History YMMV / RudyardKipling

* HarsherInHindsight: The short story "The Cause Of Humanity" is about a gang of schemers with a refrigerated steamer who plan to collect corpses from the Balkan War and sell them to London medical schools. They abandon the plan after coming across a massacre of Jews in a coastal town. “I never knew Jews ’ad so much fight in ’em as we discovered must have been the case.” It went unpublished in 1914 because a story about selling bodies was felt to be in bad taste with the [[UsefulNotes/WorldWarI Great War]] starting, but [[UsefulNotes/{{Holocaust}} later events]] make the specifically Jewish massacre even grimmer.

* HarsherInHindsight: The short story "The Cause Of Humanity" is about a gang of schemers with a refrigerated steamer who plan to collect corpses from the Balkan War and sell them to London medical schools. They abandon the plan after coming across a massacre of Jews in a coastal town. “I never knew Jews ’ad so much fight in ’em as we discovered must have been the case.” It went unpublished in 1914 because a story about selling bodies was felt to be in bad taste with the Great War starting, but later events make the specifically Jewish massacre even grimmer.

--> But there is neither East nor West,\\

** "The White Man's Burden" is understandably read as a racist creed of white supremacy, but to some it's insistence on how there's no reward for it, and how the natives will hate you, can throw them off for its more nuanced take. The point of the poem, and that of Tory imperial propaganda which Kipling typified, is that it does not advocate for the cruel treatment of natives, and it insists that those who are espousing empire should not fool themselves into thinking they are bringing freedom or that the people will greet you as liberators. Rather imperialism should be seen as a quasi-chivalric quasi-monk like vocation (WithGreatPowerComesGreatResponsibility if you will). Fundamentally, Kipling does not believe in the equality of all human beings regardless of race, religion or sex, nor does he disagree with imperialism, but rather he sees it as a job and calling for men, and not boys (as in America, to whom the poem is addressed to), and he sees the fact that the subject peoples will always be UngratefulBastard (because you know they complain about their lack of self-determination) as an inevitability.

--->'''Nilghai''': It’s a chromo,’ said he,--’a chromo-litholeo-margarine fake!

--->'''Dick''': I did him just as well as I knew how, making allowance for the slickness of oils. Then the art-manager of that abandoned paper said that his subscribers wouldn’t like it. It was brutal and coarse and violent,--man being naturally gentle when he’s fighting for his life.They wanted something more restful, with a little more colour. I could have said a good deal, but you might as well talk to a sheep as an art-manager.

** "The White Man's Burden" is understandably read as a racist creed of white supremacy, but to some it's insistence on how there's no reward for it, and how the natives will hate you, can throw them off for its more nuanced take. The point of the poem, and that of Tory imperial propaganda which Kipling typified, is that it does not advocate for the cruel treatment of natives, and it insists that those who are espousing empire should not fool themselves into thinking they are bringing freedom or that the people will greet you as liberators. Rather imperialism should be seen as a quasi-chivalric quasi-monk like vocation (WithGreatPowerComesGreatResponsibility if you will). Fundamentally, Kipling does not believe in the quality of all human beings regardless of race, religion or sex, nor does he disagree with imperialism, but rather he sees it as a job and calling for men, and not boys (as in America, to whom the poem is addressed to), and he sees the fact that the subject peoples will always be UngratefulBastard (because you know they complain about their lack of self-determination) as an inevitability.

* MisaimedFandom: Some people thought that The Ballad of the Clampherdown was intended to be serious. [[FanDumb Most]] people miss the irony of "If--" (namely, that ''if'' you can do all those things, then you are goddamn Superman), the point being the hideous pressure placed on younger generations by their elders.

* FairForItsDay: "The White Man's Burden" was at least this. It may seem shallow and racist today (and it kinda is), but it does not advocate the cruel treatment many of the natives in Africa or Asia received, and urges imperialism to be treated as a humanitarian method of introducing them to English culture. It also treats European supremacy as being a historical accident rather than an inevitable result of intrinsic superiority (a theme running through much of his work), unlike many contemporaries. Also, by Kipling's day UsefulNotes/TheBritishEmpire was already a fact (and had passed its zenith, which he was well aware of). The question was not the right or wrong of establishing it but of what to do with it. While triumphalism was hardly missing, the point of WithGreatPowerComesGreatResponsibility is also often present.

** [[DamnedByFaintPraise If nothing else]], Kipling's ability to write women and non-Western characters in more than one dimension (e.g. "The Ballad of East and West," "Cupid's Arrows," ''In Black and White'', "The Head of the District," basically every story involving [[GoodBadGirl Mrs. Hauksbee]]) put him head and shoulders above some of his contemporaries. "The Enlightenments of Pagett, M.P." is a weaker example, but it still makes the point that the people(s) of India are human beings, rather than pawns on a board.
* MisaimedFandom: Some people thought that The Ballad of the Clampherdown was intended to be serious.
** [[FanDumb Most]] people miss the irony of "If--" (namely, that ''if'' you can do all those things, then you are goddamn Superman), the point being the hideous pressure placed on younger generations by their elders.

* ValuesDissonance: Kipling's frank imperialism may grate on some modern readers.
** Also, "The Female of the Species" praises women in its way, but on a close read stands in opposition to female suffrage and women holding office.

* FairForItsDay: "The White Man's Burden" was at least this. It may seem shallow and racist today (and it kinda is), but it does not advocate the cruel treatment many of the natives in Africa or Asia received, and urges imperialism to be treated as a humanitarian method of introducing them to English culture. It also treats European supremacy as being a historical accident rather than an inevitable result of intrinsic superiority (a theme running through much of his work), unlike many contemporaries. Also, by Kipling's day TheBritishEmpire was already a fact (and had passed its zenith, which he was well aware of). The question was not the right or wrong of establishing it but of what to do with it. While triumphalism was hardly missing, the point of WithGreatPowerComesGreatResponsibility is also often present.

* FairForItsDay: "The White Man's Burden" was at least this. Shallow and racist though it may seem at first, it does not advocate the cruel treatment many of the natives in Africa or Asia received, and urges imperialism to be treated as a humanitarian method of introducing them to English culture.
** It also treats European supremacy as being a historical accident rather than an inevitable result of intrinsic superiority, unlike many contemporaries.
*** A theme running through much of his work.
** Uh, its full title is ''"The White Man's Burden: The United States and the Philippine Islands"''... If you don't know how the news of the Philippine War was received, read MarkTwain's articles on it. This was neither pretty nor boring. And, seriously, asking Americans to become what they were still a bit proud of throwing out? ''Of course'' it stirred everyone and they grandmother, provoking lots of answers immediately. In this context it looks like TrollFic, probably aimed at both sides of the [[FlameWar discussion]]. See also ''The last rhyme of True Thomas'' and ''Jobson's Amen''.

** Also remember that by Kipling's day TheBritishEmpire was already a fact. The question was not the right or wrong of establishing it but of what to do with it. While triumphalism was hardly missing, the point of WithGreatPowerComesGreatResponsibility is also often present.
*** And by the time he wrote "White Man's Burden", it had passed its zenith - and he was well aware of that.

** He may have been the first writer to use the concept of the TractorBeam. In "As Easy as ABC," when a woman tried to commit suicide to make a political point, the "flying loop" yanked the knife out of her hand.

** And that's not even considering the differing interpretations of his famous poem, ''White Man's Burden''.