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Rudyard Kipling in his autobiographical 'Something of myself' advises that one should never launch a 'glittering generality' and he quotes as an example his 'East was East and West was West and never the twain should meet' - he received a great deal of mail from the 'excellent and uplifted' of all lands firmly stating that East and West HAD met. He felt that they were misguided and had not understood the fact that there are times and circumstances under which cardinal points cease to exist ! I think his liberality with cardinal points and another glittering generality occurred in Mandalay ! I now quote Kipling: Again. I wrote a song called 'Mandalay' which, tacked to a tune with a swing, made one of the waltzes of that distant age.A private soldier reviews his loves and, in the chorus,his experiences in the Burma campaign. One of his ladies lives in Moulmein, which is not on the road to anywhere ,and he describes the amour with some minuteness, but always in his chorus deals with 'the road to Mandalay,' his golden path to romance. The inhabitants of the United States,to whom I owed most of the bother, 'Panamaed' that song (this was before copy right), set it to their own tunes, and sang it in their own national voices. Not content with this, they took to pleasure cruising, and discovered that Moulmein did not command any view of the sun rising across the Bay of Bengal. They must have interfered too with the navigation of the Irrawaddy Flotilla steamers, for one of the Captains S.O.S.-ed me to give him something to tell these somethinged tourists about it'. Kipling goes on to say: The song was a sort of general mix-up of the singer's Far-Eastern memories against a background of the Bay of Bengal as seen at dawn from a troop ship taking him there Chapter VIII of Kipling's 'Something of myself' gives a fuller explanation-and recounts the number of times he has been taken to task. I hope these extracts are helpful, but please read the full chapter !. Regards Michael Jefferson: -----Original Message----- From: John Radcliffe <[log in to unmask]> To: Kipling Mailbase <[log in to unmask]> Date: Sunday, May 02, 1999 5:42 PM Subject: Fw: >I'm sure Lennart Granqvist is right ! But is there anything people can tell >him about the writing of Mandalay, and RK's feelings about Burma ? >----- Original Message ----- >From: Lennart Granqvist <[log in to unmask]> >To: <[log in to unmask]> >Sent: Saturday, May 01, 1999 8:06 PM > > >Sir, >Being in the progress of writing an article on shipping in SE Asia in the >old days as these were my working waters in my active days I am curious >about Kiplings "Mandalay". How can he have the Burmese girl a-settinī by >the old Moulmein Pagoda; looking eastward to the sea. As Moulmein lies on >Burmas westcoast is that only a matter of Poetica licencia? >Would appreciate your learned opinion. >With thanks and hopeful for an answer. >Lennart Granqvist, Master mariner, (rtd) > > %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%