Kim
Kim is Rudyard Kipling's story of an orphan born in colonial India and torn between love for his native India and the demands of Imperial loyalty to his Irish-English heritage and to the British Secret Service. Long recognized as Kipling's finest work, Kim was a key factor in his winning the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1907.
Stats for nerds
10recommend
22mentions
19people
2008–2025years
45% recommend55% neutral
Mentions per year
What Hacker News says
- I've not read enough Corey to form a judgement, but I don't think Jordan has nearly enough literary "heft" to satisfy close reading. Don't get me wrong: the story is fun - I enjoyed every bit of Wheel of Time - and would recommend it to anyone who likes that sort of thing, but the deeper stuff (characters, prosidy, world-building, thematic "meaning") don't bear much examination.
In fantasy / sci-fi, I'd unreservedly recommend:
- Ursula K LeGuin
- Steven Erickson
- Gene Wolfe
With reservations, I'd recommend:
- Patrick Rothfuss (unfinished)
- George RR Martin (unfinished; sometimes dodgy prose, but occasionally transcendent character and theme)
- Dune (just know it goes downhill fast after the first book)
Elsewhere, but still genre (ie: meant to be entertaining, not uber-serious, self-conscious "literature"):
- Patrick O'Brian
- Arthur Conan Doyle
- Dorothy Dunnet
I'd recommend Rudyard Kipling's short stories, but they're hit and miss, and sometimes out of step with modern mores. Maybe stick with the Jungle Book, and Just So Stories, and if you like those make sure you read Without Benefit of Clergy, They (short stories), and Kim (a masterpiece of a novel).
Once you've got through those, Hemingway is approachable, and the true modernist master. Fiesta / The Sun Also Rises (same book, known by different names in different parts of the world) is ironic and beautiful; A Farewell to Arms is beautiful and almost unbearably sad; his short stories are impeccable.
- A real gem is the Adrian Praetzellis reading of Kim by Rudyard Kipling:
- Not everyone evaluates books from the point of view of politics. Kim was a great novel that basically earned Kipling the Nobel prize at a crazy young age, and it reads like a love letter to India (until the end, when it becomes a dumb spy novel). Was Kipling jingoistic? Sometimes extremely so. That doesn't mean he didn't write anything worth reading.
Life is complicated.
- Spy craft goes way back. You can read about it in Herodotus and the Old Testament.
George Washington was a spy master and much of what we think we know about his operations is dot connecting. This is true of most historical accounts of spying.
A good fictional account of true to life spy craft in the 19th century is Rudyard Kipling's Kim. Some of the characters are based on historical persons in the business.
The OG does well to point out the misconception this is somehow a modern invention. It's interesting to read well-researched accounts of spy craft in different historical eras. Its secrecy at the time makes it hard to find source material. They knew how to keep secrets in olden days and there were not many whistle blowers. A lot of what you come across is just speculation. From the article it appears there is quite a lot of source material for Venice.
- I reread "Kim" by Rudyard Kipling whenever I feel I'm in a rut. It's pleasantly soporific during reading, but kicks me back out of the rut at the end. No idea why.
- I can highly recommend Alexander Burnes' non-fiction Travels into Bokhara and Rudyard Kipling's fictional Kim, which in fact coined the term "The Great Game".
