The Brattleboro daily reformer. (Brattleboro, Vt.) 1913-1955, 1916-01-01
Write it 1916.
Kipling at Fifty.

(New York Times, Dee 800
Rudyard Kipling celebrates today his
5Oth anniversary. 1t is hardly more
than 25 years since he came, young
and unknown, from India, with vital
and interesting things to say and a
swinging, engaging, masculine way of
saying them. And now the authorized.
collected editions of his work contain
| 70 volumes of prose and poetry, Of
which some have been published in
practically every written language. It
/ IS impossible to estimate how many
million copies of his books have been
sold in all parts of the world where
books are read. In the United States
his army of readers grows with every
year. The enhstments began and
they are always for lfe-when a pa
Iper-covered edition of Plain Tales from
the Hills was put on sale on news
stands quarter century ago, and ey-
cry one who read it made haste
to tell all his friends of this new au-
thor and every one began asking who
this Rudyard Kipling was. Today his
works are far more popular III this
country than they ever were before.
most of them outselling their record
OF ten years ago by ten to one, and
some of them selling 10 times as many
> J
1 If Mr.. Kiphng ever turns his mag
ination to the pleasant task of visual
izing to himself his mighty host OF
eager, delighted, stirred readers he must
e feel their warm response Of heart anC
g find recompense UNNECESSARILY more
! rare and precious than any materi
81 reward of money or Of honcrs tina
O the years have brought He can vel
feel also keen satisfaction in tn,
i important part he has PLAYED in til,
a making of the British Empire into al
= organized, vital whole out of congo
ries Of related parts. His poems, and il
less measure his stories, telling the PEG
L pie of the home isle how little the,
a know of England who only Englan
o. know interpreted the soul of the col
? onies for the motherland as had neve
: been done before and made both o
p them freshly aware of the sentimenta
u ties that bind them together States
=. men decreed the British Empire Blu
!, kiphng was one of the few men VIII
: breathed into it the breath of life An
o of him it is hardly too much to sa
o. that he alone set its heart to beatin
le III conscious unison, because he was til
i only one of its ma kers who appealed t
the hearts and feelings of the men an
u women who made the Empire in a
S'S the Tour quarters or the globe.
. To few authors has it ever bee
given to set in motion in the gres
ocean of English speech wave
!. such solemn significance as did NJ
Kipling with his Lest We Forget H
ne Barraek Room Billiards. and his arm
I'd and Indian tales have been a Wit;
er force making for democracy and fe
bo low-feeling. Children of many gener
tions will hold his name in their hear
en- with love all their lives because
mt the delight his Jungle Tales have give
u, them. Hardly a line of all his poem
81 but strikes a free, vital, inspiring no
q for which the world is the better
Rudyard Kipling's 80 years ha,
as been full to Overlooking with wol
ne that has brought happiness and be
ia eft to his fellowmen. And every OF
of his readers and lovers ought to tai
y. a moment today in which to think he
ad much his life and work have meant f
he them and to be glad and grateful
he his life and his gift.