Saturday 25 May 2013

Just So

Many years ago, I upset my mother by telling her I had been deprived in my childhood, because I had not been read, or been given to read, children's classics like Alice in Wonderland.  This was perfectly true, and hardly surprising, as both my parents had left school at 14 in the 1930s, and were never big readers. They had no idea there was a children's canon that, as I discovered when I got to university, formed the bed-time bedrock of middle-class literacy.  Wind in the Willows?  Never heard of it. Treasure Island?  Arrh, Jim Lad, all about pirates, and parrots with wooden legs, isn't it?  Never actually read it.  Swallows and Amazons?  That was on TV, wasn't it? Seemed a bit girly.  And so on.  You name it, I haven't read it.

As a consequence, I find myself belatedly picking up these best-beloved books to read.  The latest in this line of never-too-late classics has been Rudyard Kipling's Just So Stories.  Like Treasure Island, these stories are already over-familiar to everyone who has never read them. So much so, I could barely bring myself to read "How the Elephant Got His Trunk" (or, as I now know to call it, "The Elephant's Child").  What would be the point?  Yeah, yeah, the crocodile bites his nose and pulls it.

Well, you might as well ask, "Why bother to see Hamlet yet again?"   I discovered that these are genuinely, startlingly original pieces of writing.  They are truly spellbinding, begging to be read at bedtime, again and again, by a talented reader capable of bringing to life and inhabiting the different voices and registers that Kipling weaves so inventively, and so intimately.  Where else will you find something as delightful as "he smiled one smile that ran all round his face two times"?  As vivid as "Off ran Dingo -- Yellow-Dog Dingo -- always hungry, grinning like a coal-scuttle"?  Or as memorable as "One, two, three! And where's your breakfast?"

True, there are moments when cloying cuteness threatens to break out.  Victorian and Edwardian gents were 'sclusively sentimental about characterful little girls.  But when you learn that Kipling was still mourning the death of his own eldest daughter, Josephine, the sentiment seems more heart-breaking than toe-curling.  Little Taffy in "How the First Letter Was Written" is clearly the great-grandmother of many feisty little heroines who neglect and reject their household duties in favour of more inciting adventures.

True, there are some dodgy undertones that bubble up ("'Oh, plain black's best for a nigger,' said the Ethiopian").  But I think Kipling both honours and teases the language, traditions and manners of India and Africa, just as he does those of the common British soldier in Barrack-Room Ballads.  Nobody loves slightly bent English as much as Kipling.

With hindsight, this may be condemned as colonial "orientalism", or simple condescension, but his attitude could never be described as malevolent.  Kipling is an imperialist, but very far from racist.  That unfortunate swastika on the rock in the illustration to "The Crab That Played With the Sea" is a Hindu symbol for "auspiciousness", which is why it also appeared on the covers of Kipling's collected works. Kipling himself ordered it to be removed as "defiled beyond redemption" after the Nazis had usurped it in the 1930s.

The tone of the stories is one of controlled but intense playfulness. It's a story-telling voice, rather than a story-writing voice.  It is the relaxed, unbuttoned, domestic voice of upper-middle class Imperial Britain in 1902, heard in a nursery within a large house, buffered from routine by servants, nannies, and cooks, and secure behind the impenetrable firewall of the greatest Army and Navy the world had yet seen.

Then there are Kipling's own illustrations. They are bold, Beardsley-esque, and really not very good.  Often described as "woodcuts", I'm pretty sure they are actually ink drawings in the woodcut style (though I'd be interested to know for sure?).  The Cat That Walked By Himself is an exception, and rightly popular, though few people seem to realise it is by Kipling himself.  Most of them are crowded, mannered, uncertain of line, and too reliant on the use of large black shapes -- they have none of the delicate clarity of a Beardsley, but no compensating vigour of shape or composition.  Above all, it's hard to make out what they're meant to be -- never a good thing in an illustration --  and it's no wonder Kipling felt the need to write a commentary on each.  Some of these commentaries are so whimsically strange you have to wonder what Kipling used to put in his pipe.

But I am much taken with them, Best Beloved, and if I am ever blessed with grandchildren I shall scare them something hijjus at bedtime with my gritted-teeth rendering of the Crocodile in "The Elephant's Child".


Royal Mail Just So centenary stamps
Illustrations by Izhar Cohen

16 comments:

Terry said...

Like all great children's literature, Kipling's stories have a huge amount for the adult as well. That's why Winnie the Pooh - not the godawful Disnified version, AA Milne's originals - are a joy to read, because of all the lovely jokes that appeal to adults, like WtP "living under the name of Sanders" - and the illustration shows him doing just that. And if you haven't read Wind in the Willows yet, do - cracking.

Terry said...

Hmmm - Terry is really Martyn Cornell, btw.

Gavin McL said...

I was read the Jungle Book by my grandfather and thoroughly enjoyed it though, unfortunately for him, I became fixated on one story - Riki Tiki Tavi - the brave snake fighting mongoose. I have vague memories of him saying "There are other stories in this book you know"
I read the Swallows & Amazons series myself and loved them - I harassed my father into buying a boat (a cheap sailing dinghy)and several years later I ended up studying Naval Architecture so careful what you do read your grandchildren.
I worked for a short while in the large Korean shipyards (Hyundai & Daewoo) and you see the Swastika regularly there, painted on Buddhist temples and some Buddhists wear them like Christians wear crosses. The first time I noticed them it was a bit of a shock

I did like "Elevation" by the way.

Gavin

Mike C. said...

"Terry" [your secret is safe with me, though I admit I'm losing track of who wants to be anonymous, and from whom],

Yes, though the same could be said for 90s Disney and Pixar -- I've sat through any number of their movies, happily chuckling at the stuff that went over the kids' heads.

I do find a certain level of whimsy and twee-ness toxic, which is why (yes) I have never read WtP, though I'll give it a shot one day, I'm sure.

Come to think of it, my kids are going to be levelling precisely the same charge of cultural deprivation at me...

Mike

Mike C. said...

Gavin,

I did read the "Jungle Book" and "Kim", though only because I was keen member of the Cubs. It was quite difficult getting one's 8-year old head around the idea that JB was *not* a sort of foundational text of the Scouting movement.

Yes, saving up Arthur Ransome's books, too, and hoping that his extraordinary life in Soviet Russia somehow finds expression in them. Do the Swallows form a collective? Are the Amazons really the anarchists at Kronstadt?

Mike

Gavin McL said...

I'm afraid my knowledge of the Russian revolution isn't sufficient to be able to draw parallels between the goings on in the lakes and those in early 20th century Russia. The Amazons do however wear red hats and in one story "Winter Holiday" the children's main plan is instigated by the hoisting of a red flag.
The contrast between the freedom the children in the stories enjoy, best exemplified by the famous telegram "BETTER DROWNED THAN DUFFERS IF NOT DUFFERS WON'T DROWN" and what children are limited to today is quite marked. I have two daughters and it's interesting to notice how AR lets some of the girls take on leading roles (Nancy leader of the Amazons) and others such as Susan, mate of the Swallow have much more conventional roles such as organising food and looking after people - though it is true that the first mate on a ship is also responsible for the welfare of the crew. They are lovely books and AR's illustrations do have a simple charm but I don't think AR makes it into the first rank of children's authors the stories don't have that depth that allows adult readers to engage with them fully.

Mike C. said...

Gavin,

Red hats, red flag? Say no more. I believe one of the characters is called "Titty", thoughtfully changed to "Kitty" in the TV version.

Eeyorn,

You had me puzzled with "Phillip Larkin's Golden Compass series" -- were there aspects to my least-favourite librarian-poet that I was unaware of? Then I realised you meant Philip Pullman...

Mike

Terry said...

Ah yes, Philip Larkin:

"They tuck you up, your mum and dad
And read you bedtime stories, too"

- isn't that how it went?

Martyn-not-Terry

Mike C. said...

Very neat, M-not-T!

Of course, as you very well know, that's how it shoulda went. That's Adrian Mitchell's version.

Mike

Zouk Delors said...

NEWSHOUND IN SECRET IDENTITY SCANDAL

I feel a story coming on!

[Are we sure this is the REAL Terry? Ed.]

Gavin McL said...

Able Seaman Titty to you. She's the in the Swallows and she often wraps their adventures in a story. So the local peak they climb becomes "Kachenjunga" the man living on a houseboat gets named Captain Flint etc, etc.
It wouldn't surprise me if Titty "is" AR.

Struan said...

Our lot are/were entranced by E.Nesbitt, hated Swallows and Amazons, loved Joan Aiken, and refuse point blank to go anywhere near Stig of the Dump.

There are endless depressingly bad series of books about fantasy adventures or cows in space or dogs working as spies. The kids love the and-then aspect, but they are torture to read for an adult. An exception is Mr Gum, who is so wonderfully surreal and politically incorrect that I happily read them to myself.

Terry Pratchetts books for slightly older readers are full of jokes at all levels. The Wee Free Men stories are cracking.

Mike C. said...

Struan,

Not come across Mr. Gum -- after our time. How generational these things are -- any kids book published after about 2004 might as well not exist, as far as we're concerned.

Terry Pratchett is a wonderful writer, full stop. The witches Esme Weatherwax and Nanny Ogg are two of my favourite literary characters.

Mike

Struan said...

I have vivid memories of trying to explain to the nice people at the Asian takeaway near the station that our children calling their food "rat on a stick" was the highest form of praise, and not a racial slur.

The idea of "Bang goes saxpence!" as a battle cry has a certain appeal too.

However, if I had to choose one of his inventions to take to a desert island, it would be Death. Or the Rat version.

Mike C. said...

Gavin,

You had me foxed with "It wouldn't surprise me if Titty "is" AR" -- I was was trying to work out what state / orientation that might be (cf. TG, LGBT, BP, etc.) until I realised you meant Arthur Ransome...

Struan,

Yes, Death (or DEATH) is a triumph, too. If only Pratchett wouldn't wear that stupid, sorry, idiotic hat, people would take him more seriously...

Mike

Zouk Delors said...

See Terry with the 'at on? Listen, 'e's a
Propa pukka copper-bottomed geeza!
'E likes a beer or two, but don't get lairy
(Don't get me wrong, 'e'll 'ave it - e's no fairy!)

Is this the one?