Special Edition of 'Kim' by Rudyard Kipling (2)
Image by antefixus21
Toronto: The MacMillan Company of Canada Limited, at St. Martin's House 1936
www.enotes.com/kim
Rudyard Kipling was one of the most popular writers of his era, and his novel Kim, first published in 1901, has become one of his most well-known nonjuvenile works.
The novel takes place at a time contemporary to the book’s publication; its setting is India under the British Empire. The title character is a boy of Irish descent who is orphaned and grows up independently in the streets of India, taken care of by a “half-caste” woman, a keeper of an opium den. Kim, an energetic and playful character, although full-blooded Irish, grows up as a “native” and acquires the ability to seamlessly blend into the many ethnic and religious groups of the Indian subcontinent. When he meets a wandering Tibetan lama who is in search of a sacred river, Kim becomes his follower and proceeds on a journey covering the whole of India. Kipling’s account of Kim’s travels throughout the subcontinent gave him opportunity to describe the many peoples and cultures that made up India, and a significant portion of the novel is devoted to such descriptions, which have been both lauded as magical and visionary and derided as stereotypical and imperialistic.
Kim eventually comes upon the army regiment that his father had belonged to and makes the acquaintance of the colonel. Colonel Creighton recognizes Kim’s great talent for blending into the many diverse cultures of India and trains him to become a spy and a mapmaker for the British army. The adventures that Kim undergoes as a spy, his endearing relationship with the lama, and the skill and craftsmanship of Kipling’s writing have all caused this adventurous and descriptive—if controversial—novel to persist as a minor classic of historical English literature.
Kim Summary
Chapter 1
The novel Kim by Rudyard Kipling takes place in British India in the 1880s and 1890s. The novel opens with the introduction of the title character: Kim is a thirteen-year-old boy of Irish heritage who has been orphaned in India and raised by an opium den keeper in the city of Lahore, amid the myriad cultures of India. Because of the ability he has developed to blend in seamlessly among many different cultures through language and his broad knowledge of customs, Kim is known to his acquaintances as Friend of All the World.
Kim meets a Tibetan lama—a Buddhist—who has come to India in search of the Holy River that sprang from the arrow of the Buddha and which promises Enlightenment to its believers. The River proves elusive; even the learned museum curator at Lahore knows nothing of its location. Kim learns that the lama is traveling alone, as his chela, or follower and servant, died in the previous city. Seeing that the lama is an old man in need of assistance, Kim, dressed in the manner of a Hindu beggar child, agrees to be the lama’s new chela and accompany the lama on his quest. He informs his friend and sometime guardian, Mahbub Ali, a wellknown Afghan horse trader, that he will be leaving Lahore with the lama, and he agrees to carry some vague documents from Ali to an Englishman in Umballa as a favor. However, later that night Kim observes two sinister strangers searching Ali’s belongings. Realizing that his favor to Ali smacks of danger, he and the lama, who remains ignorant of Kim’s secret dealings, depart early for the road.
Chapter 2
On the train to Umballa, Kim and the lama meet a Hindu farmer and several other characters all representing an array of customs, languages, and religions from all over India, illustrating—as Kipling will often make a point of doing—the diversity of peoples that make up India’s native population. Upon arriving in Umballa, Kim secretly seeks out the home of the Englishman—whom he discovers to be a colonel in the army—and delivers Ali’s documents. He overhears word of an impending war on the border and realizes that Ali’s documents were directly related to this development.
Chapters 3–4
The next day, Kim and the lama proceed to the outskirts of Umballa in search of the River, where they accidentally trespass in a farmer’s garden. He curses them until he realizes that the lama is a holy man. Kim is angry at the farmer’s abuses, but the lama teaches him not to be judgmental, saying, “There is no pride among such who follow the Middle Way.” In the evening they are entertained by the headmaster and priest of a village. Kim, who loves to play jokes and games, pretends he is a prophet and “forsees” a great war with eight thousand troops heading to the northern border, drawing on what he had heard in Umballa. An old Indian soldier, who had fought on the British side in the Great Mutiny of 1857, calls Kim’s claims to question until Kim makes an accurate description of the colonel—which convinces the soldier of his authenticity.
The old soldier, with renewed respect, accompanies Kim and the lama the next morning to the Grand Trunk Road. During their journey, the lama preaches to the soldier the virtues of maintaining detachment from worldly items, emotions, and actions in order to attain Enlightenment; however, when the lama goes out of his way to entertain a small child with a song, the soldier teases him for showing affection. It is the first evidence of the lama’s truly human struggle with maintaining distance from his human emotions.
Eventually, the small party comes upon the Grand Trunk Road, a fifteen-hundred-mile-long route constructed by the East India Company that connected east Calcutta, East Bengal, and Agra. A vivid, detailed description of the masses of travelers is given, including descriptions of several different religious sects, including Sansis, Aklai Sihks, Hindus, Muslims, and Jains, as well as the various wedding and funeral processions marching along the road. This section provides yet another instance of Kipling’s travelogue-type digressions to paint a vivid picture of India for his British and American readership. Kim is utterly delighted by the masses of people traveling before his eyes. The lama, however, remains deep in meditation and does not acknowledge the spectacle of life surrounding him.
In the late evening, Kim, utilizing his sharp wit and cunning, procures the aid of a rich old widow from Kulu, herself of a sharp and salty tongue, who is traveling in a royal procession from the northern lands to her daughter in the south. She offers food, shelter, and care for the lama in exchange for the holy man’s charms and prayers interceding for the birth of many future grandsons for her.
Chapter 5
While resting along the Grand Trunk Road, Kim comes upon an English army regiment, which bears a green flag with a red bull on it. Since he was a young child, Kim had been told by his guardian that his father—a former soldier—had said that a red bull in a green field would be Kim’s salvation. With excitement at having found the sign of the bull, he sneaks into the barracks to find out more information, only to be captured by the Protestant chaplain, Mr. Bennett. Together with Father Victor, the Catholic chaplain, he discovers the personal documents that Kim carries with him everywhere, which reveal him to be not a Hindu beggar but an Irish boy—and the son of Kimball O’Hara, who himself had been a member of this same regiment. Seeing that he is white and the...
99-97=2 Yellow Balloons (75)
Image by frank3.0
Somewhere within the recesses of the opaque and labyrinthian confines of the marketing minds over at Raising Cane's Chicken Finger the idea was hatched to have a free lemonade day. This day fell on Saint Patrick's Day (the real one, not the Saturday when it is convenient to get drunk, wear a patterned table cloth as a kilt and try to knock other people unconscious with fists full of plastic beads) and so thus the lemonade, which is very tasty by the way and purports to actually use gasp... real lemons, was dutifully dyed green. Otherwise, the lemonade stand-aethetic was more-or-less adhered too—there were cheerful yellow balloons, a crudely painted sign advertising the "stand" created as to appear as though an entrepreneurial 5th grader had scrawled it and everyone seemed pretty happy. Cane's was also raising money for some school, for which they should be duly applauded. Free lemonade, education, chicken fingers, this is the stuff that Thursdays are made of.
This all sounds a bit snarky, I know. But, in truth I like their playfully disheveled approach to advertising. One minute it is a sunglasses wearing golden retriever proclaiming "One Love," which I know is supposed to be about their singular devotion to chicken fingers but can't help remindng me of some mid-1980's Stevie Wonder B-side. The next minute there is a billboard with an octogenarian swearing her love for chicken fingers and, by extension, demonstrating an admirably cavalier approach to her cholesterol level. And then there was the green lemonade with yellow balloons that has something to do with a throng of African-American children soliciting money for school books.
I admire my fellow Episcopal High School graduate, Todd Graves, for his success with Cane's. They really do make excellent chicken fingers. But, I also admire the whimsical, if sometimes confusing, approach to marketing they take. It has an almost, "Confuse them with Kindness" feel to it and in this age of rigidly controlled corporate image-making I appreciate a little whimsy with my fried food.
On a side note, Quinn is fascinated with balloons. This is probably not exceptional when it comes to two year olds but I know so few of them that her love of balloons really charms me. She has become much more verbal over the time that Anna and I have dated. As anyone who has experienced the wonder of watching a child develop, this is a fascinating, beautiful and often hilarious process. I'll spare you some of her more off-color malaprops, but when she sites a balloon, she identifies it gleefully as something that sounds like a mixture of "Walloons" and "aluminum." A Walloon is another name for the French speaking people of Belgium. So, every time Quinn points skyward at a passing balloon and yells "Walloominum" I imagine shinny Belgians, chatting away in French, floating by on the breeze.
This now somewhat lengthly blog post may provide more insight into the inner working of my mind than I might like, skipping as it does from oddly-honored holidays to crispy chicken bits and then to airborne peoples of the Low Countries. But, there is no point hiding it. I can't seem to find the post now, but I once wrote a piece about Haruki Murakami's wonderful short-story, The Fall Of The Roman Empire, The 1881 Indian Uprising, Hitler's Invasion Of Poland, And The Realm Of Raging Winds. The story, not the un-locatable blog post, is about memory and the way our minds flit across details to form a coherent picture of the past based on seemingly disconnected bits of information. It is contained in the also excellent collection The Elephant Vanishes. If you have nothing else to do with your Sunday, and you are not tired of reading after having waded through all this nonsense, then I suggest picking it up. I can't image anything that would suit the day better.
My apologies to my photo-blogging pal Chloe, who has an irrational fear of balloons.
Check out more at my blog, Lemons and Beans, for lots of photos, recipes, travel writing and other ramblings. I appreciate any feedback but, please do not post graphic awards or invitations in your comments.
Sunset over Malacca
Image by alcuin
Probably the single most heavily developed stretch of tourist resorts in the entire country, the scenery and the beaches have undeniably suffered under the assault of all that concrete. Still, while the beaches aren't the best in Malaysia, there are still miles of white sand and palm trees left.
Fierce competition keeps hotel prices low and there's some great food to be found too. Also a notable fact making the decision to visit Batu Ferringhi an easier one is, that the more you approach to the west, the less the touristisation has infected the beaches.
Beaches near the famous night-market are very nice, though with less than perfect water quality because of the extensive powered water sports and infestations of jellyfish.
Batu Feringgi was hit by the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami. No lives were lost. This was unlike other parts of the island where lives were lost to the tsunami.
Picture shows a gorgeous Malacca sunset with white fluffy rain over sunrays. The clouds are marvelous and the colours, magical!
EF 24-70mm f/2.8L USM +EOS 5D
Auroville 004 ------------------------------------------------ Warm place to stay
Image by Pandiyan
We stayed in a guest house which was warm in every way. Very austere, simple and basic. Be it the facilities or food. But very clean, tasteful, and elegant.
Auroville has numerous guesthouses and each one has its own characteristic. This is one of the best and made on Indian styling. Auroville does see iself as a tourist spot and does not promote itself as such. But it welomes all visitors.
For those looking for a break, it is a great place. Wonderful buildings, numerous farms, dense woods, bicycle tracks, friendly people and a lot of interesting people. And it is extremely cheap too; though the facilities are basic the rates are very low even by Indian standards.
Check out all the Auroville Pictures in my stream.
Tidak ada komentar:
Posting Komentar