What do you think?
Rate this book
A Choice of Kipling's Verse Made By T. S. Eliot With an Essay on Rudyard Kipling
Vintage anthology of Rudyard Kipling's verse selected with an introduction by T.S. Eliot.
Hardcover
First published January 1, 1943
About the author
T.S. Eliot
1,072 books5,891 followersThomas Stearns Eliot was a poet, dramatist and literary critic. He received the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1948 "for his outstanding, pioneer contribution to present-day poetry." He wrote the poems The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock, The Waste Land, The Hollow Men, Ash Wednesday, and Four Quartets; the plays Murder in the Cathedral and The Cocktail Party; and the essay Tradition and the Individual Talent. Eliot was born an American, moved to the United Kingdom in 1914 (at the age of 25), and became a British subject in 1927 at the age of 39.
See also http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/T.S._Eliot
See also http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/T.S._Eliot
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews
Read
April 26, 2023Ah, Mary pierced with sorrow,
Remember, reach and save
The soul that comes to-morrow
Before the God that gave!
Since each was born of woman,
For each at utter need –
True comrade and true foeman –
Madonna, intercede!
from "Hymn Before Action."
Remember, reach and save
The soul that comes to-morrow
Before the God that gave!
Since each was born of woman,
For each at utter need –
True comrade and true foeman –
Madonna, intercede!
from "Hymn Before Action."
April 10, 2019
I am in the midst of a long period of schooling in which the only poetry I am taught is modern poetry, which, in my opinion, could be accomplished equally well by prose with awkward line breaks. This is a book I pick up in bed when I'm bored but not all there mentally. My favourites are: 'Dedication from the Barrack-Room Ballads', 'Tommy', and 'Cold Iron'.
November 27, 2020
This book has two components, an excellent opening essay on Rudyard Kipling by poet T.S. Eliot, followed by over one hundred-twenty of Kipling's poems selected by Eliot. I was led to the work by an essay in George Orwell's My Country Right or Left. Orwell's essay was on Eliot's book, particularly his essay, and was so compelling that I had to put Orwell aside for a bit.
Eliot writes of the changes in Kipling's work through the years, "As a man grows older, he may turn to new subject-matter, or he may treat the same material in a different way; as we age we both live in a different world, and become different men in the same world." Eliot later observes, "that the critical tools which we are accustomed to use in analyzing and criticising poetry do not seem to work: I confess furthermore that introspection into my own processes affords no assistance--part of the fascination of this subject is in the exploration of a mind so different from one's own." Eliot concludes that one must note the difference between verse, "some very good verse," and poetry; Kipling qualifies more as a verse writer than a poet, but importantly, he is also a very good writer of stories, a skill many poets lack.
The poems/verses Eliot selects include many that are new to me, and I was glad to meet them. There are a fair number of the most familiar of Kipling's verses, as well. The unfamiliar works are sometimes difficult because of the vocabulary, words of special meaning in a world over a century away. Nonetheless, while added explication by Orwell would be welcome, one may enjoy the rhythm and rhyme of Kipling's work.
Recommended for those who enjoy good writing about literature and writers.
Eliot writes of the changes in Kipling's work through the years, "As a man grows older, he may turn to new subject-matter, or he may treat the same material in a different way; as we age we both live in a different world, and become different men in the same world." Eliot later observes, "that the critical tools which we are accustomed to use in analyzing and criticising poetry do not seem to work: I confess furthermore that introspection into my own processes affords no assistance--part of the fascination of this subject is in the exploration of a mind so different from one's own." Eliot concludes that one must note the difference between verse, "some very good verse," and poetry; Kipling qualifies more as a verse writer than a poet, but importantly, he is also a very good writer of stories, a skill many poets lack.
The poems/verses Eliot selects include many that are new to me, and I was glad to meet them. There are a fair number of the most familiar of Kipling's verses, as well. The unfamiliar works are sometimes difficult because of the vocabulary, words of special meaning in a world over a century away. Nonetheless, while added explication by Orwell would be welcome, one may enjoy the rhythm and rhyme of Kipling's work.
Recommended for those who enjoy good writing about literature and writers.
November 1, 2019
Quite a good collection of the poetry of the most interesting - and, for better or worse, influential -products of the British Empire.
The poems themselves have seeped so deeply into British canon that judging them on their quality may be irrelevent. What matters is that people took Kipling at face value for decades, and here we have both his greatest hits as well as more obscure work that showcases the evolution of a man whose life and work both invited and eluded neat categorization.
The only thing disappointing about this collection is the forewored by T.S. Eliot, which broadly speaking is perfectly adequate and interesting within its aims - but as a Bangladeshi reader, one wants a far greater engagement and critique of Kipling's role as imperial spokesman. It's perfectly fine that Eliot was not the man equipped to provide this analysis; this does not mean I have to accept his foreword as adequate.
The poems themselves have seeped so deeply into British canon that judging them on their quality may be irrelevent. What matters is that people took Kipling at face value for decades, and here we have both his greatest hits as well as more obscure work that showcases the evolution of a man whose life and work both invited and eluded neat categorization.
The only thing disappointing about this collection is the forewored by T.S. Eliot, which broadly speaking is perfectly adequate and interesting within its aims - but as a Bangladeshi reader, one wants a far greater engagement and critique of Kipling's role as imperial spokesman. It's perfectly fine that Eliot was not the man equipped to provide this analysis; this does not mean I have to accept his foreword as adequate.
August 23, 2022
T.S. Eliot's selection has not made me keen to actually purchase the definitive collection of Kipling's verse, which I had had earmarked. This is three-hundred pages, and the DE is seven-hundred or so - the question is, did Eliot select with a bias towards Kipling' larps as a gawd-fearin' souljah with painful grammar 'n awl, and if that's the case, is the rest verse worth reading?
Most of this is as said a painfully forced vernacular wrapping blithe expression of life on the frontier. Kipling's best work on war in the volume was written after his son had been killed (worse - went missing), at which point the marching and drinking songs written from armchair rather than tavern seem to have lost their appeal. Those poems are moving; his work before certainly aren't.
I didn't go in with an axe to grind but I haven't come out with an urge to forage to adorn with laurels, either. You'd have hoped being raised in a land that is the fountainhead of sharp, expressive poetry, something would have rubbed off; sadly, if it did, it was only in patches and moments.
Most of this is as said a painfully forced vernacular wrapping blithe expression of life on the frontier. Kipling's best work on war in the volume was written after his son had been killed (worse - went missing), at which point the marching and drinking songs written from armchair rather than tavern seem to have lost their appeal. Those poems are moving; his work before certainly aren't.
I didn't go in with an axe to grind but I haven't come out with an urge to forage to adorn with laurels, either. You'd have hoped being raised in a land that is the fountainhead of sharp, expressive poetry, something would have rubbed off; sadly, if it did, it was only in patches and moments.
Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews