The Two Faces of Kim: An Investigation into Rudyard Kiplings Kim Essay

The Two Faces of Kim An Investigation into Rudyard Kiplings KimI would go without shirts or shoes,Friends, tobacco or breadSo unitaryr than for an instant loseEither side of my head.The isobilateral Man (Kipling 179)To think of the two-sided man is to think of the self-searching protagonist of Rudyard Kiplings Kim. burn black and yet white, Irish and yet Little Friend of All the World, British and yet immanent, ruler and yet servant, Kiplings multi-faceted Kim must find his place in the social order of a society that he resides in exactly is not truly connected to (51). More e actuallywhere, what he must also do is recognize that his two identities do not have to come unitedly to form one it may be more advantageous to concord the two separate from one an separate. Thus, his quest to find the Red tinkers damn on a green field accomplishes two-fold it allows Kim to find his identity and Kipling to consider his feelings on imperialist presence in India (49). It may be argued th at Kipling chooses England over India, elevating the righteousness and appropriateness of British rule over the lowly and poor Indian nation. To say this, however, would be incorrect, for Kim also celebrates the beauty and exoticness of India, its native languages and culture, showing that as much as British customs argon praised so too is the Indian way of life. Thus, the identity that Kim forges for himself does not mensurate British over Indian ideologies or blend the two into one hybrid mixture. What he does do, instead, is hold each as a separate, as important entity. To use the term postcolonial in Kim would therefore suggest the gather up to develop British and Indian identities in a way that the intelligible characteristics of each group are retained and yet equally r... ...oughout the contexts of the play, Kim has certain each persona independently, be it through schooling or his interactions with other characters, and done so successfully. The term postcolonial then is indeed a touch of the need to maintain both identities in the face of a culturally fragmented society, where one identity is no more important than the other. If Kim were to be an actor in a play, he could masterfully take the show of the British gentleman one night, and in the next performance, an Indian untouchable. It is this very ability to become English and then in another significance Indian that makes him such a successful spy. In the end, whatever the disguise, Kims back along the Grand Trunk Road of Life and his chase of the Great Game, as spying is called, does go on. Hopefully by doing so, Kim can one day answer his question - who really is Kim?