Transcription
[Music] Hello everyone. Today we are going to talk about the first writer in English to get the Nobel Prize in Literature: the man whom George Orwell called the prophet of British imperialism. That is why he got the Nobel Prize, because he supported imperialism. Tell me who is that? Rudyard Kipling. Born in 1865, where? In our India, in Bombay. Why? Because his father was the director of the Lahore Museum. He lived in India; he did his schooling in India, but then he went to England, continued his education there, and worked there. He came back to India, so he wrote a lot about India. As you know, the most famous being *Jungle Book*. You probably also know that his novels are less important; his short stories are more important. Rudyard Kipling was mainly a short story writer, and he wrote many famous short stories like *Wee Willie Winkie*, *The Man Who Would Be King*. You should look up the short stories of Rudyard Kipling. The early novels that he wrote were failures; they were not very famous. *The Light That Failed*, have you heard of that? And now, but famous, *Jungle Book*, written as early as 1894. It is a 19th-century novel, as all of us know. It is a story of Mowgli being brought up by wolves. It is actually a collection of short stories; it is not a proper novel, and the animals are all anthropomorphically depicted like human beings, teaching us values and morals and adventures, fighting Shere Khan. This is the most important aspect of the story, apart from the education of Mowgli. There was a second *Jungle Book* that came after this.
Very important for us students of English literature is the novel *Kim*, that came in 1901. It is a very well-known novel. The protagonist is Kimball O'Hara, Kim, an Irish orphan who is brought up in Lahore during very major political events. England and Russia were in the Great Game, spying on each other, going to fight with each other. It was a period of political tension, and Kim, without knowing it, inadvertently gets involved in politics. He's a boy; he also is involved in spirituality because he becomes a chela, or disciple, of a Tibetan Llama. So spirituality and politics, two sides of life; these are the two polarities in Kim's story. He's caught between the two; he is swinging between the two. The Tibetan Llama is searching for the River of the Arrow; it is a river that will wash away all your sins. And finally, at the end of the novel, he finds it. Whether Kim should follow that path, or Kim should follow politics and power, that is the issue in the novel. These are the two choices that he gets at the end of the novel. There are some important characters like Mahbub Ali, Colonel Creighton. Probably in exams, you can be asked something about them. It would be good if you look up *Kim* in more detail.
There are many other novels and short story collections that could be very important, like *Captain Courageous*, *The Phantom Rickshaw*, and *Other Eerie Tales*. Have you heard of *Just So Stories*, *Puck of Pook's Hill*? They are quite famous. And Rudyard Kipling also wrote poetry. You might know about *Barrack-Room Ballads*. *Barrack-Room Ballads* is an important poetry collection. Shall I tell you the names of some important short stories of Rudyard Kipling that will help you? If possible, read them. Okay: *False Dawn*, *Kidnapped*, *The Other Man*. They are all famous short stories of Rudyard Kipling. I would like to tell you about two of his poems which are very notorious—not famous, notorious—because they deal with imperialist themes. One is, of course, *The White Man's Burden*, where Rudyard Kipling says that the Easterners are all half-devil half-child. He is saying that they should be controlled; they should be civilized. That is the White Man's Burden. Obviously, this is a controversial poem because it shows the racism. Then he also wrote *If*, which is a very Victorian poem showing Victorian stoicism, and in *If*, also he shows imperialism. So these are poems that became very controversial. Rudyard Kipling supported imperialism, and that was an aspect of the Edwardian period itself, because this was the point when, this was the time when, um, social class, power of the aristocracy, imperialism—these were all ruling. The colonial empire was at its height. That is Rudyard Kipling.
Did you know, guys, there is an interesting piece of information? Rudyard Kipling used to put a swastika—our Indian swastika—on the cover page of his books. But then the swastika was used by Nazis; it became the Nazi symbol of Aryan supremacy. Then Rudyard Kipling took out the swastika. He also used to put the symbol of an elephant with a lotus in its trunk. Haven't you seen this picture in religious books? An elephant with a lotus in its trunk? That picture, also an Indian picture, he used to put in the cover page of his books. So that is about Rudyard Kipling. The next writer we are talking about is a very interesting writer: H.G. Wells. If we know that he's interesting because he wrote amazing science fiction stories. Starting from the 19th century, he was writing about science fiction. *The Time Machine*: every one of us has heard of, I'm sure. And then there is *The Invisible Man*. H.G. Wells was born one year after Rudyard Kipling, in the year 1866. H.G. Wells was the son of a very inefficient father, and he put his father as a character in one of his novels, *The History of Mr. Polly*. The story of H.G. Wells goes like this: he started studying science under T.H. Huxley. At first, he started writing some science books, and then he turned to fiction. At first, he wrote biology, geography, etc., and then when he started writing fiction, at first he wrote science fiction, futuristic science fiction, you can say scientific romances, and after that he turned to social novels. He has even depicted a New Woman in one of his novels, *Ann Veronica*. So he took up social issues in later novels.
Now, guys, even in his science fiction, he was warning the society against the, uh, consequences of their actions. Use of technology, etc., might lead to terrible consequences. That is the meaning of his science fiction also; that is the message that he gives to society. Now he got involved in some controversies at that time with writers like G.B. Shaw, and he was a very important public figure. He published his first novel, *The Time Machine*, in a very important year. Do you know that year? 1895. Now if you want, if you remember, you can tell me which are the other novels published in the same year. Do you remember? I have told you quite a few. You can type in the chat box. In 1895 came *Jude the Obscure*, the last novel by Thomas Hardy. Don't you remember? Then in 1895 came *Almayer's Folly* of Joseph Conrad, right? And also *The Importance of Being Earnest*. *The Time Machine* came in the same year. It is about a time traveler traveling to the future. A time traveler invents a machine and travels to the year 802,701. Oh my god, that is so much in the future: 802,701, where he is meeting some green-eyed mutants called the Eloi. The Eloi are very small-sized people because they have no exercise; they only use their computers or technology. The Eloi have conquered nature with technology. Because of that, even in appearance they have changed; they have no discipline; they have no curiosity to know anything, all because they are completely dependent on technology. They don't even communicate properly. I used to tell my son, when at one age he was playing with computers and mobile phones too much, like all children want to, I used to tell him, you know, if you become too much dependent on technology, you're going to be an Eloi. I used to tell him because of *The Time Machine*. And Eloi, are they not the only people in that period? There are also Morlocks. Morlocks are descendants of underground people; they are living underground; they are descendants of laborers, and they are very degenerate; they are not good people. They have lived underground for centuries, and they are now preying upon the Eloi. So this is the story. What Wells is doing here, obviously, is warning us against failures. You know, beware when you use technology; beware where our future is going; our civilization is going. That is the kind of warning that he gives here.
Have you heard of *The War of the Worlds*? It is a novel that is very interesting because missiles from Mars have destroyed the Earth. Martians have come to Earth to conquer Earth, and there are only very few survivors; one of them is our unnamed narrator. The Martians are going to destroy them also, but when they come here, they are in for a surprise. What is that? The bacteria on Earth destroys the Martians. We have our own weapons. If Martians have better arms and ammunition, no problem; we have bacteria. So that is why we have garbage dumps and such dirty things on Earth, because we are breeding bacteria in case the Martians come to attack us. Would you like that? So that is *The War of the Worlds*, 1898. All right, I forgot to mention there's another novel, 1896. What is that? *The Island of Doctor Moreau*. It is again interesting because we have a Frankenstein-like character. Remember Victor Frankenstein of Mary Shelley? Such a man is there in this novel also. You know what happens? There is a shipwrecked man; he is the narrator, and he is telling us about this Doctor Moreau who is creating human beings out of animal parts. Oh, same thing like Frankenstein. H.G. Wells copied from Mary Shelley. Now *The Invisible Man*, you know Ralph Ellison also wrote *Invisible Man*. Without the, H.G. Wells wrote *The Invisible Man*, who invents a certain chemical with which he goes invisible, and he is doing a lot of things in his invisibility. There was a famous TV show based on this, a TV serial in my childhood, in Doordarshan or somewhere, it used to come. I have watched it. Have you watched it? Might be available still. *When the Sleeper Wakes*—that is another science fiction novel. It is amazing. A man is falling into a coma-like sleep for over 200 years, and this man, it reminds us of Rip Van Winkle. Rip Van Winkle slept only for 23 years in Washington Irving's short story. Our character sleeps for 203 years and wakes up, and this is funny; he finds that he's the wealthiest man. You know why? Because he had made some investments, and the interest for 203 years made him the wealthiest man. So it is *Ann Veronica* and *Mr. Lewisham*. That is the next novel, 1899, same year as *When the Sleeper Wakes*, 1899. That is again a momentous year; many things happened in 1899. Uh, in *Love and Mr. Lewisham*, for the first time he's exploring socialist themes, not science fiction, and from here onwards H.G. Wells writes many socialist novels. However, there is another science fiction novel also: *The First Men in the Moon*. Can you believe that? Half a century before man actually landed on the moon, H.G. Wells wrote *The First Men in the Moon*. So these are the early science fiction novels. As I already told you, these early science fiction novels have a social element also, warning people against the consequences of their actions. So it is an element of satire that you find in these science fiction novels, satirizing man's mindless pursuits of pleasure and technology, knowledge. Now the later social novels, here satire developed into social criticism. These later science—sorry, social novels—these later social novels are probably inspired by Wells's engagement with the Fabian Society. Remember the Fabian Society? That was founded by George Bernard Shaw, Beatrice and Sidney Webb. They were actually the founders of the Fabian Society, and Wells put Beatrice and Sidney Webb in a novel. Which novel? *The New Machiavelli*. Wells has written the novel *A Modern Utopia*, combining science fiction with social realism. *A Modern Utopia* is narrated by the owner of the voice, one man, the owner of the voice. Then came *Kipps*; it is subtitled *The Story of a Simple Soul*. Kipps is the protagonist, and it is satirical and humorous. Like I told you, his novels of this time are, many of us, uh, might have encountered summaries of these novels made for children. I think I have read *Kipps* in my childhood's abridged, reformed, summarized versions for children, as children's literature used to be very popular. *Tono-Bungay*. They have already asked about this uh book in NETs. *Tono-Bungay*, *The Romance of Commerce*—that is a subtitle. It is about trade and commerce. You know what is happening? The narrator is George Ponderevo, to semi-autobiographical, somewhat based on Wells's own story. George Ponderevo is helping his uncle sell a medicine that he has patented. Tono-Bungay is a medicine here in the novel, and they're selling it. Ultimately, it is leading to their rise as well as fall in life. And then came *Ann Veronica*. I already mentioned it; it is a New Woman novel. What is a New Woman? A New Woman is a masculinist woman who refuses to live under the constraints of Victorian morality and conservatism, and Veronica rebels against her patriarchal father, and this novel has references to the women's suffrage movement. Then came *The New Machiavelli*. I told you that is a novel where we have Beatrice and Sidney Webb controversially portrayed, and the protagonist is a Machiavellian character, Machiavellian-like character. Then we have another novel that I already mentioned, *The History of Mr. Polly*, where the protagonist, Mr. Polly, has a father; the father is modeled on H.G. Wells's father. Here Wells's early experience in the drapery trade is semi-autobiographically presented. Wells used to work in the drapery trade, so his conflict with his father is also an autobiographical element, the conflict with his unsympathetic father who was actually a failure in his own career. So these are the major points regarding H.G. Wells. I hope you enjoyed this video. There are two authors that we talked about here; both of them are very important. Rudyard Kipling is important for the wrong reasons because he's an imperialist, and also he's a wonderful writer. H.G. Wells is also a very popular writer. There are questions that are asked about these writers usually, so it would be good if you do your own research based on them, based on what you got from this video. Read more and make your own notes. I will be back with another video on other Edwardian realists. Do watch all these videos, uh, in a correct order itself, if possible, because you will be getting an amazing overview, uh, of British literature from the entire Edwardian era. At six, VideoPedia. So happy reading, happy research, until the next video. Bye-bye.