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Alastair Wilson's comment on “the ‘countryside’ of the popular imagination” bring to mind another great writer who spent his early years in an outpost of Empire and created in his writing a portrait of an idealised rural England: J.R.R. Tolkien. I don't recall from my reading of Carpenter's biography and his collection of Tolkien's letters any particular notice that Tolkien ever took of Kipling, and there's no reason to suggest any influence. (As C.S. Lewis famously wrote, C. S. Lewis wrote, "No one ever influenced Tolkien—you might as well try to influence a bandersnatch.") But I'd be interested in learning of any comparisons between Kipling and Tolkien, or any other links between the two. Fred Lerner ________________________________ From: To exchange information and views on the life and work of Rudyard Kipling [[log in to unmask]] on behalf of Alastair Wilson [[log in to unmask]] Sent: Thursday, July 11, 2013 10:41 To: [log in to unmask] Subject: 'My Son's Wife' I have always enjoyed ‘My Son’s Wife’ (A Diversity of Creatures), along with ‘An Habitation Enforced’ (Actions and Reactions), as much as anything else because they give me a warm feeling inside, since they tell tales of an (idealised) stable England, at peace with itself. I’m well aware that the truth was not like that – or certainly not in industrial England – but then, the stories are fiction, aren’t they? And, growing up, as I did, some four miles from Bateman’s, I could recognise the country which Kipling was describing, even if it was fictional. So I particularly enjoyed Andrew Scragg’s perceptive and scholarly article in the most recent (June 2013) edition of KJ, and would like to offer some comments on it (page references are to that issue of KJ). He rightly describes the poem, ‘A Charm’, as describing a form of healing: he could also have added a reference, if not here, but later (p. 14) to Kipling’s ‘The Land’ when he is referring to Midmore’s “contemptuous reference to ‘Ther Land ‘”. I identify myself very much, a century later, with his description of having a “strong idealised ruralist leaning” (p.9) in my psyche, but I would suggest that “the ‘countryside’ of the popular imagination” (p.9) covered a wider area than he suggests: I would have put it as below a line from the Wash to the Mersey, excluding any bits of Derbyshire and Staffordshire south of that line as being either too wild or too industrialised. That would ensure that ‘the shires’ were included – remembering that Kipling absorbed the novels of Robert Surtees when growing up, and also East Anglia, whence came so much of London’s food and fodder. This latter is too easily forgotten, but many Londoners had very rural connections in that they were involved with horses on a daily basis. I would particularly endorse Andrew’s remarks about the lack of physique in the “pure bred Cockney” (bottom of p. 9) and the fact that “increasing numbers of English army volunteers were rejected as unfit” (p. 11) from my own study of naval history. In the 1890s, Vickers, the armament manufacturers, wished to sell a new design of 6” gun to the Royal Navy. It was to be hand-worked, and the projectile weighed 100lbs (45kg): the Royal Navy was unable to accept the gun because the average sailor was incapable of lifting 100lbs. However, the Imperial Japanese Navy did accept it – their ratings, still, at that time, drawn from peasant stock, could handle it. I’m not sure that I would agree with his suggestion (bottom of p. 10) that Sperrit could be classed as a professional self-made man: professional, yes, but self-made I doubt; I see him as a member of a country solicitor’s practice, probably having succeeded his father and grandfather. I don’t think Colonel Werf would have entrusted his affairs to a parvenu lawyer. (Though, mind you, the name Werf is not redolent of Olde England – one wonders how he came to be an English country gentleman: possibly his forebears came over with Dutch William, or were hangers on at the court of one of the earlier Georges – or even members of the late Prince Albert’s entourage.) And I regret to say that I am disappointed at what smacks to me as being a jibe at the hunting fraternity (bottom of p. 10). It seems to reveal the writer’s own prejudice, rather than being an objective assessment of the merits or demerits of fox-hunting. Kipling himself seems to have accepted hunting, whether fox-, hare- or otter-, as a normal part of country life, although he himself never followed hounds, not that he would have had much opportunity, that area of the weald was poor hunting country, lying on the borders of what are now the East Sussex and Romney Marsh; and the Southdown and Eridge Hunts. I was interested by Andrew’s use of the adjective ‘feminized’ to describe Midmore in his earlier existence. I have no particular quibble with it, it is just that I see him as more gender-neutral. It seems to me that Kipling had in mind the verse from ‘In Partibus’ But I consort with long-haired things In velvet collar-rolls, Who talk about the Aims of Art, [http://www.kipling.org.uk/pix/spacer.jpg]And “theories” and “goals,” And moo and coo with women-folk [http://www.kipling.org.uk/pix/spacer.jpg]About their blessed souls. But that they call “psychology” [http://www.kipling.org.uk/pix/spacer.jpg]Is lack of liver pill, And all that blights their tender souls [http://www.kipling.org.uk/pix/spacer.jpg]Is eating till they’re ill, And their chief way of winning goals [http://www.kipling.org.uk/pix/spacer.jpg]Consists of sitting still. On page 14, Andrew says “clearly Kipling has no truck with this Chestertonian vision of the countryside” (having previously (p. 11) described the latter as being “‘Merry England’ with jolly peasants . . .”). I whole-heartedly agree with Andrew’s comment, and would offer as further proof, Kipling’s poem ‘Alnaschar and the Oxen’, about his “Sussex cattle feeding in the dew”. So, my thanks to Andrew Scragg for his article – it has been one of the things which make membership of the Society so worth-while. Alastair Wilson.