A tour of Bateman’s
The film shown at the Society’s meeting on 21 September 2022 can now be viewed online….
A Kipling playlist on Spotify
We have put together this Spotify playlist with a selection of Kipling-related music containing both his verses set to music and music inspired by his works. If there is something you know is already…
Verse on our Facebook page
After three years of posts titled ‘Verse of the Week’, we have over six hundred followers, though with sharing this multiplies up. On March 20th for example, we had a ‘reach’ of more than six…
In the Kipling Library, April 13th
April 13th 2022 at 1800 BST on Zoom: members joined Dr Toby Parker, the Society’s Honorary Archivist and John Walker, our Hon. Librarian, in a celebration of rare or unusual books and ephemera to be…
One spot beloved over all
Richard Howell’s talk from February 2022 on how Rudyard and Carrie acquired and developed the Bateman’s estate can now be seen at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VVa60BquwpA&t=694s
Rudyard Kipling, a Secret Life
This remarkable documentary first seen in October 2019 on Sky Arts, is now available on DVD. Its main focus is a fresh and revealing exploration of events from Kipling’s grim childhood legacy of neglect and separation,…
A Diversity of Kipling
On August 12th/13th 2017, for 24 hours, we mounted a 24 hr reading of Kipling’s works, arranged by John Walker, then Chairman of the Society, which was a splendidly successful occasion. A programme of one-hour…
Rudyard Kipling by Andrew Lycett. A paperback edition
Ever since its publication in 1999, Andrew Lycett’s distinguished and deeply researched biography has been a standard work of reference for Kipling scholars and general readers alike. This paperback edition, with a new introduction by…
A battle in Afghanistan
As Charles Carrington recounts (p. 214) in 1894, on holiday in Bermuda, Kipling chanced to meet a sergeant in the Royal Berkshire Regiment who carried him off to the sergeant’s mess. This enabled Kipling…

This week’s quotations
November 5th to 11th
From his three hundred and fifty stories and nine hundred poems Kipling has contributed more familiar quotations to our language than anyone since Shakespeare. Here’s another group of three for you to identify …
‘Be quick,’ said Athira; and Suket Singh was quick; but Athira was quick no longer. Then he lit the pile at the four corners and climbed on to it, re-loading the gunThe little flames began to peer up between the big logs atop of the brushwood.
‘The Government should teach us to pull the triggers with our toes,’ said Suket Singh grimly to the moon.
I slid from the boom into deep water, and behind me came the wave of the wrath of the river. I heard its voice and the scream of the middle part of the bridge as it moved from the piers and sank, and I knew no more till I rose in the middle of the great flood. I put forth my hand to swim, and lo! it fell upon the knotted hair of the head of a man. He was dead, for no one but I, the Strong One of Barhwi, could have lived in that race.
From the black dark Bisesa held out her arms into the moonlight. Both hands had been cut off at the wrists, and the stumps were nearly healed.
Then, as Bisesa bowed her head between her arms and sobbed, some one in the room grunted like a wild beast, and something sharp-knife, sword, or spear, thrust at Trejago in his boorka.
Here are the sources of these extracts
Past Newsletters
Newsletters are sent by e-mail to members four weeks before each Society meeting, with details of that meeting and other events, reports on past events, and articles on subjects large and small. Past newsletters are available below, each with an item of particular interest highlighted.
Any member who is not currently receiving an online copy of the Newsletter and would like their name to be added to the mailing list should email the Membership Secretary, Fiona Renshaw, at ksmemsec@outlook.com
- August 2023 Reminiscences of Bateman’s
- June 2023 A new discovery at Bateman’s
- March 2023 Kim: An introduction to India – part 1
- January 2023 A letter from Lord Roberts
- October 2022 The Dalleys of Goldings HIll Farm – part 2
- August 2022. Why I read Kipling – part 1
- June 2022 Policy on Derogatory Terminology
- March 2022 Kipling’s uncle, Harry Macdonald
- January 2022 Kipling and Bairnsfather – final part
- October 2021 Kipling’s Uncle Joseph
- August 2021 A tribute to Peter Bellamy
- May 2021 ‘Something in Common’ – final part
- March 2021 ‘If’ reimagined – read by Serena Williams
- February 2021 ‘Rudyard Kipling and Bruce Bairnsfather’ part 1
- January 2021 ‘Something in Common’ – Rottingdean and Glendale
- December 2020 Filming with Michael Portillo at Bateman’s
- October 2020 ‘Rudyard Kipling, A Secret Life’
- August 2020 Burwash Forge Part 2
- July 2020 Remembering John McGivering
- June 2020 Burwash Forge Part 1
- April 2020 A Short History of Bateman’s (2)
- March 2020 A Short History of Bateman’s (1)
- January 2020 Kipling and Beerbohm Tree
- October 2019 Kipling in Epping Forest
- August 2019 Kipling and Rider Haggard
- June 2019 Lady Butler, War artist and Traveller
- March 2019 Kipling’s Motoring Diaries
- January 2019 Kipling’s statue in Burwash
- November 2018 The new Mowgli film
- November 2018 “The Cause of Humanity and Other Stories”
- October 2018 “Into the Jungle”
- March 2018 Society business
- July 2017 “A Diversity of Kipling”