Rudyard Kipling (1865-1936)
Eight letters, signed (‘Rudyard Kipling’) to Ronald Barnes, 3rd Baron Gorell, Bateman’s and Jersey, 3 October 1918 - 23 June 1935
11 pages in total, various sizes from 115 x 90mm, typed and handwritten. Provenance: Sotheby's, 17 July 1997, lot 443.

‘This isn’t a world, just now, where there is general recognition of Beauty … (All the same as a man under fire in a tobacco field for hours, watches the wet trickling down the veined leaves till they seem part of his brain). The fellows who hadn’t “been there” imitated – that’s my theory – and emphasized the note and structure of harshness without the authentic experiences to bite it in’. The letters concern the Great War and its effect on Kipling’s poetry, including a reflection on the reception of modern poetry: ‘Moreover, people who are interested in modern poetry are not enamoured of my stuff which, to them, represents – quite naturally – outworn methods, settings and adjectives, plus an objectionable "political outlook and orientation"'. Kipling advises Gorell to avoid Pope’s ‘heroic’ tradition’ within his own poetry. He praises an article by Wylde on modern India and disputes Gorell’s faith in progress: ‘It is not "progress" nor have "brigandage and warfare" ceased within this land. Any one who takes a walk after paying his taxes knows better’. He praises the Cornhill Magazine, discusses the thankless job of running any magazine, and questions the purpose of releasing public statements in praise of Cornhill: ‘I know all this sounds abominably ungracious, but, after all, one has only one life to live’.

Ronald Barnes, 3rd Baron Gorell (1884-1963) was the long-time editor of the Cornhill Magazine.