Rudyard Kipling is one of them writers who’s more famous for his name than for his works. The first thing that comes to mind when I think of Kipling was my Kipling bag when I was a kid with a plushy monkey keyring that comes with it. The second thing I think about is the Jungle Book, which for most people are familiar only through its Disney adaptations and products. Kipling is more of a poet than a novelist; Kim is his only major recognised novel. And in some ways, it is a bit of a shame, because Kim (despite all the criticism on pro-colonialism) is such a unique adventure novel. And Kim can be a confusing novel: a novel about India and the region, written by a white man who was a proponent of English tenancy, a man who was born there and left the country in his mid-twenties and only wrote about it after he left. Kim is Kipling’s nostalgic lovesong to India.
The Kim in the story is Kimball O’Hara, an orphan of a British soldier who found himself surviving on the streets with the ambivalent care of an opium addict. Kim does what he wants, goes where he likes and meets who he wants. That is, until he met a Tibetan lama in search of the river of life. The lama is not like any other holy men who were a penny a dozen in India, and this difference made Kim follow him as his chela, an apprentice. Yet, it was clear to the lama that they both have separate paths.
Kim feels almost a surreal novel at times. The speeches made by the characters sometimes feel unnatural, and whether this is Kipling’s understanding of how the natives talk in the region, I can’t be sure. But the tone of the dialogue can be a bit jarring — unnatural and archaic. But for the purpose of the story, it works. Kim, after all, is a multi-lingual adolescent who was able to navigate his way through Pakistan, Himalayas and India where dialects are different and English was not widely known. When Kim speaks English to other English characters however, we see that his English is flawed, imperfect. Kim in some ways, is more native than English.
But this is not to say that Kim is one or the other, as I think that Kim is a fluid character who was able to slide between his identities as he wishes or as the situation demands it. I do think also, that this is where the book absolutely shines, because Kim represents an unbridled freedom. Broke as fuck, yes, but money was never really an issue for Kim, as he also supports the lama begging when he needs to, and not requiring much to live by. His appearance can also be mistaken as a native due to his poor hygiene (when he’s not busy studying as a boarder). And I can relate to this, as I consider both an Indonesian (by birth) and Australian (by migration). I use my identities interchangeably and while this doesn’t allow me to have roots in a traditional sense, it allows a greater extent of unfettered freedom from any cultural attachments.
There is something enticing about Kim’s fluidity that makes this a classic. Kim leaves the school where he boarded at his own will, not used to being thumbed down to one place while his schoolmates are having adventures of their own in their holidays. Kim’s desire for adventures lead him to the battlegrounds and the proxy wars between Russian powers and the colonial powers. And somehow, he navigates his way through with success and became an asset to the British empire.
And to a stretch, this is where the book becomes controversial because after all, Kim is written by a supporter of British imperialism, and though Kipling shares some background with Kim, as many authors do with their protagonists, Kim as a person is a tool to forward the British colonial agenda. In the end, Kim becomes involved in the Great Game, inescapable and being an orphan, seems to be the natural progression for his career despite his youth. There are also interactions by the minor characters which also support this notion of pro-colonialism, as when the old widow professes her approval of the white officer (“These be the sort to oversee justice”).
In the Penguin Modern Classics edition that I read, I was lucky enough for it to include the introduction by Edward Said. In some ways, it is an important introduction to read because Said provides the historical context of the book which the casual reader may miss, such as the mutiny in 1857 where Indian soldiers revolted against British powers. In the book, the character of the loyalist soldier professed that during the mutiny, his compatriots were taken in by some sort of “disease”, thus supporting the views that the British status quo is the right one.
Said was rather direct on his views of the book, that the natives are portrayed condescendingly. He went as far to say that Kim was a “profoundly embarrassing novel” because of how imperialism is portrayed in such a positive light. But can we really blame Kipling? As we blame other authors for the context of their time? Kipling, though born in India, have always been the product of British education. The benefits of colonialism that he sees for India is a viewpoint that he learned from school, and though he speaks Hindi fluently, this doesn’t equate to knowing and experiencing the culture of his residence. He has no way, therefore, to be familiar with the hardships of Indian families and cholas. He is, like Kim, an outsider himself.
Yes, we should be aware of this viewpoint written by a man who was raised under British rule, but at the same time, we shouldn’t look down on the ability of Kim to uplift our imagination, of an orphaned boy who can adapt to his environment, chameleon-like, and embark in all sorts of adventures that shape entire nations without his being aware. As I mentioned, Kim brings with it the sense of wayward freedom, the best kind of freedom and in some ways, freedom without consequences or at least, the concern for them.
