Rudyard Kipling,
1899
Kipling is sometimes more problematic than others, and never more so than right here.
Was it Auden who said Kipling would be "forgiven his views for writing well"?
(Yep: "In Memory of W. B. Yeats", section III, fourth verse). Anyhow, the views expressed
herein are repugnant to me (in case that's not obvious), but the old boy sure could write
and that's why it's here: Not only for its literary worth, but also because he expressed so
well the ideology of an empire which had a massive impact on damn near everything.
Love him or hate him, you can't ignore him.
Take up the
White Man's
burden --
Send forth the best ye breed --
Go bind your sons to exile
To serve your captives' need;
To wait in
heavy harness,
On fluttered folk and wild --
Your new-caught, sullen peoples,
Half-devil and half-child.
Take up the
White Man's burden --
In patience to
abide,
To
veil the threat of terror
And
check the show of pride;
By
open speech and simple,
An hundred times made plain
To seek another's profit,
And work another's gain.
Take up the
White Man's burden --
The
savage wars of peace --
Fill full the mouth of Famine
And
bid the sickness cease;
And when your goal is nearest
The end for others sought,
Watch
sloth and heathen Folly
Bring all your hopes to
nought.
Take up the
White Man's burden --
No
tawdry rule of kings,
But toil of
serf and sweeper--
The tale of common things.
The ports ye shall not enter,
The roads ye shall not tread,
Go mark them with your living,
And mark them with your dead.
Take up the
White Man's burden --
And reap his old reward:
The blame of those ye better,
The hate of those ye guard --
The cry of hosts ye
humour
(Ah, slowly!) toward the light:--
"
Why brought he us from bondage,
Our loved Egyptian night?"
Take up the
White Man's burden --
Ye dare not stoop to less --
Nor call too loud on Freedom
To cloak your weariness;
By all ye cry or whisper,
By all ye leave or do,
The silent, sullen peoples
Shall
weigh your gods and you.
Take up the
White Man's burden --
Have done with childish days --
The lightly proferred
laurel,
The easy, ungrudged praise.
Comes now, to search your
manhood
Through
all the thankless years
Cold, edged with dear-bought wisdom,
The judgment of your peers!
moJoe: No.