{"id":748,"date":"2019-10-02T16:31:56","date_gmt":"2019-10-02T15:31:56","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.sussex.ac.uk\/libstaff\/?p=748"},"modified":"2019-10-03T09:12:13","modified_gmt":"2019-10-03T08:12:13","slug":"rudyard-kiplings-sussex","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.sussex.ac.uk\/libstaff\/archives\/748","title":{"rendered":"Rudyard Kipling\u2019s Sussex"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

A Blog by Andrew Lycett, literary\nbiographer and contributor to new TV documentary Rudyard Kipling: A Secret Life\n<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"A<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

As a new documentary\nabout our local writer Kipling airs on Sky Arts this October we thought the\ntime was right to revisit the writer\u2019s claim on our beautiful county: <\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

As far as he related to any English county, Rudyard Kipling was\na Sussex man. It was only after moving to Bateman\u2019s just outside Burwash in\n1902 that, after living primarily in India (where he was born in Bombay in\n1865) and the United States (where he went to live in Vermont, having married\nan American woman Caroline Balestier in 1892), he finally, aged 36, found\nsomewhere he felt he belonged. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"A
16th January 1928: Rudyard Joseph Kipling (1865-1936), English writer and Nobel laureate, who wrote novels, poems, and short stories, mostly set in India and Burma during British rule. (Photo by Evening Standard\/Getty Images)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Cue for a raft of memorable poems about the county that he came\nto love, such as \u2018Sussex\u2019, with its memorable lines:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Each\nto his choice, and I rejoice<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

    The lot has fallen to me<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

In a fair ground \u2013 in a fair ground \u2013<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Yea, Sussex by the sea!<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

He wrote about his beloved Sussex in many stories such as \u2018They\u2019\nand \u2018Below the Mill Dam\u2019.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

At Bateman\u2019s he treasured the history of the fields and hills\naround him where he felt the native spirits of the Iron Age and of Rome, giving\na vivid sense of place and history that he evoked so well in the \u2018Puck of Pook\u2019s\nHill\u2019 tales, published in 1906.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But Kipling\u2019s enthusiasm for Sussex had started much earlier – around 1880 when his uncle, the celebrated Pre-Raphaelite artist Edward Burne-Jones, had bought a house in Rottingdean, five miles down the road from The Keep <\/a>in Falmer. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Burne-Jones\u2019s wife Georgina was one of four formidable Macdonald\nsisters who all married well \u2013 not just her and Kipling\u2019s mother, Alice, but\nalso Louise who became the mother of Stanley Baldwin, later Prime Minister, and\nAgnes, whose artist husband Sir Edward Poynter became President of the Royal\nAcademy. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Kipling used to visit the Burne-Joneses at Prospect House (later\nexpanded to form North End House) on the Green at Rottingdean before departing for\nIndia in 1882. Feeling homesick, he wrote to an Aunt from Lahore in 1883, \u2018There\nare times when I would give all the world to be cavorting over those downs with\nyou again.\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"A
Rudyard Kipling (1865-1936) the English writer born in India, he is best known for Jungle Book, Just So Stories and the poem If, 1927. (Photo by \u00a9 Hulton-Deutsch Collection\/CORBIS\/Corbis via Getty Images)<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

But he really came to love Sussex after finally returning from\nthe United States in 1897. By then Rottingdean was almost a family domain. Not\nonly did the Burne-Joneses live there, with their daughter, Kipling\u2019s favourite\ncousin Margaret, but Kipling\u2019s cousin Stanley Baldwin had married Cissy\nRisdale, from a large family who lived at The Dene across the Green from North\nEnd House.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

After a couple of false starts, it was natural for Kipling to gravitate\nto Rottingdean and live there himself.  This was eventually The Elms on the North Side\nof the Green, where he and his family lived for three years. He was in\nRottingdean to stand vigil when his uncle \u2018Ned\u2019 Burne-Jones died in 1898. There\nhe wrote one of his best known poems \u2018Recessional\u2019, a down-beat celebration of\nQueen Victoria\u2019s diamond jubilee in 1897. Initially he was not happy with his\ncomposition and supposedly threw it in his waste-paper basket from where it was\nretrieved by Sally Norton, an American family friend who was staying, and he\nwas encouraged to send it to The Times for publication. That same year his son\nJohn was born there and later went to school at St Aubyns in the village. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Eventually Kipling tired of tourists peering over the wall of his house at him and his family. So in one of his magnificent cars, he drove around the local area and found Bateman\u2019s, thirty miles away, which was to prove such a joy for him.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Rudyard Kipling: A Secret Life<\/em> made by Odyssey Television airs on Sky Arts, 9th<\/sup> October <\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A Blog by Andrew Lycett, literary biographer and contributor to new TV documentary Rudyard Kipling: A Secret Life As a new documentary about our local writer Kipling airs on Sky Arts this October we thought the time was right to revisit the writer\u2019s claim on our beautiful county:<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":231,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"spay_email":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false},"categories":[150885],"tags":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p9fi5f-c4","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sussex.ac.uk\/libstaff\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/748"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sussex.ac.uk\/libstaff\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sussex.ac.uk\/libstaff\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sussex.ac.uk\/libstaff\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/231"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sussex.ac.uk\/libstaff\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=748"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sussex.ac.uk\/libstaff\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/748\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":761,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sussex.ac.uk\/libstaff\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/748\/revisions\/761"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sussex.ac.uk\/libstaff\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=748"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sussex.ac.uk\/libstaff\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=748"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sussex.ac.uk\/libstaff\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=748"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}