Talk: Kipling’s Later Short Stories, by Dorothy Harrison

Rudyard Kipling’s demise was much exaggerated in a premature magazine obituary, which he read with some alarm from Bateman's, the country house in Burwash where he lived for the last three decades of his life. He hastily wrote back a note to the editor: “I’ve just read that I’m dead. Don’t forget to delete me from your list of subscribers”. A telling anecdote, because although he was the youngest man to receive the Nobel Prize for Literature, and was the best-loved writer of his generation, Kipling’s literary reputation has fallen, perhaps prematurely, by the wayside, and he is seen nowadays by many to be a deeply unfashionable apologist for the British Empire.

“My talk challenges that notion” says Dorothy Harrison, who will discuss four of his later short stories; ‘Dayspring Mishandled’, ‘Without Benefit of Clergy’, 'They' and ‘An Habitation Enforced’, in the Council Chamber of the Town Hall. “People see him as something of a warmonger, but these stories show the other side of Kipling. They are written with great maturity and contain wonderful characterisation and descriptive passages. Although the settings vary, the stories, because of the range of issues they confront and the emotional depth they explore, are still of universal appeal. My mission is to convert people to reading them. If I influence just one person, I will be happy”. Kipling’s house in Burwash, Bateman’s, was bequeathed to the National Trust after his wife Caroline’s death in 1939 and is now a public museum dedicated to the author. AL