The Nobel Prize in Literature 1907 was awarded to Rudyard Kipling “in consideration of the power of observation, originality of imagination, virility of ideas and remarkable talent for narration which characterize the creations of this world-famous author.”
I love Kipling. I’ve posted poems by Kipling: Recessional, By Oak, and Ash, and Thorn, L’envoi (When Earth’s Last Picture Is Painted). And, of course, Kipling’s Jungle Book is a lovely set of stories about Mowgli and Bagheera and Shere Khan and the other inhabitants of the Indian jungle. “If” is probably Kipling’s most famous poem:
If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you;
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,
But make allowance for their doubting too:
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or being lied about, don’t deal in lies,
Or being hated, don’t give way to hating,
And yet don’t look too good, nor talk too wise;
If you can dream—and not make dreams your master;
If you can think—and not make thoughts your aim,
If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster
And treat those two impostors just the same:
If you can bear to hear the truth you’ve spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,
And stoop and build ’em up with worn-out tools;
If you can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings
And never breathe a word about your loss:
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: “Hold on!”
If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with Kings—nor lose the common touch,
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you,
If all men count with you, but none too much:
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds’ worth of distance run,
Yours is the Earth and everything that’s in it,
And—which is more—you’ll be a Man, my son!
The Shepherd of the Hills is a book written in 1907 by author Harold Bell Wright. The setting is the Ozark mountains of Missouri, and the book was one of those that appeared on a list of required reading for my Advanced Reading Survey class in college. It’s fairly old-fashioned and sentimental, but not a bad read.
Songs of a Sourdough is a book of poetry published in 1907 by Canadian poet Robert W. Service. Two particularly popular ballads in the collection are “The Shooting of Dan McGrew” and “The Cremation of Sam McGee.” (Click on the title to either poem to read or listen to the story.)
Ah, “If.” I memorized that one way back in 9th grade English. It’s a good one!