The Denison review. [volume] (Denison, Iowa) 1867-current, 1899-04-04
ROAR and rattle Of the wheels shivered
the :uiet into little bits"

roar and rattle Of the wheels shivered
: the quiet into little bits"
1t was in this trying environment
that Kipling nevertheless composed
some of his best things. In a couple of
pages on 'sMy First Book" which he
! contributed to McClure's four or five
years ago, he told something about the
way in which his verses were written.
saying:
.'Bad as they were, l burned twice
as many as were published, and of the
survivors at least two-thirds were cut
down at the last moment. Nothing can
! be wholly beautiful that is not useful,
and therefore my verses were made to
ease off the perpetual strife between
the manager extending his advertise
ments and my chief fighting for his
reading matter. They were born to be
sacrificed. Rukn-Din, the foreman OF
our side, approved of them immensely,
for he was a Muslin of culture. He
would say Your poetry very good.
sir. just coming proper length today.
You giving more soon. One-third col
umn just proper. Always can take on
third page.
"Mahmoud, who set them up, had
an unpleasant way Of referring to a
new lyric as Elk aur chiz-one more
thing-which l never liked. The job
side, too, were unsympathetic. because
l used to raid into their type for private
proofs with Old English and Gothic
headlines. Even a Hindoo does not like
to find the serifs of his rs cut away to
make long SIS.
"And in this manner. week by week.
my verses came to be printed in the
paper.
OF course these verses Immediately
attracted the attention of the English
exiles in India, and scores of people
soon began to demand the publication
of the rhymes in book form. This was
a little more than Kipling had bar
gained for when he dashed off his lines
as the exigencies of the paper or the
inspiration of the moment suggested.
Here again we may quote his own
words:
ga real book was out of the ques-
tion, but 1 knew that Rukn-Din and
the office plant were at my disposal at
a price, if / did not use the Office time:
also ! had handled in the previous year
a couple of small books, of which l was
part owner and had lost nothing. So
there was built a sort Of a book, a lean
oblong docket. wire stitched, to initiate
a D. O. government envelope. printed
IN one side only. bound in brown paper
and secured with red tape. 1t was adj
dressed to all heads of departments and
all government officials, and among q
. pile of papers would have deceived a
clerk of 20 years service. OF these
books we made some hundreds. and
as there was no necessity for advertis-
ing, my public being to my hand. l took
reply postcards, printed the news of the
, birth of the book on one side, the blank
order form on the other and posted them
, up and down the empire from Alden to
Singapore and from Quetta to Colombo.
There was no trade discount, NJ reck-j
3 oning twelves as thirteens, no commits
sion and no credit Of any kind what
ever. The money came back in poor but
r honest rupees and was transferred from
the publisher. the left hand pocket, di-
rect to the author, the right hand
pocket. Every copy sold in a few weeks.
4 and the ratio of expenses to profits, as
8 l remember it, has since prevented my
r injuring my health by sympathizing
: with publishers. who talk of their risks
e and advertisements.
The price received by Kipling for his
work he regards as nobody's business
but his own; nevertheless everybody
- \ x-:11 E1,1 a., 1x,o~~ n~o1 ,~- NJ Il,sksclS
i Weekly's paragraph on this subject:
9 .sPerhaps no one receives such large
b prices for his work as MI. Rudyard Kip
o ling. He has contracted to write eight
stories for one of the magazines next
year. for each of which he will receive
e about G240. This i simply for the Eng
lish serial rights of the stories. In adj
n dition Mr.. Kipling receives payment
from America, India and the colonies.
d This will probably bring up the price of
the stories to about $500 each. making
y ga 600 for the year. In addition to this,
It Mr.. Kipling receives the royalties for
book publication in England and Amer
lea. This will not amount to less than
about GA. 600, SO that for each story the
author ultimately receives not less than
n 81, 600. Whether these high prices will
be kept up is very doubtful. If the
cheap magazinism succeeds in injuring
d the older periodicals they cannot be
maintained. 1t remains to be seen
is whether the public cares much for
names, and it must be remembered that
is the papers with the largest circulation
is in this country do not depend upon
names at all. remember some years aga
70 Mr.. Kipling contributed one of his best
n pieces of work, better work by a great
ys deal than he has been doing lately, to a
ID monthly review. The editor informed
t. me that not one extra copy of the pc
riodical was sold.
d Among the first Of the stories of Kip
L. ling to attract attention was 'The Mar
e. Who Would Be King. and later came
d from his prolific and versatile pen such