Culture And Empire: Rudyard Kipling's Indian Fiction

Abstract

A survey of Rudyard Kipling's Indian fiction indicates that his writings reflect a deeply-felt ambivalence toward the imperial projects of his contemporaries. Kipling condemns British characters who denigrate Indians or India, and in doing so, he subverts the Victorian notion of Britain's innate superiority. Kipling's early fiction reveals the author's respect for Eastern culture and religion. His India represents a utopic vision of cultural mixing. An anthropological perspective on these stories shows that the Indian fiction is designed to create cross-cultural communication. Kipling illustrates how failure to understand India ultimately destroys the British, and by attacking many of the injustices of imperialism, he fosters an atmosphere condusive to the synthesis of cultures. Kipling's ultimate enterprise is to promote tolerance of difference through understanding and respect of the other. <p>