Subject: RE: Gunga Din. Racist or just of its time? From: Dave the Gnome Date: 07 Feb 24 - 05:58 PM I can't see it being the latter, Dick, as I cannot find any glorification of anything (apart from the eponymous water bearer) in there. What makes you think it may? |
Subject: RE: Gunga Din. Racist or just of its time? From: The Sandman Date: 05 Feb 24 - 02:54 PM Kipling represents the viewpoint of the British political establishment of that time, he was a mouthpiece for imperialism. imperialism relies upon exploitation to succeed. Kipling used his writing as a propaganda tool. but is this particular poem, racist? or is it just an attempt to glorify the empire |
Subject: RE: Gunga Din. Racist or just of its time? From: Stilly River Sage Date: 05 Feb 24 - 02:09 PM Richard, this thread and discussion of that poem are, as pointed out earlier, a teachable moment for all of us. If you take a scholarly dive into the theory of semiotics (started by Ferdinand de Saussure - using his word semiology) it can give depth to this discussion. The first blip I see is in Europe in the early 1880s (on the Google Books Ngram Viewer). The English word Semiotics starts rising in usage in about 1942. (A date not necessary to what Kipling understood so much as much as an introduction to what I'm trying to say.) In its most basic form, semiotics says that the words (signs) written have meaning to the author but have different meanings to each reader based upon their experiences. Right from the very first day in print. If I, who am from the heavily wooded Pacific Northwest read the word "tree" I tend to first visualize the tall conifers of my homeland unless it is further defined with a genus or common name (live oak, pine, etc.). What we visualize depends on what we have experience of. It extends everywhere - food, clothing, modes of travel, work. That said, the words in Gunga Din are extremely loaded when describing that world. In the day it was written the readers understood it better than we do today. The vernacular of a soldier uses colloquial and idiomatic terms. Slang ebbs and flows, terms we considered one thing in the 1950s or 60s have completely changed today ("gay," for example.) The meaning of the names and curses. As Howard said, societies' standards are evolving. We can't assume everyone who read it thought it was acceptable that a native man - employed or indentured or possibly enslaved - who carried water who had little agency, few garments, no adequate gear for the work he was doing - should be in that situation. Perhaps most of the poem's readers didn't see the status quo, that water they were swimming in, as a huge imbalance of power and agency, though scholars in the day were beginning to discuss these things. It does read like it was written to influence how people saw that world. In which case it puts him in the same boat as Harriet Beecher Stowe (someone mentioned Uncle Tom's Cabin up thread). |
Subject: RE: Gunga Din. Racist or just of its time? From: Richard Mellish Date: 05 Feb 24 - 11:49 AM Howard said > I doubt anyone will change their minds over this. Those who see it as perpetuating outdated stereotypes and attitudes will continue to do so and won't be persuaded. Those who see it as challenging them will also continue to do so. The power of poetry, and indeed of any art, is that it can have multiple meanings and mean different things to different people. Sadly, discussions such as the one on this thread do tend to consist of one faction arguing some point of view in various ways while the other faction argues the opposite, with few if any being persuaded to change their views. I see the Gunga Din poem as intended to demonstrate that assessing someone on the basis of their race is an unsound principle. I started writing some more but it would belong below the line so I'm not bothering. |
Subject: RE: Gunga Din. Racist or just of its time? From: Howard Jones Date: 05 Feb 24 - 09:51 AM The discussion is not about homosexuality but about how we should regard Kipling's attitudes and opinions. They appear out of date and perhaps unacceptable to us, but our own certainties may appear similarly out of date in another hundred years. It is fair to criticise him, but in doing so we should be aware that we are not uniquely wise, and that we too might look very suspect to future generations. The non-sequitur post was removed. The brief reference is fine - but Dick taking the bit in his teeth and running with a change of subject is not. ---mudelf |
Subject: RE: Gunga Din. Racist or just of its time? From: Howard Jones Date: 05 Feb 24 - 08:39 AM It was I who mentioned homosexuality as an example of how society's attitudes can alter, which is why we should be cautious about applying our own values to the past. Of course different societies and at different times have different attitudes, and even a single society at a point in time won't agree on everything, which is why we have politics. However my point stands - history tells us it is reasonable to expect that attitudes will be different in a hundred years time, and that our own attitudes and certainties will look out-of-date and wrong. |
Subject: RE: Gunga Din. Racist or just of its time? From: Backwoodsman Date: 05 Feb 24 - 06:46 AM https://www.irishtimes.com/culture/heritage/rudyard-kipling-s-first-world-war-tragedy-1.2190731 |
Subject: RE: Gunga Din. Racist or just of its time? From: Backwoodsman Date: 05 Feb 24 - 06:44 AM That’s the first time I’ve read ‘Mesopotamia’ too, Dave - what a powerful piece of writing! You’re right about Kipling’s son, 2nd Lieut. John Kipling was killed during the Battle of Loos in 1915. |
Subject: RE: Gunga Din. Racist or just of its time? From: Dave the Gnome Date: 05 Feb 24 - 05:08 AM Wow! Never read that before and it is indeed powerful. Didn't Kipling lose a son around then? |
Subject: RE: Gunga Din. Racist or just of its time? From: Stilly River Sage Date: 04 Feb 24 - 11:05 PM Howard is correct about Mesopotamia—it is powerful. The date pretty much says it all as far as who he was thinking of. Mesopotamia BY RUDYARD KIPLING 1917 They shall not return to us, the resolute, the young, The eager and whole-hearted whom we gave: But the men who left them thriftily to die in their own dung, Shall they come with years and honour to the grave? They shall not return to us, the strong men coldly slain In sight of help denied from day to day: But the men who edged their agonies and chid them in their pain, Are they too strong and wise to put away? Our dead shall not return to us while Day and Night divide— Never while the bars of sunset hold. But the idle-minded overlings who quibbled while they died, Shall they thrust for high employments as of old? Shall we only threaten and be angry for an hour? When the storm is ended shall we find How softly but how swiftly they have sidled back to power By the favour and contrivance of their kind? Even while they soothe us, while they promise large amends, Even while they make a show of fear, Do they call upon their debtors, and take counsel with their friends, To conform and re-establish each career? Their lives cannot repay us—their death could not undo— The shame that they have laid upon our race. But the slothfulness that wasted and the arrogance that slew, Shall we leave it unabated in its place? The fact that it doesn't say who or where, just relative age and power juxtaposition, allows the words to pull current events to mind. |
Subject: RE: Gunga Din. Racist or just of its time? From: Mrrzy Date: 04 Feb 24 - 04:00 PM Truly late reply, but my choice not to sing whaling songs, because I disapprove of whaling, was not an admonition for others not to sing whaling songs. I encourage everybody to sing songs they enjoy singing, and to stop singing songs they no longer enjoy singing for personal reasons. Also, racism is hardly a modern concept. People have been bigoted against outgroups since forming ingroups. In fact, it's pretty much a sine qua non. Vivent les différences! |
Subject: RE: Gunga Din. Racist or just of its time? From: GUEST,Phil d'Conch Date: 04 Feb 24 - 02:44 PM Tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow, Creeps in this petty pace from day to day, To the last syllable of recorded time; And all our yesterdays have lighted fools The way to dusty death. Kipling and his mates were third in line after the Dutch & French. Only the Brits thought that was an improvement and the urbane anti-colonial Kipling reader has always preferred an Upper Paleolithic/Pre-Columbian North America. There are two things in the world I can't stand: people who are intolerant of other people's cultures... and the Dutch. |
Subject: RE: Gunga Din. Racist or just of its time? From: Backwoodsman Date: 04 Feb 24 - 02:21 PM Two great posts, Howard. |
Subject: RE: Gunga Din. Racist or just of its time? From: Howard Jones Date: 04 Feb 24 - 12:51 PM Of course my statement about standards in a hundred years time is speculation, but it is a reasonable assumption. Society's standards are constantly evolving - they have changed considerably over my own lifetime. To give but one example, attitudes to homosexuality are now completely different from when I was young. It is reasonable to assume that this evolution will continue, in fact it would more be remarkable if it did not. I am warning against the assumption that we are more virtuous than previous generations, when in many cases all that means is that our priorities are different from theirs. |
Subject: RE: Gunga Din. Racist or just of its time? From: Thompson Date: 04 Feb 24 - 12:20 PM Yes, he was a wonderful writer of fiction; as a child I had a spell of a dangerously infections disease and was given only books that could be burnt after reading, so I read a lot of 19th-century books considered suitable for children. I loved the stories, but references to "fuzzy wuzzies" and other supposedly inferior races not so much. I found the combination of kindness and heroism with contempt for different humans hard to code. |
Subject: RE: Gunga Din. Racist or just of its time? From: The Sandman Date: 04 Feb 24 - 10:20 AM It does not appeal to me as a song so I would not sing it, as regards poetry, I prefer Hardy, just a matter of taste rather than anything else. I even prefer Fox Smith as a poet. as for the standards in hundred years time, that is speculation, whether they will consider past standards misguided is something none of us know. Therefore I cannot see the relevance of the quote as to how we might view standards of the past Howards statement is an opinion, but it is not based on anything factual, it does not follow automatically that because some people today crticise the standards of the past,that futore generations will critics todays standards |
Subject: RE: Gunga Din. Racist or just of its time? From: Dave the Gnome Date: 04 Feb 24 - 09:32 AM very well put, Howard. |
Subject: RE: Gunga Din. Racist or just of its time? From: Howard Jones Date: 04 Feb 24 - 08:46 AM I doubt anyone will change their minds over this. Those who see it as perpetuating outdated stereotypes and attitudes will continue to do so and won't be persuaded. Those who see it as challenging them will also continue to do so. The power of poetry, and indeed of any art, is that it can have multiple meanings and mean different things to different people. The same is true of Kipling himself. Some see him only as an imperialist and a racist, and dismiss him accordingly. He was both of those. He hated Germans and was distrustful of Jews, although he admired some aspects of Judaism. On the other hand seems to have admired the people of India, and worked to ensure that the contribution of Indian troops in WW1 was recognised. Like anyone, he was complex and sometimes contradictory. For all his undoubted faults, many of his writings were highly relevant at the time, and many still resonate today - read 'Mesopotamia' and ask yourself if the "idle-minded overlings who quibbled while they died" are any different today. Of course he was a man of his time - we all are. We should be cautious about judging previous periods by our own standards. The religious persecutions of the 16th and 17th centuries were carried out by people who believed they were doing God's work and would be rewarded in heaven. The slave trade was facilitated by god-fearing churchgoers who no doubt thought of themselves as good people. Every generation thinks that its standards are the correct ones. I have no doubt that in a hundred years' time many what we now think of as enlightened and modern attitudes will appear to be similarly outdated and misguided. |
Subject: RE: Gunga Din. Racist or just of its time? From: Dave the Gnome Date: 04 Feb 24 - 04:57 AM Interesting point in the notes on the poem linked by DaveRo "I consider this poem to be an Act of Contrition" I had never thought of it that way but, yes, it could well be. |
Subject: RE: Gunga Din. Racist or just of its time? From: GUEST,paperback Date: 03 Feb 24 - 03:11 PM I suppose Ganga Din and his fellows had their pet name for the British too only they never made it into print Twenty years or so ago I was called a Wigger. I've only just (in the past few years) learned what that means. I remember being alittle taken aback the first time someone called me a White Guy. Now it's common. I guess applying the Golden Rule in hindsight is abit foolish albeit all the rage nowadays. |
Subject: RE: Gunga Din. Racist or just of its time? From: GUEST,Phil d'Conch Date: 03 Feb 24 - 01:32 PM DtG: Nowadays people just wouldn't publish anything like it but, at the time, it was OK. As a social record of people's attitudes it is a fine example. I would happily sing it at a folk club, just as I would sing hunting songs without advocating hunting. Would you and why? If I would and you would not, it is proof positive we are not one person and nothing else. Artist and the planet Earth, for all time no less, all being on the same page of anything would be the so-called 'end times' methinks. And a bore to boot. Uncle Tom's Cabin... the most effective work of abolitionist art ever aaaand... oooooorrr hopelessly racist dreck. Or harmless symbols if one don't read the lingo at all. But it's just the one (1) book, not three (3.) Stephen King + 200 years is going to confuse a few readers about the times and the writer. You can bet on it, but you'll never collect. |
Subject: RE: Gunga Din. Racist or just of its time? From: Charmion Date: 03 Feb 24 - 12:42 PM I didn’t get the cognitive dissonance until I was well up in my 30s and had been reading about the Vietnam War. But it’s a work of art, and therefore has enough layers of meaning for readers of any age. I must admit I like it a lot more now than I did in my far-distant youth. |
Subject: RE: Gunga Din. Racist or just of its time? From: meself Date: 03 Feb 24 - 11:45 AM "you need to know rather a lot about the British Army of the Victorian era" - Of course, 'rather a lot' is relative, but I don't think you really need to know much at all about said subject to get the idea of the poem; it's fairly obvious, isn't it? I mean, I understood it when I read it as a kid, and, while I was certainly 'bookish', I wasn't a genius then or now, by any stretch. |
Subject: RE: Gunga Din. Racist or just of its time? From: Charmion Date: 03 Feb 24 - 11:26 AM Matt Milton, I guess I'll have to stay away from your folk club -- not that I have the chops to pull off a performance of "Gunga Din". Jim Croce (of all people) did a marvellous job of it on his first album, "Facets", released in 1966. As I said upthread, "Gunga Din" is a highly ironic piece intended for audiences capable of understanding the difference between words and meaning. To "get" the meaning and unbutton the irony, you need to know rather a lot about the British Army of the Victorian era, and a fair bit about the King James Bible while you're at it. In the last stanza, Kipling identifies Gunga Din with Lazarus (of Dives and Lazarus fame), who in legend went to Hell to ease the suffering of the damned. All through the poem, he contrasts the harsh terms used to describe and address Gunga Din with the man's kind and courageous behaviour. He puts the whole thing in the mouth of a British soldier to highlight the cognitive dissonance that is a necessary part of the colonialism. It's not a text for single-minded modern people unwilling to dig down beneath the surface. |
Subject: RE: Gunga Din. Racist or just of its time? From: GUEST,matt milton Date: 03 Feb 24 - 10:11 AM If it ever was a standard performance piece at folk clubs it certainly isn't now. I've never heard anyone perform or recite it in nearly 20 years of going to folk clubs and it would go down extremely badly at any of the folk clubs I go. If anyone performed it at my local folk club I wouldn't be the only person having a quiet word with the performer asking them not to do so again. The viewpoint that the poem expresses is ambivalent - liberal perhaps even radical for its time - but couched in all sorts of outdated values and assumptions about race and class. Ask yourself how you'd feel as a person of Indian descent listening to that. Then remind yourself that you don't know who's in your audience. Loads of people don't realise my partner is Anglo-Indian and once or twice over our long time together I've been in situations where someone has been extremely embarassed after they've said something slightly racist and she has informed them about her heritage using let's say colourful language. If I were at a folk club and someone 'performed' that poem, I'd be coming over to have a word afterwards. |
Subject: RE: Gunga Din. Racist or just of its time? From: Big Al Whittle Date: 03 Feb 24 - 09:09 AM If we were only allowed to write about people who were kind and virtuous and respectful of racial, sexual identities and expressed themselves with humanity and restraint.... Well I am sure it would satisfy the natures and tastes of some people, but it wouldn't leave much of human culture. Plus of course it would be untruthful. |
Subject: RE: Gunga Din. Racist or just of its time? From: DaveRo Date: 03 Feb 24 - 07:51 AM An A to Z index and the text of every Kipling poem is on the Kipling Society website Poems A to Z and many of them have a page of notes, such as this Notes to Gunga Din |
Subject: RE: Gunga Din. Racist or just of its time? From: The Sandman Date: 03 Feb 24 - 05:44 AM Gunga Din By Rudyard Kipling You may talk o’ gin and beer When you’re quartered safe out ’ere, An’ you’re sent to penny-fights an’ Aldershot it; But when it comes to slaughter You will do your work on water, An’ you’ll lick the bloomin’ boots of ’im that’s got it. Now in Injia’s sunny clime, Where I used to spend my time A-servin’ of ’Er Majesty the Queen, Of all them blackfaced crew The finest man I knew Was our regimental bhisti, Gunga Din, He was ‘Din! Din! Din! ‘You limpin’ lump o’ brick-dust, Gunga Din! ‘Hi! Slippy hitherao ‘Water, get it! Panee lao, ‘You squidgy-nosed old idol, Gunga Din.’ The uniform ’e wore Was nothin’ much before, An’ rather less than ’arf o’ that be’ind, For a piece o’ twisty rag An’ a goatskin water-bag Was all the field-equipment ’e could find. When the sweatin’ troop-train lay In a sidin’ through the day, Where the ’eat would make your bloomin’ eyebrows crawl, We shouted ‘Harry By!’ Till our throats were bricky-dry, Then we wopped ’im ’cause ’e couldn’t serve us all. It was ‘Din! Din! Din! ‘You ’eathen, where the mischief ’ave you been? ‘You put some juldee in it ‘Or I’ll marrow you this minute ‘If you don’t fill up my helmet, Gunga Din!’ ’E would dot an’ carry one Till the longest day was done; An’ ’e didn’t seem to know the use o’ fear. If we charged or broke or cut, You could bet your bloomin’ nut, ’E’d be waitin’ fifty paces right flank rear. With ’is mussick on ’is back, ’E would skip with our attack, An’ watch us till the bugles made 'Retire,’ An’ for all ’is dirty ’ide ’E was white, clear white, inside When ’e went to tend the wounded under fire! It was ‘Din! Din! Din!’ With the bullets kickin’ dust-spots on the green. When the cartridges ran out, You could hear the front-ranks shout, ‘Hi! ammunition-mules an' Gunga Din!’ I shan’t forgit the night When I dropped be’ind the fight With a bullet where my belt-plate should ’a’ been. I was chokin’ mad with thirst, An’ the man that spied me first Was our good old grinnin’, gruntin’ Gunga Din. ’E lifted up my ’ead, An’ he plugged me where I bled, An’ ’e guv me ’arf-a-pint o’ water green. It was crawlin’ and it stunk, But of all the drinks I’ve drunk, I’m gratefullest to one from Gunga Din. It was 'Din! Din! Din! ‘’Ere’s a beggar with a bullet through ’is spleen; ‘’E's chawin’ up the ground, ‘An’ ’e’s kickin’ all around: ‘For Gawd’s sake git the water, Gunga Din!’ ’E carried me away To where a dooli lay, An’ a bullet come an’ drilled the beggar clean. ’E put me safe inside, An’ just before ’e died, 'I ’ope you liked your drink,’ sez Gunga Din. So I’ll meet ’im later on At the place where ’e is gone— Where it’s always double drill and no canteen. ’E’ll be squattin’ on the coals Givin’ drink to poor damned souls, An’ I’ll get a swig in hell from Gunga Din! Yes, Din! Din! Din! You Lazarushian-leather Gunga Din! Though I’ve belted you and flayed you, By the livin’ Gawd that made you, You’re a better man than I am, Gunga Din! n/a Source: A Choice of Kipling's Verse (1943) |
Subject: RE: Gunga Din. Racist or just of its time? From: The Sandman Date: 03 Feb 24 - 03:58 AM apropos of Kipling, he had in my opinion as regards writing and political opinions similarities with Henry Willamson[ Tarka the Otter, both were excellent writers about things connected with nature. Williamson was an admirer of Fascism, as was Richard Reynell Bellamy, KIPLING was a jingoist colonialist right wing glorifier of the british empire |
Subject: RE: Gunga Din. Racist or just of its time? From: The Sandman Date: 03 Feb 24 - 03:38 AM i would not sing it.I would not sing Hugh of lincoln either in my opinion his best work was the jungle book with regard to hunting songs , I sing BOLD REYNARD THE FOX. Kipling was an establishment mouth piece, i guess that was the reason Peter Bellamy liked him. |
Subject: RE: Gunga Din. Racist or just of its time? From: Dave the Gnome Date: 03 Feb 24 - 03:12 AM I don't know if he was as I never met him! I do know that he was a brilliant writer though. That opens the argument about whether works of art should be vilified because of the character of their creators. That has been discussed many times elsewhere and is not the question being asked here. |
Subject: RE: Gunga Din. Racist or just of its time? From: Thompson Date: 03 Feb 24 - 01:27 AM Kipling was a colonialist and a racist. It doesn't excuse this to say "so were plenty of people" - the same is true now. Plenty of people weren't racist then, plenty of people weren't colonialist then. He was a flake and a creep. |
Subject: RE: Gunga Din. Racist or just of its time? From: Stilly River Sage Date: 02 Feb 24 - 08:10 PM I don't think we're disagreeing. We are products of our times and these authors were the fish who didn't see the water they were swimming in at the time. Their art is still art, but is viewed differently when looking back. Like Al said. |
Subject: RE: Gunga Din. Racist or just of its time? From: Big Al Whittle Date: 02 Feb 24 - 04:32 PM I've been told that many of my songs are politically unacceptable. All these arguments have a sort repetitious quality. Shakespeare was anti semite; Oscar Wilde was a sexual predator; Agatha Christie was a snob; Hilary Mantel romanticised a sadistic murderer; and lest we forget Seamus Heaney was the laureate of violence. The point is that the artist creates. That is the miracle. Frequently the artist cannot control what his nature produces. Always respect the miracle. |
Subject: RE: Gunga Din. Racist or just of its time? From: GUEST,S Date: 02 Feb 24 - 03:38 PM Indeed, Dave (and Charmion). |
Subject: RE: Gunga Din. Racist or just of its time? From: Dave the Gnome Date: 02 Feb 24 - 02:50 PM Well said Charmion. |
Subject: RE: Gunga Din. Racist or just of its time? From: Charmion Date: 02 Feb 24 - 01:18 PM When you consider that soldiers who respect and like each other profoundly will frequently address each as "hey Fuckface" (I have lived this experience), the language of "Gunga Din" looks comparatively mild. As I read this poem, Kipling's soldier is marvelling at the goodness and valour of this very humble person, lowlier even than the common soldiers (the scum of the earth, enlisted for drink) for whom he hauls water. In his own idiom, the soldier describes the gap yawning between what the army has taught him to think of Gunga Din and the reality of the man, revealed by his performance under fire and his kindness to the wounded. Don't be distracted by the racial slurs; that's irony, people -- a feature, not a bug. The dramatic tension is released with that last line: "You're a better man than I am, Gunga Din." |
Subject: RE: Gunga Din. Racist or just of its time? From: Stilly River Sage Date: 02 Feb 24 - 12:34 PM It is easy to imagine a musical examination of racial attitudes by going through the discussions here at Mudcat of which other songs are appropriate to perform any more. I'm sure a search will bring up a robust list, this is a frequent topic of conversation on the 'cat, and it has been made clear that they won't be deleted just because they are inappropriate today. Google's response to your keyword search might be interesting. |
Subject: RE: Gunga Din. Racist or just of its time? From: Stilly River Sage Date: 02 Feb 24 - 12:12 PM I never said don't read it; quite the opposite. It is a teachable moment. To Kill A Mockingbird (1960) is a novel that also is of its place and time, and the debate rages about whether Atticus is what is today called a "white savior." He was an activist, as was the judge who handed him the case. The intertwined relationship with the housekeeper Calpurnia probably comes into that debate also. The poem Gunga Din (from Barrack-Room Ballads) was published in 1890, and in those seventy years between the Din and Mockingbird there were paradigm shifts in how people thought and looked at race and rights and colonial activity, etc. Social Darwinism rose in the 1860s, and was apparent in policy and laws such as US immigration laws of the 1920s and the eugenics practices of the US that Hitler studied and emulated into the 1940s. Passing one text over another, looking at how the narrator tells the story, what the writer was doing with the narrator (reliable or not), is instructive. The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn was from 1884, and is, like To Kill a Mockingbird, an almost perfect novel. The publisher compelled Clemens/Twain to add the last twelve chapters with Tom Sawyer because he was so concerned that the Huck Finn part by itself would repel readers. I find the last 12 chapters to be repellant - and they take Jim from being an agent in the story to being an object to be manipulated by the Sawyer character. Again, reading it with other novels for comparison. One to add to a reading list (these all being American novels) is Their Eyes Were Watching God (1937) by Zora Neale Hurston. Examine the way characters are treated, race is being discussed, the way the narrators tell the story. What the author was writing for and about. Novels by Kipling, by Doyle, by others can be read along with more recent novels such as the Raj Quartet by Paul Scott, written in the period from 1965 to 1975. He was another English novelist writing about India or people from India and the English while they were there. While you're at it, look up some of the theory by scholars like Henry Louis Gates, Jr. Known today for his genealogical programs, he has for years written about race. The Signifying Monkey will help as a lens through which to view those novels named. Just don't ask me to read pap novels like The Help or The Blind Side or Dances With Wolves - those modern writers should have known better. |
Subject: RE: Gunga Din. Racist or just of its time? From: Dave the Gnome Date: 02 Feb 24 - 06:42 AM Nice to see this turn up again after all these years! :-) I never got round to singing it myself but that is due to lack of enthusiasm rather than any racial sensibilities. I do sing Tommy though and, even though that also may be the "ventroliquism of a working-class soldier", I think it is still relevant today. It is good to see that Gunga Din is still being performed so thank you, John. I echo Joe's sentiments about understanding the attitudes of past years to help recognise and eliminate racism now. I am not sure if the tirade against the (now defunct) British Empire does any good or adds to this discussion apart from the point "But first you have to understand the problem". Surely this tyoe of literature does help us to do that? |
Subject: RE: Gunga Din. Racist or just of its time? From: Monologue John Date: 02 Feb 24 - 05:39 AM The Soldiers comments are racist but at the time they were The Kipling commentary isn't Have I performed this one yes with a clear conscience It is part of our history Without a history a country has no future You carry on making the same mistakes over again |
Subject: RE: Gunga Din. Racist or just of its time? From: GUEST,S Date: 02 Feb 24 - 05:36 AM Excellent post, Joe. |
Subject: RE: Gunga Din. Racist or just of its time? From: GUEST,matt milton Date: 02 Feb 24 - 04:45 AM I could have phrased the above better: apologies for my rather ageist comment ("nobody under 70 would want to"). There are plenty of septuagenarians, octogenerians and nonagenarians who would never wish to sing it, of course. |
Subject: RE: Gunga Din. Racist or just of its time? From: GUEST,matt milton Date: 02 Feb 24 - 04:33 AM That Kipling poem is clearly written in the persona of a British soldier, so it is debatable whether the poem itself is racist. It undoubtedly contains racist slurs and assumptions. There's clearly some distance between the first-person I of the poem and Kipling himself. For me the distance isn't big enough. The fact that the overall tone is comic (albeit sourly comic) doesn't help either. Should you sing it today? The question is rather academic: nobody under 70 would want to. To sing it you'd have to be someone who feels comfortable voicing racist language to comic effect (the idea of which repulses me); you'd also have to comfortable singing a song with a very patronising ventroliquism of a working-class soldier - that in itself would be quite cringe-inducing. It's not even a very good poem - there are far better Kipling poems you could sing. |
Subject: RE: Gunga Din. Racist or just of its time? From: Joe Offer Date: 02 Feb 24 - 02:24 AM I would hesitate to call Gunga Din "racist." It portrays racism and the effects of racism very effectively, but it certainly doesn't promote racism. I'd hate to see literature like this be suppressed. We need to understand the racism of past years in order to recognize and eliminate it in our present time. Same with Huckleberry Finn and To Kill a Mockingbird and many others. I also think we need to see the "n-word" and hear it, to understand its impact. I don't think it's helpful to euphemize things. If we don't understand, then we're likely to deny. |
Subject: RE: Gunga Din. Racist or just of its time? From: Stilly River Sage Date: 01 Feb 24 - 10:03 PM "to appreciate many good things the British also left behind." Ah! An apologist. Of course it's racist. It is of its time and written from a place of privilege and entitlement. The things the British left behind - plundered landscape, altered crops (based upon what the British wanted to grow for profit, not what people grew to live on), mangled princely states, religious turmoil, and the coup de grâce - partitioning India and Pakistan. Add insult to injury, make it even worse by filming the story with the protagonist played by Sam Jaffee. A Jewish American actor in black face. The gift that keeps on giving. Even good intentions today go sadly awry. What went wrong for Joanna and the Gurkhas? Reparation and letting them stay in situ with better pensions would have probably served better. Once you mess up a place, it's awfully difficult to fix it. But first you have to understand the problem. (This discussion hasn't been particularly productive in the US for American Indian tribal descendents and the descendents of Africans enslaved for hundreds of years.) Just don't pretend that when you enslaved or colonized people you were adding value to their lives. You weren't. |
Subject: RE: Gunga Din. Racist or just of its time? From: GUEST,TheStoryTeller Date: 01 Feb 24 - 09:15 PM Kipling thought deeply about his writings and about people. His works were written about people and events that moved him. "Gunga Din" begins with a comment about penny fights at home,
You will do your work on water, An’ you’ll lick the bloomin’ boots of ‘im that’s got it." an heroic character who is not afraid to face danger on the battlefield as he tends to wounded men. The poem contiues:
Till the longest day was done, An’ ‘e didn’t seem to know the use o’ fear. If we charged or broke or cut, You could bet your bloomin’ nut, ‘E’d be waitin’ fifty paces right flank rear."
‘E was white, clear white, inside When ‘e went to tend the wounded under fire!" -- But Kipling's soldier does not condemn Gunga Din to hell, he tells us that he and Gunga Din will both be there eventually -
In the place where ‘e is gone— Where it’s always double drill and no canteen; ‘E’ll be squattin’ on the coals Givin’ drink to pore damned souls, An’ I’ll get a swig in Hell from Gunga Din!... ...By the livin’ Gawd that made you, You’re a better man than I am, Gunga Din!" "Gunga Din" shows how, regardless of cynicism, British and Indian, when they met when they were only human beings, and not a geographical parcel. Kipling, like some others, must be read to appreciate many good things the British also left behind. |
Subject: RE: Gunga Din. Racist or just of its time? From: GUEST,Desi C Date: 24 Nov 16 - 11:07 AM Certainly would and have. the P>C brigade to history a great deal of harm by attempting to ban terms which were once offensive, it's like trying to erase history. We should LEaRN from history not create some micky Mouse world pretending things never happened, that simply ensures they will happen again! |
Subject: RE: Gunga Din. Racist or just of its time? From: Lighter Date: 22 Nov 16 - 08:23 PM It all depends on what you mean by "racist." In fact (and I'm serious), it also depends on what you mean by "is." Do you mean, "Did Kipling intend it to be a racist statement by current standards of racism, or did he intend something else"? Or do you mean, "Are some people today racially offended by it, regardless of Kipling's intention"? |
Subject: RE: Gunga Din. Racist or just of its time? From: meself Date: 22 Nov 16 - 08:02 PM Orwell's essay on Kipling is brilliant, and, unsurprisingly, is superb writing, a pleasure to read. |
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