Format: Triple
Next to a requited attachment, one of the most convenient things that a young man can carry about with him at the beginning of his career, is an unrequited attachment. It makes him feel important and businesslike, and blasé, and cynical… |
This is from “On the Strength of a Likeness” in Plain Tales from the Hills. It describes a casual flirtation that disconcertingly awakes serious feelings. At this time Kipling was aged twenty-one and – with at least part of his head – thought himself afflicted by unrequited love for Flo Garrat, for whom he had fallen as a teenager. She was the original of Maisie in his later novel, The Light that Failed. |
|
Some people say that there is no romance in India. Those people are wrong. Our lives hold quite as much romance as is good for us. Sometimes more. |
This is from “Miss Youghal’s Sais” in Plain Tales from the Hills. Strickland, a police officer deeply versed in Indian Ways, falls in love with Miss Youghal, but is disapproved of by her parents. He disguises himself as a native servant, and is taken on as her groom. When an elderly general flirts with the girl, Strickland listens for a while, and then jumps out and threatens in fluent English to throw the general over the cliff. The general is amused and impressed, and puts in a good word for Strickland with her parents. He is accepted, and the story ends happily. |
|
After marriage arrives a reaction, sometimes a big, sometimes a little one; but it comes sooner or later, and must be tided over by both parties if they desire the rest of their lives to go with the current. |
This is the opening passage from “Three and an Extra” from Plain Tales from the Hills. Mrs Cusack-Bremmil loses her baby, and her grief estranges her husband’s affections. Mrs Hauksbee sees the situation and flirts outrageously with him. Mrs Cusack-Bremmil deciding that the memory of a dead child is not worth a lost husband, buys a magnificent new gown, and attends a ball at which she is not expected. She makes a superb entrance, and carries her husband off again.
|
|