their letter
----- Original Message -----
From: "Paul Hutchinson" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Friday, March 01, 2002 8:44 AM
Subject: an age of imperialists?
> Jane and Sharad Keskar query why "in an age of
> imperialists, Kipling should be singled out and
> castigated for being a man of his time". This gives
> the impression that Kipling was pretty much mainstream
> in his imperialism.
>
> May I ask whether this is the weight of expert opinion?
> Was his age one of imperialists?
>
> My impression, certainly superficial rather than expert,
> is that in Britain in the years 1880-1914, there was a
> very wide range of opinions about the Empire, and that
> those who were as imperialist as Kipling were quite a
> small minority. (My impression also is that Kipling's
> position was a conscious, deliberate, one --- not
> something adopted unintelligently.)
>
> Paul Hutchinson.
>
>
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