Over the weekend I read a couple of Kipling's short stories and I've found them quietly haunting me as the week has begun. The stories in question are On the City Wall and 'The City of Dreadful Night' and lie adjacent to each other in Jean Montefiore's excellent selection which has been occupying me of late. I suppose much of their impact might be ascribed to the fact that both are brilliantly written, but all the stories in the volume are, so I think there's something else involved.
I reckon that what hit me about the tales is the acute contrast between the implied harshness of City Wall, a narrative underpinned by an explicit reductive racism, and the deep compassion of Dreadful Night for the same 'natives'. It's obviously the same voice, its rhythms instantly identifiable, yet I've been wondering how the same consciousness could be responsible for both. Such is my puzzlement, I've decided to read the two tales again - and since I'm aware I missed much of the nuance of the complex former story I really owe it to RK to do so.
I doubt that I'm going to find any easy answer to my question, which is ok by me. In fact, I'm rather hoping to puzzle myself even further. I sort of enjoy a good haunting.
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