Fred (if I may)--
Birkenhead's account is incomplete.
I owned a copy of this poem's very first edition, now in my collection
at Yale's Beinecke Rare Book Library, one of five (maybe a few more
exist) known to be made up, under the title Unpublished Items by Rudyard
Kipling, in one or two small morocco-bound volumes (namely: one larger
volume at the Royal College of Surgeons presented by Kipling's
doctor--and in 1943 RCS President--Alfred Webb-Johnson, under the title
Kipling Letters, which includes with the poem copies of correspondence
between and among Webb-Johnson, Churchill, and Roosevelt, discussing the
little books; one [apparently the first of the series under the title
Unpublished Items, and in the size cited below) given by Webb-Johnson to
Churchill upon his being made an honorary fellow of the RCS but not now
locatable in his archives at Churchill College, Cambridge; one made up
by Webb-Johnson at the request of and given by Churchill to Roosevelt,
this 2-volume copy now in the Oval Office replica at the FDR
Presidential Library in Hyde Park, New York, where I examined it; one
offered for sale by Maggs in its 1994 Kipling catalogue, location
presently unknown; and the one I owned, seemingly made up for a doctor
friend of Webb-Johnson).
This little edition is fully described and discussed, in its original
1943 format as privately printed by Webb-Johnson, in my forthcoming
bibliography, on which I am speaking to the Society on Feb. 10. As
noted there, this poem was most recently published in Christopher
Hitchens' book Blood Class and Empire (1990), and was originally
published in 1943 by Webb-Johnson in the above-described small volumes
(7 5/8 by 5 inches, 32 pp.) the text blocks of which were typescripts of
this and the texts of two other poems, "A Chapter of Proverbs" (also
reprinted in Hitchens), and "President Wilson" (printed in the Kipling
Journal in March 1982), all authenticated by Webb-Johnson's blue-inked
signature. Carrington in his 1955 biography of RK speculates that the
poem "Burden" was written in 1929. There is a copy of the poem's text
in the British Library with a 1940 letter from Webb-Johnson (who
presented it to the BL, as well as presenting a calligraphic version now
in the Royal Library at Windsor Castle) saying that the poem was
intended for publication (presumably in the Sussex Edition, published in
1939-40 after RK's death in 1939), but that it had been withheld by Mrs.
Kipling.
Dave Richards
-----Original Message-----
From: To exchange information and views on the life and work of Rudyard
Kipling [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Fred Lerner
Sent: Saturday, October 24, 2009 3:28 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: The Burden of Jerusalem
If Kipling spent much time with enlisted men, he might have learned
their versions
of songs as well as more genteel versions from officers' messes. And if
he got
to know music hall performers on terms of intimacy he might have learned
some
songs from them that they would never have dared to perform on stage. (I
remember,
as an active member of a college radio station, listening to some
recordings produced
by broadcast and advertising professionals that were meant only for the
private
amusement of colleagues. Had these come to the official notice of the
Federal
Communications Commission the consequences would have been dire.)
According to Birkenhead, there were three copies of the poem: one owned
by Franklin
D. Roosevelt, one by Winston Churchill, and one by the Royal College of
Surgeons.
I would be interested to know how and why those three came to have it.
And I wonder
if it has been mentioned in any biographies of Roosevelt or Churchill. I
don't
recall seeing any mention of the poem in Michael Makovsky's recent book,
_Churchill's
Promised Land: Zionism and Statecraft_ (Yale University Press, 2008).
Makovsky
makes a strong case for Churchill's Zionist sympathies, and I would
think that
Churchill's ownership of a copy of "The Burden of Jerusalem" and his
reaction
to it would have been relevant to the discussion.
As always with Kipling, the more you look at, the more you find to look
at.
Fred Lerner
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