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Title: Plain Tales from the Hills (Penguin Classics) by Rudyard Kipling, H.R. Woudhuysen, H. R. Woudhuysen, David Trotter ISBN: 0-14-018312-4 Publisher: Penguin Books Pub. Date: 01 June, 1990 Format: Paperback Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $10.95 |
Average Customer Rating: 4 (3 reviews)
Rating: 2
Summary: Yesterday¿s Fad, Today¿s Flat Beer
Comment: I believe Kipling was wildly popular in his day. This collection of stories about English life in India may have entranced the masses and sold a lot of newspapers in the first decade of the 20th century, but in the context of almost exactly a hundred years later, they have lost most of their shine. While Kipling might have been the foremost raconteur of British India, compared to great short story writers like Chekhov, de Maupassant, or Twain, he comes across today as coy and contrived. Certain phrases make their appearance in far too many of the tales, for example: "Once there was a....but that's another story." Cute kids, the wisdom of animals, the wiles of the fair sex, the unfathomable nature of "natives", gruff officers, perfect ladies, the one-dimensional earthiness of the common soldier---these are stories filled with stereotypes. Kipling's stories may hold your interest for a short time and you can wonder at the change in taste that has occurred between 1907, when he published these, and today. In many tales, Kipling depicts the lifestyle among the higher echelons of the British Raj, but only through a veil of irony or humor. A regular topic is the struggle for social status among the British; efforts to short circuit the pecking order and reversals suffered thereby. People marrying "beneath them" or trying to marry "above them" are often found here. Though people still refer to Kipling as "a writer about India", it is still true that he wrote about his compatriots, not about India. The two or three tales with Indian characters who are anything other than servants lack any depth. Even the pathos-filled "Story of Muhammad Din", which shows understanding, ultimately deals with illness as something inevitable in India---there are no questions as to why death comes to small children so frequently. Overall, Kipling provides a certain local color to British literature of the late 19th and early 20th century, but cannot be regarded as a great British writer on the level of Maugham, Conrad, Lawrence, Forster or Greene because he lacks broader humanity, deep thought, and universal vision.
Rating: 5
Summary: One of the finest collections of short stories in english.
Comment: Rudyard Kipling writes concisely and with great insight on a wide range of issues. With each story only taking up a few pages the depth of characterisation is superb. 'The gate of one-hundred sorrows' is one of the finest short stories ever written.
Rating: 5
Summary: Excellent reading, one of my favorites
Comment: My copy has 36 stories, but Kipling's Plain Tales tells about life in British-occupied India from every imaginable angle. It's touching, it's funny, and at times it's unbelievably sad. Don't let the author put you off, this is a highly readable book. My personal favorites are "Thrown Away" and "Beyond the Pale", but be careful; they're sad.
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Title: The Man Who Would Be King, and Other Stories (Oxford World's Classics (Paperback)) by Rudyard Kipling ISBN: 0192836293 Publisher: Oxford University Press Pub. Date: 01 April, 1999 List Price(USD): $8.95 |
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Title: Kim (Penguin Classics) by Rudyard Kipling, Edward W. Said ISBN: 0140183523 Publisher: Penguin Books Pub. Date: 01 August, 1992 List Price(USD): $7.00 |
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Title: War Stories and Poems (Oxford World's Classics (Paperback)) by Rudyard Kipling ISBN: 0192836862 Publisher: Oxford University Press Pub. Date: 01 April, 1999 List Price(USD): $9.95 |
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Title: The Complete Stalky & Co. (Oxford World's Classic) by Rudyard Kipling, Isabel Quigly ISBN: 0192838598 Publisher: Oxford University Press Pub. Date: 01 April, 1999 List Price(USD): $9.95 |
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Title: Rudyard Kipling Complete Verse: Definitive Edition by Rudyard Kipling ISBN: 038526089X Publisher: Anchor Pub. Date: 27 January, 1989 List Price(USD): $20.00 |
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