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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
27 of 28 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Nostalgia for 60 year olds,
By
Amazon Verified Purchase(What's this?)
This review is from: Plain Tales from the Hills (Penguin Twentieth-Century Classics) (Paperback)
I bought this book to recall the halcyon days of my secondary schooling in the years 1957 - 61. Then the book was an assigned text for all students in English in New Zealand. The language and the concepts were then frankly beyond the comprehension of 15 year olds. As I grew older, I became aware of the position Kipling held in the Late Victorian era, and the period following the end of the First World War.
I came to understand a little of what the British Empire meant in those times, and the great debt owed by the world to the British Army which subdued Iraq, Pakistan, and the Indian Continent for almost 200 years. Without the benefit of the bomb, with a tiny armed service, and a desire to provide fair and equitable government, the Raj governed fearlessly through the efforts of the thirds sons of many of the great English Families, while the fourth sons provided the humanity of the Church. Patterns we could well emulate again today! This was bread and butter to Kipling. In his early years as a huge supporter of the system, as a spiritualist after the death of his son in the First World War, and in his later years as the designer of the huge Military Cemetaries established in France and Belgium after the War to the Empire's dead, he truly became in his own words a "Builder of the Silent Cities". In 2006, the concepts of his writings are remote from many. In terms of the trials of people, and their attempts to rise over their circumstances through a sense of duty and moral propriety, Kipling's works are without peer. For those starting out to discover him, start with "Stalky and Company", and move to this book, and his other works as extended learning. I hope you come to love his simple characters as I have, and that your School System, and its weird sense of Boyhood Literature does not destroy the desire to read Kipling until your late 60's This book has brought great joy to someone in the prime of life, and brings back some important memories of Scouts, Church and Honour in a time when these are so sadly lacking.
25 of 27 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Excellent reading, one of my favorites,
By mercy_donovan@hotmail.com (Copperas Cove, Texas) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Plain Tales from the Hills (Hardcover)
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.
20 of 22 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
One of the finest collections of short stories in english.,
By A Customer
This review is from: Plain Tales from the Hills (Penguin Twentieth-Century Classics) (Paperback)
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.
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