Rudyard Kipling: Novelist and Poet of Empire

Kipling has always been a controversial figure. Henry James called him “the most complete man of genius I have ever known”, but George Orwell dubbed him “a jingo-imperialist” and “disgusting”. He has gone in and out of fashion, and yet has never ceased to delight a vast readership with his brilliant verse and prose. His stories for children are some of the finest ever written, while Kim is the best novel about India written by an Englishman.

Susannah Fullerton talks about this enigmatic, complicated man and the variety of his literary works.